Kılkenny

Kilkenny calls itself the Marble City, though its black limestone only shines like marble once it's been polished - a fitting start for a town whose castle and cathedral get ticked off in an afternoon by visitors keen to call it done.

Scratch the surface and Kilkenny gets stranger. Dame Alice Kyteler was accused of witchcraft here while her maid Petronella burned in her place; merchant families built houses that still lean over lanes barely wide enough for two; and 800 years of hauntings, rhymes and half-remembered feuds cling to nearly every wall of what was once Ireland's medieval capital.

VoiceMap's self-guided audio tours let those stories set your pace, not a schedule. Follow the turbulent rise of Dermot McMurrough from the castle gates, or let a Kilkenny native who has walked these lanes for forty years lead you past Kyteler's Inn and the Shee Alms House, where the water still won't behave. Pause wherever the marble catches the light - the Tholsel isn't going anywhere.

Plug in, walk on, and let the Marble City whisper its own ghost stories.