Ballybunion Golf Club

Ballybunion golf course is quite simply one of the finest links courses one can play. Designed by Gods as some say, this is Tom Watson’s favourite links course where he regularly honed his skills before each Open Championship. He also greatly contributed in refining the course design. A totally obscure course until the great American writer Herbert Warren Wind walked into the course in 1971 and wrote ”…nothing less than the finest seaside links I have ever seen”, today the course sees as many visitors as St Andrews.

Starting with  the first par 4 with the uninspiring cemetery to the right, the second straight away catapults one into an awe inspiring par 5 and then a flat ride over the next three holes until your nerves are tested again with a tricky par 4 testing your ability to bite off a dog leg and then end with a humpy green at the edge of a seaside cliff. The back nine of the Ballybunion Golf Club are simply a series of one masterpiece after the other. Tom Watson's favourite is the par 4 eleventh, with a daunting cliff dropping down to the Atlantic ocean, but then as someone famously said,’ why worry when you have the whole of Ireland to your left’!

Do not miss a chance to play (at no extra cost) the neighbouring Cashen course designed by Robert Trent Jones Jr, a stark contrast to the Old course in terms of layout, but a tough test of your golfing skills on linksland in the wild winds of the Atlantic.

Facilities: Bar, Restaurant, Pro Shop, Driving Range, Golf Coaching