Description

This full day experience will explore a number of important sites that mark the Patron Saint, St Patrick.

For this tour, we will stick with County Down only.

Commemorate the humble foundations of St Patrick’s first church in Northern Ireland, the towering cathedrals named in his honour and the memorial that marks his final resting place.

We’re entering Downpatrick in County Down, where St Patrick first started his mission to spread Christianity. Captured as a slave in Wales and brought to Ireland, young Patrick initially escaped and fled these shores. But after he left, he found himself called back in a dream. Returning to Ireland, he set about his quest to convert pagans by the thousands. So effective was Patrick that one new convert, a local chieftain, donated a barn in which Patrick could hold his services. It was here, just outside Downpatrick, that Patrick lived leading up to his death and on this very spot in 1932, a church called Saul Church was built to honour the site.

Poignantly, Downpatrick is also where St Patrick is thought to be buried – under a memorial stone, a short walk away from the soaring crenellations of Down Cathedral. Pay your respects to the man who would shape Ireland for years to come, or wander through the corridors of the Saint Patrick Centre, which celebrates his life with interactive exhibits and stories that bring you closer to this extraordinary man.

As you walk the narrow streets of Armagh, keep watch for hidden gargoyles, chimeras and angels that linger in nooks and crannies and peek out over windows. However, the real stars of the city are the twin cathedrals – one Church of Ireland, one Roman Catholic – dedicated to St Patrick that sit atop Armagh’s two hills. St Patrick founded his main church here in 445AD on the spot where the Church of Ireland cathedral now stands. Explore the glorious buildings and then refuel at Uluru with some well-earned award-winning food.