Armagh

Historic pubs and local character

The Hole in the Wall Bar is down an alleyway off the city centre, and you have to know it's there to find it. It dates to 1615, which makes it one of the oldest buildings in Armagh, and it was a gaol before it was a pub. Friends and relatives of the prisoners passed food and letters through a hole in the wall, which is where the name comes from. Inside there are low ceilings, an open fire, and beams full of character. The Guinness and the Smithwick's are well kept, and there's a gin menu that runs to the Jawbox served with homemade honeycomb. It is reputedly haunted by a friendly ghost called Wilfy. Before the pandemic it kept a parrot called Casper who whistled and talked at people passing outside.

There are other bars. Red Ned's on Ogle Street is 104 years old, has six screens for the sport and live music on Friday and Saturday nights, and stocks around twenty Irish whiskeys including its own Red Ned's Malt — "one of the best drink collections in town," according to one pub guide. Keegan's on Irish Street does home-cooked food in a cosy dark-wood room. The Gables, also on Ogle Street, has a reputation for excellent food. Uluru Bar & Grill on Market Square serves a mix of European and Australian classics, which is not a combination you meet every day.

The Orchard County in a glass

This is the Orchard County, and the apples are taken seriously. The Armagh Bramley has EU protected status for its sharp, clean taste, and two family cideries press it into something you can drink. The Troughtons at Armagh Cider Company have grown apples on the same farm since 1898; their Carsons Crisp and Maddens Mellow carry the Bramley's PGI mark. Long Meadow, run by father and son Pat and Peter McKeever, makes cider, juice and apple cider vinegar three generations in.

The Mall and Palace Demesne

For walking, The Mall is a tree-lined Georgian promenade in the centre of the city that was once a racecourse. It's flanked by some of the best Georgian terraces in Ulster and makes for a level stroll. The Palace Demesne, about 300 acres of parkland created by Archbishop Robinson, edges the city with formal gardens, back meadows and the ruins of a 13th-century Franciscan friary, whose church is among the longest ruins in Ireland.

Two cathedrals on two hills

Armagh is the only city in the world with two cathedrals of the same name. Both are St Patrick's, and each stands on its own hill facing the other. The older, Church of Ireland one has a medieval core on the site where, by tradition, St Patrick founded a church in 445; Brian Boru, High King of Ireland, is buried against its north wall. The Roman Catholic one opposite went up between 1840 and 1904, with twin 64-metre spires and interior mosaics covering every blank wall, painted by the Italian artist Oreste Amici.

Rail links and a working observatory

Portadown, twelve miles off, has the nearest railway, on the Belfast–Dublin Enterprise line; Belfast itself is under an hour up the M1. Up at the Observatory, founded in 1790 and still working, they've been watching the same sky the whole time.