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TWIN TOWNS AND LIFFORD |
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Heading southwest towards Donegal town, you're certain to pass
through the twin towns of STRANORLAR and BALLYBOFEY , separated only by
a bridge over the River Finn. There's little remarkable about either,
though the latter is by far the livelier. Isaac Butt , one of the
founders of the Irish Home Rule Party, is buried in the Stranorlar
church graveyard. Ballybofey is home to Donegal's only League of Ireland
football (soccer) team, Finn Harps, and also to the successful and
innovative Balor Theatre (tel 074/31840) which has its own local company
and entertains touring companies from all over Europe. The municipal
tourist office (Mon-Fri 9am-5pm; tel 074/32337) is inside the Balor
Theatre building. Surprisingly, there's some top-notch accommodation
here at both Jackson's Hotel , Ballybofey (tel 074/31021, bjackson@iol.ie
; £90-110/¬114.28-139.67) and Kee's Hotel , Stranorlar (tel 074/31018;
£90-110/¬114.28-139.67), as well as a hostel , Finn Farm (May-Oct; tel
074/32261), two miles west of Ballybofey off the Fintown road, which
also offers camping , horse riding and trekking. There are plenty of
bars in both towns; The Claddagh in Ballybofey is the current favourite
and has music at weekends. Apart from the hotels, the best eating place
is probably the Bridgeside Bistro , in the precinct by McElhinney's
department store in Ballybofey.
If you've entered Donegal from Strabane, across the border in County
Tyrone, you'll almost certainly bypass the border town of LIFFORD ,
though it does have a couple of sights for which it's worth dallying.
The town was formerly Donegal's legal centre and its graceful Old
Courthouse , dating from 1746, was designed by Michael Priestley.
Nowadays, the building houses a visitor centre (Easter-Oct Mon-Sat
10am-6pm, Sun 2-6pm; £3/¬3.80), which tells the story of the O'Donnell
clan and notable events in Donegal's history. The building's former
legal use has not been forgotten and models re-enact old trials,
including that of Napper Tandy, with the assistance of new technology.
Down in the basement cells, there's a pretty gruesome re-creation of the
conditions experienced by prisoners. A couple of miles northwest of
Lifford off the N14 is Cavanacor House (Easter-Sept Tues-Sat noon-6pm,
Sun 2-6pm; £2/¬2.53), a fine seventeenth-century mansion where James II
dined in 1689. It was also the ancestral home of James Knox Polk , US
president from 1845 to 1849. A small museum reflects on both these
notables, but the real treat is the art gallery which displays a
changing array of work by contemporary painters.
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