Tralee Golf Club

Palmer drew the first nine. The dunes drew the rest.

Tralee Golf Club sits at Barrow, on a spit of land between Barrow Harbour and Tralee Bay, a few kilometres beyond Ardfert in north Kerry. It was the first course Arnold Palmer designed in Europe, and it splits neatly in two. The outward half runs along low cliffs and rocky shore with open sea views. The inward half climbs into big dunes, with ravines to carry and plateau greens to find. If you are building a Kerry week around Ballybunion, Tralee is the natural partner, and its online tee sheet lets you fix the date months ahead.

Tralee Golf Club green fees and tee times.

Visitors book and pay online through the club’s BRS tee reservation system, or email info@traleegolfclub.com. The published visitor times are Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, from 8am to 3pm; no visitor times are listed for Wednesday or the weekend. A 50% deposit is taken when you book and is non-refundable, and the balance falls due 90 days before play whatever happens, so treat this as a firm commitment. The maximum handicap is 28 for men and 36 for women. Single golfers, two-balls and other groups smaller than four may be joined with other players. Tralee is a walking course: the €60 buggies are kept for medical needs only, so ask for one when you book. Mobile phones are not allowed on the course or in the clubhouse.

The round, in perspective.

The club was instituted in 1896 and played for decades on a nine-hole course at Mounthawk, near the town. In 1980 it bought land at Barrow, and the Palmer course, laid out by his firm with Ed Seay as lead designer, opened in October 1984. The front nine is the seaside stretch. The par-five 2nd plays along the coastline, and the par-three 3rd, named Castle, has an old stone lookout post beside the green that you can step inside. The back nine changes everything. It turns into much higher dunes, and the 13th is a par three that is all carry, from one dune to another. Palmer is quoted as saying he may have designed the front nine, but surely God designed the back. David Lean used this stretch of coast for scenes in Ryan’s Daughter.

Know before you go.

Visitor days

Mon, Tue, Thu, Fri, 8am–3pm

Handicap

Max 28 men, 36 women

Buggies

Medical use only, €60

Deposit

50% at booking, non-refundable

Phones

Not permitted on course or in clubhouse

Dress

No sleeveless shirts, trainers, jogging pants or rugby shirts

Make the trip work.

Wednesday and the weekend are not in the published visitor window, so slot Tralee into a Monday, Tuesday, Thursday or Friday and arrange the rest of the week around it. Ballybunion’s Old Course also takes visitors on weekday mornings only, so a common pattern is Ballybunion one morning and Tralee the next, from a single base. Visitor times stop at 3pm, so an afternoon flight into Kerry rules out a same-day round. Note also the gap in the 2026 rate table: no fee is listed for 11 and 12 April, so check before booking that weekend.

Kerry Airport at Farranfore is closest, about 40 minutes by road via Tralee town. Shannon is about two hours away through Limerick, or similar using the Tarbert ferry. Tralee has a railway station on the line from Dublin and Cork, but the course is about 13 km out of town, so plan on a car or taxi. The Tralee to Fenit Greenway, a walking and cycling path, passes the club.

Where it is.

Nearby: 1. Dooks Golf Club (25 km) · 2. Ballybunion Golf Club (25 km) · 3. Trump International Golf Links Doonbeg (55 km) · 4. Waterville Golf Links (56 km) · 5. Lahinch Golf Club (78 km) · 6. The Golf Course at Adare Manor (79 km) · Compare all South West Ireland tee times

Somewhere to settle in.

Tralee town, around 15 minutes away, has the widest choice: Ballygarry House on the Killarney road, Ballyseede Castle just east of town and several hotels in the town centre. Fenit, the small harbour village on the far side of Barrow Harbour, has guesthouses and self-catering, and it is the closest place to sleep. Groups who want Ballybunion and Tralee on consecutive days often base themselves in Tralee town, under an hour from Ballybunion, for its restaurants and pubs.

Make a trip of it.

Ballybunion’s Old and Cashen courses are under an hour north, and Dooks, a much older and gentler links at Glenbeigh, is about an hour south. Killarney’s lakeside courses are within the hour too. Away from golf, Banna Strand runs for miles just north of the course, and Blennerville Windmill, on the edge of Tralee, is a restored windmill beside the old ship canal. The road west onto the Dingle Peninsula starts at Blennerville.

Find your season.

The club’s 2026 visitor rates run from 1 April to 9 October, with high-season pricing from 13 April. Outside those dates the club does not publish visitor rates, so ask by email about winter access. Remember that the 2026 high-season rate of €450 covers every published visitor date from mid-April to early October; there is no cheaper shoulder rate in September.