Ards Forest Park covers about 480 hectares of the small Ards Peninsula on Sheephaven Bay, between Dunfanaghy and Creeslough. It was once the estate of the Stewart family and is now run by Coillte, the state forestry company. The variety is the appeal: sand dunes, beaches, salt marsh, salt-water lakes, rock outcrops and both conifer and old oak woodland, with a bird hide at the end of the Salt Marsh Trail for watching winter visitors.
There are trails of all lengths, from the 3-kilometre nature and heritage walks to routes you can stitch together into a five- or six-hour circuit. Along the way are the remains of four ring forts, megalithic tombs said in legend to be the beds of Diarmuid and Gráinne, a holy well and a Mass rock from the Penal Law era.