Mount Temple, Móin an Teampaill, Co. Westmeath

Móin an Teampaill · Co. Westmeath

A strung-out village on the R390 with a Romanesque church and a greenway crossing.

Mount Temple is a small village strung along the R390 between Moate and Mullingar, in the parish of Ballyloughloe. The village was named after the Temple family - Cromwellian-era landlords whose daughter Elizabeth, the story goes, rode her horse up the local Norman motte in 1684 and gave the place its English name. The Irish name, Móin an Teampaill, means the bog of the church. Both names point at the same thing: a small parish that never grew into a town and never quite needed to.

What you actually find here is a Romanesque church too grand for the village, a few houses, a school, and a level crossing on the disused Athlone-Mullingar railway line that is now the Old Rail Trail Greenway. The cycleway runs flat and straight from the Shannon to the Royal Canal, and the Mount Temple Crossing is a stopping point on the way. The Railway Rest, a small cafe at the crossing, opens for the cyclists. That is most of what brings outsiders through.

The other thing is the football. The local GAA club is Caulry - not Mount Temple - covering Mount Temple and the neighbouring townland of Baylin. They have been at it since 1928, came up through the Junior and Intermediate ranks, and have produced enough players to keep the parish proud on a Sunday. If you stop in for a pint after a championship match, the village is the loudest it ever gets.

Population

Well under 300 in the village proper

Walk score

Strung along the R390 - five minutes end to end

Founded

Named for the Temple family, c. 1684

Coords

53.4567° N, 7.7383° W

01 / 04

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 church

Corpus Christi, 1933, Romanesque.

Modelled on St Teresa's Church in Ávila, Spain. The only church of its kind in rural Westmeath. Pope Pius XI blessed the original plans.

Stories & lore → 02 The greenway

Old Rail Trail crosses the parish.

The 43km Athlone-Mullingar greenway has a stop here called the Mount Temple Crossing. There is a small cafe at the crossing called The Railway Rest. Bring a bike.

Walks & outings → 03 The club

Caulry GAA, founded 1928.

The local club covers Mount Temple and Baylin. Founded by Fr Francis Skelly to bring the parish under one jersey. Won the Westmeath Intermediate in 2019 and made the senior semi-final in 2023.

Stories & lore →

02 / 04

Stories & lore.

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

A Romanesque church in a Westmeath bog

Corpus Christi

Mount Temple's Catholic church was dedicated on 23 July 1933, the year after the Eucharistic Congress in Dublin, and named for the Eucharist itself. The architects were T.F. McNamara & Sons of Dublin; the design was modelled on the Romanesque St Teresa's Church in Ávila, Spain. Pope Pius XI blessed the original plans and presented Monsignor Langan, the parish priest, with a jewelled monstrance and a mosaic crucifix to mark the dedication. Cardinal McRory came down to bless the building. It is the only Lombardo-Romanesque church of its kind in rural Westmeath, and it sits on the rise above the road like it was meant for somewhere four times the size.

How the parish got its team

Caulry, not Mount Temple

The local GAA club is Caulry - the Anglicised form of Calraidhe, an old territorial name. Fr Francis Skelly founded the club in 1928 to bring all sections of the Mount Temple and Baylin community in under one banner, and the name has stuck since. Caulry won their first Intermediate title in the 1970s and again in 1985, took the Junior in 2009, and lifted the Intermediate again in 2019. They reached a Senior Football Championship semi-final for the first time in 2023. The pitch is a few minutes outside the village and the second pitch and walking track opened in 2019.

A Victorian railway, second life

The Old Rail Trail

The Athlone-Mullingar branch of the Midlands Great Western Railway closed to passengers in 1987 and to freight not long after. Westmeath County Council reopened the 43km line as a greenway in 2015. It runs flat and tarmac, under stone arch bridges and past restored station houses, from the Shannon at Athlone to the Royal Canal at Mullingar. The Mount Temple Crossing sits roughly halfway between Moate and Streamstown, and the cafe beside it - The Railway Rest - is one of a small handful of stops along the route. It is the easiest way to arrive in the village without a car.

03 / 04

Things to do outside.

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

Old Rail Trail Greenway (Mount Temple Crossing) The disused Athlone-Mullingar railway, resurfaced as a flat tarmac cycleway. The Mount Temple Crossing is a way-marked stop. Athlone is roughly an hour by bike west; Streamstown and the stone-arch bridges are a short spin east. The Railway Rest cafe is at the crossing.

43 km full route - pick a sectiondistance

Half day to a day end-to-end by biketime

Getting there.

By car

Athlone to Mount Temple is about 15 minutes east on the R390. Moate is about 10 minutes south. Mullingar is 35 minutes east on the same road.

By bus

Local Link runs services along the R390 corridor between Athlone, Moate and Mullingar on weekdays. Rural timetables change with the school year - check before you travel.

Next on the tour

Co. Westmeath

Moate

Ten minutes south on the back roads. Quaker market town with a long Main Street and the Dún na Sí heritage park.

Co. Westmeath

Athlone

Fifteen minutes west on the R390. Sean's Bar, the Shannon, and the castle on the river bend. The other end of the greenway.

Co. Westmeath

Ballymore

Same R390, the other direction. Two pubs, a ruined cathedral, and a road that once led most of the village to Argentina.

Co. Westmeath

Moyvoughly

Two kilometres north, a crossroads where the old school and the post office have always done the talking.

Co. Westmeath

Streamstown

Four kilometres south-west on the cycleway, an old railway fork west of Mullingar.