The Full Irish: Ballybunion and the Craic
We head into full Bag Tag Barry-land.
When golfers make a list of courses they want to play in Ireland, Ballybunion is always right near or at the top of the list. It’s a name even casual golfers have heard of - and it’s also fun to say. (My theory is that in an Irish accent, it’s clearly the most fun golf course name to say. Try it!)
It’s a course with a TON of history that has really gotten international acclaim in the last forty years or so as noted American golfers like Tom Watson raved about it and drew attention to the wonder of it all.
Founded: 1893
Designer: James McKenna
Rating:
Top100GolfCourses: 7 (Britain & Ireland), 1 (Ireland)
The Irish Golfer: 7 (Ireland)
Golf.com: 9 (Britain & Ireland)
Of all the courses on our rota, Ballybunion (and I should state, this is the Old course, not the Cashen course designed by Robert Trent Jones, though that’s reportedly well worth playing) was both quite high on the list and still a bit of a mystery. That’s because when No Laying Up went there (a video series that at least partially inspired this trip), they were almost blown out to sea by a literal hurricane that touched ground.
As such, I had a bit less of an idea of what the course looks like than some others. I knew that off the first tee, the right side of the hole has an actual cemetery which is decidedly not in play but right up in your line of sight. That’s delightful. (It turns out this is a famine cemetery which - hey, not like any cemetery is a ball of fun, but that’s a reminder of how much hardship this country has faced.)
While no hurricanes blew through, we DID have a lot of weather hit us on the second nine.
It was so intense we saw people walking off the course, and after we posted, GHIN had a +3 stroke course adjustment, which means they basically took three strokes off our score due to conditions. (PCC is more complicated than this, but we’re not doing that.) Pin flags were wrapped around the pole and secured because they would be ripped up from the wind otherwise. This was the first but not the last time we saw this.
Because of the conditions, the camera stayed in the pocket a lot but … I’m not sure how you make a better golf course than Ballybunion.
So many holes just blew my mind, and not just the ones I had good scores on. Dean and I took a match to the final putt on 18 (Dean won, props to him).
A lot of the fun was due to our amazing caddie, Mark Allen, who read every green like a champ and had us laughing for 18 straight holes, even in the face of pounding rain.
In talking about it, my first adjective to describe Ballybunion was “macho.” Which feels immediately wrong and weird, but it is very much a TEST of golf and not necessarily a course set up for beauty, photographs and tour buses of high handicap golfers.
There’s something about playing a round on a course you can immediately tell is special, and Ballybunion is absolutely that. As you can tell from the photo above, the weather wasn’t ideal but it didn’t prevent me from adoring the course and having a truly great time out there.
After the round we headed to Killarney, a city that is just so damn cool I can’t get over it. Some of the streets are pedestrian only, and the streets are absolutely littered with buskers and bars, and chief among them is Reidy’s. Formerly an apothecary, as well as clearly a lot of other things, it’s now a massive, sprawling collection of different rooms, many of which feature musicians or distinct bars. It’s … amazing. I’d say it’s the best bar I’ve ever been to, but it’s sort of its own thing. And that night, we were fortunate enough to see Liam O’Connor and the Family Band. (That family would be his daughter and two sons.)
Plus there was this guy, who fucking ruled.
I’ve been in far too many crowded, popular bars and at Reidys I bumped into a TON of people because we were just packed in so closely. Each and every one laughed and often struck up a conversation. Back in the states, I am QUITE sure some folks would have been pretty put off and maybe looked to start something. But here, the energy was just incredible, and positive and so, so much fun.
One highlight was when his daughter sung “Zombie” by the Cranberries and literally EVERYONE was into it. This video probably shows a third of the people there - and it was a bit bonkers that the majority of the folks here are local Irish who weren’t even alive (or barely that) when Zombie originally came out.
We hung out at Reidy’s for way, way too long and the band never took even a few minutes off. Absolute legends. All trip we’d been wondering if we were going to experience the “craic,” and while we had some good times at The Nineteenth and other spots, this was the night I think we’ll all remember when we think back about the nightlife in Ireland.
Stayed in Killarney for our trip and enjoyed many a night at Reidy’s . Played Ballybunion in great weather 75 and sunny! Who would have thought we needed sunscreen in September! Nice article!