Master of the House

The highlights

• Grand holiday home with exposed stonework, high ceilings and open fireplaces to ensure you remain cosy and warm all year round.
• Beautifully styled and furnished, this lovely home offers everything you will need for an enjoyable stay.
• Sleeping up to 12 guests, across eight super-comfy bedrooms, this is the ideal home for large group getaways.
• Ideal location from which to explore the marvellous countryside of County Clare.

You should know

• Due to the location of this home, we recommend hiring a car to get the most out of your stay.
• The courtyard is shared with three other houses.
• Your host can provide a cot and high chair for free upon request.
• This home is spread over four floors, with no internal lift.
• Your host provides a supply of timber for your wood-burning stove.

The detail

Leave behind the daily grind and flourish in this grand country house, surrounded by the ancient limestone landscapes of County Clare and fields carpeted in daisies. If you like to stay somewhere with a bit of character, you'll love it here – this historical home dates all the way back to 1778, when it was originally a soldier's barracks. But it's since been lovingly restored and refurbished, all while retaining its traditional charm, and the care that's gone into every nook and cranny is more than apparent.

The grandiose furniture has a regal feel to it but somehow oozes comfort, you'll love curling up on the cosy armchair beside the fireplace, a book in one hand and a glass of wine in the other. The kitchen, which is cloaked in exposed brick, wooden beamed ceilings, and Victorian-style kitchen tiles, is one that demands to be cooked in. It's perfectly open and bright –preparing dinner will be a breeze. Or, your host can arrange a private chef to take care of that for you – perfect for special occasions and celebrations. And you'll want to take all the time you can to enjoy the stately yet cosy dining room. Gather around the solid oak dining table for the best kind of family dinner – great food, delicious wine, laughs, stories, talking over each other, and probably the occasional bicker. All the while the wood-burning stove flickers beside you, warming you from the inside out.

There's history everywhere you turn here. Even right outside your door, you'll see the ruins of a crumbling castle to explore. Then meander down to the heart of Clarecastle, it's just a four-minute walk but a beautiful one as you pass through expansive fields and cross the River Fergus. You could take a walk down the river, learning more about the history of the river's walled banks along the way, before looping back to Clarecastle. There's no better way to round it off than with a nice pint of Guinness.

The population of the Republic of Ireland sits close to five million, yet in 2019, it welcomed over nine-and-a-half million tourists. Why could that be? It might be tempting to put it down to the naturally friendly disposition of the Irish (one of the most widely known Gaelic phrases, ‘céad míle fáilte’, translates as ‘a hundred thousand welcomes’), but there’s a little more to it than that.

With more than three thousand kilometres of coastline, there’s no shortage of beaches and striking rock formations to discover, including the beautiful Cliffs of Moher and The Burren. However, the country’s interior is equally as breathtaking, with plenty of mountains, monastic ruins and large loughs (or lakes). Throw in a couple of modern, creative cities in the shape of Dublin, Cork and Limerick, and the only question left to ask is why that tourist figure isn’t higher.

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