I moved to Ireland from Germany in 2017 and spent four of the years since living in Kerry, working as a photographer around the country's coast, castles and mountains. Most of what pays the bills is hotels and tourism boards. The mornings before a shoot and the days off in between are when I find the places nobody sends anyone to, and after this long I have a working list of hidden gems in Ireland I keep coming back to.
The Cliffs of Moher will have hundreds of people on the path by ten in the morning. Forty minutes away there is a headland with nobody on it at all.
These ten are not secret exactly. They are just far enough off the main routes that the coaches never arrive.
Most of the places below sit in Your Ireland Guide alongside another sixty or so, with the access notes, parking and light timings I use myself.
Have a look herePortacloy Cliff Walk, County Mayo
North Mayo gets skipped almost entirely. Everyone drives from Sligo to Achill and misses the stretch in between, which is some of the most dramatic coastline in the country.
Portacloy sits on a small natural harbour with a loop walk running out along the cliffs above it. There is a World War Two lookout post up there, and painted into the ground near it, the old EIRE 63 sign, one of the markers that told wartime aircraft this was neutral ground. It is a strange, quiet thing to come across on a clifftop with nobody else around. Go for sunset and bring a jacket you trust. There is very little shelter.
McDermott's Castle, County Roscommon
A ruined castle on a small wooded island in Lough Key, in the middle of Lough Key Forest Park. Built by the McDermott clan in the twelfth century, knocked down by lightning at one point, and now wrapped in enough ivy that it reads as more forest than building.
You cannot walk to it. The forest park runs boat tours out to the island, or you can shoot from the shore, and a kayak rental gets you closer again. If you are flying a drone, check in with the park office first, since it sits inside a managed forest park rather than open countryside. Early morning or sunset is when the ivy and the stonework actually separate from each other in the light, and misty mornings make the whole thing look like it was built for a different century.
Doe Castle, County Donegal
On a low promontory near Creeslough with water on three sides and a rock-cut moat on the fourth, Doe Castle is one of the better-preserved tower houses in the north west and gets a fraction of the visitors Donegal's better-known sites do. It was the MacSweeney clan's home for close to two centuries.
The grounds are open daily with free admission, and there is a small car park with well-maintained paths in, so this is one of the easier hidden gems in Ireland to actually reach. Guided tours of the tower are available if you ask. The setting does the work either way: the approach across the neck of land, the water, the hills behind. Sunset is when the stone actually warms up.
Derrynane Beach, County Kerry
Derrynane sits on the Ring of Kerry, so it is not unknown, but almost everybody drives past the turn-off. Those who stop tend to stay near the car park and miss the walk out towards Abbey Island, which is where it gets good.
At low tide you can walk across to the island and the ruined abbey sitting in the dunes. At high tide you cannot, and people do get caught out, so check the tide before you set off. The water here turns a colour that looks more like the Mediterranean than the Atlantic on a clear day, which still catches me out after all this time in Ireland.
Binevenagh, County Derry
A basalt escarpment above the Roe Valley, climbing to around 385 metres above the coastal plain, with the view running out over Lough Foyle and Magilligan's dunes towards Donegal. A road runs almost to the top, which makes it an unusually easy return for the effort, and a quiet artificial lake sits on the plateau behind the clifftop. Fans of a certain fantasy series may recognise the grassland up here: it stood in for the Dothraki Sea for one season.
The catch is weather. Binevenagh sits high enough to be sitting in cloud when the coast below it is perfectly clear, so check conditions before the drive up, not just the forecast for the town at the bottom.
Ballaghbeama Gap, County Kerry
A narrow mountain pass cutting straight through the middle of the Iveragh Peninsula while the Ring of Kerry traffic goes around the outside, so this stays empty. I would take it over the Gap of Dunloe most days, and I have driven both more times than I can count.
It is single track with limited passing places, so this is not a road to take a large hire car through in a hurry. Go slowly, use the pull-in points, and take your time on the stretch where the rock closes in on both sides. That is the reason to come.
Sturrall Ridge, County Donegal
A knife-edge headland near Glencolumbkille running about two hundred metres out into the Atlantic. Park at the Church of Ireland in Straid, on the Glencolumbkille road, and walk down towards Beefan on the paved road until it turns into a footpath.
The trail past that point is unmarked, so a downloaded map is worth having, and the round trip runs to roughly seven kilometres over uneven ground. This is genuinely exposed terrain in wind, and the viewpoint partway along is the sensible objective for most people rather than the ridge itself.
Three Castle Head, County Cork
Out at the end of the Mizen Peninsula, above a lake, sit the ruins of Dunlough Castle: three towers connected by a curtain wall, dating back to 1207. The land is privately owned, but the owner allows access, and there is a proper car park with a short, scenic walk in past Lough Dunlough to the towers.
Drones are not allowed here, which is worth knowing before you drive out. Good footwear helps, the ground is rough, and it is at its best when the weather is doing something, since flat sunshine takes most of the atmosphere out of it. Save it for a day that looks like it might turn.
Ballysaggartmore Towers, County Waterford
Two elaborate Gothic gate lodges in woodland near Lismore, built in the 1830s for a grand house that was never finished. The landlord who commissioned them ran out of money, or nerve, before the mansion itself went up, so all that survives is the entrance he built for it.
It is a short, easy walk from the car park, quiet even in summer, and completely unlike anything else on this list. Overcast suits it, since the woodland canopy makes harsh sun difficult to work with, and autumn puts real colour through the trees around it.
Castle Saunderson, County Cavan
Cavan is one of the least photographed counties in Ireland, which is reason enough to go. Castle Saunderson is a Tudor Gothic ruin rebuilt in the 1840s where the River Finn meets Lough Erne, on the site of an older O'Reilly stronghold. Colonel Edward Saunderson, a founding figure of Irish Unionism, was its most famous resident.
A fire in 1990 gutted the interior, and the ivy-covered shell now sits inside an active Scout centre, so it is worth checking access before you go and staying well clear of the unstable walls once you are there. Soft, overcast light suits the Gothic mood of the place, and the river gives you reflections to work with if the water is still.
