Experience the radiant beauty of the Emerald Isle at Waterville House & Golf Links, home to one of Ireland’s premier links golf courses. Since Waterville is located in the Ring of Kerry, players spend much of their time on the links looking out onto the Atlantic. A turn of the head however, and the Atlantic is replaced by majestic mountains, the highest in all of Ireland. Waterville not only feels like the kind of links course one would play in their dreams, but looks the part too.
Waterville’s humble beginnings can be traced back to the 1880s, when a group of cable station workers decided to lay out a modest little nine-hole course. Interestingly enough, that cable station was responsible for reporting when Charles Lindbergh had successfully made it across the pond on his transatlantic flight.
American millionaire John A. Mulcahy breathed new life into the then-neglected Waterville when he bought the links in 1960. Mulcahy called upon his friend, Claude Harmon, as well as Eddie Hackett, to redesign the course. The course was later updated by Tom Fazio on two separate occasions.
As is with many of the courses Hackett had a hand in designing, each hole varies in difficulty, culminating in a climatic finish. Waterville’s penultimate 17th hole is its most well-known; not because it is challenging, but because of how beautiful it is. The tee for this par three sits 250 feet above sea level, providing golfers and their cameras an unobstructed view of the splendid beaches and rugged coastline surrounding Waterville.