Susan Byron's predictions for the top ten visitor attractions in Ireland for 2012

Bunratty Castle

1. Bunratty Castle & Folk Park, Shannon, County Clare
If you have only time to ‘do’ one visitor attraction in Ireland, this is it! Absolutely excellent, fantastic castle, medieval banquets, Irish cottages, farmyards, streetscape with traditional pubs, shops, school etc, great good value day out for all the family.


2 Butlers Chocolate Experience, Clonshaugh, Dublin
What’s not to like about a Willa Wonka-style experience with suspended walkway tour over the factory floor and all the chocolate you can eat?

3 Crawford Art Gallery, Cork City
A smashing selection of superbly curated Irish Art, just the right amount in a wonderful city centre location and admission is free!


4 Croke Park Museum, Dublin
Probably the best guided tour in Ireland, especially if you know nothing at all about Gaelic Games? The only carbon neutral stadium in the world? And top of their game right now, with a momentous Dublin win in 2011.

5 Glasnevin Cemetery Museum, Dublin
The only recipients of a Thea award in Ireland, excellent modern museum with superb multi-media, as well as the personal touch which is so important when dealing with a subject like this...
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6 Irish National Stud, County Kildare
Her majesty Queen Elizabeth enjoyed her visit here in May 2011, very interesting and informative background to one of our favourite national past times and the adjoining Japanese gardens are an absolute delight in early Spring.

7 Lismore Castle Gardens, County Waterford
What a dreamy garden, immaculate vegatable and flower gardens bursting at their neatly boxed seams while big blousely rambleing roses ran away with themselves over the castle walls. Great coffee and homemade cakes too...

8 Old Jamesons Distillery, Dublin
Another excellent guided tour where you are led through the whole process of whiskey distilling from the grain to the glass and its effect on the social history of this cobbled streeted area of Dublin, very generous whiskey tastings…

9 Museum of Country Life, Castlebar, County Mayo
Another free museum I cannot recommend highly enough and it’s free! You could happily spend the day here finding out how people lived in rural Ireland not so very long ago.


10 Swiss Cottage, Cahir, County Tipperary
Picture postcard lovely this restored Cottage Orné, is one of only two in Europe. Designed as a pastoral idyll, similar to the Trianon of Versailles it was built by Richard Butler of nearby Cahir Castle which you can walk to along the riverbank.

By Susan Byron, author of www.irelands-hidden-gems.com

Coming home to Christmas in Ireland...

There is a very old advert for electricity being re-run on RTE television at the moment called ‘Coming Home’ which depicts the emigrant (prodigal) son being picked up by his Dad at the airport and driven home to his doting (Irish) Mammy who is busy preparing the house for his arrival.

The beautiful old house is lit up like a Christmas tree, the immersion is on, so himself can have a hot bath while the electric blanket warms up his bed and something nice has just been popped in the oven.

No wonder its striking a chord nationally and globally thanks to YouTube etc as it evokes perfectly what Christmas means not just to the Irish, but universally, that elusive warm fuzzy feeling of coming home to the perfect family set up which so seldom happens in reality?

It’s been a tough year in Ireland and to be honest we’re barely holding it together and while we have no choice but to work our way out of this recession there will be a lot of broken hearts this Christmas with so many families fragmented by emigration. There isn’t a family or town in Ireland that hasn’t been affected by the loss of its young people, thanks be to God for Skype and Facebook otherwise we’d lose the plot altogether…But it’s never going to be the same as having them tucked up in their own beds, under the one roof, or around the dinner table?

At this time of year you used to hear women in particular (sorry sisters) moaning about all the work that was involved with having ALL OF THE FAMILY home for Christmas and you would just want to smack them as most of us would give our right arms for just that opportunity, but not any more? It is as in-politically correct as moaning about having a job!

“Go m’beimid go leir beo an am seo aris” – "May we all be alive this time next year" used to be my father’s toast at Christmas. Sadly he’s no longer with us and like many families my heart goes out to those who have been bereaved this year, at no other time is their loss more keenly felt than at Christmas, when it often seems that the rest of the world is happy out.

In Ireland, we know different, which is why we light a candle in the window each Christmas Eve, to shine a light, not just of welcome but of hope and solidarity with family, friends and strangers throughout the world….So whatever ‘Coming Home’ means to you this Christmas whether its fondly remembering Christmases past or bravely facing up to new realities, I wish you and yours all the very best agus Nollaig Shona Dhaoibh go leir.

By Susan Byron author of http://www.irelands-hidden-gems.com/