The Pathless Land: Finding a Way Across Ireland

by Tim Hannigan

An epic journey on foot from Dingle to Burr Point in search of Ireland's lost footpaths, and a quest to unravel the complexities of countryside access in Ireland and Britain.

Ireland is a pathless land. Public access to the Irish countryside is more limited than almost anywhere else in Europe – no right to roam, no network of footpaths across the landscape and minimal legal protection for existing rights of way. When Tim Hannigan discovers a forgotten web of paths recorded on an old map of Ireland, he sets out on an epic journey to find out how the country lost its ways.

The Pathless Land offers an important new perspective on contemporary debates about extending the “right to roam” in Britain, and asks important but neglected questions about the most practical mechanisms for public access to the heavily agricultural British and Irish landscapes.

This is also a deeply personal journey for the author, Tim Hannigan. Born in Britain, but of Irish ancestry and living in County Galway, there are awkward questions about landscape and identity, and about the connections between walking and belonging, to be answered as he struggles to find his way across a pathless land.

Kindle Edition

Expected publication September 3, 2026

About the author

Tim Hannigan was born in Penzance in Cornwall in the far west of the United Kingdom. Before becoming a full-time writer, he worked as a chef and an English teacher. He started his writing career as a travel journalist based in Indonesia. His first book, Murder in the Hindu Kush (The History Press, 2011), was shortlisted for the Boardman Tasker Prize. His second book, Raffles and the British Invasion of Java (Monsoon Books, 2012), won the 2013 John Brooks Award. He also wrote A Brief History of Indonesia (Tuttle, 2015), and edited and wrote new chapters for Willard Hanna's classic narrative history of Bali, now republished as A Brief History of Bali (Tuttle, 2016). His more recent books include The Travel Writing Tribe (2021) and The Granite Kingdom (2023). He has worked on guidebooks to many destinations including Nepal, India, Myanmar, Bali and Cornwall.