Heritage Week Family Day at Dún na Sí Heritage Park

Dún na Sí Amenity and Heritage Park in Moate opens its National Heritage Week programme on Saturday, 15 August 2026, with a free family open day built around traditional rural skills. Visitors can watch creel making, a once-essential handwoven basket used throughout rural Ireland, and join hands-on workshops covering St Brigid’s Cross making and willow weaving, alongside guided tours of the park’s heritage trail running through the day.

What to expect

The open day runs through the park’s usual mix of reconstructed historical buildings, including a hedge school, a forge, a dolmen and a stone circle, with the heritage skills demonstrations and workshops added on top for the week. As part of the same programme, the park also runs a Wild Child Day nature workshop, where children aged six and over explore the park’s turlough, a seasonal lake that appears and disappears with the water table, hunting for insects and wildflowers with nets, hand lenses and bug jars. That session meets outside the park cafe at 2pm and is free, though registration is required and organisers ask that children come in wellies or old shoes suitable for wet ground.

Getting there

Dún na Sí is on the Lake Road at Aghanargit, on the edge of Moate, just off the N6 roughly midway between Athlone and Kilbeggan. Parking costs €2 for the day, or visitors can arrive on foot or by bike via the Old Rail Trail Greenway, which passes close to the park.

While you’re in Moate

Moate’s Main Street, with its cafes and library, is a short drive from the park, making it easy to combine the open day with a stop in the town itself. There is more to see in Moate and across Co. Westmeath.

Good to know

• When: Saturday, 15 August 2026, park open from 10am; Wild Child Day workshop meets at 2pm
• Venue: Dún na Sí Amenity and Heritage Park, Lake Road, Aghanargit, Moate
• Price: free; Wild Child workshop is free but requires registration
• Recurrence: annual, part of National Heritage Week
• Accessibility: bring wellies or old shoes for the Wild Child workshop, ground can be wet