London/Ireland October 2010

Have you thought about just visiting Ireland. With just 8 nights this might be more relaxing. You can certainly visit both London and Ireland in a short time frame, but it is ambitious.

If you really want to combine London and Ireland, I would suggest that you fly from London to Dublin. London City is a good airport to fly out of. It is very small so you can be through security in very little time. I'd also suggest that you spend at least 3 nights in London.

With 8 nights, I'd also suggest that you focus on just 3 or 4 places overnight.

Hi, Sonya. With this itinerary, you'll be spending most of day 3, day 5, and day 7 traveling. I think that's too much for an 8 day trip (day 9 doesn't count, assuming your plane will leave in the morning). And keep in mind you'll probably be pretty tired on day 1 after your flight, so you may not get much done that day. (I'm always exhausted the first day, but everyone is not the same when it comes to jet lag.)

My suggestion would be to do London or Ireland, but not both. London is a fantastic city with tons to do. You could easily spend the whole time there and not run out of things to see. Even better, you could see the top sights and spend a few days doing day trips. There are a lot of great places within an easy train trip.

Alternatively, you could spend the entire time in Ireland. That would give you time to spend a night or two in Dingle, which I highly recommend. An extra day or two in Doolin would also be good because you could explore the Burren nearby or take a ferry to the Aran Islands.

Your day 5 will be possible, but endless. The drive to Blarney by itself will be upwards of four hours. If you only drive by the castle, not stopping, the drive on to Killarney from there will be another couple of hours. Do you really want to spend the entire day in the car? You have to also allow for things like stopping for lunch, taking pictures, actually SEEING Blarney Castle and the gorgeous grounds - the things you are going there to do and see.

I would suggest that you leave London for another trip. With your itinerary the way it is, you are shortchanging both London and Ireland, as well as yourselves.

Have you been to either place before? If not, I would choose either Ireland or London, but not both. With a 4 year old I think London would be the better choice. There is plenty to do there no matter what weather you encounter. There are also day trip opportunities, but you remain in the same place to sleep at night. I recommend you rent an apartment so you have more space for your daughter to play, because hotel rooms are quite small. With an apartment you will have a kitchen so you will not have to go out for every single meal if you don't want to. You might even luck out and have a washer/dryer so you don't have to bring too much with you. I enjoyed my trip to Ireland very much, but having only 7 days there I felt I only saw the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. The thought of trying to do London and Ireland in 8 days is too much in my opinion. You will be constantly traveling and not have much time to actually see and appreciate where you are. Whatever you decide, have a great anniversary trip!

Sonya,

I second the previous comments about all the travel time. You don't want to spend five straight hours in the car with a fussy four year old. Check out Google maps or viamichelin.com, then add about 50% to get a sense of how long it will take to drive these routes. Then think about how many times you'd need to stop for bathroom breaks, food, etc.

Spending the whole trip in London is a good suggestion. If you don't want to do that, you could also take the Chunnel train to Paris. It's actually much closer and easier to get to from London than Dublin.

I agree that you are planning way too much time traveling. You would find plenty to see in London - again, with a 4 year old, you can only do a couple of things each day anyway (be sure to ride a double decker bus - a regular one is fine, though the hop-on/off tours are a good overview even if you never get off - mostly I was thinking a 4 year old would like the high bus - also a boat trip - the Victoria/Albert Museum is very eclectic - a child would enjoy (free, too) - a few years back they had a child's tour coloring type book - I'd ask about that - it was fun for adults). If you do stay in London the whole time - definitely looking into apartments.
If you still have your heart set on Ireland, what about flying from London to Shannon airport where you would be better able to see western Ireland - just a thought.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. The main reason for the trip is to go to Ireland, but my husband really wanted to go back to London. We're looking at re-working our itinerary to cut out some of the travel time. I should have also mentioned that our daughter will be almost 6 at the time of the trip. Thanks again!

Hello Sonya,

I agree with what others have said, regarding flying over train & ferry. I am doing almost the same trip you are only this year and 10 days instead of 9. I know I will feel rushed and I have been to London before. In terms of how to get to Dublin I decided that in order to do both and not spend most of it in car or on a train I decided to fly to Dublin it takes about 2 hours, the ferry takes 1 hr 49 mins and just under 3.5 hours depending if you get the slow one or the fast one [there are two boats that go to and from Wales [Ferry leaves from Holyhead Wales] to Dublin---Swift is the fast ferry at about 1 hr 49 mins and Ulysses which is slower and takes 3 hrs 25 mins.] ; this is in addition to the 4 - 4.5 hr train ride from London. Therefore, and especially because you are travelling with a child [ does she get sea-sick on ferries/boats] I recommend flying. Ryanair has some cheap fares to Dublin as does BMI.
As to the Ireland portion of the trip all I know about is the distance from Dublin to Blarney, my friend just came back so I have been probing her for answers, it is about 4 hours from Dublin by car.

Cheers

Elaine

Sonya,

It's good to see that you'll be revising your itinerary. You'll be glad you did.

A few thoughts:

1. Wouldn't your husband rather go back to London on a future trip where you'll have more than 1 1/2 days to enjoy it? If Ireland is the must see on this trip, and you can't do more than 9 days, then fitting in London becomes very difficult.

2. Whatever you do, you have to revise Day 7. Dingle is much too far out of the way to go there without spending the night. Killarney to Doolin in one day is ambitious enough, but including a stopover in Dingle is impossible.

3. You could easily keep London by dropping either Dublin or the west coast. If you skip Dublin and fly from London to Shannon, then your trip is more doable. Likewise if you stay in Dublin and take a few daytrips instead of going to the west.

I think you can easily do both London and Ireland, but I think you'll want to fly from London to Ireland. I also think that you'll want to skip Dublin and fly directly to Shannon and stay in the west, as was previously suggested.

Skip Dublin---IMO it would be anti-climatic after London. London and the Irish countryside would make a good pair. Try to fly into Shannon, if possible, otherwise just get another plane at Dublin to take you to either Galway or Shannon. The best bits of western Ireland IMO are Connemara and the Aran Islands (west of Galway) or Dingle Peninsula and the Ring of Kerry / Gap of Dunloe. With only five days for the area, you probably should choose only one of the two areas.

I'm agreeing with the other posters with dropping London on this trip. We've found that traveling with our kids, we like to do slower travel, less time running around and driving. We just did a 10 day trip to Ireland with our 2 kids this summer, a week in Doolin exploring the west coast and 3 days in Dublin. With staying in Doolin, we were able to see the Cliffs, the Burren, Aran Islands, and Bunratty castle, without driving for more than 1 hour to go to anything.