The Royal Canal: Mullingar to Clondra and the Shannon

Mullingar Harbour is one of the best-equipped stops on the canal, with toilets, showers, a pump-out, shore power and a slipway. It is also the hub of the Royal Canal Blueway and home to a canoe-polo club: give the paddlers room. If you have a car or a bike, the gardens of Belvedere House near the town, with the Jealous Wall folly, stay open while the house is closed for conservation works. The canal then loops round the town on its summit level and runs 11 km west without a lock to Coolnahay Harbour, a small limestone harbour beside Lock 26 with a jetty, public toilets and a café in the old lock-keeper's cottage, open at weekends.

The hard day: ten locks in about 8 km as the canal starts its descent to the Shannon. Lock 26, beside the harbour, is the first of 21 that take you down from the summit; locks 27 to 34 follow one another through quiet farmland, and Lock 35 brings you to the village. Start early, share the work between boat and bank and take a break halfway. Lifejackets on in every lock. Ballynacargy grew up around its roomy harbour, opened in 1817; cross the old stone bridge from the greenway to find space for a good number of boats, a picnic area, toilets, showers and a slipway. North-east of the village stand the ruins of Tristernagh Priory, founded in 1192.

Three more locks west of the village, then a long lock-free level. Abbeyshrule takes its name from the Cistercian abbey whose ruins and bell tower still stand by the River Inny. The village harbour lies on both sides of Webb's Bridge, planted and kept tidy by the Tidy Towns volunteers, with a playground, benches and a slipway. The Rustic Inn, a family-run bar, restaurant and guesthouse on the canal bank, serves dinner every day. About a kilometre away, the Whitworth Aqueduct carries the canal high over the Inny, and the walk out is worth it for the view of the valley; there is a picnic and angling spot by Scally's Bridge.

Two locks and the longest cruise of the trip. Stop for lunch at Ballybrannigan Harbour, a wide basin at Chaigneau Bridge restored in 1995 by the Royal Canal Amenity Group and the Office of Public Works. Ballymahon, one to two kilometres away on the Inny, has a broad Georgian main street with pubs, a supermarket and plenty of places to eat. Then on across the bogs to Mosstown Harbour, the canal stop for Keenagh. Mack's Shack, a restaurant in a converted barn, and Newman's pub are in the village, and the Corlea Trackway Visitor Centre, 3 km from the village, keeps a stretch of an oak road laid across the bog in 148 BC (last admission 17:00).

A short morning: two locks to Cloonsheerin, where the dry Longford branch leaves the main line. After an IWAI campaign, Waterways Ireland installed a 30 m visitor jetty at Longford Junction, first used in August 2024. The branch itself is closed to boats and has no water, but its greenway runs about 8 km into Longford town, so the afternoon is for walking or cycling: St Mel's Cathedral has been restored after the fire of 2009, and the town has shops and a railway station. Just before the junction, Crossover Bridge once let the towing horses change banks for the run to Longford.

Lock 43 at Killashee has a restored lock-keeper's cottage, with the village shop and Magan's pub about a kilometre away. Lock 44 follows, then Begnagh Bog. The Begnagh road lifting bridge is meant to rise automatically for an approaching boat but has a record of breakdowns, so ring the water patroller for locks 41 to 46 (+353 87 915 1400) before you set off. After Lock 45, lunch at Richmond Harbour, the canal's 1817 terminus, with a service block, pump-out, shore power and the Richmond Inn in an old flax mill. Lock 46 and the Shannon's Cloondara Lock, worked by the Tarmonbarry keeper, take you onto the river; Tarmonbarry Lock lifts you to the public quay at Tarmonbarry.