How To avoid renting an automatic car in Dublin city and driving out of it

One way to avoid Dublin rentals, would be to take the train from Dublin to Athlone and hire a car from there, for your drive to the west.

I have always used Enterprise here and found them good...plus, they will collect/drop you off.

There is an Enterprise in Athlone - UNIT 4, DUBLIN ROAD
ATHLONE,

Tel.: 090-6491030

If you haven't gotten your tickets yet, I would suggest you flying into Shannon instead of Dublin.

Flying into Shannon instead would put you in a much better area to learn to drive on the other side of the road. The Dublin airport puts you right onto a busy street (though it's near the motorway and you don't have to drive through the city), while Shannon is a small airport in the country with limited traffic. If you are stuck flying into Dublin, do as the first poster suggested and train out to Athlone and then get your car. You might be limited in choices of companies, though.

The Dublin Airport isn't too bad since you are out of the city center. You do hit a couple of busy roundabouts before you hit the motorway though. Once you are on the motorway it's fairly easy. You can drive around the rental car parking lot area if you would like to practice.

Hertz offers automatics. Look around for discount codes (AAA, Costco, corporate numbers, etc). it will cost you an extra 100 euros for the rental period but is probably money well spent.

Even Irish companies like Dan Dooley or Irish Car Rentals offer automatics.

I'm touched by all the helpful replies and will remember you kindly on my trip to Ireland--a trip you have no doubt made safer for us and for Irish motorists!! I will take the train part pay and hope that one of the Irish Rental companies can set me up with an automatic car from a town on the way to Roscommon--Athlone Perhaps.

Much thanks,
Claire

Claire, I hope that you're not planning on waiting till you get there to book a car. You really should book as soon as possible, both to get better rates, and to insure that you get the automatic that you want. If the company that you choose doesn't charge a cancellation fee, you can book now and continue to watch the rates to see if you hit a special before you go. You could then book the special and cancel the original booking.

We were able to get an automatic from Irish Car Rentals two weeks ago. We flew into Shannon and picked it up and dropped it off in Dublin. Make sure you have a GPS (we brought ours), it makes a world of difference.

Claire,

I agree that you should book now. Especially if you don't drive stick and need an automatic, booking ahead is the only way to guarantee that one will be available for you. Especially if you're renting in a small town, they'll be very unlikely to have that many automatics around as they're much more expensive and therefore less popular there.

By the way, I drove the reverse way from Galway to Dublin airport and it was fine. The airport is quite a bit north of the city and so the roads and traffic are not that bad. You might consider renting at the airport in Dublin, which would probably provide a greater number of options and a lower price.

We have an automatic booked for Ireland when we land in Dublin next month. What we are doing is 1) go directly to the B&B just north of the airport on day 1 to recover from the flight. Day 2, go to the local train station and take the train into Dublin and return to the B&B that evening from the train station. No driving in Dublin.
Day 3, take the M1,M5 and exit 11 to the Wicklow mountains. This will be a Sunday and hopefully traffic will be a little less.

Now, the Ash may throw a big wrench into this. The buffer at the front is enough, I hope. Returning, will be a hassle if the ash gets in the way, but at least we are there. Just a hassle to make phone calls - we won't pick up our dogs today... can you add another day? Place to stay. What to do. Handle it at the time.

Thanks Debe,
This was very helpful.That's exactly what I have done. Enterprise had reasonable prices and all is now organized!
Interestingly, there is no penalty if one can't show up (due to volcanic ash, for example!) provided one tries to contact them somehow.With an automatic rental, they like an email 48 hours beforehand if I can't come. Reasonable I would say!
Thanks a million,
Claire