dunloe castle gardens

The garden is designed to be approached from the hotel, a large modern complex lying close to the site of Harrington's old house. Before entering the Walled Garden it is worth inspecting the area just behind the shelter where a birch from western China proudly displays its shining orange-brown bark with peeling pink and grey blooms. On the other side of the shelter along the path leading into the Walled Garden are a number of camellias, including the tender and the suckering shrub clerodendrum bungei whose rosy-red fragrant flowers send the butterflies into a swoon of ecstasy in later summer. The north wall of the garden provides a suitable environment for quite a variety of plants; the white flowering Eucryphia moorei from Australia, the magnificent Chilean foliage plant lLomatia ferruginea, the remarkable Camellia granthamiana from Hong Kong, a species with large parchment-white flowers that is now endangered in the wild.

Set in an incomparable location with magnificent panoramic views of the towering MacGillycuddy Reeks, these gardens contain an exceptionally rich variety of trees and shrubs, including many species that are rarely if at all found elsewhere in Ireland. Located 5 miles west of Killarney and 1 mile south of Beauford. NGR: V 808901.