Ten sites here, and they fall into two clusters with a gap between them. Six sit within a short drive of Drogheda. Monasterboice keeps Muiredach’s Cross, a 10th-century scripture cross, beside a round tower and a graveyard still in use. Mellifont Abbey at Tullyallen, the first Cistercian house in Ireland, is now mostly foundations, though the octagonal lavabo still stands. In the town itself are St Laurence’s Gate, a twin-towered barbican of about 1280, the lone Dominican belfry at Magdalene Tower, and St Peter’s, where the preserved head of St Oliver Plunkett is kept in a side chapel. Baltray, at the Boyne mouth, adds two Bronze Age standing stones behind the links.
The rest are further north. Proleek Dolmen stands in the grounds of the Ballymascanlon hotel outside Dundalk, its capstone balanced on two slim uprights; the resort is listed separately here, though it is the same ground. Above Omeath, the Long Woman’s Grave is a roadside cairn in a mountain hollow, with old tracks running over the hills. Kildemock’s jumping church, near Ardee, sits on its own in the middle of the county, its west gable standing a few feet inside its original foundation.
Much of this costs nothing. Monasterboice is free and unstaffed, Mellifont’s grounds are free, St Laurence’s Gate can be viewed at any hour, and Proleek is open to anyone. Drogheda’s three are walkable from one another; the rest need a car, and the Cooley stops are exposed.
Muiredach's Cross is the finest of Ireland's scripture crosses, carved in the 10th century and standing free and unstaffed beside a round tower.
Ireland's first Cistercian monastery, founded in 1142 and the template for twenty daughter houses; the two-storey octagonal lavabo is the piece that survives best.
A portal tomb of around 3000 BC whose vast capstone balances on two slim uprights, with a Bronze Age wedge tomb just south-east.
Victorian parkland on the Cooley Peninsula that holds Proleek Dolmen on its grounds, free to anyone, alongside an 18-hole course and a leisure centre.
Where the Boyne meets the sea: a Tom Simpson links from 1938, two standing stones aligned to the midwinter sunrise, and a six-mile beach.
10 of 10 shown — tap a pin for the place.
Monasterboice, louth
Saint Buithe founded this monastery in the late 5th century, and it grew into a centre of learning that lasted six hundred years. Its glory now is Muiredach's Cross, a 10th-century scripture cross carved in extraordinary detail, standing beside a round tower and a graveyard still in use. Free, unstaffed, and easy to drive straight past.
Tullyallen, louth
Founded in 1142 by St Malachy, Mellifont was the first Cistercian monastery in Ireland and the template for more than twenty daughter houses. Today it's mostly foundations and low walls, but the two-storey octagonal lavabo survives, and the free grounds sit on the Boyne Valley Drive near Newgrange and the Battle of the Boyne site.
Ballymascanlon Hotel grounds, louth
Proleek Dolmen is a portal tomb dating to around 3000 BC, its huge capstone – between about 35 and 40 tonnes – balanced on two slim uprights in the grounds of the Ballymascanlon Hotel golf course near Dundalk. Local custom says a pebble that lands and stays on top earns a wish; a Bronze Age wedge tomb sits 90 metres to the south-east.
Ballymascanlon, louth
Ballymascanlon House Hotel & Golf Resort sits on 130 acres of Victorian parkland on the Cooley Peninsula, north of Dundalk. The real draw is on the grounds and free to anyone: Proleek Dolmen, a portal tomb of around 3000 BC whose roughly 35-tonne capstone balances on three slim uprights. There's also an 18-hole Ruddy & Craddock course and a leisure centre.
Baltray, louth
Baltray sits where the River Boyne meets the sea in County Louth, best known for County Louth Golf Club – the links the members just call 'Baltray', laid out by Tom Simpson in 1938 and ranked among the country's finest. Beyond the course are a pair of Bronze Age standing stones aligned to the midwinter sunrise, a six-mile beach with the wreck of the Irish Trader at its far end, and a fenced little-tern colony guarded from May to August.
Millockstown, louth
The west gable of this ruined 14th-century church near Ardee stands two to three feet inside its original foundation. Local legend says it jumped in 1715 to shut out the grave of an excommunicated man; a violent storm is the likelier cause. Either way, the clean gap is genuinely odd to stand under.
Rope Walk, louth
Magdalene Tower is the lone surviving belfry of a Dominican friary founded in Drogheda around 1224. The Ulster chiefs submitted to Richard II here in 1395, and Cromwell's cannon scarred it in 1649. It's a 20-minute stop best folded into a wider walk around medieval Drogheda.
Laurence Street, louth
St Laurence's Gate is a barbican, not a town gate – a forward defensive work that once stood ahead of Drogheda's main wall. The twin-towered structure was completed around 1280, rises about 20 m, and is the sole survivor of walls that enclosed 113 acres. It is free to view around the clock, with arrow-slits, a murder-hole and a portcullis slot still in place.
Drogheda, louth
The reason to step inside St Peter's is kept in a side chapel: the preserved head of St Oliver Plunkett, the archbishop hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn in 1681 and later canonised. Beyond the shrine, the 1884 French Gothic church has forty-plus stained-glass windows and a 222-foot spire that marks Drogheda's skyline.
Corrakit, louth
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