Parks & Gardens in Donegal

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…

A secluded and peaceful garden of many parts. Visitors enjoy a warm welcome from the owner and new additions surprise the regular visitor. This is a plant-lovers paradise where modern varieties of shrubs and herbaceous plants rub shoulders with old favourites and where the non-gardener may sit and be charmed by the views across Donegal Bay. Admission: €5 to Fields of Life well-drilling proje…

Although May and June are usually the best months with the most colour and variety, there is always something in season: from the snowdrops to the autumn colours and winter-flowering cherry. The house and garden have existed for several centuries. There are many rhododendrons, azaleas and camellias, large areas of snowdrops, daffodils and bluebells and beautiful walks through young and mature bro…

The Celtic Prayer Garden is Ireland’s only such garden and is set in six acres of natural bog land, approximately 10 minutes out of the city centre of Derry. Here we invite you to step back in time to an Ireland of saints and scholars, a people who had a very strong sense of creation, a robust attitude to religious practice and who believed in a close relationship with nature. Walk back in t…

The country estate garden of Glenalla is a hidden world surrounded by native woods and moorland. Established in the late 18th century with extensive landscaping by the Franklin family since 1913. Beyond the house and walled kitchen garden are the formal elements of the rockery, rose beds, arbour and stone edged lily pond. There are collections of rhododendrons together with summer and autumn flow…