My Boy Blue
A Dingle café serving coffee, cakes, savoury snacks and toasties after returning from the Conor Pass. Check Instagram for the latest menu and opening times.
Holyground, Dingle, Co. Kerry, V92 WY44ModerateHigh ridge · Dingle
Cruach
Scéirde.
A high-level circuit from Conor Pass across the Cruach Scéirde mountain ground, with sharp ridges, corrie loughs and wide Dingle views.
Also known as Croaghskearda, or Strikeen.
DISTANCE
9.33km
ASCENT
413m
HIGH POINT
667m
My time 3 hr 14 · high ridges and rough mountain ground GRADE GUIDE ↗
Reading the map…
INTERACTIVE TERRAIN · ACTUAL GPX TRACKACTUAL GPX TRACK
A recorded time is not a planning estimate. Build your own from pace, ascent, ground, weather and daylight.
01 · DECIDE
Is this your day?
ELEVATION PROFILE
407 m to 667 m.
Every height on this profile was measured on the walk, not estimated between the ends.
Reading the forecast
413 m ascent · 422 m descent
THE LINE
The saddle nobody has explained.
The route crosses rocky crests above corrie loughs, with the Dingle Peninsula opening out whenever the cloud lifts.
The ground gives the view up cheaply. The walk starts at 418 m because Conor Pass has already done the climbing, and a moderate day on rolling green ground buys you the peninsula laid out below.
Croaghskearda, or Strikeen
The summit that names the walk is Cruach Scéirde, anglicised Croaghskearda and known locally as Strikeen. It stands at 608 m. The circuit continues over higher ground, reaching approximately 667 m, so the route’s high point and its named summit are different places.
The Coumanare arrows
The circuit also goes through something nobody has explained. On the saddle between Slievanea and Croaghskearda the peat is eroding back to bare stone, and out of it come short worked sticks, 150 to 170 mm long and up to 20 mm thick, sharpened at one end or at both. They are the Coumanare arrows. Several hundred have been carried off, and the Archaeological Survey calls their purpose a mystery. Locally they are the arrows from a battle between the champions of Ulster and Munster, which is where Com an Áir, the hollow of the slaughter, is said to get its name. The Survey thinks that unlikely and a deer trap likelier.
This is not a site you pass. It runs to several acres and the recorded line goes over it, closing to about fifty metres of the published coordinate. The peat is up to two metres deep, so most of what is there is still in it, and what is not is embedded in the peat faces or lying loose on the ground where the peat has gone. Look, photograph, leave everything where it is.
Deer Trap Site, 566 m
The Survey's suggestion has since become the name. On the walking mapping this route shows up on, the saddle is labelled Deer Trap Site, 566 m, and the recording crosses that ground at 567. A reading offered as the more plausible of two explanations has quietly turned into what the place is called, which is worth knowing before you repeat it as a fact.
- 01Conor Pass startThe walk begins on high ground at about 418 m.
- 02Rocky ridgeThe route follows a sharp crest above green fields and mountain loughs.
- 03Cruach Scéirde high groundThe route reaches about 667 m on exposed terrain.
- 04The Coumanare arrowsThe line runs over the eroding saddle the finds come from. Take nothing off it.
- 05Corrie outlookSteep ground falls towards loughs beneath the ridge.
- 06Return to the passThe circuit closes near the Conor Pass start.
Croaghskearda is the anglicised form and Strikeen is what people locally call it. It is not the Strikeen in Killarney, which is a different mountain entirely and the reason the two get confused in route listings. The arrows are Archaeological Survey site KE044-128, Com an Áir, classed by the Survey as a peatland structure and described from J. Cuppage, Corca Dhuibhne: Dingle Peninsula Archaeological Survey (Ballyferriter, 1986), no. 1560, with the dating from Mitchell (1951). The distance is measured from the recorded GPX to the published coordinate, which is a point rather than a boundary: the Historic Environment Viewer plots the record as a single marker and the Survey gives no extent beyond “several acres”. On any reading of that above two acres the track runs inside it. The label on the walking mapping sits about 210 m from the Survey’s coordinate, and the recorded line comes within 54 m of the one and 48 m of the other, so it threads between the two positions the site is given. Saying the walk goes over it is that inference, not something the record states. Deer Trap Site is not in OpenStreetMap, so that label belongs to the mapping carrying it rather than the open dataset. The Com an Áir Lakes route does not, passing no closer than 1.6 km. The fuller account of the finds is on that page. Nothing should be lifted from the ground here.
Forecast for around 650 m
Reading the forecast…
NOW
WIND
TODAY’S PEAK RAIN CHANCE
Reading the forecast…
–cloud
–humidity
–km/h peak gust
Strongest wind today–
Peak gust–
RECENT RAINFALL · LIKELY GROUND
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 ↗.
HAZARDS & OPTIONSKnow the commitment.
Narrow and broken ridge sections require confident movement.
Steep corrie edges may be difficult to judge in cloud.
Wind can be much stronger on the exposed high ground than at the pass.
Wet rock and grass can make the return line slippery, and sections of the ground stay wet in any weather: waterproof boots rather than trail shoes.
The route is not well signposted. Carry the GPX offline and do not rely on finding markers on the ground.
If cloud or wind makes the ridge unsuitable, return along the known line towards Conor Pass. Avoid improvised descents into the steep corries.
FROM THE MOUNTAIN
My photographs.
03 · GO
Getting there.
Start well.
STARTConor Pass
Select coordinates to copy
The walk starts near Conor Pass. Parking is limited and the road can be busy, so confirm a safe, legal space and current access conditions before leaving. The route crosses the Coumanare arrows site on the saddle, where finds lie loose on eroded peat: view and photograph them without lifting, moving or collecting anything.
ROUTE FILE
Take the route with you.
The original GPX, exactly as walked. Load it into your watch, phone or offline mapping before you leave signal.
Track, time and heights come from my GPX and GeoJSON.
Download original GPXcruach-sceirde.gpx · as recorded
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.
Read the ground. Keep your margin.
Conditions can change the seriousness of any route.
Before you leave
- Check the forecast and warnings
- Plan your daylight
- Save the GPX or an offline map
- Pack footwear and layers
- Share your route and return time
Leave a plan.
Tell someone your route and return time. For emergencies in Ireland call 112 or 999 and ask for Mountain Rescue.
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A central Dingle coffee stop on Green Street after the Cruach Scéirde circuit. Check Instagram for current opening times.
Green Street, Dingle, Co. Kerry