A red deer stag standing in oak woodland overlooking a misty lake in Killarney National Park

Regional library

Kerry & Killarney Library

Explore Kerry’s mountain routes, the Skellig Michael film story and the people and hill lists behind Ireland’s highest ground. The published guides below bring together walking and background reading for Kerry and Killarney.

13guides currently selected4library sections

Hiking Route Guides

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3 guides

Route Guide1 GPX download

Purple Mountain via the Gap of Dunloe

The direct out-and-back from the Head of the Gap via Glas Lough to Purple Mountain.

25 Aug 2026Read Guide
Route Guide1 GPX download

Mount Brandon via Baile Breac and the Saints' Route

The classic Saints' Route out-and-back from Baile Breac to Mount Brandon's summit cross and oratory ruins.

19 Aug 2026Read Guide
Route Guide1 GPX download

Carrauntoohil via the Devil’s Ladder

Climb Ireland’s highest mountain from Cronin’s Yard on this 12.1 km out-and-back GPX via Hag’s Glen and the loose, unstable Devil’s Ladder. The route gains 881 m and has a 3h 53m estimate, with detailed rockfall, weather and summit-navigation warnings.

06 Aug 2026Read Guide

Hill Lists and People

Guide

Vandeleur-Lynams and the 15-metre line between an Irish summit and a subsidiary top

The Vandeleur-Lynam list uses a 15-metre prominence threshold, low enough that it includes subsidiary tops alongside independent mountains. As at 31 December 2023 it contained 275 locations above 600 metres: 209 mountain summits, 14 hill summits just short of 2,000 feet, and 52 subsidiary tops with less than 30 metres of prominence.

03 Nov 2026Read
Guide

The Dodds: When Three Regional Lists Became One Metric Classification

Between 500 and 600 metres sits a collection of hills that used to be split across Deweys, Donald Deweys and Highland Fives—until the idea emerged in 2014 to unify them under a single name that works across Britain.

02 Nov 2026Read
Guide

Irvine Butterfield and The High Mountains of Britain and Ireland: When One Guidebook Author Defined 3,000-Foot Walking

Butterfield published route guides to Britain and Ireland's 3,000-foot peaks, popularising the Furth challenge and making Scottish, Welsh, English and Irish mountains accessible in one volume. His guidebook turned a height threshold into a practical walking project.

21 Oct 2026Read
Guide

The Furths: Britain's other 3000-footers

If you've ticked off Scotland's 282 Munros and need something to do with your weekends that doesn't involve developing an entirely new obsession, there are 34 more 3000-foot peaks scattered across Wales, England and Ireland that the Scottish Mountaineering Club has quietly been maintaining in their official tables since 1953.

29 Sept 2026Read
Guide

Simms: the hill category that tidied up the lists

If you've ever wondered why British hill lists seem unnecessarily complicated, Simms offer a rare moment of clarity. Introduced by Alan Dawson in 2010, a Simm is any summit over 600 metres with at least 30 metres of drop all round – a definition that consolidated several older, overlapping lists like Murdos, Corbett Tops, Graham Tops and Hewitts into something more coherent.

28 Sept 2026Read
Guide

Marilyns: Why a 150-Metre Drop is the Real Test of a Hill

Think altitude is everything? See why a 150-metre drop identifies Britain’s 1,550 Marilyns, and how the list changed in 2025.

24 Aug 2026Read
Guide

The Hewitts: A Study in Prominence and Persistence

A classification that ignores the "pretty" peaks to focus on the physical effort and distinct logic of the high ground.

24 Aug 2026Read
Guide

The HuMPs: The Geography of Independence

Forget the highest peaks and look at the hills that stand on their own—this is the fascinating, mathematical world of the HuMPs.

24 Aug 2026Read

Film Locations

1 guide

Guide

The Island at the End of the Galaxy

Remote, steep and surrounded by Atlantic water, Skellig Michael was a ready-made hiding place for Luke Skywalker. Discover how an ancient Irish monastic island became one of the most unforgettable locations in the modern *Star Wars* films.

29 Oct 2026Read

Landscape and Place Names

1 guide

Guide

Slieve, Sliabh, and Sleeve: When One Mountain Word Has Three Spellings

Slieve means 'mountain' in Irish, but centuries of Anglicisation turned sliabh into slieve, sleeve, and occasionally slee, depending on which mapmaker showed up first. The pronunciation stayed the same—the spelling just gave up.

10 Oct 2026Read

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