Slea Head
Ceann Sléibhe · Co. Kerry
The Slea Head Drive around the end of the Dingle Peninsula distils the west of Ireland into a single loop: Iron Age forts and early Christian beehive huts on the hillsides, surf breaking on dark cliffs below the road, the Blasket Islands scattered across the sound, and Irish spoken in the shops and pubs — this is the heart of the Corca Dhuibhne Gaeltacht.
Around the head
The headland itself is marked by a white crucifixion statue where the road pinches around the cliff. Just before it at Fahan, clusters of drystone clocháns — corbelled beehive huts built without mortar — stand in the fields, some likely over a thousand years old, alongside Dunbeg promontory fort, whose ramparts have been partly claimed by the sea below.
Beyond the head, Coumeenoole Beach fills a dramatic cleft in the cliffs — heart-stoppingly beautiful, famously featured in Ryan's Daughter (1970), and best treated as a walking rather than swimming beach given its currents.
The Blaskets
Offshore lie the Blasket Islands, abandoned in 1953 and home to an extraordinary flowering of Irish-language literature — Peig Sayers, Tomás Ó Criomhthain and Muiris Ó Súilleabháin all wrote here. The Great Blasket Centre at Dunquin tells their story superbly, and in summer boats cross to the island itself from Dunquin's famously photogenic zigzag pier, where seals haul out on the white strand.
Driving the loop
Drive the Slea Head loop (R559) clockwise from Dingle town, as the tour buses do — meeting one head-on on the narrow cliff section is not an experience to seek out. The full circuit via Ventry, Slea Head, Dunquin, Ballyferriter and the Gallarus Oratory — the perfectly preserved early Christian boat-shaped church — deserves a half day at minimum. Dingle town, with its harbour, music and food, is the obvious base.
Where it is
52.1024°N, 10.4624°W
Nearby stops
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