Goleen (An Góilín in Irish) is a small rural village in County Cork, Republic of Ireland, on the south-western tip of Ireland. Farming is the main occupation of its inhabitants with small numbers engaged in fishing. The village has four pubs, four shops, a petrol station and a fast-food restaurant. Sadly, Goleen is for most tourists not an inviting place in which to stop and linger - just an undistinguished hamlet passed through on the way from Schull or Bantry to the beautiful beaches at Barley Cove or the spectacular cliffs at Mizen Head.
Goleen is located towards the south-western end of the Mizen Peninsula, in West Cork and is in an area of outstanding natural beauty. Although the land is of poor quality for farming, being hilly and rocky with limited soil cover, the scenery is stark and colourful - remarkably unaffected by the unsightly one-off housing developments which have ruined so many parts of the western Ireland coastline. The village has a large Roman Catholic chapel; there is a smaller Church of Ireland church situated just outside the village which has now been deconsecrated and is the site for a sail-maker.
Mizen Head, at the southern tip of the Mizen peninsula, about five miles from the village, is often claimed to be the most southerly point on the island of Ireland, but is in fact the country's most southwesterly point. The distinction of being Ireland's most southerly point belongs to nearby Brow Head, from where Guglielmo Marconi experimented with transatlantic radio signals at the beginning of the 20th century.
See also
External Reference
- Cork Ancestors Website, [1]