Connemara and the West from Dublin

Editor's note

One night on the Shannon. Saint Ciarán founded Clonmacnoise in 544 where the great east–west road met the river, which is why kings were buried here. Read the carved panels on the Cross of the Scriptures, walk between the ruined churches and the two round towers, and see the cross-slabs, the largest collection of its kind in Ireland. At Banagher, one of the few crossings of the mid-Shannon, walk out to Cromwell's Castle of 1653 and find Fort Eliza, the Salt Battery, with emplacements for four cannons. Trollope lived in the town in the 1840s, and Charlotte Brontë's widower lived at Hill House.

Editor's note

One night on Galway Bay. Cycle the coast road west from Galway to Spiddal, about 18 kilometres each way. It starts on the Salthill Promenade, where Galwegians touch the wall at the far end before turning, with the Blackrock diving tower beside it. Break the ride at Barna, a fishing village with woods above the shore. Spiddal is a village where Irish is the everyday language, and Ceardlann an Spidéil at its entrance is a working craft village: weaving, pottery, stained glass and jewellery, made and sold on site. Buy a piece from the person who made it. On a clear day the Aran Islands show across the bay.

Editor's note

Three nights in Connemara. Roundstone's harbour was laid out by Alexander Nimmo in the 1820s; climb Errisbeg behind it, then walk the tombolo between Gurteen Bay and Dog's Bay, whose sand is shell, not rock. From Clifden, drive the Sky Road and walk out to the Marconi station and the bog where Alcock and Brown landed in 1919. Cross the strand to Omey Island at low tide. Kylemore Abbey has a Victorian walled garden, and Diamond Hill climbs from the national park visitor centre at Letterfrack. On Killary, Ireland's only fjord, kayak beneath Mweelrea or walk to Aasleagh Falls near Leenaun.

Editor's note

Two nights at Westport. The pilgrim path up Croagh Patrick starts at Murrisk, by the abbey the O'Malleys founded in 1457 and John Behan's bronze coffin ship, the National Famine Memorial. It is about 7 kilometres there and back to the chapel on the 764-metre summit, and the final cone is quartzite scree that shifts underfoot. On Reek Sunday, the last Sunday in July, 20,000 to 30,000 people make the climb. Spend the other day cycling the Great Western Greenway towards Newport, on the trackbed of the Achill railway that closed in 1937, with Clew Bay alongside. Westport House and its 400 acres of woodland stand at the start.

Editor's note

One night between the lakes. Some of Lough Mask's water leaves it underground, running south through the limestone and dropping about 15 metres before it comes up again at Cong. The Victorians tried to make that link navigable, and the unfinished canal, abandoned in 1854, has been called the Dry Canal ever since, William Wilde's name for it. Walk the Mask shore, then look across Lough Carra to the burnt-out shell of Moore Hall. The eastern shore of Mask goes very still at dusk, and it is a quiet place for a swim.

Editor's note

Two nights at Athlone to finish, the last before the crossing home. The Normans built Athlone Castle in 1210 where the Shannon narrows, to hold the only crossing for miles; walk the Left Bank, the old quarter between castle and river, and take a boat out onto Lough Ree. Sean's Bar, by the bridge, is accepted by Guinness World Records as the oldest pub in the world, and 10th-century wattle-and-wicker walls turned up there in the 1970s. Kilbeggan Distillery on the Brosna has held a licence since 1757: find the early 1800s copper pot still, the oldest working one in the world, and the restored waterwheel.