Seven days is about right for seeing Ireland properly. It's long enough to cross the country at an unhurried pace, from Dublin down through the south-west and up along the wild Atlantic coast, without the week turning into a race between hotels. This is a sample of how a week with us usually runs, not a fixed package. Tell us what matters to you and we build the real thing around it, at whatever pace suits you.
Tour Itinerary
DAY 1
Dublin to Killarney, through Kilkenny and Cashel
Day 1: Highlights
We collect you from Dublin and head south in good time, with a good stretch of country to cover before Killarney and some fine stops to make of it. The first proper stop is Kilkenny, a compact medieval city on the River Nore. Kilkenny Castle sits at the heart of it, a restored Norman castle in its own riverside parkland, with a picture gallery inside and grounds to stretch your legs in. A short walk away, St Canice’s Cathedral is one of the city’s oldest churches, and if you fancy it the round tower beside it is one of the few in Ireland you can still climb, with a wide view over the rooftops for the effort. From there the road carries on to the Rock of Cashel, a medieval fortress on a limestone crag that commands the plain around it long before you arrive. You reach Killarney in the evening.
DAY 2
The Ring of Kerry
Day 2: Highlights
The Ring of Kerry is a full day’s loop around the Iveragh Peninsula, and few drives in Ireland change their mind as often about what they want to show you. We shape the stops to your interests. The Kerry Bog Village recreates how families once lived off the bogland; the causeway out to Valentia Island leads to Geokaun Mountain, the Fogher Cliffs and the neat harbour of Portmagee, with the run up Geokaun one for our smaller vehicles rather than the larger bus; and the Kerry Cliffs, among the highest sea cliffs in the country, look straight out at the Skellig Islands on a clear day. Nearer Killarney the road climbs through the mountains past Torc Waterfall and up to Ladies View and Molls Gap, the viewpoints most people picture when they picture Kerry, with the lakes and hills spread out below. If a full loop feels like too much time in the car, a shorter circuit near Killarney takes in Ross Castle on the lakeshore and the Muckross estate, with its house, gardens and working farm.
DAY 3
Dingle Peninsula
Day 3: Highlights
Dingle is the day a lot of people end up talking about most. The Slea Head Drive traces the edge of the peninsula past beehive-shaped stone huts and the Gallarus Oratory, a small drystone church that has stayed watertight for a thousand years, out near the most westerly point of the Irish mainland, where the next stop is America. Dingle town is a working harbour of painted shopfronts and music pubs, worth an hour on foot, and it’s practically a rule to finish with an ice cream from one of the local makers before turning back east. There’s the option of a boat trip out from the harbour if the sea’s in good form, and in spring the chance to feed a baby lamb on one of the local farms, the kind of small moment younger travellers remember longest.
DAY 4
Killarney to Galway
Day 4: Highlights
The fourth day moves you north toward the west coast, and there’s more to make of it than the miles. You might break early in Adare, one of the prettiest villages in the country, a row of thatched cottages around a medieval friary. Through County Clare the day has real choice in it: Bunratty Castle and Folk Park, a restored medieval castle with a recreated 19th-century village in its grounds; the Cliffs of Moher, sheer above the Atlantic; the pale limestone country of the Burren, where the rock runs down to the sea; the music village of Doolin; and, timing allowing, a working sheepdog demonstration on a hill farm. We won’t fit it all into one day, so we shape the stops around what appeals and bring you into Galway for the evening, where the second half of the trip, out along the Atlantic, begins.
DAY 5
Connemara
Day 5: Highlights
Galway is your base for two nights, and day five heads out into Connemara, the wildest stretch of the west. Kylemore Abbey is the centrepiece, a Victorian country house turned Benedictine abbey sitting mirrored in the lake at its feet, with walled gardens to walk in season. From there the day runs out to Killary Fjord, Ireland's only true fjord, a long arm of sea reaching deep between the mountains, with a boat cruise along it an option if you'd like time out on the water. The drive back threads the Inagh Valley, a quiet road pinned between the Maumturk mountains and the Twelve Bens, and a working sheepdog demonstration can be worked in along the way if it appeals.
DAY 6
Galway to Westport
Day 6: Highlights
The road north runs first through Cong, the estate village on the shore of Lough Corrib best known as the setting for the film The Quiet Man, worth a slow wander. Beyond it the Doolough Valley opens out, one of the most striking mountain drives in the country, a dark still lake held between bare slopes with barely another car in sight. The day ends in Westport, a rare planned town laid out around a tree-lined mall, with a lively pub-and-music scene, where you'll be based for two nights.
DAY 7
Achill Island
Day 7: Highlights
The last full day heads out to Achill, Ireland's largest island, joined to the mainland by a bridge. If you'd like, the morning can start with a short run out to Murrisk, where Croagh Patrick rises straight from the shore of Clew Bay, the cone-shaped pilgrim mountain that thousands still climb, some barefoot, one Sunday each summer. From there the road turns north through Newport and Mulranny, the gateway village, and opens onto Achill's sea cliffs, blue-flag beaches and the abandoned village on the slopes of Slievemore. Depending on your flight home, the day can finish back in Westport or carry on toward your departure point.
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