Bantry House and the Hundred Steps

The house on the hill above the harbour

Bantry House sits on rising ground just west of the town, looking straight down the length of Bantry Bay. The White family built it in 1739 and has lived there ever since, which makes it one of the few Irish stately homes where the family that built it never had to sell up or hand it over. It opened to the public in 1946, and the current generation still runs the place, which gives it a lived-in feel that a lot of restored country houses lose.

Inside, the rooms hold furniture, tapestries and paintings that Richard White, the second Earl of Bantry, gathered on his travels around continental Europe in the early 1800s. The formal terraced gardens below the house were his work too, laid out in a style closer to an Italian palazzo garden than anything else in west Cork, and they are the reason most people climb the hill in the first place.

The French fleet that never landed

The house has a real claim to a moment of Irish history. In December 1796, a French invasion fleet of more than forty ships, carrying troops meant to support Wolfe Tone's United Irishmen, anchored in Bantry Bay. It never landed. Bad weather scattered the fleet before the soldiers could get ashore, and the invasion that might have changed Irish history simply blew away. Richard White, the local landowner, organised the district's defences during the crisis and was created Baron Bantry for it in 1797, then Earl of Bantry in 1816. The house's connection to that near miss is one of the more unusual footnotes in Irish history, and it is well documented inside.

The hundred steps

The best reason to visit, beyond the house itself, is the climb up the hundred stone steps behind it. They rise straight up the hillside through the formal gardens to a viewing point that looks back down over the terraces, the house roofline, the town, and the whole sweep of the bay out to Whiddy Island. It is a proper climb rather than a stroll, but it does not take long, and the view at the top is the single best vantage point over Bantry that does not involve a car.

Visiting practically

The estate is open for visits from 10am to 5pm daily, with last admission at 4:30pm and the car park closing at 5:30pm. Adult admission is around 14 euro, with a child rate (5 to 16) of around 5 euro, a family ticket around 33 euro, and a concession rate around 11.50 euro. Groups of 8 or more get a reduced rate and should book ahead by email. An annual garden pass costs around 20 euro if you plan to come back through the seasons. No advance booking is required for individual visitors, though the estate does occasionally close for private events, so it is worth checking the website before a special trip.

The estate also runs a small number of bed and breakfast rooms in the restored East Wing, so it is possible to actually stay inside the house rather than just visit it for an afternoon, along with an afternoon tea service in season.

Getting there

Bantry House is a short walk or a five-minute drive from Wolfe Tone Square in the town centre, on the Glengarriff road side of Bantry. There is parking on site. If you are combining it with a day in town, it works well either first thing in the morning or as a late-afternoon finish, since the light on the bay from the top of the steps changes noticeably through the day.