Parks & Gardens in Donegal

Oakfield Park is a 100 acre garden, that includes an award winning walled garden, ponds, a lakeside Nymphaeum, a hedge maze and many garden sculptures. Our crowning glory is a 4.5km narrow guage railway with diesel and steam trains operating daily rounds of the woodlands, flower meadows, willow tunnels and lakeside castle. There is so much to see and do, rambling the woodland walks, refreshments s…

Swan Park is a unique and invaluable amenity. Personified by its mature tree population, the Park itself is a narrow linear park extending east-west along the Crana River (An Chrannach) flowing into Lough Swilly through Castle Bridge at the river mouth, hence the towns name Bun Crannchcha, meaning ‘foot of the river Cranca’. Donegal County Councils’s Swan Park Regeneration Project has seen an e…

Established in 1972 by Mrs Jessie Mahaffy, a relative of William Robinson and a granddaughter of the forester at Lissadell, Co Sligo, Blackrock is a garden constructed completely upon rock. A charming rockery sits above the farmhouse. A grassy corridor winds between a shrubbery and a shady border to a small cottage garden where perennials are interspersed with free-seeding aquilegias, foxgloves …

This is the great garden of Donegal, much visited and yet unspoiled since it is reached by shuttle bus 4km from the Visitor Centre. The setting is starkly dramatic – at Glenveagh National Park the bare hulks of Kinnaveagh, Dooish and Staghall mountains rise above the peaty waters of Lough Veagh. The castle is placed with romantic effect at the centre where it is surrounded by its magical woodland …

Close to the coast in scenic west Donegal and surrounding a traditional farmhouse, this garden was established in 1979 in a valley on a rocky hillside surrounded by four acres of native hazel woodland with blackthorn, juniper, burnet rose, ash and oak. Native primroses, bluebells, orchids and varied ferns abound. Emphasis has been placed on the blending of nurture with nature and the provision o…