County Clare: history, culture, food and places

The history of County Clare

Clare's history runs from Neolithic tombs on the Burren, through the Gaelic O'Brien dynasty descended from Brian Boru, to the Anglo-Norman and Cromwellian settlements, mass emigration after the Famine, and the political career of Daniel O'Connell, who was elected here in 1828.

People have been living on this limestone for at least six thousand years. Poulnabrone dolmen, the portal tomb on the Burren that appears on every second postcard of the county, was built around 3800 BC and held the remains of more than thirty people. Around it sit hundreds of ring forts, wedge tombs and field walls, which is why archaeologists describe the Burren as one of the best preserved ancient landscapes in western Europe.

In the medieval period Clare was O'Brien country. The family traced itself to Brian Boru, the high king killed at Clontarf in 1014, and it held the kingdom of Thomond from strongholds such as Bunratty and Leamaneh. When Anglo-Norman power spread west, the O'Briens negotiated as much as they fought, which is part of why so many tower houses survive here rather than a handful of great castles.

The seventeenth century was harder. Cromwellian confiscation moved dispossessed landowners west of the Shannon, and the phrase to hell or to Connacht is often quoted with Clare in mind, since the county sat on the boundary of that resettlement. Two centuries later the Famine emptied whole parishes. Clare lost roughly a fifth of its population between 1841 and 1851 and kept losing people to Boston, Chicago and New York for a century afterwards. If you carry a Clare surname, that is usually the reason.

The county also produced one of the pivotal moments in Irish democracy. In 1828 Daniel O'Connell won the Clare by-election as a Catholic who could not legally take his seat, and the pressure that followed forced Catholic Emancipation through Westminster the next year. Eamon de Valera later held a Clare seat for more than forty years. For a rural county of modest size, it has had an outsized hand in the shape of the state.

c. 3800 BC

Poulnabrone dolmen built on the Burren limestone.

1014

Brian Boru, whose dynasty ruled Thomond from Clare, killed at Clontarf.

1425

Bunratty Castle rebuilt in the form that stands today.

1651

Cromwellian campaign and confiscations reshape land ownership.

1828

Daniel O'Connell elected for Clare, forcing Catholic Emancipation.

1845 to 1851

The Famine. The county loses roughly a fifth of its people.

1945

Shannon becomes a transatlantic hub, later the first duty-free airport.

Culture and traditional music in Clare

Clare is widely regarded as the heartland of Irish traditional music. The concertina and fiddle styles of east and west Clare are distinct enough that musicians can place a player by ear, and Doolin, Ennis, Miltown Malbay and Feakle all hold sessions and festivals that locals attend.

The music here is not a floor show. A session is a group of players sitting in a corner of a pub agreeing on tunes, and the correct behaviour for a visitor is simple: sit somewhere you are not blocking them, keep your conversation lower than the music, do not request Danny Boy, and do not clap in the middle of a set. Buy a musician a drink if you enjoyed it. That is the whole etiquette.

West Clare, around Doolin and Miltown Malbay, is fiddle and flute country with a strong set-dancing tradition. East Clare, around Feakle and Tulla, plays slower and more ornamented, and people will tell you so within ten minutes of meeting you. The Willie Clancy Summer School in Miltown Malbay each July is the largest traditional music school in the world, and the town becomes unbookable for the week, which is worth knowing before you plan a July trip.

Beyond music, Clare is a strong Irish-language and storytelling county at the edges, has a serious visual arts presence in Ennis, and holds one of the oddest surviving festivals in Europe: the Lisdoonvarna Matchmaking Festival, running every September since the 1850s, when farmers came to the spa town after the harvest to find a wife. It is now equal parts genuine tradition and organised chaos.

The county's other cultural signature is the Burren itself, which has drawn poets, painters and botanists for two centuries. Seamus Heaney wrote about it. So did J. M. Synge on the way to the Aran Islands. The landscape does most of the work.

What to eat in County Clare

Clare food is Atlantic seafood and small-farm produce: oysters and lobster from Galway Bay and New Quay, hot smoked salmon from the Burren Smokehouse in Lisdoonvarna, Burren beef and lamb grazed on limestone grassland, and farmhouse cheese from the north of the county.

Start with shellfish. The bay side of the county, around New Quay and Ballyvaughan, lands oysters, lobster and crab, and the honest version of a Clare lunch is a plate of them at a bar with a pint of stout, not a tasting menu. Linnane's Lobster Bar at New Quay is the reference point, sitting on the pier with the water in front of it.

The Burren Smokehouse in Lisdoonvarna is the county's best-known food producer, smoking organic Irish salmon over oak since 1989, with a visitor centre and tastings. It is the one food stop we would build into a route rather than hope to pass.

Inland, the Burren's grassland is unusual: cattle are moved up onto the limestone in winter rather than down, because the rock holds heat and the herb-rich pasture stays productive. That practice, called winterage, is centuries old and it makes Burren beef genuinely different. You will see it named on menus in Ballyvaughan and Ennis, and it is not marketing.

For a proper dinner, Gregans Castle above Ballyvaughan and the Wild Honey Inn in Lisdoonvarna have carried the county's fine dining reputation, the latter as Ireland's first Michelin-starred gastropub. Ennis has the everyday strength: bakeries, a Friday market, and enough good kitchens that you never need to eat badly.

Oysters and lobster

New Quay, Ballyvaughan and the Flaggy Shore side of the county.

Smoked salmon

Burren Smokehouse, Lisdoonvarna. Oak smoked, organic, tastings on site.

Burren beef and lamb

Raised on limestone winterage pasture. Look for it named on menus.

Farmhouse cheese

St Tola goat's cheese from Inagh, on cheeseboards nationwide.

Seaweed

Harvested along the north coast, used in baths at Lahinch and on plates inland.

Whiskey, stout and pubs in Clare

Clare drinks stout and Irish whiskey, and the county has its own distillery scene again: the Burren Distillers near Ballyvaughan and Ennistymon's growing craft trade sit alongside long-standing pubs in Doolin, Ennis and Kilkee. Sean's Bar in neighbouring Athlone claims Ireland's oldest pub title, but Clare's own pub culture is built on music rather than age.

The pub is the county's social infrastructure, not its nightlife. Many Clare pubs are still shop-and-bar hybrids where you can buy a hardware item and a pint at the same counter, and the ones worth your evening are the ones with instruments rather than televisions.

In Doolin the three long-standing music houses, McGann's, McDermott's and Gus O'Connor's, run sessions most nights in season and the crowd is a mix of locals, walkers and visitors. In Ennis, Cruise's and Knox's carry the town's music. Out at Kilkee and Lahinch the pubs are surf and golf pubs, which is a different and cheerful thing.

For whiskey, order Irish and order it neat or with a drop of water. A useful Clare-adjacent flight runs from a light triple-distilled blend through a single pot still to a sherry-cask single malt, and any decent bar will pour it if you ask them to build it. If you want a distillery visit inside the county, the Burren Distillery does tours; the bigger names, Midleton and Tullamore, are a drive away.

One practical note Americans consistently need: a pint takes time. A properly poured stout is filled, left to settle, then topped. If the barman puts it down mid-pour and walks away, nothing has gone wrong.

The Burren, the cliffs and the coast

Clare's landscape has three parts: the Cliffs of Moher on the Atlantic edge, rising to 214 metres; the Burren, a 250 square kilometre karst limestone plateau with Arctic and Mediterranean plants growing side by side; and the Loop Head peninsula, a quiet cliff coast at the mouth of the Shannon.

The Cliffs of Moher are the most visited natural attraction in Ireland, and the experience depends entirely on when you stand there. Coach traffic peaks between ten in the morning and four in the afternoon. Entry is timed and cheaper booked online in advance, and the ticket covers parking. The Cliff Walk from Doolin south to Hag's Head runs roughly eight miles on an unfenced coastal path with a seasonal shuttle bus back.

The Burren is the more unusual landscape and the one that rewards a slow day. Limestone pavement cracked into grykes holds gentians, orchids and ferns that should not, botanically speaking, be neighbours. Add Poulnabrone, Caherconnell ring fort with its sheepdog demonstrations, Aillwee Cave, and the green roads above Ballyvaughan, and you have a full day without queueing for anything.

Loop Head is the county's quiet third. A working lighthouse, cliff edges without barriers, dolphins in the Shannon mouth, and almost no traffic. It takes half a day from Kilkee and it is the part of Clare that visitors describe afterwards as the surprise.

The coast also carries the golf and surf trade. Lahinch is one of the great old links courses and the town has a real Atlantic beach; Doonbeg, further south, is the modern counterpart. Both are exposed, which is the point of links golf and the reason to pack a shell rather than an umbrella.

Getting there and getting around

Fly into Shannon Airport, rent a car, and allow two to three nights. Clare has no useful rail network for visitors beyond Ennis, roads are good on the coast and narrow inland, and everything in the county sits within about an hour's drive of everything else.

Shannon is the easiest transatlantic arrival in Ireland for a nervous driver: a small terminal, quiet roads within ten minutes, and US preclearance on the way home so you land back in the States as a domestic arrival. Dublin Airport is two and a half to three hours away by motorway if the fares work better.

Rent the smallest car your party can stand. The N67 coast road through the Burren is wide and easy, but the inland roads around Ballyvaughan, the Corkscrew Hill descent and the boreens near Loop Head are single track with stone walls and no shoulder. Automatic transmissions cost more and are worth it if you have never driven on the left.

Bases, briefly. Doolin for cliffs and music. Ballyvaughan for the Burren and quiet dinners. Lahinch for golf, surf and an evening. Ennis for a town with restaurants, or Newmarket-on-Fergus for Dromoland Castle beside the airport on the first or last night.

Weather here is Atlantic and changeable rather than cold. Expect rain on some part of most days, plan indoor and outdoor options for each day, and do not cancel a plan because the morning looks poor.

Twelve places worth planning a day around

Ordered roughly north to south, with what each one actually is, why we send people, and what to know before you go.

1. 01 · West coast, 15 minutes from Doolin

   The Cliffs of Moher

   Eight kilometres of sea cliff rising to 214 metres, with a visitor centre, O'Brien's Tower and a clifftop path.

   It is the reason most people come to Clare, and at the right hour it earns the reputation. At the wrong hour it is a car park with a queue.

   PlanningBook a timed slot online in advance. Take the first or last of the day. The walk north from the centre thins out within ten minutes.

2. 02 · The Burren, 20 minutes south of Ballyvaughan

   Poulnabrone Dolmen

   A Neolithic portal tomb built around 3800 BC, standing in open limestone pavement.

   Free, unfenced and older than the pyramids. Ten minutes here explains the Burren better than any exhibition.

   PlanningRoadside car park, no ticket. Early morning and late evening are close to empty.

3. 03 · Central and eastern Burren, near Corofin

   The Burren National Park

   Fifteen square kilometres of protected karst, with waymarked walking loops from the Gortlecka crossroads.

   The version of the Burren you walk into rather than photograph from a lay-by. Orchids and gentians in May and June.

   PlanningSeasonal shuttle bus from Corofin. Wear boots with ankle support: the pavement is uneven and slippery when wet.

4. 04 · Beside Poulnabrone on the R480

   Caherconnell Stone Fort

   A well-preserved medieval ring fort with an archaeology exhibition and working sheepdog demonstrations.

   The sheepdog demonstration sounds like a gimmick and is genuinely one of the best hours in the county with children in tow.

   PlanningCheck demonstration times before arriving. Combined ticket with the fort.

5. 05 · Above Ballyvaughan

   Aillwee Cave and Birds of Prey Centre

   A show cave running into the Burren hillside, with a raptor centre and farm shop on the same site.

   The reliable wet-afternoon answer in north Clare, and the cheese and fudge made on site are better than they need to be.

   PlanningCave is 10C year round. Book online in July and August.

6. 06 · North-west coast, on the R479

   Doolin

   A scattered village of three pub-hamlets, the ferry pier for the Aran Islands, and the northern end of the Cliff Walk.

   The best base in Clare for music and the cliffs at good light. Sessions run most nights in season.

   PlanningBook accommodation early for June to August. The ferry to Inis Oirr takes about 30 minutes.

7. 07 · Lisdoonvarna, 10 minutes inland from Doolin

   Burren Smokehouse

   A working smokehouse and visitor centre producing oak-smoked organic Irish salmon since 1989.

   The county's flagship food producer, with a free tasting and an honest shop. The one food stop worth routing around.

   PlanningOpen year round, longer hours in summer. Vacuum packs travel home in checked luggage.

8. 08 · New Quay, on the Flaggy Shore

   Linnane's Lobster Bar

   A pier-side seafood bar looking across Galway Bay, serving lobster, crab and oysters landed alongside it.

   The most Clare lunch there is. No ceremony, no view charge, and the shellfish is a few hours out of the water.

   PlanningSeasonal hours, quieter midweek. Combine with the Flaggy Shore walk that Seamus Heaney wrote about.

9. 09 · Lahinch, west coast

   Lahinch Golf Club

   An Old Tom Morris links from 1892, remodelled by Alister MacKenzie, and one of Ireland's great championship courses.

   Exposed, quirky and beloved. The blind par three called the Dell is either the best or worst hole you will play this trip.

   PlanningVisitor tee times book months ahead for summer. A handicap certificate can be requested.

10. 10 · Between Shannon Airport and Limerick

    Bunratty Castle and Folk Park

    A 1425 tower house, fully furnished, with a reconstructed nineteenth-century village in the grounds.

    Ten minutes from the airport and the most painless first or last stop of an Ireland trip. The medieval banquet is unashamed theatre and children love it.

    PlanningAllow two hours for castle and folk park. Banquet sittings book out in summer.

11. 11 · South-west tip, 30 minutes from Kilkee

    Loop Head Peninsula

    A narrow peninsula ending in a working lighthouse, with unfenced cliffs and dolphin watching in the Shannon estuary.

    The cliffs without the car park. It is the half day people talk about when they get home.

    PlanningLighthouse tours run Easter to autumn. Bring a windproof layer regardless of the forecast.

12. 12 · County town, 20 minutes from Shannon Airport

    Ennis

    A medieval market town of winding streets built around a thirteenth-century friary, with the county's densest run of pubs and restaurants.

    The place to eat and hear music without a coastal price tag, and the practical base if you would rather have a town than a view.

    PlanningFriday market, and traditional music most nights in the town centre pubs.