An hour's drive from Belfast, Tollymore Forest Park sits at the foot of the Mourne Mountains in County Down, and it feels older than it is. Much of Northern Ireland's native woodland vanished centuries ago, but Tollymore preserves the mossy, rain-soaked atmosphere that inspired all those old tales of faeries and banshees. It's not purely wild, though. From the early 1700s, aristocratic landowners shaped the hillside, planting hundreds of thousands of trees — larch, monkey puzzles, Himalayan cedars, even giant redwoods — and adding stone bridges and a barbican gate. In 1955 it became Northern Ireland's first state forest park, and it has been a public playground ever since.
Hiking is the main draw. Four waymarked routes cover the ground: a half-mile Blue Trail through an arboretum dating to 1752, a 3-mile Red Trail along the Shimna River with views of the glacial corrie known as the Pot of Legawherry, and the tougher Black Trail, split into a 5.5-mile Mountain Trail and a 3-mile Drinns Trail. Combine the two Black routes and you'll climb roughly 1,400 feet, with views over the Mournes from the Curraghard lookout. Trails also link to the wider Mourne range, including Slieve Donard, Northern Ireland's highest peak at 2,789 feet.
Fans of a certain HBO show will recognise the forest too: Ned Stark found the direwolf pups here, and Jon Snow and Tyrion chatted by a campfire on the road to The Wall. Game of Thrones Tours runs a 3-mile hike to the filming spots.
You can also sleep here. The campsite takes tents, caravans, motorhomes and trailer tents year-round, with showers, toilets, electricity hookups and a chemical disposal point. The pitches sit near the entrance with mountain views, and a food van sometimes appears selling coffee and pastries — otherwise Newcastle, a seaside resort with a beach and golf links, is minutes away for provisions or a hotel bed.
Tollymore works for a wide range of travellers: casual walkers can stick to the riverside Red Trail, hikers can bag a proper day out on the Black Trail, and road-trippers can pair it with nearby spots like Castlewellan Forest Park (home to one of the world's largest hedge mazes, 15 minutes away) or Kilbroney Park in Rostrevor, said to have influenced C.S. Lewis's Narnia. If you want forests, mountains and coast in one compact corner of Northern Ireland, this is the base.
