Private chauffeur-driven day tour

Connemara Day Tour From Galway

Connemara is where Ireland turns properly wild. The drive from Galway to Connemara takes an hour or so, and by the end of it the towns have thinned out and the land has taken over: rust-coloured bog, mountains that change with the light, a coastline that reshapes itself every few miles.

Kylemore Abbey, And The Drive To Reach It

Kylemore Abbey is the day's natural centrepiece: a Victorian country house turned Benedictine abbey, sitting at the edge of a still lake with a mountain rising straight up behind it. It's one of those views you've half seen on a postcard and quietly assumed was touched up, right until you're standing in front of it. There are walled Victorian gardens to walk in season, and enough time to actually take it in rather than photograph it and move on.

Getting there is half the pleasure. The road runs through the Inagh Valley, a long quiet stretch threaded between the Maumturk mountains on one side and the Twelve Bens on the other, with barely a building the whole way. It's the kind of drive where the talk in the car trails off on its own and nobody minds. We stop wherever it's worth stopping.

Clifden And The Coast

Clifden is as close as Connemara gets to a capital, a colourful little town worth getting out in to stretch your legs and eat at your own pace. The coast around it gives you the Atlantic views people come to this corner of Ireland hoping for, the sea opening out below with the islands scattered across it, and we know the quieter stretches to take them in from. If a working sheepdog demonstration appeals, a few of the farms around here put one on, a single dog moving a whole flock exactly where it’s wanted on nothing but whistles and the odd word, and we’ll fold in whichever fits the day.

If You'd Like To Go Further

If your heart’s set on the coast, the day can lean that way. And for anyone drawn to the Aran Islands, we can build that in on a separate day, out by ferry from Rossaveal, west of Galway. This is the part where you tell us what you’re really hoping to see out here, and we take it from there.

If you're weighing up one day against two, our guide to Connemara in a day goes through both.