Qualla: Shannon Region

Shannon Region: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

For most of the twentieth century, transatlantic aircraft simply had to stop here. Range was the limit, and the airport carved out of the flat boggy ground near Limerick was the last refuelling point before the Atlantic. So the name Shannon - which had meant a river since the Iron Age - came to mean a place in the air, a stamp in a passport, a bar full of jet-lagged Americans waiting for the connection to JFK. Longer-range jets made the stop unnecessary; the airport stayed, and so did the name. Today Shannon Region covers three counties - Clare, Limerick and Tipperary - half a million people, the lower half of the river's catchment, and most of the things people come to Ireland to see.

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Shannon Region: The Kingdom of Munster

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

This was the kingdom of Munster - one of the four ancient provinces of Ireland, christianised from the fifth century with St Patrick among its missionaries. Its dynasties warred with each other, with the Vikings, and eventually with the Normans. In 1014 Brian Boru, born up at Kil...

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Shannon Region: Castles, Lots of Them

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The castle inventory runs to absurdity. King John's at Limerick, Castle Desmond at Adare, Knappogue rebuilt as Victorian medieval fantasy, Dunguaire picturesque on Galway Bay, Newcastle West going to ruin, Bunratty turned into a tourist banquet hall with mead and harp music. Most...

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Shannon Region: Flying Boats and the Wild Atlantic

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Before the runways came the seaplanes. Foynes on the Shannon estuary in County Limerick was a major terminal for transatlantic flying boats in the 1930s and 40s - the rich, the famous and the merely lucky disembarking on the river to flash bulbs and press cars. The Foynes Flying ...

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Shannon Region: The Burren and the Hurlers

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Up in north Clare the Burren stretches across two hundred and fifty square kilometres of stripped limestone - karst pavement, sinkholes, caves, and a flora that mixes Arctic, Alpine and Mediterranean species in a way found nowhere else in Europe. The Aran Islands offshore are geo...

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Shannon Region: Down at the River

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Limerick is the only city in the region, set where the Shannon turns tidal - a Georgian street grid laid out on King John's Norman foundations, a place with the most amenities and the deepest history. The Wild Atlantic Way runs the coast from Cork all the way up to Donegal, and t...

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