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Dublin's Hell Fire Club Traditional Cache

This cache has been archived.

The Bridge Bandits: There will be one final visit to the site to remove any Geo-litter from the area. Thank you to all those Geocachers who visited the Cache and the Area. The BB's

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Hidden : 8/9/2004
Difficulty:
2 out of 5
Terrain:
3 out of 5

Size: Size:   regular (regular)

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Geocache Description:

Dublin's Hell Fire Club -- It's just a stroll in the park!

The Hell Fire Club is undoubtedly this area's most noticeable landmark. It is clearly visible on the skyline of the Dublin Mountains, and overlooks Dublin city from the south west, at an altitude of 383m (1264 ft).

The Hell Fire Club was built as a hunting lodge on Mount Pelier Hill by William 'Speaker' Connolly about 1723. After Connolly's death it was acquired by the 1st Earl of Rosse, Richard Parsons.

The 1st Earl of Rosse, known to be a sorcerer, dabbler in black magic, and a man of "humour & frolic" founded the Irish Hell-Fire Club in 1735. Members of the club reputedly met at the lodge for the purpose of gambling, card playing and drinking. Many stories abound in folklore about the Hell Fire Club's connection with the devil.
In one of these stories a mysterious stranger seeks shelter on a stormy night, the stranger is offered warm food and refreshments, soon after a card game started among the occupants. One card player drops a card from his hand which lands on the floor beneath the table. He calls for one of the maids to retrieve the fallen card from the floor. While picking up the card, the maid sees that below the table, the otherwise affable and charming visitor has cloven hooves. Her loud screams made the Devil aware of her discovery, he disappeared in a fireball leaving a brimstone smell behind him.

The Club was apparently disbanded following the Earl of Rosse's death in 1741.
"Orrr was it?"

The Cache: Head out from Rathfarnham or Tallaght to the Killakee road, on this road you'll see the Hell Fire Forest, located on the right side as you go up the Mountains. There's free car parking on the site, but remember the car park closes at 20:00hrs, and don't leave your valuable stuff on display in the car, it might be an invitation to a thief. There is no supervision in the car park. You should be prepared for a half hour walk to the Hell Fire Club Lodge, you can amble up on the winding pathway at your ease, or go up the lunatic's way which is a bit of a Killer walk (well is was for me!.. really, it was!), we used a bit of both, so I was only half dead when we got to the top instead of totally dead. Thankfully, the walk down is a lot better. There is wheelchair access to this site, but Lord knows who's going to push a chair to the top? and fair play if you do!
The co-ordinates should get you within an asses roar of this cache, we decided to leave it away from the building as there were many Muggles about. This building gets a steady stream of visitors,.... there's access to the building, and you can be seen from the building's windows, so you'll need to be very discreet.

Cache Contents are in a Camouflaged Ammo-Box:

Additional Hints (Decrypt)

Gur Pnpur vf uvqqra orarngu n Ohfu gung vf hayvxr gur gubeal ohfurf fpnggrerq nebhaq gur fvgr. Ybbx ng gur Cubgb?

Decryption Key

A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M
-------------------------
N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z

(letter above equals below, and vice versa)