The West
Why are you coming to Co. Limerick? Our guests have had all types of reasons for visiting the County ranging from lesuire, researching geneology, sports fixtures, work placements, weddings, family reunions and others besides.
Shopping and Days Out
Limerick City is only a 10 minute drive away with ample parking. There are many large brand shops as well as tourist and souviners stores for gifts. There is also a large shopping centre on the outskirts of the city with a car park, boasting a cinema and supermarkets such as Tesco Ireland. Further afield is Cork City (Capital of Culture), Tipperary and Galway. If you are partial to browsing antiques, Adare is your town.
Heritage and Sightseeing
If you enjoy history and heritage, Adare is a town nearby with an excellent Tourist Centre. Make this your first day out and collect information to plan your stay. There are plenty of pubs and retaurants to be savoured. Adare Manor is worth a visit on a sunny day, as is the park opposite the Church in the centre of town.
Bunratty Castle & Folk Park is a very popular tourist attraction. The Castle was built in 1425 and sits within a 26 acre site that includes the Folk Park, a reconstruction of the homes and environment of Ireland of over a century ago. Rural farmhouses, village shops and streets are recreated and furnished as they would have appeared at that time.
King John’s Castle is a 13th century Castle on ‘King’s Island’ in the heart of medieval Limerick City. The Castle overlooks the River Shannon offering wonderful views of Limerick City.
Out and About
Currachase Forest Park was formerly the estate of the De Vere family who built the mansion, laid out the grounds, formed the lake and planted the old woodlands. The ruined shell of Currachase House, once the home of the poet Aubrey De Vere, remains.
The park also offers a caravan/ camping park, arboretum, children's play area, trails and viewing points. Situated 13 km west of Limerick on the N69 (T68) to Askeaton.
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Killarney National Park is situated to the south and west of the town of Killarney in Co. Kerry, the famous lakes shimmer at the heart of a park of more than 10,000 hectares.
The park conserves the largest areas of natural woodland left in Ireland. On the old red sandstone of the mountains are native oakwoods, dominated by sessile oak, the ultimate tree of the steep Atlantic valleys. The smaller woods on the lower land include a yew wood growing on almost bare limestone on the Muckross peninsula. The mild, moist, oceanic climate encourages a luxuriant growth of heathery moss and ferns, many entwined in"hanging gardens' on the higher branches of the trees. Some of the park's wild plants are shared with the oceanic lands of southwest Europe, such as the arbutus, or strawberry tree, growing at the edge of the woods and along the rocky lake shore, or the greater butterwort, flourishing in the bog.
The red deer which roam the upland areas are the only herd of native red deer remaining in the country. They are outnumbered by the smaller Japanese Sika deer, found not only on the open mountain but throughout the park woodlands.
The park's main center for visitors is Muckross House. There are four self-guiding nature trails in the park, for which leaflets are available at Muckross House, where an audio-visual introduction to the park can also be seen.
Make a day of visiting. Leave early on a promise of good weather. Take a camera. You will not be disappointed!
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The Burren, Co. Clare is set in some 500 square kilometers of bare stone hills, terraces and shattered limestone slabs are turned into a rockgarden by an extraordinary mixture of plants. When they flower in spring, the strangeness and beauty of the landscape is like nothing else in Ireland—perhaps, indeed, in Europe.
Alpine and lowland flowers, northern and southern, crowd together in the chinks and deep cracks of the limestone to produce a bewildering, topsy-turvy world of botany. Extremely profuse are several plants which are usually found on the mountains or in the Arctic—mountain avens, bear-berry, spring gentian and several alpine saxifrages. Beside them grow plants of a southern range, such as the dense flowered orchid, which belongs on the Mediterranean, or the maidenhair fern, which extends to the tropics. All of these grow together right down to the edge of the sea.
The most impressive approach to the Burren generally is through Kinvara and Ballyvaughan on the northern coast of County Clare. There is a National Nature Reserve of 145 hectares on the Burren at Slieve Carron. Aillwee Cave, south of Ballyvaughan is open to the general public.