Overview
The Drowes opens for salmon on 1 January, and most years it lands the first Irish salmon of the season – the reason a knot of anglers turns out on the coldest morning of the year while the rest of the country is nursing New Year’s Day. It’s a short river, roughly five miles (8 km) from Lough Melvin down to the Atlantic just outside Bundoran, fed steadily by the lake and broken into more than 70 named pools. The lake behind it, Lough Melvin, holds the sonaghan – a brown trout subspecies that grows to about 2.5 lb and lives nowhere else on earth – alongside salmon, char, ferox and gillaroo.
If you only have half an hour and no rod, park free at Lareen Estate and walk down to the bridge: the water is clear, the banks are quiet, and you’ll have the place largely to yourself outside opening week.
Fishing the river
The season’s headline is the 1 January opening, a fixture that reliably produces Ireland’s first salmon of the year and pulls a good crowd for the first fish. The main run builds through spring and early summer, and the river turns out over 1,000 salmon in a typical year. Grilse give lively sport from late May into July; brown trout and gillaroo are here too.
The top section, from Lough Melvin down to Four Masters Bridge, is reserved for guests staying in the Lareen Park cottages. The rest fishes on day tickets, with the most reliable public access at Four Masters Bridge, Lennox’s Bridge and Tullaghan Bridge. Fly, spinning and bait are all permitted.
Permits and licences. A day permit is €25, a week €100, a season €300. On top of the permit you also need a State salmon licence (a one-day licence is €36, 21-day €50). Buy online at drowessalmonfishery.ie – it’s the easy option, because the Fishery Office at Lareen Park, Kinlough, only opens for two one-hour windows a day, 9–10am and 1–2pm.
The estuary
Below Bundrowes Bridge the river opens into the Drowes Estuary, three tidal pools running down to the sea. This water is run by a separate syndicate and it’s tightly rationed: only six permits a day, split into a day session (8am–5pm) and an evening one (6–10pm). At high spring tides you can watch salmon making their final push in from the sea. If you want to fish it, arrange it well ahead – six rods a day sells out fast in the summer.
The sheltered pools and low cliffs draw coastal birds; grey herons and kingfishers are regular, and the whole stretch is quiet enough for an unhurried walk.
History on the banks
The river has a genuine claim to a place in Irish scholarship. Between 1632 and 1636, a group of Franciscan friars including Mícheál Ó Cléirigh compiled the Annals of the Four Masters – the great chronicle of medieval Ireland – at a refuge near the river at Bundrowes, having been driven from Donegal Abbey. It’s an unshowy spot for one of the foundational texts of Irish history, with nothing but a river and a few fields to mark it.
Walking and staying
The riverside walk runs from Lough Melvin down towards Bundoran, crossing several old bridges through woodland and open meadow – easy going, with frequent pull-offs. Parking is free on the Lareen Estate grounds for anglers and walkers alike.
Lareen Estate, which runs the fishery, also lets 11 holiday cottages on the river year-round, with boat hire on Lough Melvin included in the fishing packages. Bundoran’s surf schools and promenade are ten minutes down the road, and Mullaghmore’s beaches and horse-riding are a short run north.
Practical information
- Season: salmon 1 January – 30 September.
- Permits: €25 day / €100 week / €300 season, plus a State salmon licence. Buy online rather than chasing the office’s two daily hours.
- Estuary: separate syndicate permit, six rods a day, day and evening sessions – book ahead.
- Getting there: the estuary is about a 10-minute drive from Bundoran; Bus Éireann serves Bundoran, and Donegal Airport (CFN) is roughly 30 km east.
Check the tide tables before heading for the estuary – the fishing and the fish movement both swing hard with the tide.