Spences River, Rocky Mnt, Annalong Valley

Ray and Diane led our little walking group round this track in an area of the Mournes that I'm not overly familiar with. It was so enjoyable I decided to write it up a little. The first stretch going up close to Spences River has beautiful views over the coast, and later on you have spectacular views over the Annalong River to Slieve Binnian and Lamagan. Even though a lot of the walking is off-piste, the going is generally good. There's the odd slightly boggy patch, but I had no trouble in my soft walking boots, and didn't feel I needed my leather ones.

To reach the start you head up Quarter Road from Annalong, and the track begins at the top of the road, just at the right-angle bend left. You can park just before the bend at the side of the road, or continue past the bend and park near the big red gates on the right (leaving access clear, of course) where the trail ends.

The track initially leads along the edge of some trees. Just before 900m keep
an eye out for the sharp bend to the left. When we did this walk at the start of October the path was quite hard to discern because of the bracken.

Futher up head cross country towards an idyllic cottage, where you turn left and head up to cross Spences River. Just afterwards an optional diversion to a ruined cottage offers a little shelter for a snack, and a view of the lazy beds (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_bed) in the adjoining field.

Continue to follow the Spences River upstream, cross the main Mourne Wall at a style, and head up to the peak of Rocky Mountain, enjoying great views of the higher Mournes around.

From the peak head roughly northwards down to a track, then turn leftwards and head across to the high ground overlooking the Annalong River Valley. Soon afterwards you arrive at the outcrop of Hares Castle, and you can either bypass this on the path to the left, or for those who like a bit of scrambling the way up is just at the right hand side, and the way down, further along the top on the left.

From here you can see the construction on the Annalong River which is your next port of call. Here you can see the beginning of the 2.5 mile tunnel under Slieve Binnian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binnian_Tunnel) which was built to carry water from the Annalong River to the reservoir in the Silent Valley.

Leaving the weir, it's an easy walk along the road through the trees to the gates at the main road. Through the gate, head left along the main road 300m to the start point.

(I've changed the grading of this walk from Easy to Moderate based on a comment below, and when a few of us did the walk yesterday in driving rain the consensus was that it's Moderate rather than Easy).