Markethill is what happens when a Scottish family gets a thousand acres of Armagh in 1610 and decides to plant a town around the cattle market. The Achesons were the family. The market was the point. Four hundred years later the mart's still going three days a week, and the family - by then the Earls of Gosford - left the castle in 1921 and the apartments in it now belong to whoever could afford one.
The thing to understand about Markethill is that the village is small and the demesne behind it is enormous. Gosford Forest Park is 240 acres of drumlin, woodland, walled garden and red deer, and it's all open to the public for a few quid at the gate. The castle in the middle of it is one of the earliest Norman-revival buildings on this scale in Ireland - Thomas Hopper, 1819, granite from Mullaglass quarry up the road. It's been a country seat, a wartime prison camp, a derelict ruin and now a set of private flats. Game of Thrones used the outside as Riverrun. Most of the people walking past the front door don't know that and don't care.
Come for the forest, stay for a bowl of soup in the Village Inn, drive on. Or come on a Saturday in early August when the Vintage Vehicle Club takes over the park with tractors, threshing machines and lawnmower racing. That's the year's big day.
Three things every local will eventually mention. Read these and you've already understood more than most day-trippers do.
Thomas Hopper started it in 1819 for the 2nd Earl of Gosford - one of the earliest Norman-revival castles in Ireland, on the scale of a small town. Now flats. The grounds are public.
Stories & lore → 02 Swift slept hereJonathan Swift came up from Dublin in 1728, 1729 and 1730. Wrote 'The Grand Question Debated' about Hamilton's Bawn down the road. He liked Lady Acheson. Lord Acheson he tolerated.
Stories & lore → 03 The martMarkethill Livestock Sales runs cattle on Tuesday and Saturday, sheep on Monday. Forty-five years and counting. The town is named for the market - that part isn't a metaphor.
Walks & outings →None of these are themed Irish pubs, because they don't need to be. A few that earn the trip:
103-105 Main Street. The kind of place where the staff know what you want before you order. Soup-and-wheaten lunch is the move.
44 Main Street. A drinking pub, not a gastro pub. The drinks are cheap and the welcome is warmer than the décor suggests.
91-93 Main Street. The third pub. Quieter than the other two on most nights.
| Place | Type | € | Local note |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Buttery | Steakhouse | ££ | Round the back of the Village Inn. Steaks, a cocktail list, sticky toffee at the end. The smartest table in the village. |
| Courtrooms Restaurant | Restaurant | ££ | 7 Main Street. In the old sessions house - hence the name. Sunday lunch is the one to book. |
| Village Inn kitchen | Pub food | £ | Soup, wheaten bread, ravioli, the daily roast. Honest plates at honest prices. If The Buttery's full, eat here instead. |
The reason to come back. The things every local will eventually tell you about, usually after the second pint.
Wear waterproofs. Bring a sandwich. Tell someone where you're going if it's the mountain.
There is no bad time. There are different times.
Bluebells under the oaks at Gosford. The deer have calves. Lambs in the fields outside town.
The Vintage Rally takes over the park on a Saturday in early August. That weekend the village is busy. The other weekends it isn't.
The arboretum is the whole reason to come in October. Russet, copper, gold, the lot.
The forest park stays open but the days are short. Castle apartments don't do tours. Plan a half-day, not a full one.
If a local was sitting beside you, this is the bit where they'd lean in.
The castle is private apartments now. There is no tour. You can walk up to the front of it and admire the granite - that's the visit.
It's twenty seconds of screen time on the show. Come for the forest, get the Game of Thrones bit as a bonus.
It was demolished in 1731 to build the barracks Swift's poem argued about. The barracks is gone too. There's a townland and a village called Hamiltonsbawn, and that's it.
Markethill is on the A28, 8 miles south-east of Armagh city and about 10 miles north of Newry. Free parking on Main Street and at Gosford Forest Park (small entry fee for the park).
Translink Ulsterbus 251 runs Armagh-Markethill-Newry several times a day. About 20 minutes from Armagh.
Belfast International is 50 minutes north. Dublin Airport is about 90 minutes south on the M1/A1.