tourist attractions kildare

Climb on board for a short train ride - or travel further afield on a special mainline steam excursion. Many engines and coaches are on display in transport museums and railway centres, with memorabilia from the golden age of steam. The first railway in Ireland opened in 1834, and the network quickly reached into all corners of the island. By 1920 almost 3,500 miles of track threaded the countryside and no Irish town was more than 10 miles from a railway station. Ireland's national railw...

Located in the former 18th Century Market House, Athy Heritage Centre-Museum bring the history of Athy to life, from its Anglo Norman foundations, through the 1903 Gordon Bennett Motor Race, to Athy Men and World War 1 and the story of local Polar explorer Ernest Shackleton. Which is the only permanent exhibition anywhere devoted to Shackleton. Its highlights include an original sledge and harness from one of his Antarctic expeditions, a 15ft model of Shackleton's ship 'Endurance' and an au...

the castle was probably begun by Gerald Fitzgerald, Baron of Offaly, in 1203. the main tower, one of the largest of its kind, was built in three successive phases, but the vaults on the ground floor were added probably long after the rest of the tower had been completed. The inside of the tower was divided into two main rooms for each floor, as at Trim, Co. Meath, and the walls are preserved almost to the top where fragments of the original turret at the northeastern angle can still be seen....

About the Gardens

The Japanese Gardens of Tully were created between the years 1906 and 1910. Devised by Colonel William Hallwalker, a wealthy Scotsman of a famous brewery family, the Gardens were laid out in their paths of beauty by the Japanese Eida and his son Minoru. Planned to symbolise the life of Man, the landscapes are now of international renown and are acclaimed as the finest Gardens in Europe.
The Irish National Stud Company was formed in 1945. Its primary aim was...

Celbridge Abbey was built in 1960 by Bartholomew Van Homrigh, Lord Mayor of Dublin 1697. Bartholomew Von Homrigh secured from King William III the great chain of office still worn by Lord Mayors today. His daughter Vanessa had romantic associations with the eminent author Dean Jonathan Swift. Swift visited Celbridge Abbey Grounds regularly with Vanessa, delighting in the beauty and seclusion of the natural walks and bowers. Their relationship did not come to fruition and Vanessa died at the...

It may justly be said that Castletown is one of the largest and most splendid country houses in Ireland, but it's also one of the most important for it introduced sophisticated Palladianism from the continent and brought about a revolution in Irish architecture....