This beautiful viaduct provides fantastic views of the surrounding areas and the garden at the end of the viaduct is the perfect place for a picnic or a quick walk to break up a journey. Its a bit of a scrable up the grassy hill which is not wheelchair assessable. But there is a wheelchair possible entry to the cache from N52 35 48.6 W6 54 56.7 down an unpaved pathway.
Thanks to local voluntary effort the overgrown embankment to the south of the viaduct, ending with a beautiful stone-arch bridge over a local farm road, has been cleaned up, planted with flowers, and furnished with tables and chairs, creating an outdoor haven for both locals and visitors. Much ivy has been removed, allowing the viaduct’s well-cut granite blocks to be visible again, and the grass on the old trackbed is now kept neat and well-trimmed by regular volunteer work. Theres a small path where the cache is that leads down under the viaduct and back to the picnic area again.
Borris viaduct, co Carlow (c. 1860)
One of the best things about county Carlow is its local building material: a beautiful, tough and sparkling granite from the quarries of Crane, Kildrana and Ballawilliamrow. The stone has distinctly affected the fabric of the small Carlow town of Borris, and can be seen in all its glory in gate lodges, houses, churches, and this large railway viaduct to the south, over the relatively flat valley of the Mountain River, rising in the Mount Leinster range and draining into the Barrow a little beyond the town. Built c. 1860-66 as the Palace East Branch to link Bagenalstown on the main Dublin-Kilkenny railway with Palace on the Waterford, New Ross and Wexford line, in effect allowing for a second Dublin-Wexford line. Never particularly successful, it lost passenger services soon after the Second World War, and closed completed in the early 1960s. The viaduct is very accessible and well-maintained
Congratulations to Buachaill for FTF