We'll be arriving in Dublin from Edinburgh in the early afternoon. We will fly home from Shannon. We'll rent a car.
We will be heading west; no plans to stay in Dublin as we've previously visited. I'm trying to decide on the best order to see the following:
Any suggestions for a location between Kinsale and Dingle to reduce the amount of driving?
We are planning 7 days.
Closer to Kinsale, and a smaller town: Kenmare.
A bit farther from Kinsale, and adjacent to the National Park, but also full of generic hotels and tour buses starting off on the Ring of Kerry tours: Killarney.
Closer to Dingle, just before you get onto the Dingle Peninsula: Tralee.
Glengarriff, Co. Cork is also an attractive option.
Hi from Wisconsin,
Kinsale? Pretty heavily touristed. Same with Dingle.
Glengarrif, and the Beara Pennisula. Then you have two pretty good places and Dingle is right next door.
Ennis is a nice city to visit. You could turn your car in a day early and spend the night, carless in Ennis.
wayne iNWI
Thanks so much for these ideas. I wasn't familiar with Kenmare, Glengarriff or Beara Pennisula. I'll definitely look into them.
You should definitely drive up and over winding and supremely scenic Healy Pass on the Beara Peninsula. It's in both counties Cork and Kerry.
The Beara peninsula is wonderful and we much enjoyed it to Ring of Kerry. Don't miss the Hag of Beara. If time allows, do try and fit in a trip to Garinish Island (foot ferry only) and also to Bere Island (short trip on car ferry).
Unfortunately the Dursey Island cable car is still not working at the moment, as that would be woirth a triop just for the experience!
Sheep's Head peninsula to the south, is also worth driving and even quieter than Beara.
After a stay in Kinsale for a few days at Acton's we drove to Dingle. Although I should mention that prior to our stay in Kinsale we were in Dublin and took a train to Cork, then a bus to the Cork airport to pick up a rental car then drove to Kinsale. This minimized our driving on the trip in general.
My family fell in love with Kinsale. Dingle we also enjoyed and there is more to do there, more pubs, etc. but we said if we were to move to Ireland Kinsale would be it. But I get the sense with Kinsale and a bit with Dingle that the communities are suffering from the Rick Steve's effect. When we spoke with a museum guide in Dublin who asked where we were going next and we said Kinsale she laughed and said "So you've read Rick Steve's book have you.".
Thank you. I'm now looking at Glengarriff / Beara as a stop.
