About Astelleen Burn Waterfall
Astelleen Burn Waterfall is a remote waterfall situated in the Upper Glenveagh Valley beyond the popular Glenveagh Castle.
It’s a big sloping waterfall with volume (according to my GPS logs, it has a 180m cumulative height) as it fed the Owenacoo River just upstream of the Lough Veagh.
Although most visitors to the Glenveagh National Park only bother to visit the Glenveagh Castle, that presents a delightfully tranquil and naturesque experience to be had hiking beyond that castle to get to this waterfall.
That said, just even earning a sighting of the Astelleen Burn Waterfall involves a good deal of hiking because it’s roughly 4km to get from the car park (see directions below) to the castle.
Then, it’s another 3.5km (in each direction) to get from the castle to a rest bench with a nice view of the Astelleen Burn Waterfall.
Nevertheless, the waterfall sits across an open valley so it’s possible to get different views from various vantage points depending on where you’re standing on the trail (it’s really up to you).
Although it’s possible to continue hiking (or biking) even further on the trail, I used the Astelleen Burn Waterfall viewing experience as my turnaround point.
In any case, there’s quite a few options in terms of how short or how long you want an excursion that includes both the Astelleen Burn Waterfall and the Glenveagh Castle to be.
I’ll go through that decision process in the trail description below, which primarily focuses on how I managed to do it, but I’ll bring up the options as they come up.
Hiking from the Glenveagh Car Park to the Glenveagh Castle
From the car park area at the Glenveagh National Park Visitor Centre, I had the option of walking or taking the shuttle bus to traverse the 4km distance to get to Glenveagh Castle.
The shuttle bus costed 1.5 euro for each direction or 3 euro round-trip, but it didn’t start running until some time after 9:30am (timed to show up right when the castle opens for the day).
I opted to walk this distance while my wife and daughter waited to take the shuttle bus (we had shown up around 8am).
So in doing the hike, it pretty much followed along the road to the Glenveagh Castle, but it was on a well-developed narrower path that wasn’t on the road itself.
That way, I was never in the way of traffic except for a couple of road crossings and until I was near the castle grounds.
I also got to enjoy the views of the Vale of Glenveagh fronted by the Lough Veagh while checking out some interpretive signs talking about aspects of the valley’s climate, fauna, flora, and some history.
By about 3.3km from the car park, I did encounter a part of the lake that appeared to be conducive to swimming, which I’m sure would be inviting on a warmer day.
Anyways, when I got to the castle grounds at around 9:15am, the castle still wasn’t open, but the gardens and the grounds were.
So I used this time to explore a steep ascent up the hillside backing the Glenveagh Castle, which led up to a viewing point looking down at the context of the castle fronting the Lough Veagh lake.
This extra 1.2km detour (600m in each direction) took me around 15-20 minutes or so.
By the time I had my fill of this viewpoint, I then rejoined my wife and daughter within the Glenveagh Castle to do some touring of its interior (costing us about 7 euro per adult, though we paid 15 euro for the family).
After having our fill of the castle’s interior, Julie and Tahia then chilled out at the tea room there while I solo’d my hike to pursue the Astelleen Burn Waterfall.
Hiking from the Glenveagh Castle to the Astelleen Burn Waterfall
From the Glenveagh Castle, I continued along the local road further up the Glenveagh Valley past some picnic tables and some historical artifacts.
There was a sign here saying that it was still another 3.5km to get to the Astelleen Burn Waterfall, which meant that I had to go another 7km round-trip.
This hike was mostly flat (or at least the elevation gain/loss was not that noticeable).
Throughout the hike, I was pretty much skirting the southeastern shores of Lough Veagh before things started to get more interesting towards the head of the lake.
At that point (roughly 2.5km from the Glenveagh Castle), I started to hear (and slightly see) some side cascade tumbling towards the head of the lake.
Shortly after getting past the head of the lake, I started to see the Astelleen Burn Waterfall in the distance.
There was also a spur trail descending towards some kind of shelter, which I’d imagine would serve as a refuge if the weather would turn foul.
Roughly about 400m beyond the spur trail leading down to the shelter, I eventually got to an opening with a rest bench peering right at the Astelleen Burn Waterfall.
From what I could tell, there was not a sanctioned way to cross the Owenacoo River and get right up to the waterfall’s base, and so I had to appreciate the cross-valley views of the falls.
Although the rest bench and opening in the valley made for a logical spot to check out the falls before turning back to the castle, it wasn’t the only place to get views of the waterfall.
Indeed, I actually kept going for another 200m before I started to notice that the views of the Astelleen Burn Waterfall became more suboptimal.
That said, I did see some mountain bikers keep going along the trail (probably getting all the way to the R254 Road before heading back.
So when all was said and done, I wound up spending 2 hours away from Glenveagh Castle to go this 7km distance.
However, overall, I wound up hiking 12.2km including all my detours while taking the shuttle back to the car park from the castle (but not including the walking within the castle itself).
I guess had I taken the shuttle in both directions, then the hiking could be reduced down to 7km round-trip for just the waterfall.
That said, if I opted to just hike the entire way without involving the shuttle bus, then the total hiking could be as much as 16.2km round-trip (including the detour to the overlook of Glenveagh Castle).
Overall, we all wound up spending about 5 hours away from the car.
One thing about this excursion in Glenveagh National Park was that there were lots of biting midges swarming around the car park during our mid-July 2024 visit.
They didn’t seem to be too bad around the Astelleen Burn Waterfall nor around the Glenveagh Castle (maybe it was because I was moving more?), but I’d imagine it really depends on the conditions and circumstances.
And unlike how we do with mosquitoes, I applied Jungle Juice 100% DEET, and it did seem to have some effect against the midges in terms of reducing the incidents of biting, but they still swarmed around my head in the early part of the excursion.
Authorities
The Astelleen Burn Waterfall resides in the Glenveagh National Park near the city of Letterkenny, County Donegal, Ireland. It is administered by the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS). For information or inquiries about the area as well as current conditions, you can try visiting the National Parks website.
The Astelleen Burn Waterfall resides in Glenveagh National Park roughly a little over a half-hour drive from Letterkenny.
However, since we approached this waterfall from Donegal as well as Londonderry (Northern Ireland), I’ll also describe the driving directions from these places.
From Donegal, the most straightforward route would be to drive the N13 for about 27km towards its junction with the N13 in Stranorlar.
Then we drove the N13 north for a little over 13km to its junction with the N56 in Letterkenny (heading towards Dunfanaghy).
The N56 then went around the city centre of Letterkenny as it ultimately took us a little over 16km to a well-signed turnoff for the R255 and the Glenveagh National Park.
Once on the R255, we then drove this road for about 6km to its junction with the R251 Road.
Finally, we followed the R251 Road towards Glenveagh National Park, where the turnoff for the visitor centre and car park was on the left after a little over 4km.
Overall, this drive took us a little over an hour (though it could be longer due to traffic in Letterkenny).
From Londonderry (or Derry) in Northern Ireland, we’d drive the A2 towards the A40, which we’d then head west on as the road becomes R237 after crossing the border back into Ireland.
Then, we’d continue on the R237 for about 4km or so before turning left onto the N13 Road.
Once on the N13 Road we’d then follow this road for a little over 10km before joining up with the N56 in Letterkenny.
From there, we’d follow the directions as above towards Glenveagh National Park as described above.
Overall, this drive would also take a little over an hour.
For context, Letterkenny is about 35km (over 30 minutes drive) southeast of Dunfanaghy, about 22 miles (over 30 minutes drive) west of Londonderry (Northern Ireland), about 51km (about an hour drive) northeast of Donegal, 91 miles (over 2 hours drive) northwest of Belfast (Northern Ireland), and 236km (over 3.5 hours drive) northwest of Dublin.
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First look at the Astelleen Burn and a smaller cascade from near the head of the Lough Veagh lake
Nearly 720 degree sweep showing the context of my turnaround spot while also checking out the falls from this angle
360 degree sweep from the viewing bench before focusing on the falls towards the end
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