This Hidden Cork Island Is Now The ‘Best Tourist Attraction In Europe’

A former prison on Spike Island in Cork Harbour has just been named as Europe’s leading tourist attraction at the 2017 World Travel Awards.

Fortress Spike Island beat off tough competition from the Eiffel Tower and the Colosseum to win, after a €6 million investment was put into the island.

In the last 1300 years Spike Island has been home to heroes and villains, captains and convicts, red coats and rioters, sinners and saints, and the islands impressive 104 acres have at one time or another hosted an Island monastery, an Island prison, an Island fortress and an Island home.

Tours on the island include learning about the prison escapes and characters behind bars, as well as spooky after dark tours of the prison itself.

You can also check out…

• The Punishment Block, an 1858 prison where inmates were chained to the wall in dark cells.
• The 1985 cells, which housed modern prisoners in 4 man cells and included famous inmates like Martin Cahill, orchestrator of a 40 million Euro art heist in Dublin.
• Irelands largest Artillery Gun Park, with cannons and modern military machines.
• Walk the deep and narrow tunnels to our 6’’ harbour defence guns, the largest in Ireland.

Have you ever been here?

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