Carton alternative to the holiday package

Tommy Barker visits a 200-year-old estate with teenage attitude.

CARTON HOUSE, long the seat of the Earls of Leinster, has had some pretty demanding guests, from its 18th century nobility callers, to elite golfers in the Irish Open, on through demanding house buyers picking up more than 100 of its demesne-set lodges. A hotel since 2006, it has also met the high expectations of hotel and spa pampered high-rollers of the Celtic Tiger years. Even more prima donna types — soccer players from Real Madrid among other elite athletes — are even rumoured to be set to visit this summer, for training sessions on its new playing pitches, next to the 165-bed hotel in the 1,100 acres of private ground. Carton’s new owners have even built a 5,000 sq ft private house in the woods that has footballer’s wife stamped all over it (see panel).

Now, though, having drawn all of this on itself as its daily business Carton had better prepare itself for the most challenging, the most demanding, the hardest to please of all of its guests over a 200-year span: might that be teenagers, then?

Keeping small children happy on holidays isn’t easy (in fact, it can be hell, especially with travel factored in,) but at least its travails prepare parents for the trials of teenage/adolescent years. That’s when you’re not cool, in fact duh! though you are the walking ATM card/lifeline they need, you’re an embarrassment, and they don’t want to be seen dead with you. But, you want a holiday, and you can’t leave them at home. “Free gaff, folks away” is the text no parent wants sent from an offspring’s mobile. As you bunker down into the “you’re coming with us, no arguments” sort of arguments, step up Carton House, beautiful and brave place that it is... this month.

From July 1, Carton Demesne is rolling out a Teenage Kicks holiday experiment — and on the evidence of a weekend visit, it might just be worth while bribing them to join you there. They might even (ha, ha) thank you for it afterwards.

It is a good deal: the offers start from €500 per person for five days, starting on a Sunday, with full-board, scheduled activities, workshops and competitions. The genuinely long list of activities of offer include mountain biking and GPS treasure hunts on the 19km of wooded trails and walks, tennis, golf and dance academies, and best of all for the lads and ladettes, a blast of exhilarating challenges with the on-site Ireland Xtreme company, who have sweaty-palms inducing low and high rope challenge courses with 40’ high trapeze “leap of faith” jump, archery, laser clay pigeon shooting, bridge building and a zip line. There’s also an 18-metre swimming pool and dumbell-laden gym, while for the young belles there’s Aveda spa workshops. One of the hotel conference suites is being give over to an adult-free Teenage Chill Space for the few months, complete with things like music and X-Box consoles... that’s if your own gang forget to pack their own gaming paraphernalia for their bedrooms’ flat screen tellies.

The Irish Examiner had a June weekend press preview, along with two 16/17-year-old boys and two 12-year old girls — spoiled son and daughter each got to bring a friend as their price for coming along as research assistants. Carton had something, in fact, a lot, for each target group and some of the adrenaline challenges even had the lads quiet for a while, with a bit of evident pride in achievement filtering through a few days later: we’ll take that as a thanks, so lads.

And, it is funny the things you learn about your children. Who’d have though a family Christmas present of a Wii Fit game could have transformed a 12 year old girl’s coordination when back out on a real tennis court, with real racket in hand? Coke-fuelled, of course, but not with the sort that turns up in drugs tests.

With 1,100 acres to call on, each family member can find a demesne place to hell-raise in (and Maynooth a mile away has a 24-hour Tesco for food-fuel), or find utter peace and tranquillity. There’s a sentinel 19th century folly which sort of serves as a marker for finding your way around the place, looking out on the two golf course, one by Mark O’Meara, the other a tougher links-like challenge by Colin Montgomerie. Original building features on the estate include the Boathouse, built for Queen Victoria on the lake on the River Rye, and the river-cascade set Shell Cottage, naturally psychodelic and lived in the 1980s by Marianne Faithfull.

Adults really do get some chill time (the hotel, with sensitive funky extensions to the period original designed by Murray O’Laoire Architects) is officially four-star, but feels five-star) and a spokesperson says they are trying to appeal to both traditional and non-traditional family set-ups, ideal for single parents with teenage children. Before checking out, the more biddable part of the gang (ie, no boys) visited Maynooth Castle, opened in summer season by the OPW. There, a guide tailored her talk to the young and old alike, talked of centuries of FitzGerald rule (the Normans who built the castle in the 12th century and Carton House in 1739) and explained the foster system used under Brehon Law, where very young children were fostered out as a means of cementing alliances across clans, chieftains and the Irish sea. The only thing, she noted, was that you got your children back when they got to be teenagers. Duh! can’t live with them, can’t live without them.