The souterrain, an underground stone-lined tunnel or chamber of the kind commonly built in early medieval Ireland for storage or refuge, sits in the southern half of the fort, its presence hinted at by the uneven ground above. That combination of a commanding elevated position, a buried subterranean feature, and a surface too disturbed to walk cleanly across gives the site a quietly unsettled quality.

The ringfort, known in Irish archaeology as a rath when formed primarily from earthworks rather than stone, sits on top of a steep hill beside Ballinlough Lake. It is circular in plan, measuring around 26 metres east to west, and enclosed by an earthen bank that rises some two metres on its inner face. In parts, that bank is stone-faced on the inside, suggesting a degree of structural care that went beyond simple earth-piling. Around the northern to eastern arc, an external fosse, essentially a defensive ditch, runs to a depth of around one metre. Ringforts of this type were typically farmsteads of the early medieval period, roughly the fifth to twelfth centuries, and were built by farmers of some local standing. The combination of a steep natural hill, a substantial bank, and an outer ditch would have made this one a well-defended position, with the lake below adding to the sense of deliberate, considered placement in the landscape.

The interior is heavily overgrown, and the ground is notably uneven, partly because of the souterrain below. Anyone approaching should expect rough going underfoot rather than a cleared or maintained site.