Things to do in Downpatrick
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Ego Patricius
The Saint Patrick Centre houses a multimedia exhibition called Ego Patricius, charting the life and legacy of Ireland’s patron saint. Occasionally filled with parties of school kids, the exhibition uses audio and video presentations to tell St Patrick’s story, often in his own words (taken from his Confession, written in Latin around the year AD 450, which begins with the words ‘Ego Patricius’, meaning ‘I am Patrick’). At the end is a spectacular widescreen film that takes the audience on a swooping, low-level helicopter ride over the landscapes of Ireland.
reviewed
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Down County Museum
Downhill from Down Cathedral is Down County Museum, housed in the town’s restored 18th-century jail. In a former cell block at the back are models of some of the prisoners once incarcerated there, and details of their sad stories. Displays cover the story of the Norman conquest of Down, but the biggest exhibit of all is outside – a short signposted trail leads to the Mound of Down, a good example of a Norman motte and bailey.
reviewed
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Railway Museum
From mid-June to mid-September, plus December, St Patrick’s Day, Easter, May Day and Halloween, this working railway museum runs steam-hauled trains over a restored section of the former Belfast–Newcastle line. There is a halt next to the grave of King Magnus Barefoot, a Norwegian king who died in battle in 1103. The ticket price includes a return journey on the train and a tour around the engine shed and signal cabin.
reviewed
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Inch Abbey
Built by de Courcy for the Cistercians in 1180 on an earlier Irish monastic site, Inch Abbey is visible across the river from Down Cathedral. The English Cistercians had a strict policy of non-admittance for Irishmen and maintained this until the end in 1541. Most of the ruins are just foundations and low walls; the neatly groomed setting beside the marshes of the River Quoile is its most attractive feature.
reviewed
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Quoile Countryside Centre
A tidal barrier was built at Hare Island, 3km downstream from Downpatrick, in 1957 to control flooding. The waters enclosed by the barrier now form the Quoile Pondage Nature Reserve, whose ecology is explained at the Quoile Countryside Centre. The centre is housed in a little cottage beside the ruins of Quoile Castle.
reviewed
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Down Cathedral
According to legend, St Patrick died in Saul, where angels told his followers to place his body on a cart drawn by two untamed oxen, and that wherever the oxen halted was where the saint should be buried. They supposedly stopped at the church on the hill of Down, now the site of the Church of Ireland's Down Cathedral.
The cathedral is testimony to 1600 years of building and rebuilding. Viking attacks wiped away all trace of the earliest churches, and the subsequent Norman cathedral and monasteries were destroyed by Scottish raiders in 1316. The rubble was used in a 15th-century church finished in 1512, but after the Dissolution of the Monasteries it was razed to the ground…
reviewed
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Saint Patrick Centre
This heritage centre houses a multimedia exhibition called Ego Patricius, charting the life and legacy of Ireland's patron saint. Occasionally filled with parties of school kids, the exhibition uses audio and video presentations to tell St Patrick's story, often in his own words (taken from his Confession, written in Latin around the year 450, which begins with the words 'Ego Patricius', meaning 'I am Patrick'). At the end is a spectacular widescreen film that takes the audience on a swooping, low-level helicopter ride over the landscapes of Ireland.
reviewed
-
Down County Museum
Downhill from the cathedral is Down County Museum, housed in the town's restored 18th-century jail. In a former cell block at the back are models of some of the prisoners once incarcerated there, and details of their sad stories. Displays cover the story of the Norman conquest of Down, but the biggest exhibit of all is outside – a short signposted trail leads to the Mound of Down, a good example of a Norman motte and bailey.
reviewed
