Please sign in to post.

Itinerary for 13 days.

Hi everyone,
I've been researching and reading lots of post. I think I have an itinerary that works. It will be me (27yrs) and my sister (28yrs) travelling together. We thought it would be fun to be in Dublin for St. Patrick's day. But mostly because I'm busy spring, summer and fall (farmer). So I'm hoping the weather won't be that bad in march. We're landing march 7th and flying home on march 20th.

Day 1: Land 5:30am and train to Galway (is the train or bus better?)
Day 2: Aran Island day trip. Sleep Galway
Day 3: Pick up rental car drive and see Quiet Man Sites (only 27 but huge fan of John Wayne and one its one of my fav movies) and Ashford castle/falconry. Sleep Galway
Day 4: local Ploughing Match (I compete at home) Westmeath county hopefully not too far of a drive. Sleep Galway
Day 5: Drive through burren and see cliffs Moher. Drive to Tralee to Ballyseede castle hotel (sister wanted 1 castle stay and it's on the way)
Day 6: Drive to Dingle. Free day in dingle do some laundry. Sleep Dingle
Day 7: Dingle peninsula drive. Sleep Dingle
Day 8: Drive ROK and then to kinsale. Sleep kinsale. (This is the day I'm worried to much to far? Is this doable? Should I skip ROK?)
Day 9: Old Midleton distillery, rock of cashel and Kilkenny. Sleep Kilkenny
Day 10: Drive through Wicklow mountains on to Dublin. Drop off rental car.
Day 11: St. Patty's day woot woot!!
Day 12: recover!!! And Dublin sights. Sleep in Dublin
Day 13: beef farm day tour. Sleep in Dublin
Day 14: fly home

Hopefully the experts on this forum can let me know if this is a good plan or to aggressive.

Posted by
3561 posts

I would say your day 8 is a problem. Trying to drive ROK and get to Kinsale is too much driving.
We stayed in Killarney and drove the ROK this past summer. Left the hotel at 8am and returned at 5:30pm. We only made 4 stops and there are lots of places you will want to stop.

Posted by
509 posts

What diveloonie said regarding ROK. You could spend Days 8-11 on ROK and not run out of things to see.

Tough choice, but you might want to save ROK for another trip or drop Kilkenny. Let your interests guide you. That said -- here comes the hypocrisy -- don't delete falconry at Ashford Castle; it was a trip highlight for us and you can get a nice selfie with John and Maureen at the statue in Cong. If it's in the budget, you'll enjoy each flying your "own" hawk.)

Maybe staying on someone else's farm isn't your idea of a vacation, but there's a terrific farm B&B just south of Kilkenny that we found through Rick's book. If interested, shoot me a PM and I'll send details; I don't want to appear like a shill on the public forum.

Posted by
36 posts

I think your itinerary sounds great! We stayed the night in Cork and drove the Ring of Kerry and took our time, and then slept in Dingle that night. It is a long day but certainly doable. That way in the morning you will have lots of time to go to the distillery and Rock of Cashel and sleep in Kilkenny.

Posted by
45 posts

Hi thanks for the replies. I agree I'm worried to about day 8 as well, that's why i appreciate the honest feedback. I agree it would be a loooong day and in march there would be less daylight. I'll have to do more research for that day. If I do skip the ROK any suggestions for day 8?

Thanks