Take the ferry from Rossaveal to Inis Meáin

Visit Teach Synge in Carrowntemple, the cottage restored as a museum where Synge stayed and wrote

Find Cathaoir Synge, the stone seat on the island's western cliffs, looking across to Inis Mór

Walk to Dún Chonchúir, the great oval stone fort on the island's high ground, and look down at the limestone terracing Synge described

J.M. Synge spent his summers between 1898 and 1902 on Inis Meáin, the middle and least-visited of the three Aran Islands, staying in a cottage in Carrowntemple now preserved as Teach Synge. The island's Irish speech, currach fishermen and bare limestone landscape fed straight into The Playboy of the Western World and Riders to the Sea. Of the hours he spent lying on the cliffs he wrote that he seemed "to enter into the wild pastimes of the cliff, and to become a companion of the cormorants and crows".

Inis Meáin: Synge's Chair and Teach Synge

An Spidéal

Six nights of living traditional music up the west coast, from Willie Clancy's Miltown Malbay and the session pubs of Doolin to Yeats's tower at Gort and the Irish-speaking Aran Islands off An Spidéal.

Trad Music and the Atlantic: Clare to Connemara

Photograph the Plassy on the north shore — wrecked in 1960 and thrown up onto bare rock by later storms

Climb to O'Brien's Castle, a 14th-century tower house built inside a prehistoric stone fort

Walk the single road to the lighthouse at the south point and watch the Atlantic from the end of the road

Cycle the full island loop — it takes less than an hour and feels like cycling through another century

Inis Oírr is the smallest of the three Aran Islands and the one most people skip. The Plassy was wrecked on the shore here on 8 March 1960, every one of her crew taken off alive by breeches buoy, and Atlantic storms have since thrown the hull up above the high tide mark, which is why she sits on bare rock. O'Brien's Castle is a 14th-century tower house built inside a prehistoric stone fort, using the older wall as its outer defence. A single road runs south to the lighthouse and stops at the Atlantic. The whole island loop takes under an hour on a bike, and Irish is still the working language on it.

Inis Oírr: The Forgotten Island

Take the ferry from Rossaveal, which runs all year, or from Doolin between late February and the start of November

Cycle to Gort na gCapall and walk the last stretch out over the limestone pavement to Poll na bPéist, the Wormhole

Walk the limestone pavement around the pool, connected to the sea by underwater channels that fill it with each tide

Cycle the island's back roads between the dry-stone walls that criss-cross Inis Mór's fields

Poll na bPéist is a rectangular pool cut into the limestone shelf on the Atlantic side of Inis Mór, near Gort na gCapall — a deep rectangular pool with corners so square that people assume it was quarried. It was not. The sea made it by working along the joints in the rock, and underwater channels refill it with every tide. Getting there means the ferry from Rossaveal, which sails all year, or from Doolin between late February and the start of November and then a bike along the back roads between the dry-stone walls, which is half the point.

Inis Mór: The Wormhole

Take the ferry from Rossaveal, about 18 km across, or from Doolin between April and October — then cycle or take the minibus the 8 km west to the path up to the fort

Walk through the chevaux-de-frise outside the walls — a band of jagged stones set upright from cliff to cliff, each one placed by hand

Go to the cliff edge with great care: there is no fence or barrier of any kind, and the wall simply stops at the 87-metre drop

Look back at the three walls behind you — the fort was probably oval or D-shaped when it was built, and the open side is what the sea has taken since

Dún Aonghasa on Inis Mór sits on the edge of an 87-metre cliff above the Atlantic and is one of the most dramatic prehistoric monuments in Europe. The first enclosure here goes back to about 1100 BC, and the triple walls you see were probably built around 500 BC; the whole complex was refortified in AD 700–800, and the walls were rebuilt again in the 19th century, which is why the mortared sections are easy to pick out. Outside all three walls runs a chevaux-de-frise — a dense band of jagged limestone stones set upright in the ground, thousands of them, running from cliff to cliff.

Dún Aonghasa: The Fort at the Edge of the World

Attend a trad session at Gus O'Connor's, Doolin's oldest pub, trading since 1832 and a music session fixture since Gus O'Connor's own tenure from 1956

Attend a session at McDermott's, in the same family since 1867, or McGann's, bought by the McGann brothers in 1975

During a session, identify by ear the fiddle, bodhrán, tin whistle, and uilleann pipes as musicians take turns leading a tune

Follow session etiquette for a full night — applaud between tunes rather than during them, and stay quiet through a slow air or solo song

Listen from just outside the circle at a third venue — the seats inside it belong to the players

Doolin's three pubs — Gus O'Connor's (trading since 1832), McGann's (bought from the Laffertys in 1975 by the brothers Tony and Tommy McGann), and McDermott's (in the same family since 1867) — host live trad sessions most nights of the year. Doolin has been a magnet for traditional musicians since long before it became a tourist destination.

Doolin's Three Pubs: O'Connor's, McGann's and McDermott's

Walk the fenced cliff-top path north from the visitor centre to O'Brien's Tower

Climb O'Brien's Tower, built in 1835 as a viewing point for visitors

Look for the Aran Islands out in Galway Bay on a clear day

Read the geology and seabird displays in the visitor centre, built into the hillside

Take a boat out from Doolin and see the cliffs from the water instead

The Cliffs of Moher run about 14 kilometres down the Clare coast, 120 metres high at Hag's Head in the south and reaching 214 metres just north of O'Brien's Tower, the round stone tower Sir Cornelius O'Brien put up in 1835 so that visitors would have somewhere to look from. Over a million people a year come, nearly all of them to the visitor centre — built into the hillside so as not to break the cliff-top line — and the fenced paths either side of it. The long coastal trail that used to run the whole way from Hag's Head to Doolin is not an option at present: the six kilometres from Liscannor up to Hag's Head are closed altogether on safety grounds, and from the Doolin end you can walk only as far as Surfers Path and turn back. On a clear day the Aran Islands sit out in Galway Bay in front of you.

The Cliffs of Moher: The Cliff Top and O'Brien's Tower

Descend into Doolin Cave to see the Great Stalactite, reported at 7.3 metres and the longest known free-hanging stalactite in Europe

Find out how two English cavers from the Craven Pothole Club found the cave in 1952

Walk the cave's above-ground eco-trail through Burren farmland

Walk the full eco-trail loop before or after the cave tour, included with your ticket

English cavers from the Craven Pothole Club dropped into a hole in the Burren in 1952 and found something nobody expected: a single stalactite hanging free from the roof, reported at 7.3 metres and the longest known free-hanging stalactite in Europe. It is still there, still growing, and the cave was opened so you can stand under it. Above ground the same ticket gets you an eco-trail through Burren farmland, which is worth doing before or after to see what kind of rock makes a thing like that possible.

Doolin Cave: The Great Stalactite

Tour Thoor Ballylee, the 15th-century Anglo-Norman tower house Yeats restored in 1919 and lived in until 1929

Find where Yeats wrote The Tower, and read his inscription cut into the stone outside

Drive the three miles to Coole Park, Lady Gregory's estate — see the Autograph Tree where Yeats, Shaw and Synge cut their initials

Compare Thoor Ballylee's fortified tower with Coole Park's now-vanished house — only the tree and the walled garden remain of Lady Gregory's home

Yeats bought a derelict 15th-century Anglo-Norman tower house in Galway for £35, restored it in 1919, called it Thoor Ballylee and lived in it until 1929. He then wrote his way out of it: The Tower came out of these walls, and the tower and its winding stair run through the poems that followed, including The Winding Stair of 1933, by which time the family had left. He set his own inscription into the stone outside. Three miles away is Coole Park, Lady Gregory's estate and the seedbed of the Irish Literary Revival, where the house is gone but the Autograph Tree still carries the initials Yeats, Shaw and Synge cut into it.

Thoor Ballylee: Yeats' Tower

Take a boat out onto Lough Gill and find Innisfree, the tiny uninhabited island that gave Yeats' 1888 poem its title

Note the local claim that Church Island, not Innisfree itself, better matches the poem's description — Innisfree is really too small to live on

Explore the Yeats exhibition at Sligo County Museum

Walk Sligo town's streets that Yeats knew as a boy, now home to the Yeats Building and Society

Yeats wrote The Lake Isle of Innisfree in 1888 while homesick in London, and the island is really out there on Lough Gill — though locals will tell you Church Island fits the poem better, because Innisfree itself is far too small to build a cabin on. That argument is part of the pleasure of taking a boat out. Sligo town, where he spent his boyhood summers, now holds the Yeats Building and the Yeats Society, and the county museum keeps the exhibition devoted to him.