Silent Valley Mourne Mountains
The Silent Valley in the Mourne Mountains of County Down is a large reservoir complex in the heart of the granite mountain range, a landscape of considerable drama and beauty managed by Northern Ireland Water as both an operational water catchment and a recreational facility open to the public. The combination of the mountain landscape, the great dam at the head of the valley, the Mourne Wall encircling the catchment watershed and the walking available in the surrounding mountains makes Silent Valley one of the principal visitor attractions of the Mournes and one of the most scenically rewarding water authority landscapes in Ireland. The reservoir was constructed between 1923 and 1933 to supply water to Belfast and surrounding areas, a major engineering project in the difficult terrain of the granite mountains that required the construction of a dam across the head of the valley and the management of the entire catchment enclosed by the Mourne Wall. The Wall itself, built between 1904 and 1922 in dry stone technique to enclose the water catchment, traverses fifteen Mourne summits in a continuous circuit of approximately thirty-five kilometres and is one of the most remarkable dry-stone engineering projects of the twentieth century. The views from the dam and the valley above it encompass the highest peaks of the Mournes, including Slieve Donard and Slieve Binnian immediately above the reservoir, and the character of the mountain granite landscape is experienced here in an unusually accessible context. The shuttle bus service operating from the visitor car park to the dam allows visitors without sufficient fitness for the full walk to reach the most dramatic viewpoints.