3 Best Sights in The Southwest, Ireland

Fully refurbished and extended with high-spec interactive gadgetry and new displays and a first-rate café, this museum is a worthy stop to discover life on the Blasket Islands (An Bhlascaoid Mhóir), which are among Ireland's most extraordinary islands. The largest visible from Ceann Sléibhe is the Great Blasket, inhabited until 1953. The Blasket islanders were great storytellers and were encouraged by Irish scholars to write their memoirs. The Blasket Centre explains the heritage of these islanders and celebrates their use of the Irish language with videos and exhibitions. The new viewing platform (free) alone makes this center an essential part of the Dingle itinerary.  

Signposted from the main road, and accessed via a dramatic corkscrew walkway, Dún Chaoin pier is surrounded by cliffs of colored Silurian rock, more than 400 million years old and rich in fossils. Down at the pier you can see naomhóga (open fishing boats traditionally made of animal hide stretched over wooden lathes and tarred) stored upside down. Traditionally, three or four men walk these currachs out to the sea, holding them over their heads. Similar boats are used in the Aran Islands, and when properly handled they're extraordinarily seaworthy. Five minutes south on the R559  don't miss an opportunity to visit staggeringly beautiful (but lethal for swimming) Coumeenoole Beach at the foot of a curving stepway. It also featured in Ryan's Daughter in 1970. 

Overlooking the beach is the pottery studio of one of Ireland's leading ceramic artists. Louis Mulcahy produces large pots and urns that are both decorative and functional. You can watch the work in progress and buy items at workshop prices. There's also a coffee shop.