Alan J. M. Noonan

Hidden History of Cork

Born and raised in County Cork, Alan offers a tour for one to four guests that takes you from earliest Cork history to its recent fight for freedom. This tour of the “Rebel County” of Cork city and county travels through the early history of Cork city as a Viking settlement, through the medieval period of monasteries and castles, the trauma of the Great Irish Famine “an Gorta Mór,” the battlegrounds of the Irish War of Independence, and the landscapes of the acrimonious Irish Civil War.

During this driving tour through the gorgeous green hills of the Cork countryside you will hear the songs and stories the many different lives that form the tapestry of Cork history. We visit hidden gems that others never see and walk through the footsteps of monks, lords, soldiers, poets, and the poor to understanding the history of Cork and its people.

Includes:

Tour locations include Elizabeth Fort in Cork City, the ruins of Kilcrea Abbey, Macroom Castle, the site of the Battle of Kilmichael, a Famine Gravesite, and the ambush site at Beal na mBlath where Michael Collins was killed. Full-day tour (approx. 6 hours) of Cork historical sites. Picnic lunch, with tea/coffee and traditional homemade Irish brown bread in a scenic countryside location.

Please enquire if you wish to make inquiries or changes to the tour. For example the tour can focus on a particular area, the Cork countryside or time period, e.g. Early Christian & Monastic Ireland, the chieftains and battles of Medieval Ireland, or Ireland’s struggle for Independence.