A wood with a long memory
For centuries this ridge above Stradbally held one of Ireland’s great medieval manuscripts. The Lebor na Nuachongbála, the Book of Oughaval, was kept at the monastery here before it moved to Trinity College Dublin, where it survives as the celebrated Book of Leinster. The monastery itself was founded in the late 6th century by St Colman mac Ua Laoighse, a disciple of Colmcille. Its stone church stood into the 18th century, when the stone was robbed to build a mausoleum; the graveyard is still in use today.
Oughaval (Coill na Nuachabhála, “wood of the new settlement”) covers more than 150 hectares of beech and oak on a limestone ridge, part of the Stradbally Hill Natural Heritage Area and once part of the Cosby estate of Stradbally Hall, whose old estate walls still run through the trees. Entry is free.
Cobbler’s Castle and the Mass Rock
Two features are worth the walk. Cobbler’s Castle is a folly, a mock castle with a castellated silhouette, built between 1845 and 1848 during the Great Famine as relief work for starving tenants, on the site of a pre-Christian fort. It never defended anything; it was made-work, and it is one of the county’s more striking famine relics.
Hidden in the middle of the wood is a Mass Rock, where Catholics worshipped in secret during the Penal era, roughly 1691 to 1727, when saying Mass was outlawed. A stone cross was put up here in 1957, and an altar and seating were added for the Millennium in 2000. Mass is still said at the rock on occasion.
There is a modern coda too. Around 1994 a Russian Orthodox chapel dedicated to St Colman was built nearby in the Stradbally Hall demesne, quietly reviving the wood’s ancient patron.
The walks
Coillte maintains three waymarked loops from the car park, each marked with a white arrow on a red background. If you have only half an hour, do the Mass Rock Walk (2 km, moderate), the one that actually reaches the altar. The Beech Way (2 km, 30 minutes) runs through the tallest beech, planted between 1938 and 1941. For the folly and the best of the wood, take the Cobbler’s Castle Walk (6 km, about 1 hour 15 minutes), which climbs around 129 m and turns muddy after rain, so wear proper footwear.
The beech and oak bring badgers, foxes, squirrels and woodland birds, and in late March and early April the floor fills with bluebells and primroses, the prettiest and busiest time to come. There are no toilets or refreshments on site, though there are picnic tables by the car park, so bring what you need.
Getting there
From the centre of Stradbally, head south-east on the N80 for about 2 km; the free Coillte car park is on the left. Portlaoise is about 20 km away, and Dublin roughly an hour and a half. Public transport is thin: Bus Éireann stops in Stradbally town, but there is no bus to the wood, so you will walk or drive the last stretch.
Nearby
Oughaval links into the Laois Heritage Trail and the Laois Monastic Trail, which take in Aghaboe Abbey and the Rock of Dunamase. A short drive north is Emo Court, a neoclassical house with walled gardens, and Stradbally Hall, which hosts the annual Steam Rally.