Introducing Listowel

The late writer Bryan MacMahon said of Listowel: 'I harbour the absurd notion of motivating a small town in Ireland, a speck on the map, to become a centre of the imagination.' Listowel certainly has more literary credentials than your average provincial town, with connections to such accomplished scribes as John B Keane, Maurice Walsh, George Fitzmaurice and Brendan Kennelly.

Outside these connections and a few venues, however, the town is little more than some tidy Georgian streets arranged around a main square with the St John's Theatre and Arts Centre, formerly St John's Church, and a park running along the edge of the River Feale, which can be reached down a road alongside the castle.

There's metered parking in the main square and free parking downhill to the right of the castle.