The Southwest Features

The Southwest Features

• Top Reasons to Go to The Southwest
  

  Blarney Castle: Visitors line up to kiss the Blarney Stone and acquire the gift of gab. This is an impressive 15th-century tower-house castle... read more

• A Romantic Past
  

  Such great writers as Sir Walter Scott and William Thackeray struggled to find the superlatives to describe Killarney's heather-clad peaks, subtropical... read more

• Dingle by Any Other Name
  

  Residents of Dingle, especially those involved in the tourist business, are fighting a battle with the government for the right to continue to... read more

• Rebel Cork
  

  Cork City received its first charter in 1185 from Prince John of Norman England, and it takes its name from the Irish word corcaigh, meaning... read more

• Monks & Wine
  

  A mid-13th-century Franciscan abbey at the water's edge is Timoleague's most striking monument. (Walk around the back to find the entrance gate.)... read more

• The Silence Strikes You at Once
  

  The Great Blasket, which measures roughly 3 km by 1 km (2 mi by ½ mi), has no traffic, no pub, no hotel, and no electricity. Yet this... read more

• A Battle Lost
  

  Before Kinsale became the foodie capital of Ireland, it was chiefly famous for the Battle of Kinsale in 1601, when the Irish and the Spanish... read more