Hey all,

My wife and I are planning a 1 week's stay in Ireland mid July.

We are flying into and out of Dublin and planning to tour south and west of Dublin over to Galway. Looking for suggestions.

We will rent a car. In our 50s and not adventure sports people. Most interested in sightseeing.

Most likely we will skip the ring of Kerry and do the Dingle Penninsula instead.

Current thougts.
Dublin - 2 nights
Kinsale - 1 night
Dingle - 2 nights
Galway - 1 night
Return to a Dublin airport hotel for 1 night and an early flight out.

Thanks in advance.

Cliffs of Moher, Blarney Castle. In Northern Ireland Giants Causeway and in Belfast, Titanic Exhibit is great. Because Northern Ireland is part of the UK and not the EU there may be border crossing procedures to follow.
My wife and I went in 2019, great trip.

I enjoyed the Guinness brewery tour when I was there. I liked Galway better than Dublin when I was there you’ll really like it there it’s a beautiful country.

I just spent last week in England on business. Driving a manual transmission left handed was interesting but not as difficult as you might think, if you can drive a manual in the first place. Drivers are pretty courteous in general which helped. They actually give you space when you signal, and don't rush to cut you off like many places in the U.S.

One of the issues in England (maybe Ireland) is that things close early. Parking garage near the hotel closed at 7pm, and I didn't know that until after getting back from work late. Pubs were open later to 10 or 11, but they stopped serving food at 7pm.

Airport COVID testing, which you need a negative test within 24 hours to board a flight to the US, closed at 5:30 PM in a city as big as Manchester. I arrived there around 8PM for a flight the next morning (drove from the city I was working in about 2-3 hours away). I found a Pharmacy to do the test but if that had not been available the airport testing place availability in the morning was such that I would have missed my flight.

Make sure you arrange to get a test within 24 hours of your return flight, during the day, with plenty of time. Make an appointment if possible.

That said UK is almost 100% normal now. A few people were wearing masks but there are no mandates, no testing or vaccination requirements. Only the idiotic US government requires a negative test to fly back into the country.

Are you ready to drive a small stick shift car on tiny, narrow roads? That's how most of Ireland will be off the main highways.

We went in 2012 for our honeymoon and loved it, you could spend a week alone in Dublin and not see it all. If you can, reserve at least a half day if not the day for the Guinness Storehouse, you will not want to rush through it. There is also a cool Dublin history museum called Dublinia.

https://www.dublinia.ie/

https://www.guinness-storehouse.com/en


I'd recommend staying mainly on the eastern side if you only have a week and hit these places:

Dublin
Glendalough
Waterford
Cliffs of Moher

We went about 5 years ago. A few highlights were, Kinsale, the ‘cliffs’, Smithwicks tour in Kilkinney, Irish food & rooting around. The spelling may be off with some, we flew in & out of Shannon, never went to Dublin.

Make day trips into Dublin from Rathnew and stay at Tinakilly House. https://tinakilly.ie/

Visit here: https://powerscourt.com/, also in Wicklow

Drink Murphys (not Guinness) while in County Cork

Stay at the Trident Hotel at the end of the wharf in Kinsale

Not sure it's still offered but my best friend did the Quiet Man tour while on his honeymoon 25 years ago. He & his new bride loved it.

Beware the narrow roads in the Irish countryside!

I did a week-long Ireland trip similar to what you did. We were young and eager so we rented a car and damn near circumnavigated the entire island: Dublin-Belfast-Galway-Cliffs of Moher-Cork-Waterford-Dublin

If you really like driving and you two are good at navigating, go for it. Otherwise I'd recommend have somebody else do the driving; join a tour, the itinerary you're looking to do is pretty popular, you want to hit the highlights. Other than Dublin-Belfast and a few of the outlaying areas, most of Ireland is simple two-lane country roads interrupted by flocks of sheep and blind hills/corners.

For a one week itinerary, you're going to spend a significant amount of your time route-finding, driving and searching for your next accommodation, while constantly double-checking you're parked in the right spot. Do you plan on having any fun? How experienced are you as int'l travelers?

Corsair is spot on.

To be honest, you would be better off booking a tour with CIE, and let them do the driving you around plus they know every spot in Ireland.

We used CIE and it was wonderful:

CIE Ireland Tours

For the love of god I hate tour groups. The few organized day tours I've been on were excruciating. The good stuff was only about half the time, and the rest I felt like a hostage. Many organized tours get a cut of money you spend and steer you to restaurants and stores THEY benefit from.

Hire a private driver who knows the area but will let you do what you want on your time. Otherwise drive. On my England trip I landed in London, drover a rental to Daventry, spent two days, drove to Darlington, stayed 3 days, drove to Manchester, stayed a night, and flew home. Granted it wasn't a vacation. With just an iPhone, Apple Maps, and Apple Carplay, I got everywhere I needed to go, with a few wrong turns (or wrong roundabout exit) and reroutes.

If I had a navigator to help, it would have been better with respect what time I had for a little sightseeing. But you do have to be comfortable in a small care with a manual transmission and very tight city driving and even tighter parking.

Now I see why Europeans love 5-door cars. The liftgate allows the rear end to be lopped off with very little overhang past the rear wheels. You need that to back into tight parking spaces.

I might take my son to Ireland this summer before he starts college if I can make the time. Have to see if it works out. Otherwise maybe during a break.

All this hassle about transmissions. I've never encountered ANY car rental company that doesn't have automatics on the line. This is 2022, not 1952.

Our NDN has a Mini with an autobox...it's an ex-rental car.

Wife and I spent a week in Ireland in 2010 for our honeymoon. Even then all the rentals I could find were automatics, which was a shame as I was really looking forward to driving a stick on the wrong side.

I say rent a car and drive; we had a blast.

I see where you're talking about spending two nights in Dingle. Let me suggest going to Kenmare during that time instead. Awesome little town with a lot to see/do near by, great restaurants, and way less touristy. It's also a great jumping off spot to explore to Ring of Beara, a very scenic drive with lots a small towns to explore.

If you do end up in Kenmare, do yourself a favor and book your stay at Watersedge Guesthouse, awesome stay and the owner is great.

Pax Guest House in Dingle. Great breakfasts, incredible views. An longish walk to town if you want to or drive down. Best public parking is along the waterfront and everything walkable from there.

We spent a week outside Kenmare in a rented house with friends. Even though we had a kitchen, the other wife wanted lunches and dinners out. We never had a bad meal and some were outstanding. Here's a partial list:

The Mews
Davitt's Bar & Restaurant
The Lime Tree
Purple Heather

Can't say if any or all survived Covid, though, as far as staying in business.

We are experienced international travelers.

I could find not guided tours that fall on the days we are there with an agenda that we liked.

We will rent an automatic. I can drive a manual but I prefer not to make navigating more complicated than it needs to be.

Guided tours are always a compromise, and they're not for everyone, date alignment is a major hurdle. If you're under the age of 50, you're likely to go do a trip on your own. Hiring a guide for the day is a great alternative to a multi-day guided service. AirBnB and other platforms you can hire somebody to drive, or do a walking tour to show-off the local food scene, historical areas or, various points of interest. Let them know some specifics and they'll build-in a tour, thus your head isn't stuck in a tour book or, staring at your screen.

Tour groups today are wide and varied, Baby Boomers are hitting retirement and there's a lot of options. Some are simply cattle-operations, usually that 'value' tour that hustles you from spot-to-spot, where every seat on the bus is packed and you're led around by a guide with an idiotic flag to follow. Meals are mediocre at best and the hosts are practically cartoon characters. Others are a lot more sophisticated and considerate, looking to break the stereotypes since repeat business and word-of-mouth is the surest way to stay in existence. I've had several friends take a Rick Steves tour and they were very impressed with the overall experience, no packed transport, solid accommodation and meal schedule wasn't fixed or required.

Do some homework before departing, I usually will watch a bunch of You Tube videos to get a sense of the roads, the signs and what the surroundings will be like.
Also a good resource: https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/ireland

Make sure to grab a meal here in Kinsale, best meal we ate in Ireland, they lived up to their reputation.
http://www.fishyfishy.ie

quote:

Originally posted by tacfoley:
All this hassle about transmissions. I've never encountered ANY car rental company that doesn't have automatics on the line. This is 2022, not 1952.

Our NDN has a Mini with an autobox...it's an ex-rental car.

This is 2022 after COVID. US rental car companies sold off their fleets and filed bankruptcy in 2020. Business travel in 2021 they had barely any cars in the US and you usually got some high mileage banged up POS. Not sure what the Europeans did.

Searching multiple corporate contracted rental car companies (Enterprise, Hertz) at multiple locations in UK (London, Birmingham, Manchester) the only thing available to reserve for pickup a week and a half ago on Sunday at the contracted rate was a COMPACT MANUAL. PERIOD. They had a Tesla for 4x more but that would not fly with the bean counters. And yes they had an auto for 2x the price that I should have been able to get at the same corporate rate as the manual but they balked at doing it. I may call Hertz and complain but I haven't yet. I did put it in the feedback survey though.

Before COVID I'm sure it was a lot better. Maybe it's because the UK removed all COVID travel restrictions so a shit ton of people are going there for vacation. Flights were booked solid too. As always YMMV but this is how things were for me less than two weeks ago.

Obscure brands of Irish Whiskey. Find them. Drink them.

Dublin Trinity College where they have the Book of Kells, Temple Bar, Guinness, Grafton Street, Dublin Castle, Jameson Distillery.

Ireland was great, always have lunch in a pub, hot food, good stuff and a Guinness, think I drank a keg all by myself...

I went in 2017

I stayed in AirBnBs along the way.

the rental was a manual and saved 75% over an automatic.
I loved driving the scenic roads, If you enjoyed the show TopGear, you probably will too. Beware the roads seem like 1.5 lanes wide for two opposing direction cars. They are friendly drivers.

My Kentucky accented english and their Gaelic accented English made for some interesting and awkward interactions.