Ireland’s best days out: the readers write

The Irish Times is searching for the country's most impressive visitor attractions, and we want our readers to help, by recommending great ways to spend a day in Ireland. The 200-plus entries so far have come from 23 Irish counties; only Armagh, Carlow, Derry, Fermanagh, Louth, Monaghan, Offaly, Tyrone and Westmeath are unrepresented. Here are two of the pitches. Nominate your favourite attraction at irishtimes.com/bestdayout.

Ballycroy National Park, Co Mayo

Did you know that wild gorse smells of coconut or that you can use moss as an antiseptic bandage? Have you heard the sounds of pine martens, wild geese or otters?

There can be no place more beautiful to learn such things on this island than the sparsely populated boglands of Co Mayo. Ballycroy National Park lies inland, east of Mulrany and Achill Island, and is a joy for lovers of flora and fauna.

Among lonely hills stands a modern visitor centre, with a bright cafe and art gallery and views over the mountains to the sea.

Outside, knowledgeable guides take you on a leisurely stroll along the wooden walkways and explain the medicinal values of the bog, how frogs spawn, and how the Irish mountain hare, the otter and the American mink lurk in the wild confines of the park. (The walk doesn’t have to be demanding. My 96-year-old mother did half of the hour-long walk – not a bother.)

If the Atlantic has spread its stormy self inland you can cocoon yourself in the visitor centre, where you can discover what people ate centuries ago and marvel at butter found perfectly preserved in the bogs. Multimedia technology plays the sounds of wild geese, deer, whales and gulls; short films explain how the people once lived in this remote landscape.

Upstairs is the Ginger & Wild Cafe. Tea never tasted better than when gazing at the mountains of Nephin Beg, or west to Achill Island.

John F Kennedy Memorial Park

The weather is to be good, so after a couple of texts and a phone call we aim just south of New Ross, Co Wexford, and set off in cars packed to bursting with bikes, kids, picnics, grandparents and dogs. John F Kennedy Memorial Park – one of the most beautiful places I've ever been – here we come.

We abandon the car in the car park and inhale the calm of the place. The kids head off on two wheels to the playground, and we adults stroll after them, happy in the knowledge that there is nowhere safer to let them out of sight. This is a place of climbing trees, running, hiding and jumping – and of grazed knees and the smell of suntan lotion, with no iPods, iPads, televisions or computers.

We discuss the merits of the remaining empty picnic tables and lay our blanket beside one. After John F Kennedy Memorial Park-flavoured egg and onion sandwiches we get coffees and ice creams and settle in for the day.

I look at the glowing faces on my children and think that this is what my parents saw when they looked at us running around the same trees years ago. There is nowhere more peaceful, serene, inspiring, awesome and fun for a family day out.

[ www.irishtimes.com/bestdayout ]

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