Things to do
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Connemara National Park
Two thousand hectares of bog, heath and mountain at Letterfrack taking in four of the Twelve Bens, with Connemara ponies and a red deer herd reintroduced to the enclosure. The Diamond Hill walk climbs four hundred and forty-two metres on a made path and stone stair.
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Kylemore Abbey
A Victorian castle on a lake under a wooded mountain, built as a private house in 1868 and held by Benedictine nuns since 1920, with a Gothic church and a walled garden of two and a half hectares restored to its 1870s planting. It is among the most photographed buildings in the west.
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Ballynahinch Castle Hotel
A country house on a salmon river under the Twelve Bens in two hundred and eighty hectares of woodland, once owned by the cricketer Ranjitsinhji, with fishing beats let by the day and a walk along the river from the door. It is the classic Connemara sporting lodge.
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Diamond Hill
A quartzite peak of four hundred and forty-two metres in the national park, climbed on boardwalk and stone steps for a full circuit of Connemara, the Twelve Bens and out to Inishbofin. The upper loop is steep and closes in high wind.
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Dog's Bay
A horseshoe of white sand near Roundstone made entirely of crushed shell rather than quartz, backed by dunes and paired with Gurteen Bay on the other side of the same neck of land. The water is clear and very cold.
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Inishbofin
An island of about a hundred and seventy residents ten kilometres offshore, with a Cromwellian barracks at the harbour mouth, three looped walks and a corncrake population. The ferry runs from Cleggan and the crossing takes thirty minutes, and the boat is cancelled in heavy weather.
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Sky Road
A sixteen-kilometre loop west of the town climbing to about a hundred and fifty metres above Clifden Bay, looking out at Inishturk, Turbot and the open Atlantic. The upper road is the one with the view and there are two proper pull-ins.
