Cloonacool, Cluain na Cúile, Co. Sligo

Cluain na Cúile · Co. Sligo

A scattered south-Sligo parish at the foot of the Ox Mountains, the rural half of Tubbercurry, with one bar that takes its country music seriously.

Cloonacool is a scattered parish in south Sligo at the southern foot of the Ox Mountains, roughly 15 kilometres south-west of Coolaney along the back road toward Ballina. The Irish name, Cluain na Cúile, means the meadow at the back. There is no real village street: a church, a national school, the GAA grounds and a bar gathered loosely around a junction, with the houses spread out across what is the single largest townland in County Sligo.

It is the rural half of the parish of Tubbercurry, in the Diocese of Achonry, and the joke locally runs the other way - that Tubbercurry is the urban half of the parish of Cloonacool. The two are tied together in name, in football, and in the parish bulletin. For practical purposes Tubbercurry, ten minutes east, is the town with the shops and the pubs and the Saturday market.

What is around Cloonacool is more than what is in it. The Ox Mountains rise directly behind, low and rolling and covered in blanket bog, and three rivers - the Moy, the Mad River and the Berna - meet near the village. The road through the parish climbs north over the Ox ridge to Coolaney and the National Mountain Bike Centre. Treat Cloonacool as a place you pass through on the back roads, with one good reason to stop: a Thursday night in Brennan's Bar, where the Cloonacool Music Club has made the place a country-music room.

Walk score

Junction to church in five minutes

Coords

54.1019° N, 8.7775° 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 setting

Foot of the Ox Mountains, on the Ballina road.

Cloonacool - Cluain na Cúile, the meadow at the back - sits at the southern foot of the Ox Mountains, 15 km south-west of Coolaney on the back road toward Ballina, just off the road from Tubbercurry. The Moy, the Mad River and the Berna meet near here.

The full picture → 02 The parish

The rural half of Tubbercurry.

Cloonacool is the country end of the parish of Tubbercurry, and the locals will tell you it works the other way round - that Tubbercurry is the town end of the parish of Cloonacool. St Michael's church, a national school, the GAA pitch and Brennan's Bar around the junction.

Stories & lore → 03 The Oxes

Slieve Gamh on the back door.

The Ox Mountains - Sliabh Gamh, the mountain of the storms - rise immediately behind the parish, low and bog-covered. The road carries on north over the ridge to Coolaney and the National Mountain Bike Centre.

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:

Brennan's Bar

Family-run, Thursday-night country music

Country bar, Cloonacool

The bar of the parish, family-run, around the junction. Its claim to fame is the Thursday-night sessions run by the Cloonacool Music Club - country and country-and-Irish, locals up to play and sing, going from late into the night. People drive in from across south Sligo for it. The rest of the week it is a quiet country bar. If you stop in Cloonacool at all, this is why.

03 / 07

Stories & lore.

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

Cloonacool and Tubbercurry

The rural half of the parish

Cloonacool is the country end of the parish of Tubbercurry, in the Diocese of Achonry and the old Barony of Leyny. The standing joke - and locals mean it - is that it is really the other way round, that Tubbercurry is just the urban half of the parish of Cloonacool. The parish church here is St Michael's, with Sunday Mass at 10am. The catholic registers go back to 1859. Between the two halves they share a name on the parish bulletin and a rivalry on the football field.

Cloonacool GAA

A hundred years of football

Cloonacool GAA is the south-Sligo Gaelic football club, and it marked its centenary in 2016 - a hundred years of fielding teams from a parish this scattered is no small thing. The club published a centenary book that year, with the history pulled out of old newspapers and the national archives. The pitch is one of the few fixed points in a parish that otherwise spreads itself thin across the bog and the lower slopes of the Ox Mountains.

The Ox Mountains

Slieve Gamh, the mountain of storms

The Ox Mountains run roughly east to west across the south of Sligo. The Irish name, Sliabh Gamh, is usually read as the mountain of the storms. They are low - nothing here reaches much above 540 metres - but they cover a wide swathe of moorland and blanket bog, and Cloonacool sits right at their southern foot. The road north out of the parish climbs over the ridge toward Coolaney; in cloud it is no place to be guessing your way.

04 / 07

Things to do outside.

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

The Ox ridge road to Coolaney The back road north out of Cloonacool climbs over the Ox Mountains toward Coolaney. Bog on both sides, big skies, the kind of empty road the Ox country does well. Over the top is the Coolaney National Mountain Bike Centre. In low cloud the ridge is featureless and the road narrow, so pick a clear day.

Drive or long cycledistance

Allow an hour over and backtime

The river meeting Three rivers - the Moy, the Mad River and the Berna - come together near the village. Not a marked trail or a visitor site, just a feature of the ground worth knowing about when you are on the back roads here. The Moy itself goes on to Ballina and is one of the great salmon rivers.

Shortdistance

30 minutestime

05 / 07

When to go.

There is no bad time. There are different times.

Spring

Mar-May

Bog drying out, lambs on the lower slopes, the Ox ridge clearing of cloud.

◉ Go

Summer

Jun-Aug

Long evenings on the back roads. A useful detour if you are riding the Coolaney trails over the hill.

◉ Go

Autumn

Sep-Oct

Best light of the year on the Ox ridge. Quiet roads, and the music keeps going in Brennan's.

◉ Go

Winter

Nov-Feb

Bog roads get treacherous in heavy rain and the Ox ridge is no place to be in cloud. Stay low, and go round through Tubbercurry if the weather is closed in.

◐ 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 to wander

There is no street to speak of. Cloonacool is a scattered parish - a church, a school, a pitch and a bar around a junction. Come for the bar or the back roads, not for a stroll through a village.

Crossing the Ox ridge in cloud

The road north to Coolaney is exposed and narrow over the top. In poor visibility, go round the long way through Tubbercurry.

Expecting beds and dinner here

There is no hotel and no restaurant in the parish. Sleep and eat in Tubbercurry, ten minutes east, or in Ballina over the Mayo border.

Getting there.

By car

Sligo town to Cloonacool is about 50 minutes via the N4 and N17 and the back roads. Tubbercurry is 10 minutes east. Ballina (Mayo) is around 40 minutes west.

By bus

No direct service to Cloonacool. The nearest public transport is at Tubbercurry, on the Bus Éireann and Local Link network; check Local Link Sligo for rural routes in the area.

By train

No station. Sligo MacDiarmada is the nearest railhead, around 50 minutes north-east; Foxford and Ballina (Mayo) are on the Dublin-Westport line to the west.

By air

Ireland West Airport Knock (NOC) is roughly 35 to 40 minutes south.