Ireland's second largest county after Cork is Galway. Galway contains Galway city, Ireland's most lively western city, famous for its festivals, nightlife and culture, and yet some of the most remote, wild, rocky and mountainous and boggy scenery in Connemara.
Lough Corrib, Ireland's second largest lake separates the rugged and barren Connemara country, which still looks much as it did in the last century with infrequent white stone cottages and tidy B&Bs, dry stone field walls and traditional pubs being the main features on the wild landscape, from the lowlands in east Galway.
The county has some beautiful coastal scenery, especially around Costello where hundreds of tiny islands dot Greatmans Bay, and in northwest Galway, where the long steep inlet of Killary creates an amazing natural harbour. Many remote fine white sand beaches also line the coast. The Aran Islands in Galway Bay are the most visited of the many islands off Ireland and are famous for their traditional lifetstyle and their huge stone clifftop forts.
