galway 2 days with aran islands and cliffs then dublin. Doable? tips?

You plan confuses me. Dublin is on the EAST side of island, Galway on the West coast.

Are you flying out into Shannon? Its easily 3 hours travel distance between Shannon and Dublin. As well as 3 hours from Shannon to Galway.

Galway to the Cliffs of Mohr is 2.5-3 hours by public transport.

Your stay is short. You will loose a day via jet lag. Reconsider your itinerary.

Personally I’d stay somewhere like Doolin but if Dublin is a must see only give it a day.

I was born when Truman was in office. Female and have driven the entire island solo (including NI ) twice. Last drive was 5 years ago Belfast to Dingle.

Nary a problem but planned my route the night before using Google Maps satellite view so I knew where I could stop for a loo and petrol.

Ireland is a gorgeous country. Slow down and engage in meeting people.

Dingle Peninsula is gorgeous.

Slainte

Tastes vary, but to me, the west coast of Ireland (including the Arran islands) were way more interesting to me than Dublin.

Your trip is extremely short. You only have four days.

If you really want to get out to the west and include the Arran Islands, I'd reduce the time you spend in Dublin to an absolute minimum. Upon landing, take the bus ("coach") to Galway. Spend your arrival afternoon in Galway, try to stay awake until dinner, get a good night's sleep and try hard to get up early the next day. Next day (your first full day in Ireland after arrival), I'd FLY to Inishmore (skip the ferry, it's slow and you have no time to waste; flights are not expensive and are a hoot). Get on the first outbound flight of the day (that gets you there hours before the ferry, effectively buying you almost a half-day more usable time). Make good use of the long daylight, try hard to see the most important sights on Inishmore (there are only a few "must see" places). If you want to relax, unwind and savor a place, Inishmore is a good place to do that. Spend the night there.  It's empty after the ferry-day-trippers go back to Galway. Get up early next day, check out of your B&B, go see the last of your sights, and catch the last flight back to Galway late afternoon (again, ferry day-trippers will all leave hours before you, so getting the last flight off the island buys you more time there). Sleep in Galway, then move on the next day. You could go to the Cliffs of Moher before heading back to Dublin.

Note: there are cliffs on Inishmore that I found better and more impressive than the so-much-more famous Cliffs of Moher. If you get out to the cliffs on Inishmore, you will have them pretty much (or completely) to yourselves. Cliffs of Moher are set up for mass tourism, and will have crowds.

David’s recommendation for flying to the Aran islands is perfect, whether you have limited time, or lots of time. We used the ferry on our first visit, in 2011. We flew the next visit, a few years later. The small Aer Arran planes can fly, even when the seas are too rough and choppy for the ferries (which happened on both of our trips), so with your time constraints, their fast plane is the only way to go.

Check out the Website: https://aerarannislands.ie/. To maximize your sightseeing time, if you’re truly wanting/needing to be on one of the islands and see the Cliffs of Moher, and providing that you’re not driving anyway and needing to get back to the car, consider a fly/ferry “loop” trip that day, if you can find a workable schedule. From Galway, head to the Connemara airport west of the city. How you get there you’d need to figure out (taxi? private driver? maybe a bus exists?), as we had a rental car ourselves. Then fly to Inishmore. After your quickie visit to that island, ferry to the Doolin Port on the west coast of the mainland. This assumes that the waters are calm enough for the ferry to sail. Also, that the ferry schedule gives you adequate time on Inishmore, and to get to the Cliffs. Another consideration is to possibly fly to one of the smaller of the 3 islands, then ferry from there.

Once off the ferry, go south, to the Cliffs. Again, I’m not certain by what means you’d get there, but it would avoid backtracking thru Galway. Maybe you could arrange to have someone (or is there a bus? you’ll want to confirm your options) take you to the cliffs … and then later to Dublin.

The year we saw the Cliffs (2011), we stayed in Lisdoonvarna, a charming town down the road about 9 miles, if you wanted a great place to spend the night after your whirlwind day, and before making your way back to Dublin.

Thanks for the suggestions! Exactly things I needed to hear. I don't think we can do Arran Islands and Cliffs, and I hadn't even done enough research to know about the Irishmore. May have to look into that, but either way I would only pick one thing on the West Coast if this is something we can do. So not sure if cliffs are better to pick because it is on the mainland or arran. (will research). (We also heard Dublin airport is taking hours! So we don't want to assume we will just arrive in Dublin and head out west. If we can't do west we will look for day trips from Dublin...thanks for all the insight... helps so much.

If you are flying into Dublin, then I would stay in Dublin the entire time. There are many day trips you can do from there, including a very long day to the cliffs of Moher. With so few days it doesn’t make sense to waste time changing locations. The day you land you will spend a lot of time getting out of the airport and into the city so that day you won’t be able to do much other than wander the city and get your bearings. So, according to your dates you will have four days on the ground to do tours. You could do Newgrange one day, Cliffs of Moher one day, then maybe Glendalough on another day, and also have a full day in Dublin for Killmainham Jail, Book of Kells, and other sights.