Top 20 attractions in Ireland

The state of Ire­land occu­pies part of the island of the same name in the north­east of the Atlantic Ocean. This is one of the most beau­ti­ful coun­tries in Europe, dis­tin­guished by its orig­i­nal cul­tur­al tra­di­tions, ancient archi­tec­ture, pic­turesque hills, green val­leys and clear rivers.

Who should come to Ireland and why?

Ire­land is a coun­try with a rich his­to­ry that has pre­served ancient cas­tles, medieval abbeys and tem­ples. Peo­ple tend to come here to look at the archi­tec­ture of old cities, Stone Age arti­facts, and admire nat­ur­al sights.

The rocky shores of the island smooth­ly pass into broad-leaved forests and plains cov­ered with emer­ald veg­e­ta­tion. And in its depths, nation­al parks are hid­den for lovers of eco­tourism. There you can learn a lot about the nature of Ire­land, take a walk, admir­ing the local beau­ties, or go horse­back rid­ing.

It is very inter­est­ing to spend hol­i­days in this coun­try. On the first of May, tourists gath­er for the pagan Beltane, which sym­bol­izes the begin­ning of sum­mer. On this day, locals dec­o­rate rowan bush­es with rib­bons, toys, and make big fires on the hills in the evenings. In autumn, Hal­loween fans come to the coun­try, because Ire­land is the birth­place of this pop­u­lar hol­i­day. Imme­di­ate­ly after Hal­loween, anoth­er Celtic hol­i­day is cel­e­brat­ed — Samhain, which marks the end of the har­vest.

Pic­turesque Ire­land is per­fect for a fam­i­ly hol­i­day. In each city, chil­dren are wait­ing for medieval cas­tles, inter­est­ing muse­ums, excur­sions. If you come here with a child, go to the Dublin Zoo, vis­it the Aqua Dome in the town of Tralee and take a look at the Adven­ture Park amuse­ment park in Bun­do­ran.

While vaca­tion­ing in Ire­land, do not for­get to try nation­al dish­es: hard cheese with a nut­ty cream fla­vor and sausage pud­ding. Be sure to buy sou­venirs for fam­i­ly and friends. A good gift for them would be hand-knit­ted wool sweaters, cash­mere items pro­duced at the Blar­ney fac­to­ry, whiskey, crys­tal, jew­el­ry with Celtic motifs, lep­rechaun fig­urines and clover key rings.

Historical sights of Ireland

Dublin Castle

The gov­ern­ment res­i­dence in Dublin is a majes­tic and beau­ti­ful cas­tle found­ed in the 13th cen­tu­ry. Ini­tial­ly, the com­plex was intend­ed to pro­tect the city. At var­i­ous times there were an Irish court, the res­i­dence of the king and gov­ern­ment.

Now it is a place for con­fer­ences and offi­cial meet­ings. When there are no state events, the cas­tle is open to the pub­lic. Tourists can see the inte­ri­or dec­o­ra­tion of the halls, the Birm­ing­ham Tow­er, the Church of the Holy Trin­i­ty and the arts cen­ter, locat­ed in the dun­geon of the roy­al chapel.

Kells Abbey

Kells Abbey ris­es in the town of Kells near Dublin. The first men­tion of the cas­tle dates back to 554. The monks who cre­at­ed the mas­ter­piece of reli­gious art, the Book of Kells, found refuge here. This is a col­lec­tion of the Gospels, dec­o­rat­ed with ele­gant orna­ments and minia­tures that have not lost their bright­ness of col­ors to this day.

The abbey was repeat­ed­ly raid­ed by the Vikings, so many of the build­ings of the com­plex were destroyed. Only the main tow­er and the high walls sur­round­ing the court­yard are well pre­served.

Castle Cayre

The largest cas­tle in Ire­land, built at the begin­ning of the 12th cen­tu­ry on an island in the mid­dle of the Suir Riv­er, is per­fect­ly pre­served. It was found­ed by Conor O’Brien, a prince who lived before the Nor­man inva­sion.

Walk­ing through the cas­tle, it is easy to see with your own eyes the pecu­liar­i­ties of the life of the ancient Irish, exam­ine the lord’s rooms, the three-sto­ry don­jon, stone steep stairs, watch­tow­ers and the lat­tice pro­tect­ing the gate.

Bunratty Castle

Bun­rat­ty Cas­tle is locat­ed in Coun­ty Clare. The citadel, built in the Nor­man style, was destroyed more than once dur­ing the wars, but was always restored, as it was of great strate­gic impor­tance. The cas­tle has been com­plete­ly restored and is open to tourists all year round. It stores wood­en fur­ni­ture, paint­ings, tapes­tries of the 17th cen­tu­ry, medieval weapons.

There is an open-air muse­um in the court­yard. Guests can see farm huts, a mill, learn about old crafts, taste dish­es cooked in an old oven, and buy local sou­venirs.

St. Patrick’s Cathedral

The largest cathe­dral in Ire­land is locat­ed in Dublin. A strik­ing exam­ple of Goth­ic archi­tec­ture was found­ed at the begin­ning of the XII cen­tu­ry near the source of St. Patrick.

Now it is a huge tem­ple com­plex, includ­ing a church, chapels, the arch­bish­op’s palace. Reli­gious ser­vices and impor­tant nation­al cer­e­monies are reg­u­lar­ly held here. Church relics, ancient fres­coes and an organ are kept inside the cathe­dral.

Christ church church

Dublin’s main cathe­dral church is known local­ly as Christ Church or Christ Cathe­dral. It was built in the 11th cen­tu­ry and has always been the cen­ter of the reli­gious life of the coun­try. The cathe­dral is dec­o­rat­ed with orig­i­nal 13th-cen­tu­ry tiles, columns, wall paint­ings and fres­coes.

A small muse­um was found­ed in the crypt, where unique works of art are exhib­it­ed: ancient man­u­scripts, paint­ings, can­dle­sticks and church uten­sils.

newgrange

New­grange is a huge tomb made of stone blocks, part of the Bru na Boine com­plex, locat­ed near Dublin. It con­sists of a wide bur­ial cham­ber and a nar­row long pas­sage. From above, the struc­ture is cov­ered with earth and stones. The age of the mound is about 5 thou­sand years. It is much old­er than Stone­henge and the Egypt­ian pyra­mids. Dur­ing exca­va­tions, sci­en­tists dis­cov­ered many unique arti­facts here.

There is a hole at the top of the mound — from Decem­ber 19 to Decem­ber 23, the rays of the sun pen­e­trate into the bur­ial cham­ber through it for a short time. But only lot­tery win­ners can see the illu­mi­nat­ed room. On ordi­nary days, excur­sions are con­duct­ed under the light of spot­lights.

Carrowmore

The pre­his­toric sanc­tu­ary is locat­ed in Coun­ty Sli­go and is one of the main Neolith­ic mega­lith­ic struc­tures in Ire­land. Sci­en­tists have not come to a con­sen­sus on the age of the mon­u­ment. Some experts believe that the stone blocks are about 7 thou­sand years old.

In Car­row­more, there are about 30 dol­mens sur­round­ed by fences of hewn stones. Arriv­ing here, tourists can touch the ancient cul­ture and admire the pic­turesque green hills.

Museums in Ireland

Dublinia

In the his­tor­i­cal part of Dublin there is a beau­ti­ful build­ing made of gray brick with a high tow­er — the Dublin Muse­um. This is a great place for a fam­i­ly vaca­tion. In the halls of the muse­um, the era of the Mid­dle Ages and the Vikings is recre­at­ed.

Adults and chil­dren can look at the actors dressed in knight­ly armor, nation­al clothes and join their “games”. The muse­um, which intro­duces liv­ing his­to­ry, is vis­it­ed annu­al­ly by 125,000 tourists.

Irish National Museum

Next to the par­lia­ment build­ing in the cen­ter of the cap­i­tal is the nation­al muse­um. The rich cul­tur­al her­itage of the Irish peo­ple is col­lect­ed here.

The exten­sive col­lec­tion includes:

• Celtic clothes and jew­el­ry;
• Chris­t­ian relics;
• archae­o­log­i­cal finds of the pre-Chris­t­ian peri­od;
• ancient forged weapon.

The pearl of the expo­si­tion is the Clony­ca­van Man. This is an Iron Age mum­my found in the swamps of Coun­ty Meath. The approx­i­mate age of the exhib­it is 2300 years.

Art Museum in Dublin

The Nation­al Irish Gallery is of great inter­est to con­nois­seurs of paint­ing. Here are can­vas­es by Dutch, Span­ish, French, Ital­ian and Ger­man mas­ters, paint­ed before the begin­ning of the 18th cen­tu­ry. A sep­a­rate room is occu­pied by a huge col­lec­tion of Irish paint­ings.

There are about 14 thou­sand paint­ings, sculp­tures, pen­cil draw­ings, as well as graph­ic sam­ples in the muse­um’s stor­age.

Leprechaun Museum

The cap­i­tal has a muse­um ded­i­cat­ed to Irish folk­lore. The expo­si­tion tells about lep­rechauns — mag­i­cal crea­tures dressed in green clothes and grant­i­ng wish­es. Tourists learn a lot of inter­est­ing things about lit­tle peo­ple who are com­pared to elves or fairies.

Dur­ing the tour, adults and chil­dren are shown a tun­nel with opti­cal illu­sions, an Irish mythol­o­gy room, arti­facts from the New­grange tomb, and an ancient well. Sou­venirs are sold on the ter­ri­to­ry of the muse­um.

Guinness Museum Dublin

The his­to­ry of the leg­endary brew­ery begins in 1752, when Arthur Guin­ness rent­ed a small build­ing and found­ed a fam­i­ly busi­ness. For 200 years, a small com­pa­ny has grown into a glob­al brand.

The exhi­bi­tion halls of the muse­um tell about the tra­di­tions of brew­ing and the meth­ods of mak­ing a foamy drink. Here you can taste beer in the Grav­i­ty bar, buy beer-filled sweets and inter­est­ing sou­venirs. There is an obser­va­tion deck on the roof of the build­ing, which offers a gor­geous panora­ma of Dublin. The beer muse­um attracts about 700,000 vis­i­tors a year.

kilmanham

Kil­man­ham Prison, used by the British author­i­ties to hold pris­on­ers, has now been con­vert­ed into a muse­um. The com­plex built in the cap­i­tal is called the Irish Bastille because many famous peo­ple of the coun­try and fight­ers for its inde­pen­dence served their sen­tences or were exe­cut­ed in it.

Vis­i­tors can see the court­yard and the cells where the pris­on­ers lan­guished. The Kil­man­ham Muse­um has an exhi­bi­tion ded­i­cat­ed to Irish nation­al­ism. On the sec­ond floor there is an exhi­bi­tion of sculp­tures, paint­ings and draw­ings made in places of deten­tion.

Natural attractions, parks and entertainment

Cliffs of Moher

In Coun­ty Clare, near the vil­lage of Lis­can­nor, you can see one of the main attrac­tions of Ire­land — the Cliffs of Moher, tow­er­ing on the ocean. Tourists tend to come here to climb to a height of two hun­dred meters and admire the mag­nif­i­cent scenery.

O’Brien’s Tow­er was built on one of the cliffs, equipped with an obser­va­tion deck, which offers an even more gor­geous view.

Burren

In the west of the coun­try near the town of Gal­way lies the Bur­ren Nation­al Park. This is an unusu­al place that attracts lovers of fan­tas­tic land­scapes.

Here are:

• lime­stone plateaus;
• mead­ows;
• small groves;
• rocks;
• under­ground caves;
• lakes;
• peat bogs.

Ivy, fern, moun­tain ash, hazel, heather, alpine grass­es and moss­es grow on the ter­ri­to­ry of the park. The reserve has hik­ing trails with dif­fer­ent lev­els of dif­fi­cul­ty. It is rec­om­mend­ed to trav­el as part of an excur­sion.

Killarney National Park

In the south­west, Coun­ty Ker­ry has a nature reserve estab­lished in 1932. On an area of ​​10 thou­sand hectares there are beau­ti­ful lakes, under­ground springs, forests, moor­lands and green hills. Trav­el­ers here can see deer, marten squir­rels, geese, fal­cons. The flo­ra is rep­re­sent­ed by a rare Kil­lar­ney fern, straw­ber­ry tree, ancient oaks.

Glendalough

In the val­ley of Glen­dalough in Coun­ty Wick­low, the monk Quentin set­tled in the 6th cen­tu­ry. In a pic­turesque cor­ner sur­round­ed by high hills, he built a small monastery, out­build­ings and a hos­pi­tal.

The abbey is a place of pil­grim­age for believ­ers and attracts tourists with beau­ti­ful nat­ur­al land­scapes. Many trees, shrubs, flow­ers grow here, but most impor­tant­ly, many reli­gious shrines and ancient stone tow­ers have been pre­served.

Botanical Garden

Dublin Botan­ic Gar­dens is an easy place to spend an entire day. More than 20 thou­sand plants grow on 25 hectares of land in the cen­ter of the cap­i­tal. Trop­i­cal trees and herbs are plant­ed in closed green­hous­es, mag­nif­i­cent ros­es and med­i­c­i­nal plants import­ed from dif­fer­ent coun­tries grow in the open ground.

Alleys are laid along the perime­ter of the park — where guests stroll slow­ly and relax on cozy bench­es. Every­one can sit in a cafe or try nation­al cui­sine at a local restau­rant. In the gar­den itself there is a shop sell­ing seeds and seedlings of the pre­sent­ed plants.

Tayto Park

In the vicin­i­ty of Dublin there is a large amuse­ment park for chil­dren of all ages. Tay­to Park, named after pota­to chips, is open every day. The chil­dren are wait­ing for play­grounds with attrac­tions, roller coast­ers, fun com­pe­ti­tions and cos­tume shows.

The park pro­vides sep­a­rate areas for kids with safe swings, tram­po­lines, labyrinths. The tick­et price includes a vis­it to the Teito fac­to­ry, where those deli­cious chips are made. Chil­dren can watch an inter­ac­tive exhi­bi­tion and try prod­ucts that have just rolled off the assem­bly line.