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County Sligo - Yeats country

Ben Bulben

Sligo, the land of heart's desire, is Yeats country, the spiritual home of Ireland's greatest poet.

William Butler Yeats had a passion for its gentle scenery and away from it wrote: 'I longed for a sod of earth from some field I knew, something of Sligo to hold in my hand.'

Sligo's single most-distinctive feature is the flat-topped Ben Bulben mountain and at the foot of lies Drumcliff Churchyard, where Yeats is buried. His headstone carries the inscription: 'Cast a cold eye on life, on death. Horseman pass by.'

Drumcliff is not an imposing site and is along a busy stretch of road, but it's worth the stop - where else can you get a great cafe, great view, round tower and a dead poet?

The county has an archaeological heritage dating back 6,000 years with two of the largest megalithic cemeteries in Ireland. Carrowkeel south of Sligo is a surprising wilderness with stone tombs visible for miles.

Sligo's scenic coast has some excellent beaches - Strandhill in Sligo has great sand-dunes and Streedagh (an easy-to-miss turn off the main road on the way to Donegal) has great dunes and great views of the Donegal mountains to boot.

Drive along the peninsula from Streedagh and enjoy the sea views on the way to Mullaghmore, a pretty village with a harbour.

Lakes are in important part of the county with Lough Gill outside Sligo and Lough Allen and Lough Gara in the south of the county.

Although Sligo is a city, having a charter and two of the prerequisite cathedrals, it is locally known as Sligo Town. The name is thought to mean shelly place.

Points of Interest

Lissadell House
An austere but significant stately house on 500 acres, once the home of the Countess of Markiewicz, a suffragette and Irish rebel. She was the first female to be elected to the House of Commons in Britain and to Dail Eireann in Dublin. She was one of the leaders' of Ireland’s independence movement. Lisadell is now in private hands and has been recently refurbished