We are planning a trip to Ireland. Looks like a car will be a requirement, at least some of the time. We would like to look into hiring a driver from time to time during our travels. Does anyone have any suggestions regarding that? Is it very expensive?
Thanks for any information you can offer.
Linda
Posted by
bedford, indiana
459 posts
http://www.kenmaretaxitours.com/home.html LInda if you plan to go to south west Ireland and want to take a day or two to have a guided tour I would highly recommend Paul Brown owner/operator of Kenmare Taxi Tours. As you can see from his website he has numerous tours available. He has a great van and is a really great, fun, well informed, guy. He picked us up at our B&B in Kenmare. We hired him for a whole day for the Ring of Kerry tour and it was awesome. It provided me, as our driver, a day off from driving and he hit all the great spots and some out of the way spots and provided wonderful commentary tailored to your requests. He also provided us with directions and insights into a tour of Ring of Beara (just south of RofK) that I drove the day after we were with Paul. Paul was one of the best decisions we made for our 10 day driving tour of west Ireland. We also enjoyed Denis Ryan up at Dingle. http://dingletours.com/ and Denis was great. We only hired him for a half day tour of the Dingle Peninsula and really enjoyed all he provided. You wont go wrong with either of these guys for a few days touring with a guide. Paul is a bit more expensive but worth every penny spent as his van is awesome for touring, easy in easy out, built for viewing, and about the size of a normal soccer mom van from here in the US.
Posted by
Waterville, Ireland
409 posts
Linda,
The Ring of Kerry tour really is rushed on one day. Most of the "tours" do it that way, as they're limited to how many hours they're allowed to drive (they stick a disk in the dashboard that tracks their time....). I'd suggest staying ON The Ring of Kerry and doing something like one half one day, one half the next! Maybe to Iveragh Historical Tours on the Skellig Ring spin-off road (no big buses go here, so it's quieter). I find in general, some of the taxi tours are pretty dear (as they say here: read expensive).
Here's a few other suggestions for drivers:
Valentia Taxi & Bus: Ted Kennedy & his daughter - www.kennedybus.ie
Iveragh Historical Tours: www.iveraghhistoricaltours.com - Oonagh ("Una") and Muiris - their website it fantastic with descriptions of what's to see in the Ring of Kerry area
Derik - taxi driver in Killarney - 353-87-191-1955 - a taxi driver that I always use in Killarney - also does tours around Dingle and RoK.
hope this helps!
Susan
Posted by
OP
Aiken, SC, United States
89 posts
Thank all of you for the great information.