Clara

Clara is a town in County Offaly in the midlands of Ireland. It's on the main Dublin-Galway railway and has become a commuter town for the capital, with a population of 3400 in 2022. Its main sight, 2 km south, is the wetland of Clara Bog.

53°20′6″N 7°36′54″W

Map of Clara

By road from Dublin follow M6 to junction 5. From there N52 heads south to Tullamore, but you need to circle north through Kilbeggan to get onto R436 to Clara.

Trains from Dublin Heuston run every couple of hours, taking an hour to Clara via Portarlington and Tullamore. They continue west to Athlone then branch either to Athenry and Galway or to Roscommon, Castlebar and Westport. See Irish Rail for times, fares and online tickets.

53.34-7.6161 Clara railway station is south side of town.

Bus Éireann 73 traverses the country from Waterford via Thomastown, Kilkenny, Carlow, Stradbally, Portlaoise and Tullamore to Clara and Athlone. There are two M-Sa; the one Sunday bus continues north to Ballymahon and Longford.

Local Link buses are:

- Bus 815 five times a day from Athlone to Clara, Tubber, Moate and Tullamore.

- Bus 840 from Banagher to Ballycumber, Clara, Ballinamere and Tullamore, with 6 M-F and 4 Sa Su.

- Bus 850 connects with the 840 at Banagher. It runs six times a day from Athlone to Clonmacnoise, Shannonbridge, Banagher, Birr and Roscrea. On Sunday it continues to Thurles.

Evil men – demons in human form (...) lure girls from the town to go for motor drives into the country, and you know what happens - it is not for the benefit of the motor drive. It is for something infinitely worse. — sermon circa 1930

So you'd better walk or cycle.

• The town grew up in the 19th century when there was a textile industry, with St Brigid's RC church at its centre. North on higher ground beyond the green is St Brigid's Church of Ireland built 1770, and somewhere buried around it was the monastery.
• 53.3421-7.61751 Clara Bog Visitor Centre is within the town library on Ballycumber Road, open M-F 10AM-5PM, free. Informative exhibition on this and other Irish bogs. The bog is 2 km south with no buildings there, since they'd damage the habitat.
• 53.323-7.6262 Clara Boardwalk takes you on a 1-km circuit of the bog. After the last Ice Age, a lake backed up against an esker (a ridge of debris) then infilled. Over millennia the poorly-drained surface built up into a dome, a "raised bog". These formed all over prehistoric northern Europe but most succumbed either to deliberate drainage, or to road-building which creates a channel that empties the bog. Cutting the "New Road" to Rahan (by which you get there) in the 19th century collapsed the dome, and its fringes were nibbled by peat-cutters. That might be sustainable on a traditional cottage scale but certainly not as the peat-burning industry it became in the 20th century. So a once-common habitat (much too common, if you were an early traveller trying to squelch across Ireland) is now rare and endangered. Clara Bog has been sufficiently scarred to scupper its bid for inclusion as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, nevertheless it's one of the best examples in the country, and its drainage has been halted. It's free to access 24 hours: the parking layby is small but you're unlikely to find it busy. Don't step off the boardwalk, the habitat is fragile, and remember those grotesque bog-bodies you saw in the museum in Dublin. There's a second boardwalk 300 m south of the main boardwalk - this area is called Tony's Hill.

• 53.326-7.523 Durrow Abbey — see Tullamore for this monastic site along N52.
• 53.28-7.6164 Rahan is a village 12 km south with remains of a monastery from the 11th and 12th century, plus early modern churches. It's on the Grand Canal, which is navigable from Dublin to the Shannon.
• 53.393-7.5825 Horseleap on the boundary with County Westmeath is named for a feat of medieval horsemanship and is graced by a horse sculpture of doubtful fame and provenance. This tale goes round and round more often than a Formula One Ferrari; its contortions involve a World War I Italian flying ace, minor European nobility, Scuderia Ferrari racing team, and their former driver Eddie Irvine. Such anyway was the baloney and horse-doodoo fed to the eejits persuaded to buy this prancing horse statue and erect it in 2000. So there it stands, outside Paddy Ryan's pub at the junction of R446 and R391: "Horseman, pass by" as WB Yeats put it.

• Clara Swimming Pool is a 25-m pool. It's on Ballycumber Rd just north of the railway station.
• Clara Sports and Leisure Centre is 200 m west of the pool. It's open daily.
• Golf: Esker Hills Golf Club is 10 km southeast off R420. Blue tees are 6617 yards, par 71. There's also a driving range 1 km east of town.
• Read and pass on: Ballycumber is a tiny village 5 km west of Clara. In 1983 Douglas Adams' Meaning of Liff defined Ballycumber as "One of the six half-read books lying in your bed". This sparked the idea of an exchange now called BookCrossing, where books are left in public places; some 12 million are in circulation.

• Centra facing St Brigid's Church is open M-Sa 7AM-10PM, Su 8AM-10PM.

Strung along the main road are Rose Garden, Macari's takeaway, Mill Bar, Super Kebab, Jel's Kitchen, Yummy House and Mario's.

Along on the main road are Nigel's Place, Dessi Dolan's and Christy Cowen's.

See Tullamore for the Tullamore Dew and Kilbeggan distilleries. Both offer tours.

• 53.3424-7.61311 Caroline's Guesthouse, River St, Clara R35 K2D5, ☏ +353 86 100 4784. Friendly place near village centre.  (updated Jun 2026)
• 53.3035-7.56972 Grennan's Country House, Aharney R35 E974, ☏ +353 57 935 5893. Smart modern B&B, also has 3 self-catering chalets.  (updated Jun 2026)

As of June 2026, Clara and its approach roads have 4G from Eir and Three, and 5G from Vodafone.

• Tullamore is best known for its two distilleries.
• Athlone has a castle and fine cathedral.
• Birr has a pleasant Georgian centre. Within the castle grounds, the "Leviathan" was for 70 years the world's largest telescope.