Forty Foot
Rocky sea-bathing cove off a granite point, swum year-round since the mid-eighteenth century.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to the Forty Foot in Dublin opens on the twentieth of July, 1974, when a woman stepped out of a currach onto the rocks below and men on the ledges started shouting, ending roughly two hundred and fifty years in which this sea-bathing cove had belonged to men only. It follows the dozen women who came that morning, among them poet Mary D'Arcy and journalist Nell McCafferty, and the jeers and abuse that met them. It also reaches back to a young James Joyce, who once lodged in the Martello tower behind you.
This audio guide was created using AI.
Similar places
Ireland's Eye
Uninhabited rocky island off Howth with a Martello tower, seabird colonies, and a haunting Victorian murder mystery.
Sandymount Beach
Vast tidal strand where the sea retreats a mile out and can rush back fast enough to strand walkers.
James Joyce Tower
Napoleonic-era coastal watchtower where a young writer's chaotic six-day stay inspired a novel's opening scene.
Dalkey
Seaside village where locals once crowned a mock king each summer to satirize royal pomp on a tiny offshore island.
MoLI – Museum of Literature Ireland
Georgian house museum holding James Joyce's inscribed first copy of Ulysses and rotating literary exhibitions.
Bray-Greystones Cliff walk
Clifftop coastal path along an abandoned Victorian railway bed, with sea views and old tunnel scars.