Dunkerron Castle

Ruined four-storey tower house outside Templenoe

A roofless tower house in a field three kilometres west of Kenmare, just off the road to Templenoe. Access is informal — park near the gate, walk across the meadow, mind the cattle. There are no signs, no entrance fee, and usually no other visitors. From the top of the rise the castle frames a view across the Kenmare River to the mountains of the Beara.

The walls are made of local sandstone and rise four storeys, with gun loops in the lower courses and a corbelled bartizan at one corner. Climbing inside is not recommended — the staircases are gone and the upper floors have collapsed — but the ground floor with its barrel vault is intact and atmospheric.

things to do landmark
A story
Dunkerron was the stronghold of the O'Sullivan Mór, lords of this part of Kerry, who built the present tower in the 1590s on the site of an earlier fortress. The castle was abandoned after Cromwell's wars and slowly stripped for building stone, but the four-storey shell still stands almost to roof height — a striking silhouette on its little headland above the bay.