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COLLON

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Collon
Collann

The Ireland's Ancient East
STOP 05 / 06

Collann · Co. Louth

A planned Georgian estate village four kilometres from the first Cistercian abbey in Ireland.

Collon is a Georgian estate village on the N2, halfway between Slane and Ardee, sitting on a low ridge above the Mattock river. Just under nine hundred people, three pubs, a Church of Ireland church designed in 1810 by Daniel Augustus Beaufort, a red-brick mill chimney from the 1860s on School Lane, and a long stone-walled boundary on the west side of the road that is the demesne of Collon House.

The whole place is a Foster project. Anthony Foster, Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer, built the house around 1740. His son John — born here, MP for Dunleer, then Louth, then Speaker of the Irish House of Commons from 1785 until the Act of Union swept the Parliament off the map in 1800 — extended the house, laid out the streets, brought in linen weaving, and planted the oak woods that the family was famous for. He was a forester before there was a word for it. After the Union he retreated up the road to Oriel Temple, his folly by a small lake, and lived out his years there until he died in 1828.

The reason most people come is what is four kilometres south of the village. Old Mellifont — the first Cistercian abbey on the island, founded by St Malachy of Armagh in 1142 — is the OPW site that gives Collon its standing on any Boyne Valley itinerary. New Mellifont, the working abbey on Speaker Foster's old grounds at the edge of the village, has been a Cistercian house again since 1938. Two abbeys, eight hundred years apart, four kilometres of road between them.

Don't come for a checklist. Come for an hour at the ruined cloister at Old Mellifont, an afternoon walking the demesne, dinner and a bed at Collon House if you have booked weeks ahead, and a slow pint at Stanley's afterwards in a bar that has been pouring them since 1896.

Population

~896 (2016)

Pubs

3and counting

Walk score

End to end of the village in fifteen minutes

Founded

Planned estate village, Foster family from 1744

Coords

53.7786° N, 6.4811° W

01 / 09

At a glance.

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

01 Mellifont

The first Cistercian house in Ireland, founded 1142.

Old Mellifont Abbey is four kilometres south. St Malachy of Armagh founded it in 1142 — the mother house of every Cistercian abbey on the island. Ruined cloister, the lavabo octagonal and roofless, the Treaty of Mellifont signed here in 1603. OPW site.

Stories & lore → 02 The Fosters

A planned village built around one family.

The Foster family took the estate in 1744. Anthony built Collon House around 1740; his son John — Speaker Foster, last Speaker of the Irish House of Commons — extended it in the 1770s and laid out the linen industry that fed the village. The plan of the place is theirs.

Stories & lore → 03 New Mellifont

A working Cistercian abbey, re-established 1938.

On the edge of the village, a community of Cistercian monks from Mount Melleray took over Speaker Foster's old retreat at Oriel Temple in 1938 and made it back into an abbey. Full abbey status 1945. The monks are still there.

Walks & outings →

02 / 09

The pubs.

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

Stanley's Bar

Old, settled, local

Village pub, since 1896

On Main Street, the longest-running of the three. Dark wood, a stove in the corner, regulars at the bar most evenings. The kind of village pub where the conversation drops a beat when a stranger walks in, then resumes. Pints poured properly. No food to speak of.

Watters Bar

Quiet, weekday

Pub, since 1954

The other end of Main Street. Smaller, plainer, the local for whichever houses are nearest. Useful if Stanley's is full or the regulars at Stanley's are not in the mood for company. Closes early on a weeknight.

Donegan's

Weekend trade

Village pub

The third bar. Livelier at weekends than the other two, occasional music nights, a younger bracket of locals. If a session is going to happen on a Saturday in Collon, it tends to happen here.

A note on Slane

—

Five minutes south

If you want a bigger night out, Slane is ten minutes south on the N2 — Boyle's, Coyne's, the hotel bar at Conyngham Arms. Drinking in Collon is village drinking; for music and a crowd, drive.

03 / 09

Where to eat.

Place	Type	€	Local note
Collon House	Country-house dinner, by arrangement	€€€	Dinner at Collon House is served in the panelled dining room, by booking, for groups of six or more. The room is the original 1740 panelling, the silver is family, the cooking is a single set menu of whatever is best that week. If you are staying you may get a seat regardless. Otherwise, gather six and book ahead.
Forge Family Restaurant	Roadside diner on the N2	€	On the N2 at the southern edge of the village. All-day breakfast, carvery at lunchtime, fries-and-burger plates the rest of the time. Truckers, locals, families on the way to Drogheda. Not a destination but it does the job and it does it from early.
A note on Slane and Ardee	Out of town	—	Collon is not a restaurant village. For a proper sit-down dinner, drive ten minutes south to Slane (Tankardstown, the hotel) or fifteen minutes north to Ardee (Nosh, Brian Muldoon's). Plan into the trip rather than against it.

04 / 09

Where to sleep.

Place	Type	Local note
Collon House	Georgian guesthouse, 4 rooms	The proper stay. Speaker Foster's own house, four bedrooms with four-poster beds, period antiques, a panelled dining room and a sunken box garden out the back. Rates around €225–€255 a night for two with breakfast. Member of the Hidden Ireland circuit. Book weeks ahead — the house is not big and word has long got around.
New Mellifont Abbey guest accommodation	Monastic guesthouse	A small guest wing at the working Cistercian abbey on the edge of the village. Quiet stays, not silent retreats — the monks welcome guests but the rhythm is theirs. Plain rooms, daily Office available, simple food. Contact the abbey directly. Not a tourist hotel; do not turn up expecting one.
B&Bs around Tullyallen and Slane	Country B&Bs, ten minutes	A handful of working B&Bs and farmstays between Collon and the Boyne — easier to find a Friday-night room here than in the village itself. Useful if you are doing the full Boyne Valley loop by car and want to stay near Mellifont and Newgrange.

05 / 09

Stories & lore.

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

Old Mellifont, founded 1142

St Malachy and the first Cistercians

Malachy of Armagh, returning from a trip to Clairvaux where he had stayed with Bernard, brought four French monks back with him in 1142 and gave them a piece of the Boyne valley four kilometres south of the present village. Mellifont — Latin font of honey — was the first Cistercian abbey on the island. By 1170 it had a hundred monks and three hundred lay brothers, and was the mother house of every Cistercian foundation in Ireland. The 1152 Synod of Kells-Mellifont was held here. The abbey survived four hundred years until Henry VIII's commissioners closed it in 1539. The 13th-century lavabo — the octagonal stone basin where the monks washed before meals — is the most photographed ruin in the Boyne valley.

The last Speaker of the Irish House of Commons

Speaker Foster

John Foster, born at Collon House in 1740, MP for Dunleer at twenty-one, MP for Louth from 1768, Chancellor of the Irish Exchequer 1784–85, then Speaker of the Irish House of Commons from 1785 until the Parliament voted itself out of existence in 1800. He opposed the Union to the last vote, and never quite forgave Pitt or his own colleagues for it. He kept the original Speaker's mace; the Foster family held onto it for nearly a century afterwards. Created Baron Oriel of Ferrard in 1821, died at Collon in 1828. The village laid out around his house is his other monument.

A folly that became a working abbey

Oriel Temple and New Mellifont

Around 1780 Speaker Foster built a small temple-like retreat by a lake at the edge of his demesne and called it Oriel Temple. After the Act of Union he moved out of the big house and lived there for the rest of his life. The estate passed in time to the Massereene family, then in 1938 — with backing from Cardinal MacRory — was bought by a community of Cistercian monks from Mount Melleray Abbey in Waterford. They re-established a monastery on Foster's old grounds, four kilometres from the original Mellifont, and called it New Mellifont. Full abbey status came in 1945. The community is still there.

The Industrial Revolution in a Louth village

Collon House and the linen mill

Anthony Foster built the house in the Irish longhouse style around 1740. His son extended it in the 1770s with a ballroom, a master four-poster bedroom, and second-floor rooms for the children and the governess. The Speaker also brought linen weaving to Collon, importing Protestant weavers and putting up a mill on what is now School Lane. The freestanding red-brick chimney from the rebuilt mill of around 1860 still stands. The mill itself is gone; the chimney, like the house, is the village's argument against being forgotten.

06 / 09

Things to do outside.

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

Old Mellifont Abbey site Not a walk from Collon proper but the obvious one. Drive four kilometres south on the R168, park at the OPW site, and walk the ruined cloister, the chapter house, and the octagonal lavabo. The visitor centre opens seasonally; the ruins are accessible year round. Combine with Monasterboice round towers ten minutes further on the same road.

1 km loopdistance

1 hourtime

Monasterboice round towers Eight kilometres south-east of Collon. The 10th-century round tower, the great west cross of Muiredach (one of the finest high crosses in Ireland), and a small graveyard still in use. Open and free. A natural pairing with Mellifont on the same afternoon.

1 kmdistance

45 mintime

New Mellifont Abbey grounds The working abbey at the edge of the village allows visitors to walk the grounds during daylight hours. Peaceful rather than scenic. The lake that gave Oriel Temple its setting is in here. Be quiet, behave like a guest, and the place repays you.

2 kmdistance

40 mintime

Beaulieu and the Boyne Down the R168 to the river at Drogheda, then east along the Boyne to Beaulieu House and gardens — the oldest unfortified house in Ireland, occasional opening — and on to Baltray and the coast. Not a Collon walk, but the natural day-trip out of it.

20 km drivedistance

Half a daytime

07 / 09

When to go.

There is no bad time. There are different times.

Spring

Mar–May

Mellifont is at its best in April, the Mattock river is full, the demesne walls have wild garlic at the foot of them, and the village is back to normal. The OPW site re-opens for the season around Easter.

◉ Go

Summer

Jun–Aug

Long evenings, the abbey ruins photograph well, the Boyne Valley sites combine easily with Collon as a base. Collon House books up — call ahead at least a month out for weekends.

◉ Go

Autumn

Sep–Oct

October light on the Mellifont stone is what twelfth-century stonemasons were aiming at, even if they didn't know it. The pub fires come back on at Stanley's. The locals' season.

◉ Go

Winter

Nov–Feb

The OPW visitor centre at Old Mellifont closes for the winter, though the ruins themselves stay open. Short days. The pubs and Collon House stay open. A wet Saturday at Mellifont with no one else there is the version of Collon people remember.

◐ Mind yourself

08 / 09

What to skip.

Honestly? Don't bother.

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

Driving past on the N2 without stopping

Most traffic is heading for Slane or Ardee and treats Collon as a stretch of straight road between them. Pull off at the village, walk Main Street, look at the demesne wall, and you have spent ten minutes on a place that has been arranging itself for nearly three hundred years.

Confusing Old Mellifont with New Mellifont

Old Mellifont is the OPW ruin four kilometres south. New Mellifont is the working Cistercian abbey at the edge of the village. They are different places, eight hundred years and four kilometres apart. Tour-buses sometimes get this wrong. Now you don't have to.

Treating Collon House as a hotel

It is a four-bedroom Georgian guesthouse run as a private house. Dinner is by arrangement, not by walking in. Book ahead, behave like a houseguest, and you get the version of Speaker Foster's house no plaque can deliver.

Getting there.

By car

Dublin to Collon is 50 minutes on the M1 to junction 9 (Slane/Donore), then north on the N2 for ten minutes. Or off the M1 at junction 14 (Dunleer/Ardee) and west on the N33/N2. Belfast is 1h 10m via the A1/M1.

By bus

Bus Éireann route 100 (Dublin–Derry) stops in Collon on the N2 several times daily, about 1h 10m from Dublin Busáras. Local Link runs to Drogheda and Ardee on weekdays.

By train

No train. Nearest station is Drogheda on the Belfast–Dublin Enterprise line, twenty minutes south on the M1.

By air

Dublin Airport (DUB) is 50 minutes by car. Belfast International (BFS) is 1h 15m. Most visitors fly into Dublin.