No tropical beaches, but this island is still a paradise

We have a habit of associating islands with sultry lagoons, sand and bright colour. Even the medieval Irish illuminated bibles with islands of palm trees and parrots. When they looked out their windows, however, they saw monochrome islands grazed by damp cows, and clouds lumbering across low horizons to tangle themselves in monastery towers.

Today we escape to tropical islands for sun and heedless holidays. The monks were escaping troublesome vikings and the devil’s temptations, and looked for spiritual contemplation. If that sounds dull, you’d be wrong. The place they chose is one of Ireland’s loveliest spots, yet hidden away from marauding tourists.

Enniskillen main street.

Enniskillen has a high street fine enough for a Jane Austen movie set. Banks and churches culminate in a Renaissance-style town hall, and plaques recount where old barracks and breweries once stood. In-the-know locals come here for good food, fine pubs, country rambles, and boating and fishing.

Enniskillen is the largest town (population 18,500) in Fermanagh, a county tucked into the south-west corner of Northern Ireland. It’s lightly populated, rural, verdant and unconcerned with modern urgency – Fermanagh Time is the equivalent of Spain’s manana – although it occasionally bursts out in golf resorts and craft distilleries.

Although far inland, Enniskillen’s original core sits on an island as its Gaelic name indicates: Inis Ceithleann or Cethlenn’s Island. This being Ireland, Cethlenn was predictably an ancient warrior woman who came to an unfortunate end in an incomprehensible feud.

Rounding Enniskillen Castle.

Irish mythology and history are grim yet wonderfully entertaining when related by garrulous John Lomasney, tour manager on my Collette country-intensive escorted journey in Ireland. His anecdotes range from the schoolboy antics of Oscar Wilde, who studied in Enniskillen, to the shenanigans of the medieval Mag Uidhir or Maguire clan.

Enniskillen Castle was the Maguire seat and controlled the choke point between Lower and Upper Lough Erne. In a Europe of twee castles this is the real deal: grim and solid, although its twin-towered watergate makes for a pretty backdrop for passing boaters.

Enniskillen Castle.

You can give the castle’s interior a miss unless you enjoy fusty military knick-knackery. A pleasure of Enniskillen is its lack of major sights and its watery setting. Lough Erne is pimpled with 154 islands fringed in rustling reeds. Cattle stand knee-deep in bogs, wildflowers fleck the meadows, oaks trees sigh on hillsides.

It rains a lot around here. On a good day, waters have a glassy stillness sparking with the electric-blue flashes of kingfishers, and you could walk a lovely five kilometres from Enniskillen Castle to Castle Coole, an earl’s estate set in parkland.

Take a boat or kayak out to the islands. Lough Erne’s water has a peaty darkness that makes you feel like a necromancer peering into the past. White Island and Boa Island have early archaeological sites and Christian stone figures, plus two of two-faced Roman god Janus.

Lough Erne.

Devenish Island has a huge 12th-century round tower surrounded by monastic ruins and monks’ gravestones. It has a quiet mystery under elegiac skies rolling with clouds. You can see why monks came here from as early as the sixth century and stayed on until Henry VIII booted them out in the 16th century.

This is the answer to Europe’s heaving tourist trails and the lines of tour coaches that clog Ireland’s Cliffs of Moher and Giant’s Causeway. My tour takes me to those places too – and who wouldn’t want to see them – but kudos to Collette for including the subtle, over-the-horizon delights of Enniskillen too.

Devenish Island.

A thousand years of history entangles Enniskillen, and its islands have a haunting solitude unusual on tourist itineraries. It’s a rare opportunity to be a little monkish, and retreat for a while to islands not for sun but for soul.

THE DETAILS

TOUR
Collette’s 14-day The Best of Ireland tour between Dublin and Kilkenny overnights in Enniskillen and includes a visit to a gin distillery on the banks of Lough Erne. The tour visits several other destinations such as Belfast, Donegal, Galway, Cork and Kilkenny. Regular departures September-November 2025 and March-November 2026. From $9349 a person twin share including accommodation, transport, select meals and tour guides. Collette has several other tours in Ireland. See gocollette.com

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ireland.com

The writer travelled as a guest of Collette.