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Seeking Advice on 8 day/7 night trip to Ireland in June

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I am traveling to Ireland at the end of June with my daughters (20/14) and looking for some input. I've done lots of reading, and while I want to do some of the traditional "tourist " stuff, I also want to just experience Ireland and move more slowly, in less crowded areas. Sadly we are flying in and out of Dublin, in hindsight should have gone one way out of Shannon, but we will make the best of it.

Biggest debate for me right now is 2 or 3 nights in Dublin

Tentative Itinerary
Day 1 - Dublin (arrive @ 6:30 AM). Explore Dublin and overnight.
Day 2 - Day trip to Valley of the Boyne and afternoon in Dublin. Overnight
Day 3 - Day trip to Kilkenney. Overnight.
Day 4 - County Clare (2 nights in Doolin area). Explore Cliff's of Moher, Hiking in The Burren
Day 5 - County Clare - Loop Head Pennisula drive?
Day 6 - Drive to Connemara, visit Galway in the afternoon (2 nights in Roudstone)
Day 7 - Exploring Connemara area
Day 8 - Meander leisurely back to Dublin. Overnight near the airport.

I have thought about skipping Kilkenny and just staying 2 nights in Dublin and then 3 in either Doolin area or Roundstone/Connemara areas instead, just to be able,to feel a bit like locals and be rooted for a little while..

Anything thoughts or ideas would be welcomed!

Katie

Posted by
317 posts

Hi Katie, greetings from Ireland!
Good itinerary. If at all possible try and keep Kilkenny in, maybe overnight there, its a very authentic and historic city.
Doolin will be fun, particularly for the music scene and Loop Head is a joy. 2 years ago I was one of 4 judges in the 'Best Place to holiday in Ireland' context for the 'Irish Times', our national newspaper (still cant believe someone was willing to pay me for such a job!). We overwhelmingly opted for Loop Head. theres an old lighthouse there which is now a B&B and the local community spirit is so refreshing and thriving.

Visitors often choose a hotel at the airport because of the easiness of it. Id opt for staying the last night in Dublin city centre. Drop the car back if you like en route and then taxi or better still - bus back down to the city centre (30 minutes) and stay overnight for another night in our thriving Capital. I guarantee you'll find more to do and enjoy.

The airport hotels are so soulless and can be quite pricey, not really saving you much money, just saving you time on the morning of departure. Getting from Dublin city centre to the airport is so easy, 24/7. The city-centre is also easy to drive in.

Let me know if you have any more specific questions

Le meas/with respect
Stephen McPhilemy
Rick Steves Ireland - Tour Guide.
Derry & Dingle

Posted by
36 posts

Just a few ideas you can take or leave. You may like the extra time in Dublin other than your first day, especially if you're jet-lagged but if that's all you have with limited time then make the most of it. When you go to Kilkenney are you going to Rock of Cashel and Blarney Castle? They're cool places. We used Kilkenney as a base to see these two places, I wasn't overwhelmed with Kilkenney although a nice place.

We drove from Cork and did the Ring of Kerry and onto Dingle Peninsula and stayed in Dingle for 3 nights. From Dingle we drove to Galway and stopped to visit Cliffs of Moher and Doolin on the way. It made for a long day but it was doable. I would recommend Dingle, it is a really nice town with pubs to listen to live music, Fungie the Dolphin (if he's still around). The drive around the peninsula is beautiful too, I preferred it over Ring of Kerry. If you like hiking, we hiked Mount Brandon outside of Dingle which was really awesome. I'm sure the scenery would've been better too if it wasn't foggy at the top - it was right on the Atlantic. We hiked through a farmer's field (up the mountain) with sheep grazing around and a few old stone ruins as well. As I didn't stay in Doolin I can't really say but Dingle has a bit more to do, Doolin seemed very small and several nights might be a bit much. I think it would be possible to see it and continue on..

Galway in itself wasn't that impressive, but we did stay two nights in Galway to do a day trip to the Aran Islands, which was by far one of my favourite days of the trip. We rented bikes off the ferry and biked out to Dun Aengus (an large old stone fort on the edge of cliffs) Beautiful!!

We drove from Galway to Dublin and stopped at Clonmacnoise which is pretty much half way between Dublin and Galway. Clonmacnoise is an old monastery and was a neat place to tour around, we basically had the place to ourselves. We spent a day touring Valley of the Boyne sights and that was really neat to see. I haven't been to the other places you listed so I can't comment on that. I did hear good things about Connemara. Your plan to stay in a place for 2-3 nights in one spot is a good idea. I also agree it would be easy to stay in Dublin on your last night and take a bus back to the airport, they have some that are direct from Dublin to the airport and vice-versa. When we walked out of the airport someone was there selling tickets for the bus.

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