Lower Shannon Estuary

Downstream from Kilrush, the first stop is to anchor in decent holding and admire the castle at Carrigaholt. You can have a drink as well if you've a mind to, but my own choice for an exciting pint will always be the partially open anchorage of Kilbaha a couple of miles inside Loop Head. Here, with the Atlantic shouting around the corner, you will find two pubs, one of which promises the last pint before New York. Its barmaid, who pulls a pint that could claim to be the finest in Ireland and has a smile to match, comes of Irish parents, was raised in England, lived much of here life in America and now tends bar on the ocean's edge. How could a sailor drink anywhere else?
Before you enter Kilrush Marina for the last time to complete your Shannon Estuary cruise, you must choose your evening and anchor off Scattery. Row ashore after dark when the visitors have returned to their hearth fires, and wander among the ruins. Venus might be setting over America, and far up the estuary will ride the lights of today's economy. But as you stand inside the round tower and watch the rising moon filter through the slit windows that warded off the Norsemen a thousand years before, you'll know that in the west, the past and the future all somehow run into one.
And then it's back into the shelter of the marina and the warm hospitality of John Hehir and his friendly staff, back to the returning vitality of Kilrush and a song accompanied pint and the best of craic in the lively pubs where you are reminded that Clare is Ireland's most musical county. And Kilrush is the place where the new life of County Clare is manifesting itself, with its traditional horse fair and ancient tunes vibrantly interacting with the vigour which has been brought by this fine harbour development.  Back to Intro