We headed up from the road at the south-eastern end of Brusselstown. 100 metres into the field are the remains of the outer ramparts of the huge Spinnan's Hill/Brusselstown complex. The Arch. Inventory of Co. Wicklow shows a line about 5 kilometres in circumference surrounding the two peaks and their respective hillforts. This line of rubble, at this point, is very low, less than a metre in height but with some larger stones standing proud of the remains. It's hard to make out from here how much of the rest of the outer ramparts remain, and even from above it remains difficult to do so.
We headed up and entered the fort. What looks like chevaux de frise is in fact the old fortification of the hillfort. The landowners have built their field boundaries from this, and at this section in the south-east the wall is inside the ramparts. At the western end the field boundaries twist snakelike over the ramparts and are both inside and outside the old fortifications.
The interior of the fort has 3 large natural outcrop pinnacles. All 3 of these look to have been quarried and all 3 also seem to have been superb lookout points. There are many places showing the remains of structures, but none that we could find make any sort of layout sense.
It was very windy here today and we arrived about 2 hours before the expected rain. We could make out Lugnaquilla and had a commanding view of the whole of the Glen of Imaal. Keadeen to the east looks worshipful, towering above the hillfort and dominating the atmosphere. Spinnan's Hill, Brusselstown's twin hillfort, is now covered by forestry, but may be worth a look sometime soon.
Brusselstown is a pretty easy climb up, I climbed from the east side of the hill. I parked up at a point approx half ways along the hill where i spotted a bit of a track. There was a lot of tracks all over the hill so i suspect a group may have climbed it over the weekend.
The views from the hill are truely amazing and this site would have been brillant for defence. There is no way anyone could sneak up on you. The central rock outcrop that sticks up in the centre of the hillfort is quite interesting. The boleycarrigeen stone circle is intervisable with the site.
Reading the Arch Inventory of Wicklow this is meant to be the biggest hillfort complex in Europe if you include Spinans Hill as part of it, I was over at Maiden Castle a few months ago so im sure they would argue with that.
The Keadeen Mountain looms large and broodingly on the northern horizon of the ring.
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