Clifden Castle is a roofless Gothic Revival ruin just west of town, reached by walking along a private lane from the Sky Road. It was built for John D'Arcy, the landlord who founded Clifden in the early 19th century, before debt, famine and absentee ownership pulled the estate apart.
The ruin is unsafe to enter, but the walk is worthwhile for the setting: pasture, bay views, broken towers and the sense that the town's polished Georgian ambitions ended rather abruptly in the western weather.