10 passenger (or more) van/minibus rental in Ireland

You may want to consider booking 2 vehicles instead of one big one. We were there with a group of 11 last year, we rented an economy car and a 7-seater, which was a Hyundai Santa Fe with a 3rd row of seats. Not much room for luggage, though.

We checked into larger vans, and they were hard to find and outrageously expensive. Plus, those roads are tiny, and I think they have different laws about needing a commercial license for driving vehicles that big.

I'm assuming with all of this that you don't want a car for Dublin. You don't need or want one there.

Of course Dublin is not in the UK .....

I'm with Maureen - two smaller vehicles beat a large one. Having driven multiple times in Ireland, there's no way I would want to try to navigate some of those roads (on the other side) in a huge van. And luggage takes a lot more space than you know until you see it all in a pile.

I worry about people renting a van or minibus to drive on those narrow Irish roads--that is, if they haven't driven Irish roads before and don't know how surprisingly narrow some of them are.

If they know what they're getting into, well, that's different.

Craig,

On your thread about accommodation you say that you are a family of five. Why do you need such a big van?

The Auto Europe site shows two different nine-passenger vans.

I need such a big van because there are two families of 5 travelling together. And we know our kids will enjoy the trip more if they have their friends in the vehicle with them. We are NOT using the vehicle in Dublin at all of course, just for the rest of Ireland.

I'm with the others. Rent two vehicles. One could be a nine-passenger van that will hold a driver, another adult to serve as navigator, and all six children. The second vehicle would need to be big enough to hold two adults and most of the luggage.

I've done the multiple families thing before in separate cars. Get 2-way radios for the kids. They'll have more fun with that than they would being in the same car together. They'll still get to 'share' sights with one another and they'll have the cool-factor of the radios as well. Enjoy!

Regular FRS 2-way radios used here are illegal for use in Ireland (and Europe as a whole). The frequency used on our radios is used for the emergency band abroad. There are radios made for use in Europe, but you would probably have to locate them online.

You could always get two vehicles and mix and match the kids in the two. We have traveled with other vehicles, and every time we stopped someone shifted seats to another vehicle. If there are two families of five, you aren't going to get by with a single 9-passenger van anyway. You'd be a seat short with no capacity for luggage at all.

Yes, Craig if you haven't driven in Ireland before - or even if you have, I'd go for two cars. The last thing you want to do is try to drive something that size down the roads. We rented a small by US standards SUV, and had brush on -both- sides of the road simultaneously whacking us most of the time. I'd definitely recommend two cars.

Even with the 9 passenger vans like the VW, with some of them you'll see the luggage capacity with 9 is 2 full size bags, and 2 small size bags. yikes.

Hope it works out for you.

PS - With over 9 passengers, I know Ireland requires another category (what we'd usually call class or endorsement) of license: a D or D1. Not sure if a regular US license, without large vehicle endorsements would be allowed... maybe somebody else knows???