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Ballinafad Castle is located in Ballinafad village at the south east corner of Lough Arrow in County Sligo and is about 10 minutes drive from ArrowRock Hostel.
The more adventurous might think about hiring a boat and taking the trip across the lake from the pier at Arrowrock Hostel to the public pier a few hundred meters from the village.
The drawing, by Wakeman, shows how the castle looked in 1879. The castle itself has changed little since but even then the old three span bridge was out of use and has since been demolished.
The castle was built in 1590 to protect The Red Earls Road, an important route across the Curlew Mountains and so called after Richard de Burgo who built it in the 1300's.
The Red Earl's Road passes by Ballinafad Castle as it crosses the Curlew's from Ballymote Castle to Boyle and such was the castles strategic importance that it became known as the Castle of the Curlews.
The castle is built in a style more common in the 13th Century, it had four floors, four towers and a drawbar. The castle is now a ruin and the timber floors and wooden stairway (in the west tower) are long gone. The entrance doorway in the northwest wall is almost entirely rebuilt but an original drawbar socket survives. Numerous openings for gun loops can be seen throughout the castle. Tall chimney stacks survive on top of the east and north towers.
Despite Ballinafad Castle being used for only 90 years it had a very eventful and active past. Red Hugh O'Donnell partially destroyed it in 1595 but quickly repaired then survived numerous attacks by Irish Rebels in 1641 only to be sacked again in 1642. It came back into English control in 1652 before eventually falling into disuse around 1680.
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