POSTED FROM

BALLYBUNION

CO. KERRY · IE

Ballybunion
Baile an Bhuinneánaigh, Co. Kerry

The Wild Atlantic Way
STOP 10 / 10

Baile an Bhuinneánaigh · Co. Kerry

A links course, a Clinton statue, and two beaches split by a castle ruin.

Ballybunion is a small north-Kerry seaside town that became famous for golf and never quite got over it. The Old Course - the long links above the Atlantic - is on every serious top-twenty list in the world, and the town has spent a hundred and thirty years arranging itself around the fact. The bronze Bill Clinton on Main Street, frozen mid-swing, is the most-photographed thing in the place. Locals walk past him without looking.

Off the course, the town is a working seaside village with two beaches, a castle ruin between them, and a tradition of seaweed bathing that predates the golf by a couple of decades. Collins' baths have been running since 1932 - same family, same idea. You sit in a wooden tub of hot seawater and serrated wrack and you come out claiming things about your skin you cannot prove. People keep coming back.

It is fifteen kilometres from Listowel, which means John B. Keane country - the playwright lived and pulled pints up the road - and a lot of the writing weekends end up out here for the air. Come for the golf if golf is your thing. Come for the cliffs and the baths and a long walk on the strand if it isn't.

Population

~1,800

Coords

52.5097° N, 9.6700° W

01 / 10

At a glance.

Three things every local will eventually mention. Read these and you've already understood more than most day-trippers do.

01 The golf

One of the world's twenty.

The Old Course at Ballybunion Golf Club is on every serious links list ever written. Bill Clinton played it in 1998. The town put a bronze statue of him on Main Street and never quite explained why it stayed.

Stories & lore → 02 The beaches

Two beaches, one castle in the middle.

The Geraldine ruin of Ballybunion Castle sits on the headland. The Ladies' Beach is to the north, Castle Green to the south. The names date from when bathing was segregated and nobody got around to changing them.

Walks & outings → 03 The seaweed

Collins' baths since 1932.

Hot seawater, a tub of serrated wrack pulled off the rocks that morning, an hour to soak. Collins' family have been running it since 1932. It is not a spa. It is a bath. The difference matters.

Stories & lore →

02 / 10

The pubs.

None of these are themed Irish pubs, because they don't need to be. A few that earn the trip:

Daly's Bar

Local, steady

Town pub

On Main Street, a short walk from the Clinton statue. The kind of pub where the regulars have a stool each and a stranger is welcome to one of the others. Pints, sport on the telly, talk.

The 19th

Post-round, pints high

Golfer's pub

The post-round room. After eighteen on the Old Course, this is where the stories get told and slowly improved. Walls of memorabilia. Order a Guinness and listen - half of what you hear is true.

Kilcooly's

All-rounder

Pub & food

Does a proper pub dinner - chowder, fish, a steak that isn't pretending. Live music some weekends. The kind of place a wet golf afternoon ends up in by accident and stays for hours.

03 / 10

Where to eat.

Place	Type	€	Local note
La Costa	Restaurant	€€	Italian-leaning menu, short and seasonal. Pasta done properly, fish off the boats. Books out on summer weekends - ring ahead.
The Beach Café	Café	€	Day-only. Soup, sandwiches, a chowder that warms the cold off you after a Ladies' Beach walk. The brown bread is the brown bread you came for.
Allo's of Listowel	Bistro & bar (15 min away)	€€	Not in town - fifteen minutes inland, on Church Street in Listowel. Worth the drive for dinner. Dating back to the 1850s, run as a serious kitchen for the last thirty years. Book.

04 / 10

Where to sleep.

Place	Type	Local note
The Cliff House Hotel	Hotel	Sits above the cliffs on the Listowel road. Sea views from most rooms, a decent restaurant, a bar that does golf-course politics most evenings. The closest hotel to both courses.
Tides Guesthouse	Guesthouse	Eight rooms, walking distance to Main Street and the beaches. Run as a proper guesthouse - breakfast that sets you up for eighteen holes or a long strand walk. Quiet at the back.
Teach de Broc Country House	Country house	Across the road from the entrance to the Old Course. The golfer's first pick. Run by the Brock family for years; they will arrange the tee time, the caddy and the taxi back. Bar food on the premises so you needn't drive.

05 / 10

Stories & lore.

The reason to come back. The things every local will eventually tell you about, usually after the second pint.

How a links course got a president

Ballybunion Golf & Clinton

Ballybunion Golf Club opened in 1893. The Old Course - the one everyone means when they say Ballybunion - sits on a stretch of dunes above the Atlantic that links architects spent a century arguing they couldn't have designed better themselves. Tom Watson said as much in print. Bill Clinton played it in September 1998 with the world's press in tow, and the town commissioned a bronze statue of him mid-swing on Main Street. He came back. The statue stayed. It is now the most-photographed thing in the village, and locals walk past it without looking up.

Same family, since 1900

Collins' Seaweed Baths

Collins' Seaweed Baths opened in 1932 and have been run by the same family ever since. The drill has not changed. They cut serrated wrack off the rocks at low tide, fill a wooden tub with hot seawater, drop the seaweed in, and you get an hour. The seaweed slips, the water is the colour of weak tea, and your skin afterwards does the thing the brochures promise. There used to be a dozen bath houses on this coast doing it. There is one left. It is the original one.

A Geraldine ruin and two beaches

Castle Green

Ballybunion Castle is a 16th-century Fitzmaurice tower house perched on the cliff between the two town beaches. The Fitzmaurices were a Geraldine sept - Norman Irish, in the long way of these things - and the castle was burned during the Desmond Rebellion in 1583. What's left has been a protected national monument since the 1920s. The headland it stands on is called Castle Green; the beach to the north is the Ladies' Beach, the beach to the south is the Men's Beach. The names are from segregated-bathing days. Nobody felt the need to change them.

06 / 10

Things to do outside.

Wear waterproofs. Bring a sandwich. Tell someone where you're going if it's the mountain.

Ballybunion Cliff Walk North from the town car park, along the cliff-top path above the Ladies' Beach. The Geraldine castle ruin is halfway along. Some sections have been closed due to erosion - the path is maintained but check current conditions at the car park notice board. The views north along the coast are why you came.

1.5 km one-way (3 km return)distance

45 min-1 hourtime

Ladies' Beach to Castle Green circuit Down to the Ladies' Beach, across the rocks at the castle headland at low tide, and back up onto Castle Green on the south side. Tide-dependent - check before you start. The castle ruin is between the two. Better in morning light.

2 kmdistance

40 mintime

07 / 10

Tours, if you want one.

The ones below are bookable through our partners - pick one that suits, or skip the lot and just turn up.

via Viator

3-Day Dingle, Killarney and the Wild Atlantic Way Small-Group Tour from Dublin

private tours

Small-group tour (max 16) from Dublin to Dingle, Killarney and the Wild Atlantic Way, with Glendalough and the Rock of Cashel along the route. From €660.

72 hours From €660

See tour → via partner

From Dublin: 3-Day Dingle, Killarney & the Wild Atlantic Way

multi day

Three days covering Glendalough, the Dingle Peninsula, Killarney National Park, and the Rock of Cashel - Ireland's spiritual and wild Atlantic landscapes in one trip.

3 days From €603

See tour → via Viator

Wild Atlantic Way 7 Day Private Tour Mayo Connemara Kerry Cork

cultural

A 7-day private tour along Ireland's Wild Atlantic Way in a luxury Mercedes, covering Mayo, Connemara, Kerry and Cork with an expert accredited guide.

168 hours From €5496

See tour →

We earn a small commission when you book through our tour pages. It costs you nothing extra and keeps the village hubs free. All Co. Kerry tours →

08 / 10

When to go.

There is no bad time. There are different times.

Spring

Mar-May

Golf season opens. The town is quiet before the summer families arrive. Collins' Baths are open from Easter.

◉ Go

Summer

Jun-Aug

The beach fills up. The golf course has a waiting list. Everything is open and everything needs booking. Best if you plan months ahead.

◐ Mind yourself

Autumn

Sep-Oct

After the families leave, the golfers are still here. The waves build on the Ballybunion course side. The Listowel Races in September bring a different crowd fifteen minutes inland.

◉ Go

Winter

Nov-Feb

Half the town closes. The golf club is open; the beach is empty; Collins' Baths run on reduced hours. A quiet pint at Daly's is still a quiet pint.

◐ Mind yourself

09 / 10

What to skip.

Honestly? Don't bother.

If a local was sitting beside you, this is the bit where they'd lean in.

Expecting a tee time on the Old Course without booking months ahead

It is on every serious links list in the world. Tom Watson wrote about it. Walk-ons exist but are rare and expensive. Book online at ballybunion.ie.

The summer ice cream queue on Main Street at 3pm

There is nothing wrong with the ice cream. The queue is half an hour. Walk the cliff first, come back when it has thinned.

Collins' Seaweed Baths expecting a spa

It is a wooden tub of hot seawater and wrack pulled off the rocks that morning. It is not a spa. It is better than a spa. Manage the expectation and it will exceed it.

Getting there.

By car

From Tralee, 40 minutes north on the N69 via Listowel. From Limerick, 1h 30m down the N69 via Tarbert and the Shannon ferry, which is the scenic way to come.

By bus

Bus Éireann 274 runs Tralee-Listowel-Ballybunion several times a day. The Listowel leg is fifteen minutes; the Tralee leg about an hour. Local Link picks up the gaps.

By train

No train. Nearest station is Tralee - onward by bus.

By air

Kerry Airport (KIR) is 50 minutes by car. Shannon (SNN) is 1h 15m and gives you the Tarbert ferry crossing on the way down.