HardGully · Reeks
A demanding day through the Hag’s Glen, Cummeenoughter and Brother O’Shea’s Gully in the MacGillycuddy’s Reeks, returning over Leaca Bhán and down through the Heavenly Gates.
Also known as Eisc na bhFiach.
My time 6 hr 46 · steep, loose gully and complex navigation · start and finish at Lisleibane car park GRADE GUIDE ↗
A recorded time is not a planning estimate. Build your own from pace, ascent, ground, weather and daylight.
01 · DECIDE
ELEVATION PROFILE
Every height on this profile was measured on the walk, not estimated between the ends.
Reading the forecast
THE LINE
The climb from the Hag’s Glen passes through a staircase of glacial hollows beneath Carrauntoohil. Their names describe that ascent: Coimín Íochtair is the lower little coum, Coimín Láir the middle one and Coimín Uachtair the upper. The last holds Lough Cummeenoughter, reported as Ireland’s highest lake at 707 m.
The gully is named after Michael Laurence O’Shea, an Irish Christian Brother who died on Carrauntoohil on 24 July 1969, aged sixty-eight. The Coroner for Kerry held the inquest four days later and certified cerebral haemorrhage and fractures from an accidental fall. Kerry Mountain Rescue searched the mountain and brought his body down, and the gully has carried his name since. Before him it was Collins Gully, and before that Eisc na bhFiach, the channel of the raven. It is worth knowing whose name you are using on the way up.
The Faill Dubh, or dark cliff, flanks the gully on the right as you climb from Coimín Uachtair. Its position matters: another similarly named cliff appears towards the Devil’s Ladder, on a different part of the mountain.
The recorded return does not reverse the gully. From the summit the track drops south-east, picks up the long shoulder of Leaca Bhán and follows it north above the Hag’s Glen, then turns down through the notch mapped as the Heavenly Gates. That descent is the steepest sustained ground on the day’s return: about 280 m of height lost in under a kilometre of walking, on broken slope rather than a path. Below it the line passes the Eagles Nest and rejoins the glen for the walk out.
The cairn you top out beside is six metres by five, loose flat slabs gathered off the summit scree and rebuilt at some point into a climbers’ shelter. The Survey calls its antiquity dubious. The iron cross north of it went up in 1950.
O’Shea’s death is registered at Killorglin, Co. Kerry, entry 158 of 1969: died 24 July 1969 on Carrauntoohil Mountain, Irish Christian Brother, aged 68, the cause certified as cerebral haemorrhage and fractures from an accidental fall on information from Dr O’Donovan, Coroner for Kerry, inquest held 28 July 1969. See the register page ↗. Kerry Mountain Rescue’s 1966–1979 callout archive ↗ records the search and recovery, and notes that the area is now known as Brother O’Shea’s Gully. The archive’s dates are month-precise at best, forty of its forty-five dated entries falling on the first. The personal name, Collins Gully, the older Eisc na bhFiach and the coum names follow Barry Dalby’s Coimín Uachtair & Brother O’Shea (4 July 2022) ↗. Dalby’s bhFiach and the archive’s bhfiach are the sources’ own spellings. The summit cairn is Archaeological Survey record KE073-047, described from A. O’Sullivan and J. Sheehan, The Iveragh Peninsula: An Archaeological Survey of South Kerry (Cork University Press, 1996); the recorded line passes within six metres of it. Leaca Bhán, the Heavenly Gates and the Eagles Nest are the names carried by the hill mapping for the return leg; where that name for the notch came from, nothing sourced here can tell you. The lake’s height and description as Ireland’s highest are reported in the Irish Times ↗.
Reading the forecast…
Reading the forecast…
NEXT SIX HOURS · swipe
Reading the forecast
Forecast. This is a modelled estimate for this route’s high ground; conditions can differ sharply across the mountain. Derived from Open-Meteo forecast data ↗.
Steep gully terrain with broken, loose or wet rock; the gully is full of scree and moves underfoot.
Exposed ground continues above the gully; topping out does not mark the end of the difficult terrain.
Complex navigation beneath Carrauntoohil’s north-east face, especially in cloud.
Water, wind, ice or winter conditions can quickly increase the seriousness.
The descent through the Heavenly Gates is steep, loose and unpathed, and the line into it is easy to lose in cloud.
A long descent remains after the high point; protect time and daylight.
Before you enter the gully, the safest option if conditions turn is to go back the way you came. Once you’re on the steep ground there’s no simple way off, so make the decision to turn back early.
FROM THE MOUNTAIN
03 · GO
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The walk starts at Lisleibane car park on the Hag’s Glen approach. Cronin’s Yard, on the other side of the Gaddagh, is the usual alternative start for the same glen, and adds a short walk in before the two approaches converge. Parking at both is a paid, privately run arrangement. Confirm current parking arrangements locally and follow all signs and landowner directions.
ROUTE FILE
The original GPX, exactly as walked. Load it into your watch, phone or offline mapping before you leave signal.
Track geometry and activity time come from the GPX. Elevation, cumulative distance, ascent and descent come from my matching GeoJSON.
Confirm the download when your browser asks, then open the file from your browser’s downloads and your mapping app will offer to take it. HiiKER and Garmin Explore both do; the route loads on HiiKER’s free tier, though its EastWest mapping of the Irish uplands is a paid layer. Onto a watch: import the GPX into Garmin Connect, Komoot or Strava and send it to the device from there.
A proper mountain day needs a proper plan.
Brother O’Shea’s Gully is mountain terrain where navigation, weather and ground conditions matter. Kerry Mountain Rescue describes this route as taking in spectacular but serious scenery beneath Carrauntoohil’s north-east face.
Tell someone your route and return time. For emergencies in Ireland call 112 or 999 and ask for Mountain Rescue.
AFTER THE WALK
A small, personal shortlist around Lisleibane and the Reeks.
The working farmyard trailhead on the far side of the Gaddagh, with parking, toilets and a café at the door of the Hag’s Glen. A good alternative start, and the easiest coffee on the mountain at either end of the day. Check Instagram for current opening times.
Mealis, Beaufort, Killarney, Co. KerryA handy coffee stop by the Lisleibane trailhead after a day in the Reeks. Check Instagram for current opening times.
Lisleibane, MacGillycuddy’s Reeks, Co. Kerry
