County Dublin
Georgian squares and literary pubs in the centre, and the bay an easy ride away: Howth, Malahide and Dalkey along the coast. The capital repays two or three days at least.
Dublin
The capital earns its own trip: history, literature and music in a compact centre, and the bay at the end of the road.
Most people land here and leave. Treat the capital as a destination rather than a stopover and it rewards the extra days. The centre is compact and walkable: Trinity College and the Book of Kells, Dublin Castle and the medieval cathedrals, Georgian squares, national museums and galleries, and neighbourhoods from Temple Bar to Stoneybatter each with their own pubs and cafés.
The wider county adds the other half of the Dublin experience: the bay. Coastal walks at Howth, harbour towns like Dún Laoghaire and Malahide, the Phoenix Park's deer and the foothills of the Dublin Mountains mean a city break here can include sea air and hill views within half an hour of the centre.
Highlights
Book of Kells and Trinity College
The illuminated manuscript and Long Room library in Ireland's oldest university.
Dublin Castle and the Medieval Quarter
Cathedrals, castle and lanes where the Viking and Norman city began.
Phoenix Park
One of Europe's largest enclosed city parks, with fallow deer and Dublin Zoo.
Howth Cliff Walk
A peninsula walk with harbour seafood at either end, north of the bay.
Literary Dublin
Joyce, Yeats, Beckett and Wilde: museums, statues and pubs across the city.
Counties
What we would choose ourselves
The Cliffs of Moher, County Clare
Cliffs & coastal tours
Dublin to Cliffs of Moher, including Wild Atlantic Way and Galway (Wild Rover Tours)
The Cliffs of Moher are the one sight nearly every first trip to Ireland is built around, and this is the day trip we point people to. It runs about thirteen hours from Dublin, out along the Wild Atlantic Way to the cliffs, then into Galway for a couple of hours on the cobbled streets before the run home. It leaves from College Green in the city centre. The numbers are hard to argue with: from US$88.21 a head, rated 4.9 from nearly 24,900 reviews, the largest count of any cliffs tour on Viator, with free cancellation up to a day ahead.
Best for: Anyone whose trip is built around the cliffs and who would rather not hire a car. It is a long coach day of about thirteen hours, so travellers who like to set their own pace may prefer to drive the coast themselves.
Glendalough, County Wicklow
Day trips from Dublin
Kilkenny, Wicklow and Glendalough Sheepdog Trials from Dublin (Wild Rover Tours)
If you have one day to get out of Dublin, this is the day we would spend. The coach leaves the city for Kilkenny first, with a guided walk through the medieval streets and free time around the castle grounds. Then it is up into the Wicklow Mountains, past the Wicklow Gap, to Glendalough and its 6th century monastic settlement between the two lakes. The finish is a working sheep farm, where border collies move a flock on whistle commands. Ten hours, free cancellation, from US$49.15 a head, rated 4.9 from more than 8,700 reviews, and the farm stop is the part people write home about.
Best for: First-time visitors with one spare day in Dublin. It is a full ten hours with an early start, and the walking takes in old town streets and uneven monastic ground, so it is not the pick for a slow morning or for limited mobility.
The Giant's Causeway, County Antrim
Northern Ireland tours
Dunluce Castle, Giant's Causeway, Dark Hedges and Belfast (Finn McCools Tours)
The north in a day, without hiring a car or working out the border crossing, because there is not one to work out. The coach leaves Parnell Square at a quarter to seven and heads up the coast: a photo stop at Dunluce Castle, an hour and a half on the stones of the Giant's Causeway, twenty minutes under the Dark Hedges, and an hour in Belfast to finish. It carries Viator's Badge of Excellence, a 4.9 rating from nearly 5,900 reviews, from US$91.65 a head, and free cancellation to the day before.
Best for: A first run at the Causeway coast without driving. It starts at a quarter to seven in the morning and runs twelve and a half hours, and the operator does not recommend it for small children.
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