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TEMPLENOE

CO. KERRY · IE

Templenoe
An Teampall Nua

The Wild Atlantic Way
STOP 07 / 07

An Teampall Nua · Co. Kerry

Kenmare's quiet next-door neighbour — a pier, a parish, and a GAA club that punches three weight classes above its roll.

Templenoe is the parish you drive through on the way out of Kenmare. Four miles west on the N70 — the Ring of Kerry road — on the north shore of the Kenmare River where it widens out toward the open Atlantic. The name means "the new church," though the church it referred to is long gone and the present one is a chapel of ease for Kenmare. Population about 250. There is no village in the High-Street sense. There is a pier, a GAA pitch, two castle ruins in the fields, and a stretch of road.

What you do in Templenoe is leave Kenmare. The town next door is the kitchen and the hotel and the Wednesday market, and Templenoe is the quiet bit twenty minutes out the back of it. The Beara Peninsula starts pulling away to the south across the water. The Iveragh hills rise on the inland side. Dromquinna Manor — the old Mahony hunting lodge, now a glamping-and-weddings outfit with manicured grounds — sits on the shore at the eastern end of the parish. The pier is at the western end. Most things in between are sheep.

It is a small place that produces big footballers. The Spillane brothers — Pat, Mick and Tom, with sixteen All-Ireland senior medals between them — were born here. Tadhg Morley plays for Kerry now and trained on the same pitch. The 2016 All-Ireland Junior Club final, won by Templenoe in Croke Park, is the proudest day the parish has had in living memory. Drive past the pitch on a winter evening and the floodlights will be on and a half-dozen kids will be doing drills in the rain. That is the village. The rest is scenery.

Population

~250

Walk score

A pier, a GAA pitch, and the N70 between them

Founded

Civil parish, name means 'the new church'

Coords

51.8678° N, 9.6886° W

01 / 07

At a glance.

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

01 Two ruins

Dromore and Dunkerron, both fallen.

Dromore Castle was the Mahony seat above the Kenmare River; Dunkerron was a 15th-century O'Sullivan tower a mile west. Both are ruins now. You walk to them across cattle fields and read the dates yourself.

Stories & lore → 02 The club

All-Ireland junior champions, a Kerry inter-county on the books.

Templenoe GAA won the All-Ireland Junior Club final in 2016 with a parish of about 250 souls. The Spillane brothers came from here. Tadhg Morley still does. The pitch is signposted off the N70.

Stories & lore → 03 The pier

Sea fishing and a slipway on the Kenmare River.

Templenoe pier sits below the road on the north shore of the bay. Mackerel from the wall in summer, the odd charter boat going out for pollock and conger. Quiet most days — the Kenmare crowd go to Reenagross.

Walks & outings →

02 / 07

Where to sleep.

Place	Type	Local note
Dromquinna Manor	Manor house, glamping & weddings	The old Mahony hunting lodge on the shore at the eastern end of the parish, between Kenmare and Templenoe pier. Now run as an upmarket tourism business by the Brennan brothers — luxury bell-tents in the woods, a restored manor for weddings, manicured gardens running down to the water. Not a hotel in the booking-a-room sense; you book a tent or a cabin. The grounds are the reason to stay.
B&Bs along the N70	Family-run B&Bs	A handful of farmhouse and bungalow B&Bs sit along the Ring of Kerry road through the parish — most with a view of the bay, most run by the same families for thirty years. Listings change; ask the Kenmare tourist office or check the Failte Ireland approved list. Cheaper than Kenmare town and ten minutes nearer the silence.
Stay in Kenmare instead	Honest note	Templenoe has no hotel and no village centre. If you want a pub on the doorstep and a restaurant for dinner, sleep in Kenmare four miles east and drive out. The Park, the Lansdowne, Sheen Falls and Brook Lane are all there.

03 / 07

Stories & lore.

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

The Mahony seat, fallen

Dromore Castle

Dromore was built in 1831 as the country house of the Mahony family, who held the Templenoe estate from the early 1700s. Pierce Mahony — a Dublin solicitor and political agent for Daniel O'Connell — was the man who commissioned it. The house was Tudor-revival, three storeys, sat on the ridge above the bay. The family ran out of money in the 20th century, the roof came off in the 1950s for tax reasons, and the building has been a shell ever since. You can still walk the avenue. The view is what the Mahonys paid for.

O'Sullivan Mór, 15th century

Dunkerron Castle

Dunkerron is the older ruin — a square tower-house built around 1465 by the O'Sullivan Mór, the senior branch of the O'Sullivan clan that held this end of Kerry before the Plantations. It sat at the head of a small inlet a mile west of where Dromore would later stand. Cromwellian forces took it in the 1650s. The Mahony estate later absorbed the lands and built a new house beside the old tower; that newer house is also a ruin, two ruins side by side. Cattle graze around them now. There is no signage. Ask in Kenmare.

A parish of 250 in Croke Park

The Spillanes and Templenoe GAA

Templenoe GAA was founded in 1933 and spent most of its history as a junior club competing in the Kenmare district. Then the Spillanes arrived. Pat — eight All-Ireland senior medals, nine All-Stars, the most decorated Gaelic footballer of the 1970s and 80s — grew up here, as did his brothers Mick and Tom. The next generation came through in the 2010s: the club won the Kerry Junior Championship in 2015 and the All-Ireland Junior Club final in 2016, with Killian Spillane (Pat's nephew) as captain. Tadhg Morley, also Templenoe, plays full-back for Kerry and has two senior All-Irelands. For a parish this small to keep producing inter-county footballers is not normal. It is the thing the village is most quietly proud of.

Where the parish meets the water

The pier

Templenoe pier is small — a stone slipway, a short concrete arm, room for a handful of boats. It sits below the N70 at the western end of the parish, on the north shore of the Kenmare River where the bay starts widening out. Locals fish off the wall in summer for mackerel and pollock. The odd charter boat goes out from here for sea-angling trips toward the Bull and Cow rocks. There is no shop, no café, no toilet. There is a bench. On a still evening the water is glass and the Beara mountains are mirrored back at you, and you understand why people who could live anywhere chose to live here.

04 / 07

Things to do outside.

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

Templenoe Pier and shore Park at the pier signposted off the N70. Walk the slipway, follow the shore east along the rocks for a few hundred metres until the field-edge stops you. Mackerel anglers in July, oystercatchers most of the year, the Beara mountains across the water.

1.5 km out and backdistance

30 mintime

Reenagross Park (Kenmare) Four miles east in Kenmare, but the obvious walk if you are staying in Templenoe. Mature woodland on a peninsula sticking into the bay, otters in the river mouth, and quiet enough that the locals walk dogs there and the visitors mostly miss it.

3 km of pathsdistance

1 hourtime

The road itself Honestly: the Templenoe stretch of the N70 is a walkable road with a wide verge and a sea view, and on a still morning before the coaches roll out of Kenmare it is a fine forty minutes. There is no marked loop. The road is the walk.

As long as you likedistance

—time

05 / 07

When to go.

There is no bad time. There are different times.

Spring

Mar–May

Lambs in the fields above the bay, gorse going yellow on the slopes, the GAA league starting up. Quiet on the road.

◉ Go

Summer

Jun–Aug

The Ring of Kerry coach traffic is real on the N70 from about ten in the morning. Walk the pier early. Drive west before nine or after six.

◐ Mind yourself

Autumn

Sep–Oct

Championship football season. If Templenoe are playing, the parish goes. Storm light over the Beara is the reason painters come to this stretch of the N70.

◉ Go

Winter

Nov–Feb

Half the local accommodation closes. Dromquinna shuts the tents until April. The road is quiet, the GAA pitch is floodlit, and Kenmare is where you go for dinner.

◐ Mind yourself

06 / 07

What to skip.

Honestly? Don't bother.

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

Looking for a Templenoe village centre

There isn't one. It is a parish strung along the N70 with a pier, a pitch, and two ruins. Kenmare is the village. Treat Templenoe as the country drive between Kenmare and Sneem.

Trespassing for the castle ruins

Both Dromore and Dunkerron sit on private farmland with cattle. Look from the road, ask in Kenmare if you want a closer look, and do not climb gates.

Booking a Templenoe pub crawl

There is, at most, a quiet local bar at the Kenmare end of the parish; the village has no pub strip. The session you are looking for is in Kenmare or Sneem.

Getting there.

By car

Kenmare to Templenoe is 6 km west on the N70 — about 10 minutes. From Killarney, allow 50 minutes via the N71 and Kenmare. Sneem is 17 km further west on the same road, another 25 minutes.

By bus

No public service stops in Templenoe. The Bus Éireann 282 between Kenmare and Cahersiveen passes along the N70 but does not have a scheduled stop in the parish. You need a car or a bike.

By train

No train. Killarney is the nearest station, then car or taxi via Kenmare.

By air

Kerry Airport (KIR) is 60 km, 1h 10m by car via Killarney and the N71. Cork is 2h 15m. Shannon is 3h.