Site of a moveable feast

Tommy Barker gives a fascinating historical slant to a piece of land.

NOW you see it, now you don’t. The site of the moving Irish hotel, the former Atlantic Golf Links Hotel at Harbour View in Kilbrittain, Co Cork, is up for sale.

And, given the fascinating historical background, it is possible that some interesting product or property might once more fetch up on this seaside setting and six-acre site.

First, a potted history. Some of the temporary buildings erected for the Cork International Exhibition of 1902 went on to have second and third lives.

So it was with the Chalet Restaurant pavilion building. Assembled in the United States, this wood-framed beauty was erected in Cork on the Mardyke to cater for the masses at this huge international fair.

When its work was done, the building was dismantled, and was bought in 1903 by Ester Mary Alcock Stewell (Lady Riversdale, of Kilbrittain Castle) who erected it in two sections in Harbour View, as the centrepiece of an early golf and spa tourism venture, the Atlantic Golf Links hotel, complete with salt water baths, nine-hole golf course on sloblands and tennis courts.

It attracted American, Irish and British guests, and day-trippers from Cork, while a ferry brought people to and from Courtmacsherry.

But, the Great War hit the adventurous business venture, followed by Civil War turmoil, and it was sold in 1922.

One half was bought as a ‘take-away’ by Cork city wine merchant Dominic Daly as a family holiday home: in its new site 30 miles away, it still stands pretty in pink at the foot of Currabinny Wood, outside Crosshaven in Cork harbour.

The other half was bought by Richard Walsh of Bandon, and for 30 years it was a private family retreat in Harbour View. In the 1950s it reopened as the Horse Rock Inn, and ownership and use changed rapidly up to 1970, when Cork city builder and estate agent Denis McCarthy acquired it.

It burned down in 1973 in a fire triggered by an electrical fault: its resin impregnation and its peat-lined walls used as cavity insulation ensured rapid destruction. Other surviving pavilions of the international exhibition still stand in Fitzgerald’s Park, including the Lord Mayor’s Pavilion, Sunday’s Well Tennis Club, Cork Cricket Club, and Shandon Boat Club on the Marina.

Now, the future: auctioneer Martin Kelleher of SWS Property Services is selling the original six acres of land the Atlantic Golf Hotel complex stood on, which is being disposed of by the McCarthy family after 34 years of ownership.

It is close to the Pink Elephant bar and restaurant, and the public road divides the land, with over three acres on the coastal side of the road and unlikely to secure any planning permission.

Aspiring purchasers will have to argue a case for planning, and there might be scope on the 2.7-acre inland section for a superbly sited house or two, says Mr Kelleher, who seeks around €500,000 for the land.

What chance an argument that goes: ‘If you give planning permission, it doesn’t mean that the new building will be there for ever. And we can always move it again later’?