Cahore Beach Cliff Walk location

Cahore is about 20 minutes south of Courtown. The village of Cahore is best known as a fishing and holiday destination.

The starting point of the Cahore walk

We started the cliff walk at the pier here. There was lots of parking when we arrived but it was a cold windy December day.

As we parked at the pier and we brought a buggy with us (there are steps at the start) we walked back up the road to the strand Cahore restaurant and started our walk beside the coffee shop.

About the Wexford Cliff Walk

• Very Good path over 2 meters wide and perfect for a buggy.

• The walk is 2.5km out and back

• There are Great views of the coast filled with wildlife, beach and Cahore beach

• No large drops, it’s relatively safe for small kids

• Food is available at the start/end. The kids loved being able to get hot chocolate at the end of the walk. We were too early for the Pizza :(

• Lots of parking on the pier and the Strand restaurant

• Beach section optional- You can walk down to the beach at the turn around point

• Loop walk option is also available

• Buggy Friendly- One of our children is 2 years old and is out of her hiking bag and the buggy but the buggy is still being used.

Would we recommend the Cahore Cliff walk?

Yes, this cliff walk is perfect for families, our children are 4 & 2 years old at the minute and they loved this walk. At the end of the walk, you can walk down to Cahore Beach or just return the way you came.

Our Instagram Reel of our Cliff walk

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We read about the Jean Kennedy Smith walk in Oulart the Ballagh in the Irish Independent newspaper. It was voted the top historic walk in Ireland. It is a 30-minute drive from where we live and believe it or not we have never heard of this walk before. Well, what a hidden gem, it was such an enjoyable walk. And talk about picking the right time to do it, we walked through the village just in time to see the Parade and marching band for the unveiling of Mise Eire.

About OULART HILL and this Wexford Walk

It is an 11.5km looped walk that will bring you past a number of very interesting sights like Tulach a’t Solais on the top of Oulart Hill which consists of a grassy burial mound cut in half by a narrow passage that leads to a modern chamber. Oulart Hill was a scene of a United Irishman victory in 1798. The monument was erected to commemorate the battle. Along the walk, there are lovely viewing points of the countryside and Father Murphy’s grave, the bygone day’s storytelling house and also the tree of Liberty that Jean Kennedy Smith planted on her visit here in 1995.

We started the walk at the large carpark up the road from the church. Keep driving straight on the road until you see a large 1798 memorial stone at the entrance of the carpark.

The path is signposted and it cuts between a grass ditch and a field. The trail provides great panoramic viewing points with information signs detailing hills and historic locations in the distance, this is great for people that are not from the area.

Tulach a’t Solais Wexford Family Walk

We walked through a young small wooded area to be greeted by an amazing monument called Tulach a’t Solais on Oulart Hill. The monument was built to commemorate the 1798 rebellion and Jean Kennedy Smith turned the first sod of the building in 1999.

After taking many pictures around the monument we continued walking the blue loop. We continued down the back of the monument into a pine tree wooded area. At the end of the pine forest, we came to the edge of someone’s house and backyard but the signs pointed us through the yard. We sheepishly nudged and egged each other through the yard hoping that we were not intruding on someone’s privacy.

After passing through the yard we then crossed a busy main road and walked onto an old skinny horse and cart lane that was grown over. I’m sure 100 years ago this road was a hive of activity especially on market days in the town.

The hike then progressed to another busy road which we crossed to see the Jean Kennedy Smith monument, this town in Ireland is tiny in the scale of things, it’s amazing to think that Jean Kennedy Smith visited here.

We continued walking down another horse and cart trail but this time it was more overgrown than the last one and full of stingy nettles (not good for shorts). We walked out of the overgrown cart track onto another main road leading into the town but this time there were police at the exit.

We could see in the distance a large crowd and the road was closed off, we continued walking the trail and came up to the crowd. There was a marching band, and a parade full of people dressed up in 1798 army gear (We picked a good time to do this Wexford hike).

We started walking back toward the middle of the town and passing all the music and marching army folk, it made for an entertaining hike. We walked back to the church that we passed on our drive up to the carpark. We continued walking on this road until we arrived at the carpark where we started.

The verdict of Oulart Hill walk and the Jean Kennedy Smith trail

It was a very nice walk with an outstanding memorial at the start on Oulart Hill. There was a lot of road walking but the roads were very quiet and most of them were too small to fit cars on. Take care when crossing the busy road sections.

The Tulach a’t Solais on Oulart Hill is a monument that needs to receive greater publicity, as it is simply amazing and totally free.

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Tara Hill is a hill dominating the landscape over Gorey, Court town and Castletown. Tara hill is only 253m high but as it sits beside the gorgeous Wexford coastline it provides extensive panoramic views of the sea and distant larger mountains. Tara hill village seems like a small Irish village with the usual small Irish town facilities. Tara Hill hike is perfectly situated as it is only a 10-minute drive off the N11 road, which is the main road from Wexford and Dublin. This hike can provide a perfect 45-minute break from the monotony of motorway driving.

Tara Hill looped Hike Start Point

We did the usual thing of just putting’Tara hill’ into google maps to find the location, occasionally, this doesn’t work and it brings us to the wrong location but this time it brought us straight to the starting point of the intended hike. We took exit 22 from the N11 motorway, for Gorey/Inch and drove towards Gorey on the R722 until we got to the road junction L5032 road for Ballymoney or the Seafield hotel. We continued on this road for about 4-5 km and turned left at a Y junction with a sign for Tara hill on a stone. We drove 1 km up the road then took the next left. We continued driving up the hill until we seen the Tara hill lopped walk signs.

There is a small car park at the start of the hike that fitted about 3-4 cars maximum, so try to come early. As we walked, we saw that there was another car park available closer to the village beside the national school. We were lucky and parked the car safely in the one small remaining space at the start of the blue hike.

The sign for the Tara hill hike shows two possible routes, the red lopped walk, and the blue looped walk.

• The red loop is 5km and goes around the base of the hill.
• The blue loop is 5.4km goes up the hill and gives amazing views.

When we go hiking we always seem to go instinctively for the longest and highest hike and this hike was no different, we decided to go for the blue looped walk. We started walking from the car park following the signpost going up the small cul-de-sac residential lane. This part of the walk was very quiet, with no traffic to worry about, as we gained elevation we started to get views of the sea and the lovely Wexford coastline.

We walked to the end of the tarmac lane where the blue and red loop split, the blue loop enters the wood and has 4-5 large rocks entering a cleared forestry.

Within 1-2 minutes of walking into the forestry, the trail will gain in elevation quickly. The trail will follow a zig-zag pattern up to the top of the blue looped.

There is a small seating area among a rocky area of the trail that provided us with the best views of the day. When we hiked this walk there was a bad wind chill so we didn’t hang around here too long as it was quite exposed. This seated area would be perfect to relax and take in the amazing Irish landscape, as the views don’t get much better than this.

After this seating area, we continued further up the hill, we came to a T junction but unfortunately, the signpost was knocked down. We stood there and tried to guess which was the right direction but I think we guessed the wrong route. We continued straight ahead until we came to another T junction where we could see windmills in the Sea in the distance. There was another blue arrow pointing us right at this junction, we followed it and started walking downhill again.

This was another nice section of the hike as we were walking towards the sea views, the cold winter wind was behind our backs and the forestry has been replanted with eucalyptus trees. We walked downhill for a couple of kilometers unaware that we had taken a wrong turn somewhere.

Halfway through the downhill section, we had a small picnic but as it is winter and VERY cold we just kept walking and eating. Our little hiker LOVES mandarin oranges at the minute so we all had some fruit to keep our energy levels up.

We continued walking downhill until we got to an open yellow metal barrier but there were no more Blue arrows to be seen, only one red arrow pointing into the wood. We walked down to a carpark at the bottom of the lane about 50m away but there were no more blue arrows to be seen here either. We walked back to the Red arrow sign, which cut through the bottom of the wood on a muddy footpath, we followed this sign as we knew it would bring us back to the start.

We walked on the muddy path until we came to a farm gate, which also brought us onto a small country lane but thankfully the red arrows were very consistent at this stage of the trail.

Like most small hikes in Ireland, there will be a section of road walking and the Tara hill hike was no exception. This section was on a very tight country road with limited stand in sections when cars came, the road was very busy when we were walking it, we probably met 5-6 cars in the 500-600 meters of road.We didn’t mind this too bad as this section of the trail brought us past Tara village Catholic church, which we walked in around to admire the building.

We were delighted that the church doors were open as we always love walking into churches for a quick break. The church is called Saint Kevins and was built between 1939-1941. St Kevin’s church is a small church which gives it a very welcoming warm feeling. The Christmas nativity scene was still up when we visited and our daughter seemed very impressed when we gave her a closer look at all the detail. The church had amazing vaulted ceilings with exposed beams and is well worth a visit when hiking this trail.

We walked back out of the church and walked towards the junction beside the national school, where we saw another Red sign. We continued past the national school up the hill on a footpath where there was another carpark, which the red loop could be walked from.

We continued up the road but the footpath quickly disappeared and we were back to walking on the side of a very small busy country road, this section might not be suitable for a pram. Another Red sign appeared about 1km on this road and we turned onto an even smaller road which was another cul-de-sac and was very quiet.

Turn left here onto a cul-de-sac

This small cul-de-sac road starts to rise sharply and follows the edge of the side of the hill contours, the road starts to turn muddy but also becomes very sheltered as the hill is now to our side and it blocks the cold sea air.

This was a very enjoyable section of the walk as it was reasonably flat and it felt like we were walking through the middle of the Wexford countryside, you could nearly imagine these roads were used with horse-drawn carts maybe a century ago.

The grassy country lane continued for another couple of kilometers and was slightly overgrown but this added to the character of the hike. The lane then turned back into a tarmac road again which quickly revealed our car around a corner.

Conclusion of our Tara Hill Hike

To be honest, when we set out to do the Tara hill hike we didn’t have high expectations, as we couldn’t find much information online about it. As we got lost it was hard to give an accurate distance but we clocked it at around 7.5km with the mixture of the Blue and Red looped walks, this took us 2 hours to complete but we had a lot of stops and breaks to admire the views when we could.

The hike has amazing views and is nicely challenging without the need to climb a larger mountain. Boots are necessary for winter, I’d imagine you would get away with hiking shoes in summer as there were only a few areas that had mud in the depths of winter. If you are passing Gorey and need a break this hike is a must, and we highly recommend it.

There were only a few problems we found with the hike;

• Signposting was very poor and sporadic in places
• Where we parked it was only limited to 3 cars
• Road walking for a couple of Km’s on very tight roads.

The issues above would not stop me from recommending this hike.

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