Glenveagh National Park

The park

Glenveagh (Gleann Bheatha in Irish, meaning “glen of the birches”) is the second-largest national park in all of Ireland. Located in County Donegal, it covers 170 square kilometres and includes much of the Derryveagh Mountains, Lough Veagh, and Glenveagh Castle on the lough’s shore. As of 2024 it is the only national park anywhere in Ulster, the northern province, and the park’s castle gardens display a multitude of exotic and delicate plants. The park is the proper day out in the Derryveagh country: the lough, the mountain, the castle and the walks all inside the same gate.

The castle

The castle is the park’s other story. Captain John George Adair, an Anglo-Irish businessman, built Glenveagh Castle and founded the Glenveagh estate, and the estate’s history is the one that does not let go: during the 1861 famine, Adair evicted 44 families — 224 people in total — from their blackhouses on his land, and the nickname “Black Jack Adair” is what the tenants called him for it. The estate passed to his wife Cornelia Adair, was bought by Arthur Kingsley Porter in 1929, and then by Henry Plumer McIlhenny in 1937, who bequeathed it to the Irish nation. The castle is the place the story sits, and the gardens are the reward for the walk to it.

The lough and the mountain

Lough Veagh is the park’s water: the lough, the castle on its shore, and the Derryveagh range on the far side. The walks from the lough into the mountain are the other half of the day — the park’s trails are signposted and the mountain is the one that does the work. The park is the kind of place that is easy to arrive in and hard to leave, and the castle is the reason most people come.

Practical

Allow a full day: the lough in the morning, the castle and the gardens, and a mountain walk in the afternoon. The park charges an entry fee — check the current price and the season hours before travelling.