Inishowen is the big peninsula at the top of Ireland, pushing north from Derry between Lough Swilly and Lough Foyle until it runs out at Malin Head, the most northerly point of the Irish mainland. It covers almost 900 square kilometres. Most people live around the coast; the interior is low, boggy mountain, rising to Slieve Snaght at just over 600 metres. After the last ice age it was an island, and it still feels a little cut off from the rest of Donegal.
The way to see it is the Inishowen 100, a signposted scenic drive of roughly 100 miles that starts at Bridgend and loops round the whole peninsula. Going clockwise, it follows Lough Swilly past Inch Island and Buncrana to Fort Dunree, climbs over the Mamore Gap, passes the golf links of Ballyliffin and the famine museum at Doagh, then runs through Carndonagh and out to Malin Head. The east side brings Culdaff, Kinnagoe Bay, the fishing port of Greencastle and the Lough Foyle shore back down through Moville. Inishowen is also where the Wild Atlantic Way starts.
History is everywhere on the ground. At the neck of the peninsula the stone ring of the Grianán of Aileach was a royal seat of the northern Uí Néill, and you can see three counties from its walls. The O'Dohertys held Inishowen for centuries until their rebellion of 1608 failed, and Lough Swilly, deep and sheltered, was a British naval anchorage until 1938, which is why its headlands are lined with forts.
Give it at least a full day by car, and more if you want to walk. The weather comes straight off the Atlantic, the roads are narrow, and public transport is thin. Carndonagh is the most practical base in the north; Buncrana is the main town in the south. Seasonal ferries cross Lough Foyle from Greencastle to Magilligan and Lough Swilly from Buncrana to Rathmullan, which makes it easy to link Inishowen with the Causeway Coast or the rest of Donegal.
