Baile an Ghearlánaigh / Cill Sárain · Co. Louth
A Bellingham estate village on the old N1, with a castle that became a hotel.
Castlebellingham-Kilsaran is a twin-village on the old Dublin-Belfast road, halfway between Dundalk and Drogheda, just east of the M1 at junction 16. Roughly 1,100 people across the two townlands, a 17th-century castle on the green, a Norman-era ringfort under a field nearby, and a name that travels further as a brand than as a place. Most of the traffic on the M1 goes past now, which is the best thing that ever happened to the place.
The village was Gernonstown from the 14th century - named for an Anglo-Norman family. Around 1710 the surrounding settlement took the name of the Bellinghams, who had bought it from Cromwell, and Castlebellingham it has been since. The estate village you see now is the work of Sir Alan Henry Bellingham in the late 19th century, who laid out the green, built almshouses for widows, and put inset biblical panels and quotations on the village houses - features that are unique in Ireland. Read the upper facades as you walk.
Don't come for nightlife, and don't come expecting to eat or drink at the castle - Bellingham Castle is an exclusive-hire wedding and events venue, not a walk-in hotel. Come instead for a pint at P.J. Byrne's on Main Street where the Byrnes have been pouring for over a century, an hour walking the green reading the religious quotations on the houses, and the river path down to the weir. If you want a story, drive five minutes north to Dromiskin to see the round tower, or five minutes east to Annagassan for lunch at the Glyde Inn and the Viking longphort site. Castlebellingham is a base. The interesting things are around it.
