Things to do in County Westmeath

Athlone Castle is a military fortress overlooking the River Shannon, and occupies a strategic gateway between east and west Ireland. The castle has an imposing position in the town centre. Athlone Castle is an imposing defensive castle in Athlone town with views over the River Shannon and the town of Athlone. The castle was extensively fortified during the Napoleonic years with strong towers and keep. There is a visitor centre in the guardhouse, which provides tourist information and souvenir shop. Parts of the walls that remain from the original medieval castle are enclosed behind glass to preserve them. Athlone Castle is a national monument. Facilities The museum inside the castle features audio visual presentations and waxwork exhibits of local and historical interest. Displays include the Siege of Athlone in 1690-1691 by Williamite troops, the Military History of Athlone which displays various soldier uniforms, John McCormack the famous tenor from Athlone. The local history section is housed in the polygonal shaped keep, with exhibits of plant and animal life of the River Shannon. Athlone Castle museum and visitor centre is closed for major renovation in 2010 and is scheduled to re-open in 2011. The first Norman castle on the site was built around 1210. Most of the original medieval castle has disappeared, and most of the buildings on the site today was built in Napoleonic times. Athlone Castle has been a military base for over 300 years, and was still used by the Irish army until 1970. The barracks dating back to 1697 is the oldest functioning barracks in Europe. The Old Athlone Society opened the museum in the castle in 1967.

Belvedere House near Mullingar in County Westmeath is a mid-eighteenth century villa and pleasure grounds on Lough Ennell, renowned for its rococo-period landscape and the extraordinary Jealous Wall, the largest sham ruin in Ireland, built to block the view of his brother's house after a bitter family feud by Robert Rochfort, the first Earl of Belvedere. The story behind its construction, involving the long imprisonment of Robert's wife, adds a dramatic human dimension to the pleasure grounds. The demesne includes extensive walled gardens, woodland walks, an animal sanctuary and lake views. Managed by Westmeath County Council, Belvedere is one of Ireland's most distinctive heritage gardens.

Fore Abbey in County Westmeath is one of the most atmospheric and most completely preserved medieval monastic sites in the Irish Midlands, a Benedictine priory of the thirteenth century set in a wooded valley below the Fore Hills whose combination of the substantial surviving church, chapter house and anchorite's cell, the tranquil lakeside setting and the extraordinary series of seven wonders associated with the site creates one of the most rewarding monastic heritage visits in the midland counties. The Seven Wonders of Fore are a medieval tradition of improbable natural or miraculous features associated with the monastery. The monastery was founded as a Benedictine house in the thirteenth century on the site of an early Christian church traditionally attributed to St Feichin in the seventh century, and the current buildings represent the principal period of Benedictine occupation from the thirteenth to the sixteenth centuries. The church, the chapter house, the cloister foundations and the refectory are all identifiable in the substantial ruins that survive above the valley floor in unusually good condition for a midland Irish monastery. The Seven Wonders of Fore, which include water that won't boil, a mill without a millrace and a tree that won't burn, reflect the medieval tradition of associating monastic sites with miraculous phenomena that demonstrated divine favour. The anchorite's cell in the tower above the valley, where the last occupant is said to have been walled in voluntarily, provides the most dramatically human connection to the monastic tradition of this unusual and rewarding site.

Tyrrellspass Castle in the village of Tyrrellspass in County Westmeath is a well-preserved tower house and bawn maintained by the Office of Public Works, built by the Tyrrell family who gave their name to the village. The castle includes an unusual semi-circular bawn tower adding to its architectural interest, and forms the centrepiece of the attractive planned estate village of Tyrrellspass, a Georgian settlement with a distinctive semicircular layout of church, crescent of cottages and tree-lined green. The nearby Belvedere House and Gardens on Lough Ennell, with its famous gothic Jealous Wall, provides one of the most distinctive country house experiences in the region.