Rosslare Strand

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Rosslare Strand, or simply Rosslare (Ros Láir in Irish, meaning "the middle peninsula"), is a village in County Wexford, Ireland. The name Rosslare Strand is used to distinguish it from the nearby community of Rosslare Harbour, site of the Rosslare Europort.

Rosslare has been a tourist resort for at least 100 years. It prides itself on being the sunniest spot in Ireland, and records bear this out: Rosslare receives 300 hours more sunshine each year than the average place in Ireland. The long sandy strand is a Blue Flag beach so it attracts swimmers and families, while there are a number of good golf courses in the vicinity. The Dublin to Rosslare Europort railway passes through the village. Rosslare has a few good hotels and a few good restaurants.

The village has seen a huge amount of building in recent years, as tax grants became available for building holiday homes in this region. As a result, there are large housing estates of holiday homes near the strand.

A long sandspit stretching north from Rosslare separates Wexford Harbour from the Irish Sea. Until the early 1920s, this spit stretched for many miles north, almost touching the Raven Point and giving a very narrow mouth to Wexford Harbour. At the end of the spit was a small fort called Rosslare Fort. In the winter of 1924-25 a storm breached the spit and it was gradually washed away. The fort was abandoned and now all that is left is an island at low tide. Most maps of Ireland, however, still show the long spit of sand.

Rosslare is commonly known in Ireland as being in the "Sunny South-East", and in 1959 Rosslare recorded 1,996.4 hours of sunshine, the highest recorded in Ireland. [1] However, it is not the warmest or driest place in Ireland.