West Ireland · Ireland · Liam Higgins / Ron Kirby
Old Head Golf Links
James Kinloch
Golf Travel Specialist · played this course
Old Head Golf Links is the most dramatic golf course I have ever played. The course occupies a promontory two hundred metres above the Atlantic, surrounded by ocean on three sides, and the views are genuinely distracting in a way that affects scoring. I don't say this lightly — I've played Turnberry, I've played Pebble Beach. Old Head is more relentlessly spectacular.
The golf itself is a secondary consideration to most people on their first visit. That's acceptable. The second visit, you start to appreciate the design — the way the holes use elevation and ocean exposure, the par-3s that play across cliff edges to greens that would be unremarkable anywhere else and are unmissable here.
Green fee at £250 is steep. I recommend it once, without apology. Then I direct clients to Ballybunion and Lahinch for their second and third Irish rounds.
Signature hole
Par-4 12th, 428 yards, cliffs on three sides
"The fairway narrows as it approaches the cliff edge. The green is visible from the tee but the drop to the Atlantic on the left makes it feel narrower than the yardage suggests. Pure theatre."
Designer
Liam Higgins / Ron Kirby
Par
72
Yardage
6,906
Green fee
from £250
Best for
Best time to go
May to September. The cliff exposure means this course plays very differently in different winds.
Play Old
James can arrange tee times, transfers, and accommodation around this course. One call is all it takes.
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