Drummin, An Dromainn, Co. Mayo

An Dromainn · Co. Mayo

A ridge village south of Westport, under Croagh Patrick, on the old pilgrim road through the last of the Atlantic oakwood.

Drummin is a small ridge village about fifteen kilometres south of Westport, on the high hilly ground under the southern side of Croagh Patrick. The Irish is An Dromainn - the ridge - and the place is honest to it: winding lanes, scattered farms, long views down to Clew Bay and the islands. It is not a town and it does not pretend to be one. There is a church, a national school, a pub, and the country around them.

What it has that the bigger places do not is the old road and the old wood. The Tochar Phadraig, the pilgrim causeway to Croagh Patrick, passes through the parish and through Brackloon Wood beside it. The wood is the headline: one of the last good stands of native Atlantic oakwood in the west, restored over the last few decades by Coillte, with a quiet looped walk through oaks that are descendants of the trees the O'Malleys would have known. There is a stone ringfort hidden in the middle of it.

The area was O'Malley country - the elevated ground gave Granuaile, Grace O'Malley, the pirate queen of Clew Bay, the long sightlines down to Clare Island and the bay she ruled. The Famine emptied a lot of these townlands, as it did across rural Mayo, and the population never fully came back. What stayed is a working parish and a landscape that rewards anyone willing to leave the Westport-to-Leenane road and go up the lanes.

Use it the way the locals and the pilgrims do: as a base for the wood, the Tochar, and the climb. Westport for everything else is twenty minutes north. Don't come expecting a village centre with shops and cafes - come for the trees, the road, and the mountain at the end of it.

Population

Small rural parish (a few hundred across the townlands)

Pubs

1and counting

Walk score

A church, a school, a pub. The real walking is in Brackloon Wood and on the Tochar.

Founded

National school here since 1849; church and pilgrim road far older

Coords

53.6950° N, 9.6100° 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 name

"The ridge" - An Dromainn.

Drummin is An Dromainn, the ridge, and it earns the name: high, hilly ground south of Westport with long views down to Clew Bay and out to Clare Island. The land that made it useful to a pirate queen also makes it good to stand on.

Stories & lore → 02 The mountain

At the foot of Croagh Patrick.

The Reek is the landmark for the whole area. Drummin sits below its southern flank, about fifteen kilometres south of Westport, and the old pilgrim road - the Tochar Phadraig - runs through the parish on its way to the holy mountain.

Walks & outings → 03 The wood

Brackloon - a surviving Atlantic oakwood.

Next to Drummin is Brackloon Wood, one of the largest remnants of native Atlantic oak woodland left in the west of Ireland. Oaks a couple of centuries old, a stone ringfort buried in the trees, and a marked loop through it all. This is the reason to stop.

Walks & outings →

02 / 07

The pubs.

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

The village pub

Rural local

Traditional public house, Drummin

Drummin has one public house, the social centre of a small scattered parish. It is a traditional country pub rather than a destination bar - the kind of place that does its real business with locals and the odd walker coming off the Tochar or out of the wood. For a fuller choice of pubs, music and food you are looking at Westport, about twenty minutes north. (Campbell's at the foot of Croagh Patrick, on the Murrisk side, is the famous pre-and-post-climb pub, but that is across the mountain, not in Drummin.)

03 / 07

Stories & lore.

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

O'Malley country above Clew Bay

Granuaile's high ground

The ridge that gives Drummin its name was part of the territory of the O'Malleys, the seafaring clan whose most famous member was Grainne Ni Mhaille - Granuaile, Grace O'Malley, the pirate queen of sixteenth-century Clew Bay. The high ground here matters for one reason: sightlines. From the ridge you can see down to Clare Island, where she kept a castle, and across the whole sweep of the bay she controlled. Her power was built on knowing what was coming in off the Atlantic before anyone else did, and ground like this is where that knowledge came from. The view is still the view. The castles are on the islands now, not the hill, but the reason the hill mattered has not changed.

The pilgrim road to the Reek

The Tochar Phadraig

The Tochar Phadraig, Patrick's Causeway, is an ancient pilgrim path to Croagh Patrick that runs through Drummin and Brackloon. It predates Christianity: the route once stretched all the way east to Tulsk in County Roscommon, linking it into the pre-Christian ritual landscape, and was later adopted as a Christian pilgrim road to the holy mountain. The modern revived pilgrimage walk runs from Ballintubber Abbey to the summit of the Reek, and Drummin's stretch is part of it. You are walking ground that has carried pilgrims, and before them something older, for thousands of years. It is the kind of continuity that does not announce itself - just a marked path through fields and the oakwood, with the mountain ahead.

Atlantic oakwood, restored

Brackloon Wood

Brackloon Wood, beside Drummin along the Owenwee River off the N59, is one of the largest surviving fragments of native Atlantic oak woodland in the west of Ireland - around 74 hectares of it. The oaks are 150 to 200 years old, descendants of the woods that once covered most of the country. In the 1960s conifers were planted in under the oak canopy; Coillte, the state forestry company, has since felled them and replanted native trees from local seed, restoring the wood toward what it was. Hidden in the middle is a cashel, a stone ringfort about 25 metres across, and scattered through the area are fulachta fiadh, prehistoric cooking pits. A wood with this much time in it, this close to a road, is a rare thing.

04 / 07

Things to do outside.

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

Brackloon Wood Loop The walk to do here. A gentle marked loop through the restored Atlantic oakwood, starting from the wood's entrance off the N59 around six kilometres south of Westport. Native oaks, the Owenwee River, the stone ringfort in the interior if you go looking. Part of the route shares the Croagh Patrick Heritage Trail waymarking - the walking-man logo and yellow arrows. Good in any season; the wood is at its best in late spring and in autumn colour.

4 km loopdistance

1 hour to 1.5 hourstime

Tochar Phadraig (Drummin stretch) The pilgrim road from Ballintubber Abbey to Croagh Patrick passes through Drummin and Brackloon. Most people do not walk the whole Tochar - it is a serious all-day undertaking ending in a mountain climb - but the stretch through here, on old ground through the parish, is walkable on its own. Check the Croagh Patrick Heritage Trail and Ballintubber Abbey for the current waymarked route and access before setting out.

Part of a 35 km pilgrim routedistance

Full route is a long daytime

Up onto the ridge The lanes above the village climb onto the high ground that gives Drummin its name, with the views down to Clew Bay, Clare Island and Croagh Patrick that made the ridge worth holding. No formal trail - this is road and lane walking. Boots, a map, and respect for farm gates and livestock.

Variesdistance

An hour or twotime

05 / 07

When to go.

There is no bad time. There are different times.

Spring

Mar-May

Brackloon Wood comes into leaf and the oakwood floor greens up. The Tochar pilgrim season builds toward summer. Long views off the ridge on a clear day.

◉ Go

Summer

Jun-Aug

Best for the walking and for climbing the Reek nearby. Reek Sunday, the big Croagh Patrick pilgrimage, falls on the last Sunday in July and brings the whole area to life. Westport is busy; Drummin stays quiet.

◉ Go

Autumn

Sep-Oct

The oakwood in autumn colour is the reason to come in this season. Cooler, quieter, the light good across Clew Bay.

◉ Go

Winter

Nov-Feb

Short days, weather off the Atlantic, the higher ground and the Reek not for the casual. The wood walk still holds up. Come with a plan and good boots.

◐ 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.

Looking for a village centre

Drummin is a parish, not a streetscape - a church, a school, a pub and scattered farms on a ridge. There is no row of shops or cafes. Do your provisioning in Westport and come here for the wood, the road and the mountain.

Confusing Drummin's pub with Campbell's

Campbell's, the well-known pub at the foot of Croagh Patrick, is on the Murrisk side where the main pilgrim climb starts, not in Drummin village. Different side of the mountain. Don't drive up the Drummin lanes expecting it.

The whole Tochar on a whim

The full Tochar Phadraig from Ballintubber to the summit is a long, committing day that ends on a mountain. It is not a casual stroll. If you want a taste, walk the Brackloon loop instead, which is genuinely gentle.

Getting there.

By car

Drummin is about fifteen kilometres south of Westport on the high ground under Croagh Patrick. The simplest approach is the N59 Westport-to-Leenane road, then up the local lanes (the L1824 and similar) into the village; Brackloon Wood's entrance is signposted off the N59 around six kilometres south of Westport. The lanes are minor and winding - a decent map or a downloaded route helps.

By bus

There is no direct public transport into Drummin itself. Bus Eireann and Local Link serve Westport, which is the hub for this part of south Mayo; from there it is a car or taxi up to the village and the wood. Check Bus Eireann and TFI Local Link for current Westport timetables.

By train

The nearest railway station is Westport, on the line from Dublin Heuston via Athlone and Manulla Junction. From Westport it is about twenty minutes by car south to Drummin.

Next on the tour

Co. Mayo

Westport

Twenty minutes north. The base for the whole area - Matt Molloy's, the Mall, food, music and beds. Everything Drummin is not, and the obvious place to stay.

Co. Mayo

Murrisk

On the far side of Croagh Patrick, where the main pilgrim path up the Reek begins. Campbell's pub, the National Famine Memorial, and the climbers' car park.

Co. Mayo

Aughagower

An old ecclesiastical site east of here with a round tower, on the Tochar Phadraig pilgrim road between Ballintubber and the Reek.

Co. Mayo

Louisburgh

West along the bay, past Croagh Patrick toward the open coast - planned town, beaches, and the road on to Killary and Clare Island.

Co. Mayo

Delphi

Twelve kilometres north-east through the hills, into the glacial valley that never lets the famine story go.