If you are interested in ancient history, this is a great place to visit. When you stand on the hill, the vista is truly commanding, and you can easily imagine why the ancient kings chose this as their seat.

This is the place where St. Patrick confronted the ancient religion and preached his famous analogy of the shamrock and the Trinity. There's a statue of Patrick commemorating this event. There are ancient objects including the Stone of Destiny and the ancient standing stones as well as the Mound of the Hostages.

In modern history, Tara was the site of one of the greatest crowds ever to gather in Ireland. Daniel O'Connell held one of his "monster rallies" here in 1843 and more than 750,000 people came to hear him speak against union with Great Britain.

We took a guided tour out here as we wanted to visit other sites in the area and did not want to rent a car. I've added a journal entry about the guided tour we took.

Tara is a holy spot, first settled by the Druids hundreds of years BC. On this site are burial mounds and earthworks. All of the dead were cremated and placed in these mounds, except for one body that has been identified as a 15 year old Egyptian. Makes you wonder. Also, there is an old church at the site and a statue of St. Patrick. In 327 AD or so, he came here to establish the Catholic Church in the area.