Page 224 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Ireland

222  IRELAND REGION B Y REGION

East wall and gatehouse at Roscommon Castle
s Turoe Stone nature trail, outdoor and indoor heritage back 1,500 years.
pic nic areas, a playground and The ruins of their gabled
Road map B4. Turoe, Bullaun,
Loughrea, Co Galway. Tel 091 841580. two supervised indoor play areas. 17th-century home are visible
Open mid-May–Aug: daily; Sep–mid- in the grounds. On the lawn lies
May: Sat & Sun only. & 7 - the O’Conor coronation stone,
∑ turoepetfarm.com d Roscommon which dates from 90 BC.
The interior includes a library
Road map C3. Co Roscommon.
The Turoe Stone stands at the * 3,500. £ @ n Jun–Sep: of many books and documents
centre of the Turoe Pet Farm and Harrison Hall (090 662 6342). ( Fri. recording Irish history, a tiny
Leisure Park, near the village of ∑ discoverireland.ie private chapel and a gallery of
Bullaun (on the R350). The white family portraits spanning 500
granite boulder, which stands The county capital is a busy years. In the billiard room is the
about 1 m (3 ft) high, dates back market town. In Main Street is harp once played by Turlough
to the 3rd or 2nd century BC. Its the former gaol, which had a O’Carolan (1670–1738), blind
top half is carved with curvi- woman as its last executioner. harpist and last of the Gaelic
linear designs in a graceful Celtic “Lady Betty”, as she was known, bards (see p28).
style, known as La Tène, also was sentenced to death for the
found in Celtic parts of Europe, murder of her son in 1780, but
particularly Brittany. The lower negotiated a pardon by agreeing g Strokestown Park
half has a smooth section and a to become a hangwoman. Road map C3. Strokestown,
band of step-pattern carving. South of the town centre, Co Roscommon. @ House, Pleasure
The stone was originally found just off Abbey Street, is the Gardens and Museum: Tel 071 963
at an Iron Age ring fort nearby, Dominican Friary, founded in 3013. Open daily. Closed 1 week at
and is thought to have been 1253 by Felim O’Conor, Lord Christmas. & 8 0 = 7
used there in fertility rituals. of Connaught. Set in the north ∑ strokestownpark.ie
Efforts at preservation sometimes wall of the choir is a late 13th-
hamper viewing, so call ahead. century effigy of the founder. Strokestown Park, the greatest
The park around the Turoe Roscommon Castle, an Palladian mansion in County
Stone is designed mainly for Anglo-Norman fortress north of Roscommon, was built in the
children. The Pet Farm has some the town, was built in 1269 by 1730s for Thomas Mahon,
small fields containing farm Robert d’Ufford, Lord Justice of an MP whose family was
animals and a pond. There is also Ireland on land seized from the granted the lands by Charles II
a wooded river side walk with a Dominican Friary, and rebuilt after the Restoration. It
11 years later after being des- incorporates an earlier
troyed by the Irish led by Hugh 17th-century tower house
O’Conor, King of Connaught. (see p24). The design of the new
house owes most to Richard
Cassels, architect of
f Clonalis House Russborough (see p136). The
galleried kitchen, panelled
Road map B3. Castlerea, Co
Roscommon. Tel 094 962 0014. stairwell and groin-vaulted
Open Jun–end Aug: 11am–5pm stables are undoubtedly his
Mon–Sat. & 8 7 limited. work, tailoring Palladian
∑ clonalis.com principles to the requirements
of the Anglo-Irish gentry.
This Victorian manor just The house stayed in the fam-
outside Castlerea is the ily’s hands until 1979, when
an cestral home of the O’Conors, major restoration began. In its
the last High Kings of Ireland heyday, the estate included
The Celtic Turoe Stone carved with graceful and Kings of Connaught. This ornamental parkland, a deer
swirling patterns old Gaelic family can trace its park, folly, mausoleum and the
For hotels and restaurants in this region see pp300–301 and pp318–20

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Eyewitness Travel LAYERS PRINTED:
Catalogue template “UK” LAYER
(Source v2)
Date 14th November 2012
Size 125mm x 217mm