Your Summer in Monaghan: The Local Events, Venues and Experiences Worth Putting in the Diary for 2026
Your guide to summer 2026 in County Monaghan — the reborn Nuremore Estate, award-winning Muckno Mania, Clones, Ballybay Wetlands, and the food tourism opportunity worth travelling for.
The Farney county has never been short of things to do — but between a reborn hotel, a festival that just won a national award, and a summer calendar filling up fast, 2026 might be the best year yet to explore what's right on your doorstep.
There is a particular kind of pleasure in rediscovering somewhere you thought you already knew. You've driven through it a hundred times. You've been to matches there, eaten there, maybe grown up there. But then you stop, look around properly, and realise that the county you call home has been quietly doing remarkable things while you weren't paying full attention.
That's where County Monaghan is in the summer of 2026. The hospitality and tourism scene in the Farney county has more energy, more investment, and more ambition behind it than it has had in years — and the locals who are most invested in it are doing so not because a government strategy told them to, but because they genuinely love the place. That pride of place is contagious, and it's the best possible foundation for a tourism economy.
Whether you're a Monaghan native planning a staycation, a visitor from across the border, or someone from further south wondering what's up here — this is your guide to the people, places, and events making County Monaghan worth visiting in 2026.
The Nuremore Returns: Carrickmacross Has a Jewel Again
Let's start with the venue that was on everyone's lips at this year's Monaghan Business & Tourism Awards — because it also hosted the awards themselves, which is a statement of confidence in its own right.
The Nuremore Estate by McGettigans has come back. Set amid rolling hills, shimmering lakes, and 160 acres of mature parkland outside Carrickmacross, the former Nuremore Hotel and Country Club had long held a special place in the hearts of Monaghan and Cavan families — the kind of place associated with celebrations, anniversaries, and Sunday dinners that stretched long into the evening. When it closed, its absence was felt.
Its reopening under the McGettigans brand is not a simple restoration. It is a reimagining. The new ownership has launched an extensive redevelopment that blends the estate's heritage and natural beauty with a modern vision of sustainability and luxury. The first phase of this transformation is already open and welcoming guests — and the early signs are that it has the potential to become one of the standout hotel and leisure destinations in the region.
For local businesses, the Nuremore's revival matters in ways that go beyond sentiment. A world-class hotel and conference venue in Carrickmacross means more visitors staying in the area, more events that pull people from outside the county, and more economic activity flowing through the surrounding town and countryside. For restaurants, retailers, activity providers, and service businesses in south Monaghan, this is genuinely good news.
If you haven't been yet, it is worth the visit — even if just for a coffee and a walk around the grounds. The setting alone is worth the journey.
Muckno Mania: The Festival That Just Won a National Award
In April 2026, the Muckno Mania Festival Committee received the Best Tourism Event Award at the inaugural Monaghan Business & Tourism Awards. It was one of the most warmly received moments of the entire evening — and among those who know the festival, entirely unsurprising.
For those who haven't experienced it: Muckno Mania is Castleblayney's annual summer festival, built around the stunning setting of Lough Muckno and the town itself. It is the kind of event that reminds you why community festivals matter. Not just as entertainment, but as an expression of collective identity; a reason for people who've moved away to come home; a catalyst for businesses in the area to see a surge in footfall and spend.
The festival runs on an extraordinary foundation of volunteer effort. The committee are not paid event managers. They are local people who give their time year after year because they believe in what Muckno Mania does for Castleblayney. Their award acceptance reflected exactly that: "The award isn't just for the committee; it belongs to the volunteers who give their time and energy year after year. The partners including Monaghan County Council and the local businesses who back us. The community — every person who attends, cheers and makes the events so special."
If you're planning your summer around County Monaghan and you haven't put Muckno Mania in the diary, that is the first thing to fix. The festival draws visitors from across the border counties and beyond, and the businesses of Castleblayney — the cafés, the pubs, the restaurants, the accommodation providers — all feel the benefit. It is a perfect example of how a well-run local event lifts an entire local economy.
Lough Muckno itself, of course, is one of Monaghan's great natural assets: a sprawling, beautiful lake with walking trails, water sports, angling, and that quality of light on the water in the evening that is hard to find anywhere else. Whether you're coming for Muckno Mania or just for a day out, Castleblayney and its lake deserve more attention than they typically get from visitors.
Clones: A Town That Wears Its Character Proudly
Any honest piece about Monaghan tourism has to include Clones — the western market town that occupies a unique place in the cultural and sporting imagination of the county. Home to St Tiernach's Park, with its iconic atmosphere and its summers full of Ulster championship drama, Clones is a town that draws visitors who arrive as tourists and leave as converts.
But beyond the GAA — and specifically this summer, when St Tiernach's Park hosts the Monaghan senior footballers' All-Ireland championship home fixtures — Clones has a character and history that rewards slow exploration. The town's diamond, with its round tower, the old canal remnants, and the surrounding drumlin countryside, make it one of the more visually distinctive places in Ulster. The food and hospitality offering in the town has improved steadily over recent years.
And there is real investment coming. The planned Digi Hub, due to be located in the former Bank of Ireland building in the town centre under a PeacePlus cross-border initiative, will bring a new kind of energy and footfall to a building that has sat empty. Projects like this — which combine physical regeneration with digital skills and community use — are exactly what towns like Clones need to thrive in a changing economy.
For now, if you're heading to a game at St Tiernach's Park this summer, give yourself an extra hour in the town before or after. The locals will be glad you did, and so will you.
Ballybay: The Wetlands, the Food Hub, and a Town Coming Into Its Own
One of the less-heralded but genuinely impressive tourism and enterprise stories in Monaghan in recent years has been the development of the Ballybay Wetlands and the Ballybay Food Hub, both supported by Enterprising Monaghan and Monaghan County Council. The wetlands offer walking trails through a genuinely beautiful piece of midland landscape — reedy lakes, birdlife, and the kind of quiet that has become a commodity in its own right in a noisy world.
The Food Hub at Ballybay is a different proposition — a facility designed to support food entrepreneurs, giving small-scale producers access to commercial kitchen space and production infrastructure that they couldn't realistically afford independently. For anyone who has bought local Monaghan food products — jams, cheeses, prepared foods, baked goods — at a market or independent retailer, there's a real chance some of them started life in a facility like this.
Both projects speak to a coherent vision for Ballybay and the surrounding area: a town with natural assets, a food culture, and the infrastructure to turn those assets into livelihoods.
The Agri-Food Tourism Opportunity: Monaghan's Biggest Underdeveloped Asset
Here is a question worth sitting with: what county in Ireland has more to say about food than Monaghan?
This is the home of Monaghan Mushrooms — one of the largest mushroom producers in the world, built here from scratch over nearly 50 years. It is home to Lakeland Dairies, Manor Farm, Silver Hill Foods, and a density of food production that is almost without parallel for a county of its size. The agri-food sector is the largest indigenous industry in the region. It employs thousands of people and underpins the rural economy across the whole north-east.
And yet, Monaghan has barely scratched the surface of what it could do with that story from a tourism and visitor perspective. Food tourism — farm visits, producers opening their doors, food trails, events built around local produce — is one of the fastest-growing segments of the domestic and international tourism market. Counties that have told their food story compellingly have transformed their visitor economies as a result.
Monaghan has the raw material to do exactly that. The Blas na hÉireann all-island food awards have long included Monaghan producers in their results. The 'Look for Monaghan' and 'Shop Carrickmacross' local buying campaigns championed by the LEO are a start. But there is a bigger opportunity here — to build a Monaghan food identity that visitors come specifically to experience.
The businesses that could anchor that identity are already here. They are listed in directories like this one. Connecting them to each other, and to visitors who want to experience them, is the work.
Where to Start: Supporting Monaghan's Tourism and Hospitality Businesses
Whether you are a visitor or a Monaghan native looking to rediscover your county this summer, the businesses that make up the local hospitality economy are worth seeking out and supporting. They range from the Nuremore Estate's luxury offering in Carrickmacross to the independent cafés and restaurants in Monaghan Town, Clones, Castleblayney, and every town in between. The activity providers, the accommodation hosts, the tour guides, the food producers selling at farmers' markets.
They are the ones who keep the county's visitor economy alive. They are the ones who employ local people, source from local suppliers where they can, and reinvest in communities they are part of. Every coffee bought in a local café rather than a motorway service station, every night's accommodation in a local B&B rather than a chain hotel, every dinner in a Monaghan restaurant rather than a takeaway from a national brand — all of it makes a difference.
This summer, Monaghan has plenty to offer. The GAA, the festivals, the lakes, the drumlin countryside, the food, the pubs, and the hotels. Find them, use them, and tell people about them.
This directory is a good place to start.
Looking for places to eat, stay, or visit in County Monaghan? Browse our full directory of local hospitality and tourism businesses — from Carrickmacross to Clones, Castleblayney to Monaghan Town.
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