The old penitential roads to Brandon, Glendalough, Croagh Patrick, Lough Derg and Gougane Barra, walked again: where each starts and ends, how long it is, and the saint it is linked with in tradition.
In 1997 the Heritage Council started a Pilgrim Paths Project on seven medieval routes. Pilgrim Paths Ireland was founded at a meeting in Nenagh in 2013 as an umbrella body for the volunteer groups behind the paths; it is non-denominational and represents twelve community groups. The first National Pilgrim Paths Day, on 19 April 2014, drew more than 1,700 walkers, and the second, in 2015, more than 3,000. (Wikipedia, "Pilgrim Paths of Ireland" ↗)
Pilgrim Paths Ireland's own account: early Christians came to Clonmacnoise, medieval penitents to Lough Derg and Glendalough, and others to Skellig Michael and Croagh Patrick, yet until recently the penitential trails saw few walkers. (pilgrimpath.ie ↗)
The Saints' Road · County Kerry · 18 km
From Ventry Strand (Cill Mhic an Domhnaigh) to Ballybrack, at the foot of Mount Brandon
Saint: St Brendan the Navigator. Tradition: The pilgrimage to Brandon is said to be older than Brendan: Pilgrim Paths Ireland says the pagan god Crom Dubh was "reputedly ousted from the mountain" by the saint, and Wikipedia notes the speculation that it began as a Lughnasa ritual.
The medieval route went on to Séipéilín Bréanainn, Brendan's Oratory, on the summit. The waymarked trail, laid out under the Heritage Council's 1997 Pilgrim Paths Project, stops at Ballybrack for safety; the mountain is steep and prone to mist. On the way: Gallarus Oratory and the church, ogham stone and holy well at Kilmalkedar. The start at Ventry is one of the places where pilgrims would have come ashore.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗ · Wikipedia, Mount Brandon ↗
the hill of the wells (Knocknadobar) · County Kerry · 9 km
From The car park at the foot of the mountain, near Cahersiveen to The summit (690 m)
Saint: St Fursey (Fursa). Tradition: A well at the foot of the mountain is dedicated to St Fursey and is known as a cure for the eyes. Both sources describe the mountain as a place of Lughnasa gatherings before Christianity.
Fourteen Stations of the Cross line the ancient trail, put up by Canon Brosnan of Cahersiveen; Pilgrim Paths Ireland dates them to 1885, Wikipedia to 1884–85. The route takes about 3.5 hours (Wikipedia). It is the most recent path added to the Pilgrim Paths list.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗ · Wikipedia, Knocknadobar ↗
County Cork · 35 km
From The Top of the Rock, Drimoleague to Gougane Barra
Saint: St Finbarr of Cork. Tradition: Local tradition has it that Finbarr came to the Top of the Rock in the sixth century and called the people back to Christ before going on to Gougane Barra, where he is said to have built a monastery on the island in the lake.
Pilgrims from West Cork and South Kerry have walked to Finbarr's hermitage at Gougane Barra for centuries. The Drimoleague route was revived in 2008 and crosses three mountain ranges and four valleys (the Ilen, Mealagh, Ouvane and Lee). The ruined hermitage on the island dates from about 1700.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗ · Wikipedia, Gougane Barra ↗
Slí Chaoimhín · County Wicklow · 30 km
From Hollywood (or Valleymount, joining at Ballinagee Bridge) to The monastic site at Glendalough
Saint: St Kevin of Glendalough. Tradition: The route follows the way Kevin is said to have crossed the mountains to found Glendalough in the sixth century; medieval pilgrims then came to his tomb.
Crosses the Wicklow Gap, the highest point, where flagstones of the old pilgrim road still show in places, then follows the Glendasan River down into Glendalough. Usually walked in a day.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗ · Wikipedia, Saint Kevin's Way ↗
Patrick's causeway · County Mayo · 35 km (30 km in Wikipedia)
From Ballintubber Abbey to Croagh Patrick
Saint: St Patrick. Tradition: Leads to the mountain of Patrick's legendary fight with the devil's mother and the demon birds. It has been suggested that the road first ran from Cruachan, seat of the kings of Connacht; both sources call this a possibility, not a fact.
Pilgrims register at Ballintubber Abbey, founded in 1216, before setting out. Pilgrim Paths Ireland gives 35 km; Wikipedia's Croagh Patrick article gives 30 km and about ten hours. On the way: the cup-marked boulder at Boheh known as St Patrick's Chair, probably Bronze Age, and Aghagower, with a round tower, holy well and "St Patrick's Bed". This was the main way up the Reek before most pilgrims switched to the Murrisk side.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗ · Wikipedia, Croagh Patrick ↗
County Waterford and Tipperary · 115 km
From Ardmore to Cashel
Saints: St Declan of Ardmore, St Patrick. Tradition: Tradition has Declan walking from his monastery at Ardmore to Cashel to meet Patrick, where it was agreed that Declan would keep authority over the Déise and Patrick would be primate of all Ireland. Pilgrim Paths Ireland calls Declan, in the view of many historians, the first Christian missionary to preach in Ireland; that is a claim, and a contested one.
Fully upgraded and re-opened in October 2021. Wikipedia notes an annual walk, nicknamed the "Irish Camino", from 24 to 28 July, begun in 2013.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗ · Wikipedia, Declán of Ardmore ↗
County Donegal · 12 km · loop
From Station Island Visitor Centre to The lakeshore opposite Saints Island, and back
Saints: St Patrick, St Brigid of Kildare. Tradition: Legend says Christ showed Patrick a cave on Station Island that was an entrance to Purgatory. Wikipedia notes there is no proof Patrick ever visited, and that the legend probably dates from the twelfth century.
Follows the old pilgrim road not to Station Island, where pilgrims go today, but to Saints Island, its gateway several hundred years ago. It passes St Brigid's Chair, St Daveoc's Chair (linked with a local hermit, and perhaps a Bronze Age burial place, Pilgrim Paths Ireland suggests) and St Brigid's Well. The three-day pilgrimage on Station Island itself runs from late May or early June to 15 August; the cave was closed on 25 October 1632.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗ · Wikipedia, St Patrick's Purgatory ↗
County Clare · 8 km · loop
From Rath church car park, near Corofin to St Tola's church and high cross, Dysert O'Dea, and back
Saints: St Blathmac, St Tola. Tradition: Rath church is on a monastic site attributed to Blathmac in the sixth century, and the earthen fort beside it is "reputed" to be his birthplace; Dysert is attributed to the eighth-century St Tola. Local tradition puts a "Blackwater Abbey" near the holy well, but only a mound marks it.
About 2.5 hours. Passes a cillín, a holy well (Tobar Oireachta, a cure for the eyes), and ends at St Tola's church with its Romanesque doorway, 12th-century round tower and high cross.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗
County Louth and Kildare · length not published
From Dundalk to Kildare
Saint: St Brigid of Kildare. Tradition: Traces the route Brigid is said to have taken from Dundalk to found her monastery at Kildare.
Pilgrim Paths Ireland describes a five-day organised walk in June 2024, with daily stages of 10 to 15 km; it gives no total length, and names Dundalk as the start but no precise starting point.
Sources: Pilgrim Paths Ireland ↗
Pilgrimages in their own right, not on Pilgrim Paths Ireland's list of paths.
Cruach Phádraig · County Mayo · length not published
From Murrisk to The summit (764 m)
Saint: St Patrick. Tradition: Patrick is said to have fasted forty days on the summit. The folklorist Máire MacNeill thought the pilgrimage older than Christianity, a Lughnasa ritual.
Thousands climb on Reek Sunday, the last Sunday in July, some barefoot; Pilgrim Paths Ireland puts the crowd at around 30,000. Until 1970 the climb was traditionally made after dark. The separate Croagh Patrick Heritage Trail, a National Waymarked Trail, runs 61 km from Balla to Murrisk in about three days.
Sources: Wikipedia, Croagh Patrick ↗ · Wikipedia, Croagh Patrick Heritage Trail ↗ · See also Reek Sunday
County Donegal · length not published · loop
From Glencolmcille to Fifteen stations around the glen
Saint: St Colmcille. Tradition: The glen is named after Colmcille.
Every 9 June, Colmcille's feast, local people make the round of fifteen stations. It begins at a court cairn built about 3000 BC: the pilgrim goes round it three times sunwise, praying, then with back to the stone renounces the World, the Flesh and the Devil (Wikipedia). We have not found a published length.
Sources: Wikipedia, Glencolmcille ↗ · See also Patterns and rounds
Launched by Pilgrim Paths Ireland at Easter 2016, it is stamped at the end of each of five paths: Cosán na Naomh, Cnoc na dTobar, St Finbarr's Pilgrim Path, St Kevin's Way, Tóchar Phádraig. Walkers who finish all five can apply for a Pilgrim Certificate, the Teastas Oilithreachta, from Ballintubber Abbey. Wikipedia gives the five paths together as 124 km in one article and 125 km in another.
Of the paths here, St Declan's Way (115 km, Waterford and Tipperary). Pilgrim Paths Ireland calls Tóchar Phádraig "the longest of the surviving pilgrimage roads", meaning the old roads that survive on the ground.
Pilgrim Paths Ireland holds it at Easter; the first National Pilgrim Paths Day was 19 April 2014, and it became a week in 2016.
Saints and feast days · Pattern days · Holy wells, county by county · Reek Sunday · Abbeys, priories and friaries