Southern Headlands

The Blasket Islands may be one of the most remote places in Ireland. It's located off the Souuth West Coast of Ireland and is part of the Irish Language Speaking area of Corca Dhuibhne. The village on the island was deserted in 1953 and is famous for the wide range of literature produced by the Irish speaking natives whose lives will live on forever through the documentation of the extraordinarily ordinary lives the led back when life was difficult in this remote part of the country.

The island consists of over 1,100 acres of unspoiled mountainous lanscape. An Blascaod Mór is 6.5km long by 0,8km wide. It's home to a vast range of wildlife, flowers and fauna, and has a thriving Gaelic history and life.

It's true to say that the Skellig Islands, 2 uninhabited, rocky islets off the southwestern coast of Ireland were made famous by featuring in the latest Star Wars trilogy but Skellig Michael is also known for its well-preserved early Christian monastery. The precarious, rocky site, includes stone beehive-shaped huts, oratories and crosses.

Tens of thousands of the unique puffin species breed on Skellig Michael during the warmer months. If you are a bird watching enthusiast you'll love the area with plenty of seabird breeds to spot, from Arctic terns and razorbills to the 70,000 gannets living on Little Skellig.

In the Gaelic speaking area of the South West of Ireland, the Dingle Peninsula is known as Corca Dhuibhne. It stretches almost 50 kilometres into the Atlantic Ocean on the Wild Atlantic Way. It is dominated by the Slieve Mish mountains that form its spine, running from the range to the Conor Pass and Mount Brandon, Ireland’s second highest peak. The magnificent coastline consists of steep sea-cliffs such as Slea Head, dramatic headlands broken by sandy beaches, with the award-winning beach at Inch in the south and the tombolo of Maharees to the north.

Fungie the Dingle Dolphin, as he is known as locally is a male common bottlenose dolphin who became separated from his family of wild dolphins now lives very close to us mere humans. He's not only known in Ireland, but also around the world for his playfully interaction with surfers, swimmers, kayakers and scuba divers.

The Mizen Head Maritime Museum and Heritage Attraction is a fantastic all-weather experience. The centre is perched high on cliffs overlooking the wild Atlantic Ocean. The Signal Station can be accessed by walking along a headland path, down a large flight of steps and across the famous Arched Bridge. It takes approximately 10 minutes to reach the station from the visitor centre car park. The area is renowned for wildflowers and sightings of wildlife, dolphins, seals, whales, gannets, kittiwakes, choughs. The north-south bird migration flight path is only a mile off the coast here.

To the south, visitors can see the Fastnet Rock Lighthouse also known as Ireland's Teardrop and is the last landfall that many emigrants would have seen as the left famine ridden shores for America. One of Guglielmo Marconi's first telegraph stations was located at the Mizen Signal Station back in 1931. Nowadays, visitors can learn about the history of the area, the people who lived here, manned the lighthouses and the early years of Safety at Sea, Wireless Signals, Racon, GPS and DGPS. Coaches and Bus Tours welcome.

The Gaelic for Dursey Island is Oileán Baoi, which is translated to Island of the Bull in old Viking Norse. Located on the Beara Peninsula, it's one of the only inhabited islands off the Southwest Coast of Ireland and is separated from the mainland by a narrow, rocky, treacherous stretch of water called the Dursey Sound. It is a very peaceful place, with only a handful of semi-permanent residents, no shops, pubs or restaurants and is connected to the mainland by Ireland's only cable car!

The landscape is practically treeless due to the exposure to strong winds and the salty sea spray. Visitors can hike a 9km loops walk which has wonderful sea views and a quantity of antiquities of interest to visit including standing stones, an early monastic settlement and an impressive signal station from Napoleonic times.