Ireland travel solo without a car

Most, if not all, are accessible by public transportation or by organized day tours. How much time will you have? It will definitely take longer to do all of these by public transportation rather than by driving.

If you're using Rick's Ireland guidebook, he summarizes bus connections in each chapter to the next destinations in the book. See www.irishrail.ie for train lines such as Galway-Dublin and www.buseireann.ie for a lot of the buses, or www.transportforireland.ie combines several services.

There are many places you can get to by train/bus but it will take more time, and if your time is limited you may have to be prepared to cross some things off your list. I did a three week tour of Ireland by train/bus several years ago, and I found that it was best to base myself in larger towns that were accessible by train, then stay a few days and do guided day tours to the things I wanted to see. So, I stayed several days each in Dublin, Killarney, Galway, and Belfast, then a couple nights in both Kinsale and Kilkenny. The thing to remember is that the days you travel (get on a train or bus) you probably won't be able to catch a day tour when you get to the next town as they all tend to leave at 9am. So, if you grab the train from Dublin to Killarney be prepared to do your touring on foot for the rest of the day once you get there. These smaller towns don't have great public transit, either, so unless you want to take a lot of cabs you will probably have to rely on the day tours. Be well organized to make the best use of your time. You might want to visit the Lonely Planet web site as there will be a lot more people there who travel this way.