"Rosapenna acquires St Patrick's to become 81-hole links mecca"

Brian Keogh reports on the acquisition of the 370-acre Rosapenna Hotel & Golf Resort formerly known as St. Patrick's Golf Links. Besides having existing golf with design touches from Old Tom, the sale includes an 800-acre dunes system that might lead to more golf holes.

Rosapenna - which features the Old Tom Morris Links, the Sandy Hills Links, the No. 3 Links, No. 4 Links and the Coastguard Nine - has a long illustrious golfing history dating to 1891 when Lord Leitrim brought Old Tom Morris of St Andrews to design the first links.

And some of the land and existing golf was almost made into a Jack Nicklaus course in 2006, but was halted.

Here's a video showing the stunning site:

Comments

[Me]

I cannot wait for that. Rosapenna is soul stirringly beautiful.

[Amen Coroner]

Played Old Tom Links. Liked it a lot. Even met some Dubliners on holiday there so that must say something about golf and overall experience at Rosapenna. Carne still my overwhelming fave on the West Coast. Glad to see there is some action out of the sleeping or is just a napping Celtic golf Tiger? Wasn't Carne supposed to build more holes at one point?

[Ivan Morris]

Rosapenna is awesome golf and awesome scenery. It's one of the few, maybe only, place in Ireland that this Irish man would go to on a week's golf holiday. I go there every other year (it's a 6-hour trip, after all) with my wife and we have never got rained upon - while we were on the golf course. In summer, the days are exceptionally long and playing 54-holes is easily on. Maybe even 81-holes in a day would be on if I were younger. Did it before, y'know!

[Jonathan]

The Old Course is magical - the front nine (pictured) reminds me of Troon. Not so with Sandy Hills, which is unplayably difficult. JC

[DLGOLF]

Jonathan,
Pictured is the back nine of Old Tom Morris Links -
new strand nine was added in 2009 so you haven't made
it to Rosapenna in a few years....
The Sandy Hills is currently very playable with members returning
40pts plus on a weekly basis to win the club competitions...

[3foot1]

Bears a striking resemblance to Cabot Links.

[RLL]

Have played many of the world's finest, including Scotland and Ireland, but Rosapenna still stands out as the most beautiful course I've ever had the pleasure of walking. Was like being inside a 3D version of a gorgeous watercolor painting all day long. Still occasionally have dreams of something that happened there when a small dog walked up out of nowhere, sat down on the tee next to my ball, and accompanied me for the next three holes. To this day I use the scripted R ball marker I got there when I play a round where I want to stay particularly mindful.

[so]

RLL....Thank You for your beautiful vision.

[rose]

Great news. What a shame it was when St. Patrick's was stripped and then left to the elements. Thank goodness this wonderful golfing ground will be protected and, hopefully, returned to play.

[Brad]

Keep the Donald away!

[Peter Spurway]

Stunning. True links golf is a wonderful experience. We are blessed here in Nova Scotia with Cabot Links. It's absolute links heaven.

[Jonathan]

It has been a few years since I was at Rosapena. If the difficuty of SH was addressed then that's an improvement. JC