Slieveanorra

About Slieveanorra

Rising above the vast conifer plantations of north Antrim, this heather-topped Marilyn offers a blend of easy forestry tracks and wilder moorland. From the summit, the vistas across the Glens are impressive, stretching towards Trostan and the North Channel, while the mountain’s dark history adds a somber, reflective character.

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Did You Know?

• •The name derives from the Irish Sliabh an Orra, which is most commonly interpreted as 'mountain of the boundary,' likely marking the historical divide between the territories of the Glens and the Route.
• •The mountain's slopes were the site of the 1583 Battle of Slieve-na-aura, a decisive clash where the MacDonnell clan famously defeated the MacQuillans by luring their heavy cavalry into a lethal area of bog disguised with rushes.
• •A memorial plaque near the summit commemorates the ten American airmen who lost their lives when their B-17 Flying Fortress crashed into the hillside during a heavy storm in October 1942.
• •As a prominent waypoint on the Moyle Way long-distance path, the summit provides an exceptional vantage point for looking south to Trostan—Antrim’s highest peak—and north across the sea to the Paps of Jura in Scotland.
• •The local forestry is so dense and the Antrim weather so fickle that you may spend several hours studying the bark of Sitka spruces only to reach the summit and find the view replaced by a solid wall of Atlantic mist.