Paul Clements at Banba’s Crown, Malin Head in Donegal, the starting point of his epic journey along the Wild Atlantic Way Picture: Evan McElligott
ONE of the country’s top travel writers has urged cross-border coperation in helping boost Fermanagh tourism by connecting it to the Wild Atlantic Way (WAW).
As previously reported in the Herald, work is already underway to build a walking path at Belleek to connect the lakelands to the WAW in south Donegal. However, it turns out the county is actually already connected the phenomenally popular tourist route along the west of Ireland.
As broadcaster and writer Mr Clements has pointed out, one official WAW route already takes in part of the county.
“It’s called the Butterfly Route, not because of butterflies but because of the shape of it, and it takes in Leitrim, Donegal, Sligo and, interestingly, Fermanagh, where it connects to the Marble Arch Caves at Florencecourt,” he said. “It’s an official WAW initiative, so it shows the WAW is already connected to Fermanagh. The Butterfly Route is just a small example, but to me that shows that the connection is already there.”
The former BBC journalist, who has published several books and writes the Ireland editions for the internationally renowned Fodor Travel Guides, is somewhat of an authority on the highly-successful tourist route.
Having hitchhiked along the west coast of Ireland back in 1991, he has now, over 25 years later, published a new book, Wandering the Wild Atlantic Way, where he has retaken that journey via car, bike, foot and horse back.
Hailing from Clogher, Mr Clements is also well acquainted with both the wilds of Fermanagh and the joys of spending his childhood weekends in Bundoran. He believes connecting the county to the WAW would be a natural progression for the route that would benefit both tourists and locals alike, pointing out that the Government in the south recently announced an extra €100 million investment in the WAW, which has attracted around a million extra visitors to the west coast since it was established in 2014.
“The Wild Atlantic Way is so close, it would seem bizarre not to connect to it. I don’t see why it can’t be done,” he continued. “I think it would be a brilliant initiative if it happened. It’s so close, it would seem bizarre not to, and there is no doubt Fermanagh would get a very positive boost from it.
“There’s already a great connection between Fermanagh people and the WAW, just look at the numbers who go to the beach in Rossnowlagh, for example. South Donegal is the county’s hinterland. That should really be built on and developed. There can definitely be a spin off.”
Mr Clements said the only issue holding back the county from connecting to the WAW is the fact it is a Failte Ireland initiative, rather than Tourism Ireland which takes in the whole island. The Tyrone man urged for more cooperation between Tourism NI, Tourism Ireland and Failte Ireland.
“The border doesn’t exist to tourists. There is essentially no border there anymore anyway, it has no relevance these days,” he said. “For all intents and purposes it’s one country to them. There certainly should be more cooperation on tourism.”
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