Dowth

Dowth is the same age and roughly the same scale as Newgrange and Knowth - a passage tomb of around 3200 BC, about eighty-five metres across - but it has had a very different afterlife. In 1847 it was excavated by digging a crater straight down into the top, a method that wrecked the summit and left the depression still visible today. There are two passages on the western side; the northern one includes a chamber with a recess and carved stones, and the southern is aligned on the winter solstice sunset, which makes Dowth the counterpart to Newgrange's sunrise. Both passages are gated shut and not open to the public. What is open is the mound itself, reached through a gate off a quiet road, free, unstaffed, and usually empty - which after the managed experience at the visitor centre is the reason people who know about it come here.

What you actually see

• The mound - about eighty-five metres across, contemporary with Newgrange.
• The 1847 crater - the excavation scar still open in the summit.
• The kerbstones - carved stones around the base, accessible on foot.
• The emptiness - free, unstaffed, and usually with nobody else there.

When to go

Any season. It is open ground with no facilities and no staff. Winter solstice is the alignment date for the southern passage, though the passages are closed.

Honest expectations

The passages are gated and cannot be entered. There is no interpretation on site, no toilets, and roadside parking only. The mound is damaged and overgrown in parts. Nothing is provided - which is either the appeal or the problem.

Nearby

Newgrange and Knowth are close; the Bru na Boinne visitor centre is across the river.