Sir Bob’s dad’s former home sails into view

CORK harbour has been linked with the 1722-founded Royal Cork Yacht Club since, well, 1722, though the club’s name and even its location has changed a bit down the centuries.

However, the club has been long-established in the public mind with Crosshaven (a weighty and beautifully published history of the RCYC and a social document in its own right was published this summer for a cool €100 a copy), and one of the closest and older homes to the renowned yacht club are the trio at Westbourne Terrace.

No 2, mid-ships on the terrace, was once home to the hotel-manager father of ex-Boomtown Rat, campaigning activist and philanthropist Bob Geldof. Though born in Dublin, Sir/Saint Bob’s dad was a hotel manager who work for a number of years in Cork, most notably at the Grand Hotel in Crosshaven which is a stone’s throw from this handsome terrace.

No 2 has been extensively improved in the last four or five years by its vendors, and is a four-bed home with nothing left to do but move in and drop anchor.

Ann O’Mahony of Sherry FitzGerald guides it at €475,000-plus, and reckons it will be bought as a family home - but equally, it may find new boat-owing buyers who will buy it as a second home, perhaps as an Irish base and adjunct to an apartment on the Med or the Costas.

No 2 has hall, two interlinked reception rooms, with bay window to the living section in front, fireplace and second fireplace in the dining room behind. A modern kitchen opens out to a decked patio, while the first floor has two bedrooms, plus bathroom, with a third bedroom on the first floor return, and fourth bedroom at attic level.

There’s marina and club views and a lawn.