The town
Belmullet (Béal an Mhuirthead in Irish, meaning “mouth of the Mullet Peninsula”) is a coastal Gaeltacht town with a population of 1,019 on the Mullet Peninsula in the barony of Erris, County Mayo, Ireland. It is the commercial and cultural heart of the barony of Erris, which has a population of almost 10,000. According to the 2016 census, 50% of people in the town were able to speak Irish, while only 4% spoke it on a daily basis outside the education system.
The two bays
Belmullet has two bays — Blacksod Bay and Broadhaven Bay — linked by Carter’s Canal running through the town. That is the town’s shape: the canal through the middle, a bay on each side, and the isthmus where the Mullet meets the mainland. The walk through Belmullet is the walk across the isthmus and along the canal, and the light on the water is best in the evening. The town is the gate to the Mullet: the peninsula runs out from it, and the villages of the Mullet are a short drive on either side of the bays.
The name
The origin of the name Belmullet is not clear. It may have come from Irish Béal Muileat or Béal an Mhuileat, which has been translated as “mouth of the isthmus”. Bernard O’Hara in Mayo: Aspects of its Heritage suggests that a change from “L” to “R”, which is quite common in Irish, may have given Béal an Mhuireat, which in turn became Belmullet. The name is the town: the mouth of the peninsula, where the Mullet meets the mainland.
Practical
Belmullet is at the isthmus of the Mullet, a drive from Westport; the canal and the two bays are in the town. The town works as the base for the Mullet and the Erris country — the bays in the morning, the Atlantic in the evening, and the town in between.
🧭 Route plannen