Connemara continues north past the glacier-carved fiord of Killary Harbour.
Clifden's Sky Road loop is a scenic drive-within-a-scenic-drive – take the upper road for a dizzying panorama of the cragged coast. North of the music-filled pubs and quaint painted shop fronts of Galway, the rugged, sheep-flecked Connemara region is crowned by Clifden, its 'capital'. This storybook-pretty village neighbours the town of Crooke – in 1170, Strongbow (Robert FitzGilbert de Clare, earl of Pembroke) reputedly instructed his men to land ‘by Hook or by Crooke’ on his way to capture what's now the thriving port city of Waterford. On the western side of the Hook Peninsula, it's a five-minute crossing by car ferry from Ballyhack, dominated by a 15th-century castle, to the thatched fishing village of Passage East. Its jagged southern tip, Hook Head, is capped by the black-and-white-striped, 13th-century Hook Lighthouse (the world’s oldest working lighthouse) and cloaked by sea spray. Southwest of the Viking-founded town of Wexford, the Ring of Hook road circumnavigates the wind- and wave-swept Hook Peninsula. Wexford to Waterford via Hook Head (95km) The valley's two teal-blue lakes flank the road east towards the Midlands hub of Portlaoise. Many of its medieval buildings are still intact. Turning east here takes you past the precipitous, wooded Glendalough valley, sheltering Ireland's finest monastic settlement, founded in the 6th century by St Kevin. The road winds through Wicklow Mountains National Park before descending to the leafy village of Laragh.
Sweeping vistas over the surrounding blanket bog unfold from the Sally Gap mountain pass. At the foot of the mountains, Powerscourt Waterfall (Ireland's highest), surrounded by beech, oak and pine trees, makes an idyllic picnic stop. The bustling Irish capital of Dublin gives way to wild, remote countryside in the Wicklow Mountains. Dublin to Portlaoise via the Wicklow Mountains (138km) Turn off the main thoroughfares to discover Ireland’s most scenic stretches of asphalt with these five picturesque routes. And while state-of-the-art main roads and motorways now link its cities and towns, there are some spectacular alternatives. The Emerald Isle is renowned for its spellbinding scenery.
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