POSTED FROM

CASLA

CO. GALWAY · IE

Casla
An Casla, Co. Galway

The Wild Atlantic Way
STOP 05 / 06

An Casla · Co. Galway

The village where the Irish-language airwaves come from, where the road to Carraroe splits off, and where a Titanic ghost story sits in a Lutyens lodge by the water.

Casla, An Casla in Irish and Costelloe in the older spelling, is a small Gaeltacht district on Cashla Bay in south Connemara, about 42 kilometres west of Galway city on the R336 coast road. The name is read as a twisting sea inlet, and also tied to the gCaislé sept said to have held the ground between here and Carraroe long before the Norman Costellos of Mayo ever turned up. The population is small, a few hundred spread across the townlands, and Irish is the working language, not the second one.

It is, above all, a junction. The R336 comes in from Inverin and the east and carries on west toward Rossaveal harbour; at Casla the R343 forks south for Carraroe and the islands district. That fork is the whole point of the place geographically. But the village punches above its size for one reason: RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta has broadcast from here since 1972, and the national headquarters of the Irish-language station is still in the village. For a place this small, that is a remarkable thing to own.

The other thing Casla owns is a ghost story. Costelloe Lodge, by the water south of the junction, was designed by Edwin Lutyens with a garden by Gertrude Jekyll, rebuilt in 1925 after the original fishing lodge was burned in 1922 during the Civil War. J. Bruce Ismay, the White Star Line chairman who got into a lifeboat the night the Titanic went down and was hounded for the rest of his life for it, came here to fish and to be left alone. He died in 1937. The lodge is private and still privately owned, a protected structure, and you see it only from the road - but the story sits on the bay all the same.

Come if you are routing to the Aran Islands and want to understand where you are before the boat. Come if you care about the Irish language and want to stand outside the building the airwaves come from. Do not come for restaurants, sessions every night, or mountain drama - that is further into Connemara. What Casla offers is honest: a junction, a radio station, a pub, a lodge with a famous unhappy man's name on it, and salt water all the way round.

Population

~400 (small Gaeltacht district)

Walk score

Junction to the bay shore in ten minutes

Coords

53.2122° N, 10.0956° W

01 / 07

At a glance.

Three things every local will eventually mention. Read these and you've already understood more than most day-trippers do.

01 The voice

RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta has broadcast from Casla since 1972.

The Irish-language radio station went on air from here on 2 April 1972, a station built by the Gaeltacht for the Gaeltacht. The national headquarters is still in the village. When the news is read in Irish across the country, this is where it starts.

Stories & lore → 02 The junction

Where the R336 meets the R343 and the road to Carraroe begins.

Casla is a fork in the coast road. The R336 carries on west toward Rossaveal and the Aran ferry; the R343 turns south for Carraroe and the islands district. A working junction, not a scenic one. Most traffic is passing through to somewhere else.

Getting there → 03 The lodge

Costelloe Lodge - a Lutyens house with a Titanic shadow over it.

Sir Edwin Lutyens designed the lodge and Gertrude Jekyll laid out the garden, rebuilt in 1925 after the original was burned in the Civil War. J. Bruce Ismay, chairman of the White Star Line who survived the sinking of the Titanic, retreated here to fish until his death in 1937. Private. You see it from the road.

Stories & lore →

02 / 07

The pubs.

None of these are themed Irish pubs, because they don't need to be. A few that earn the trip:

Tigh Kitt

Irish first, locals first

Local bar, Derrynea / Costelloe

Also signed as O'Flaherty's Bar / Tigh Kitt, out at Derrynea on the Casla road. The pub people in the district mean when they say the pub - a long-standing local with the talk in Irish and a welcome that warms once you are recognised. Music turns up some nights rather than to a schedule. Small, plain, real.

03 / 07

Stories & lore.

The reason to come back. The things every local will eventually tell you about, usually after the second pint.

RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta, since 1972

The Irish airwaves start here

On 2 April 1972, RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta went on air for the first time from Casla. It was a station the Gaeltacht had agitated for and partly built itself - an Irish-language service for Irish-language communities, with major studios later added in Gaoth Dobhair in Donegal and Ballydavid in Kerry, but the main headquarters here in Connemara from the start. More than fifty years on it still broadcasts from the village. For a place of a few hundred people, owning the voice of a national language is no small inheritance. The building is working radio, not a visitor centre, but knowing it is there changes how you hear the place.

Costelloe Lodge, Lutyens and Jekyll, and the Titanic

Ismay's exile by the bay

J. Bruce Ismay bought the fishing lodge at Casla in 1913, the year after the Titanic sank under the company he chaired. He had survived the night in a lifeboat and was pilloried for it across two continents for the rest of his life. He came to Connemara to fish the Casla River and to be out of the way. The original lodge was burned in 1922 during the Civil War; the house you see now was rebuilt in 1925 to a design by Sir Edwin Lutyens, with gardens laid out by Gertrude Jekyll, in a low rendered-limestone Arts and Crafts manner under long slate roofs. Ismay died in 1937. The lodge is privately owned and a protected structure - admire it from the road and leave the family that lives there in peace.

Irish is the working language

An Gaeltacht

Casla sits in the heart of the Conamara Gaeltacht, the largest Irish-speaking region in Ireland, where the language is spoken by choice in the shop, the pub and the home. The road signs give the Irish first because Irish is what is used. This is not a heritage performance for visitors; it is ordinary life. The radio station is the loud part of it, but the quiet part - two neighbours talking outside the shop in a language that has held this coast for a thousand years - is the part worth slowing down for.

04 / 07

Things to do outside.

Wear waterproofs. Bring a sandwich. Tell someone where you're going if it's the mountain.

Cashla Bay shore Casla sits at the head of Cashla Bay, the long sheltered inlet that runs down to Rossaveal. There is no formal looped trail, but the quiet shore roads off the junction give you rock, salt water, low bog and the bay opening toward the Atlantic. Boots, not runners - the verges are wet. The reward is the south Connemara light, which is the real thing.

2-3 km, out and backdistance

45 minutestime

The Costelloe Lodge road South of the junction the road runs down past the grounds of Costelloe Lodge toward the water. The house is private and screened, so this is a road walk for the view of the bay and the river mouth rather than the building. Pleasant on a still evening with the tide coming in. Stay on the public road.

1-2 km returndistance

30 minutestime

05 / 07

When to go.

There is no bad time. There are different times.

Spring

Mar-May

Quiet, the light clean off the bay, the ferry schedules from Rossaveal settling into summer rhythm. A good time to have the coast roads to yourself.

◉ Go

Summer

Jun-Aug

The Aran ferry traffic builds through Casla toward Rossaveal, and the islands district at Carraroe fills with Irish-college teenagers. Casla itself stays quiet; accommodation around the wider district books well ahead.

◐ Mind yourself

Autumn

Sep-Oct

Gold light, the bay clear, the crowds gone, the ferry still running most days. South Connemara at its best and most itself. Locals favour it.

◉ Go

Winter

Nov-Feb

Atlantic weather comes hard across the bay and the Rossaveal ferry can cancel for days. Short light. The radio station and the pub keep going; not much else does.

◐ Mind yourself

06 / 07

What to skip.

Honestly? Don't bother.

If a local was sitting beside you, this is the bit where they'd lean in.

Expecting a village centre

Casla is a junction and a scatter of townlands, not a tidy main street with shopfronts. There is no square to stroll. Adjust the expectation: you are here for the road, the radio station, the lodge story and the bay, not for a postcard streetscape.

A restaurant scene

There is not one. The pub and the basics are the village; the proper eating and the nightly trad are at Spiddal and Carraroe, or back in Galway city. Plan meals accordingly rather than arriving hungry expecting a menu.

Getting into Costelloe Lodge

It is a private home and a protected structure, not a visitor attraction. Do not go up the drive. The Lutyens lines and the Ismay story are yours to enjoy from the public road and nowhere closer.

Getting there.

By car

Galway city to Casla is about 50 minutes west on the R336 through Barna, Spiddal and Inverin. At Casla the R343 forks south for Carraroe; the R336 carries on west, with the spur to Rossaveal ferry harbour about 10 minutes further on.

By bus

Bus Éireann route 424 runs from Galway city out along the Connemara coast through Casla. Services are timed to the coast and the ferry rather than a frequent city timetable, so check before you set out.

By train

No railway. The nearest station is Galway (Ceannt), on the Dublin line. From Galway it is bus or car west.

By air

Ireland West Airport (Knock) is about 2 hours by car. Shannon is about 2 hours 30 minutes. Galway city is 50 minutes east.