Most popular landmarks and natural wonders in Down
#1 SS Nomadic is a former tender of the White Star Line, launched on 25 April 1911 at Belfast, that is now on display in Belfast's Titanic Quarter. She was built to transfer passengers and mail to and from the ocean liners RMS Olympic and RMS Titanic. She is the only surviving vessel designed by Thomas Andrews, who also helped design those two ocean liners, and the last White Star Line vessel in existence today.
#2 Slieve Croob (SLEEV CROOB; from Irish Sliabh Crúibe 'mountain of the hoof') is a mountain with a height of 534 metres (1,752 ft) in the middle of County Down, Northern Ireland. It is the heart of a mountainous area, the Dromara Hills, north of the Mourne Mountains. It is designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and is the source of the River Lagan. There is a small road to the summit, where there is an ancient burial cairn and several transmitter stations with radio masts. It has wide views over all of County Down and further afield. The Dromara Hills also includes Slievenisky, Cratlieve, Slievegarran and Slievenaboley. Slieve Croob may have been the mountain named Brí Erigi or Brí Airige in medieval writings. The cairn on its summit is believed to be the remains of an ancient burial mound, possibly of a passage tomb like the one on Slieve Gullion. In the 19th century it was recorded to be 77 yards (70 m) around and 18 yards (16 m) in "conical height", with forty-two "pillar stones" or kerbstones around the edge. The cairn would have had a well-defined shape when it was built. Still, over time it has slipped and been damaged by visitors. Irish folklore holds that it is bad luck to damage such cairns. Some of its stones have been piled into smaller cairns on top of it, which led to the summit being nicknamed 'The Twelve Cairns'. Traditionally, people would gather on the summit at Lughnasadh where they would add a stone to one of the cairns. They would collect and eat bilberries and there would be folk music, dancing and games. Local people still climb the mountain on the first Sunday in August (referred to as Cairn Sunday or Blaeberry Sunday), and carry a stone up the mountain to help bury the twelve Kings, who are said to be buried at the top. Legannany Dolmen sits on the southern slopes of Slieve Croob near the village of Leitrim.
#3 The Legananny Dolmen is a megalithic dolmen or cromlech nine miles southeast of Banbridge and three miles north of Castlewellan, both in County Down, Northern Ireland. It is on the slopes of Slieve Croob near the village of Leitrim in Drumgooland parish, between a farmer's stone wall and a back road. It is a State Care Historic Monument sited in the townland of Legananny, in Banbridge District, at grid ref: J2887 4339. This tripod dolmen has a capstone over 3 m (10 ft) long and 1.8 m (6 ft) from the ground. It dates to the Neolithic period, making the monument around 5,000 years old. Such portal tombs were funerary sites for the disposal of the dead in Neolithic society. The heavy stones would have been dragged some distance before being set in place. The three supporting stones are unusually long and there are slight traces of a cairn which must have been far more extensive. Some urns were found underneath. The name Legananny is derived from Irish Liagán Áine 'Áine's standing stone'.
Greencastle is a castle in County Down, Northern Ireland. While it dates mainly from the 13th century, it had substantial 15th- and 16th-century alterations. It was originally surrounded by outer rectangular walls with four corner towers (ruins of some remain). It is likely to have been built by Hugh de Lacy, along with Carlingford Castle on the opposite side of Carlingford Lough, to guard the narrow entry channel to the Lough, and the ferry crossing between the two. The motte from the earlier wooden motte-and-bailey castle (possibly built by John de Courcy) is still on the seaward side nearer the point. According to one legend John de Courcy was married at Greencastle, but this may have been at the original motte & bailey castle. According to the information boards at the site it was held for the English Crown by Richard de Burgh, Earl of Ulster, from 1264 to 1333. It was attacked and taken by Edward Bruce, the brother of Robert, in 1316. This was in spite of one of Richard de Burgh's daughters having married Robert the Bruce himself. It was attacked at least twice by the Irish in the later 14th century but still maintained as an English garrison in the 1590s. In the 16th century it was held by the Earl of Kildare and then Nicholas Bagenal of Newry. It fell into disuse after a bombardment by Cromwellian soldiers, to stop it being used by rebel forces. The site is also surrounded in close proximity by other medieval sites/monuments: e.g., the motte fortification predating the stone castle (Northern Ireland Sites and Monuments Record No. DOW 057:001), late-Medieval stone church (DOW 057:002) and two burial pits (DOW 057:017) that were excavated in 2003; one contained a female aged 25–35 and the second a child (one presumes related) of less than four years old at death (1 and a half to 3 and a half years old). A calibrated date range of AD1270-1380 was indicated; likely contemporary with the construction of Greencastle in the mid-13th century. The castle underwent archaeological excavations from 1966 - 1970 which also identified layers of occupation deposits that pre-dated the castle on the site. The castle is a state-care historic monument in the townland of Greencastle, in the Newry and Mourne District Council area, at grid ref: J2473 1184.
#5 Castle Espie is a wetland reserve managed by the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT) on the banks of Strangford Lough, three miles south of Comber, County Down, Northern Ireland, in the townland of the same name. It is part of the Strangford Lough Ramsar Site. It provides an early wintering site for almost the entire Nearctic population of pale-bellied brent geese. The Castle which gave the reserve its name no longer exists.
#6 Slieve Donard ( SLEEV DON-ərd; from Irish Sliabh Dónairt, meaning 'Dónairt's mountain') is the highest mountain in Northern Ireland, the highest in Ulster, and the seventh-highest in Ireland, with a height of 850 metres (2,790 ft). The tallest of the Mourne Mountains, it is near the town of Newcastle on the eastern coast of County Down, overlooking the Irish Sea. It is also the tallest mountain in the northern half of Ireland. The Mourne Wall – built in the early 20th century – runs up the western and southern slopes of the mountain, joining a small stone tower at the summit. Also on the summit are the remains of two ancient burial cairns, one of which is the remains of the highest known passage tomb in Ireland. In Irish mythology the mountain was associated with the mythical figures Boirche and Slángha. It was later associated with, and named after, Saint Donard, who was said to have made the summit his hermitage. Up until the 1830s, people would climb the mountain as part of a yearly pilgrimage, which may have originally been a Lughnasadh (harvest) ritual. Royal Engineers camped on the summit for four months in 1826 as part of the Ordnance Survey's Principal Triangulation.
#7 Hillsborough Castle is an official government residence in Northern Ireland. It is the official residence of the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, and the official residence in Northern Ireland of the British monarch and other members of the British royal family when they visit the region, as well as a guest house for prominent international visitors. From 1924 until the post's abolition in 1973, it was the official residence of the Governor of Northern Ireland. Since April 2014, it has been managed by Historic Royal Palaces, and is open to paying members of the public.
#8 Titanic Belfast is a visitor attraction in Belfast, Northern Ireland, which opened in 2012. It is a monument to Belfast's maritime heritage on the site of the former Harland & Wolff shipyard in the city's Titanic Quarter where the RMS Titanic was built. It tells the stories of the Titanic, which hit an iceberg and sank during her maiden voyage in 1912, and her sister ships RMS Olympic and HMHS Britannic. The building contains more than 12,000 square metres (130,000 sq ft) of floor space, most of which is occupied by a series of galleries, private function rooms and community facilities.
#9 Castle Ward is an 18th-century National Trust property located near the village of Strangford, in County Down, Northern Ireland, in the townland of the same name. It overlooks Strangford Lough and is 7 miles from Downpatrick and 1.5 miles from Strangford. Castle Ward is open to the public and includes 332 hectares (820 acres) of landscaped gardens, a fortified tower house, Victorian laundry, theatre, restaurant, shop, saw mill and a working corn mill. It has a shore on Strangford Lough. From 1985 to 2010 it has also hosted Castleward Opera, an annual summer opera festival.
#10 HMS Caroline is a decommissioned C-class light cruiser of the Royal Navy that was the lead ship of her sub-class. Completed in 1914, she saw combat service during the First World War and served as an administrative centre in the Second World War. The ship served as a static headquarters and training ship for the Royal Naval Reserve, based in Alexandra Dock, Belfast, Northern Ireland, for the later stages of her career. At the time of her decommissioning in 2011, she was the second-oldest ship in Royal Navy service, after the ship-of-the-line HMS Victory. Caroline was converted into a museum ship after she was decommissioned. From October 2016, she underwent inspection and repairs to her hull at Harland and Wolff and opened to the public on 1 July 2017 at Alexandra Dock in the Titanic Quarter in Belfast. Caroline was the last remaining British First World War light cruiser in service, and she is the last survivor of the Battle of Jutland still afloat. She is also one of only two surviving Royal Navy warships of the First World War, along with the 1915 monitor HMS M33 (in Portsmouth dockyard). A third ship, the Flower-class sloop HMS President, (formerly HMS Saxifrage) was scrapped in 2026.