Ireland & Northern Ireland

• INTRO IRELAND

• IMPRESSIONS OF IRELAND

• THE TRAVEL IN IRELAND

• PHOTOS OF IRELAND

• PRINTABLE FORMAT
  
  

INTRO IRELAND & NORTHERN IRELAND

Kind of travel:
Me and my wife Elisa with our 1.5 year old daughter INES in an independent travel

When:
10th- 22nd Aug'14

Do I need a visa:
Show up with your ID and it'll be enough

How many km:
1500 km by a rented car (by Budget car: 40€/day + toddler seat: 40€)

How I moved:
We rented a car picking up and leaving it at the airport (all the agencies have an office at the airport); Aran island reached by ferry without the car

Freezing or baking:
Shitty shitty weather! it was not only always windy but also changing every hour from rainy and foggy to sunny. Temperatures 13- 19 C. In general weather has been the worst memory of the trip

Where I slept:
B&B’s, hotels or rooms upstairs the pubs ranging from 90€ (in Dublin, Derry) to 55€ (in the Ring of Kerry) without breakfast (6-10€): the average is 70€. Dublin tends to be the most expensive place. Baby cob (if there’s room enough) is always for free. Availabiilty even during peak season is discrete (except Derry it is very limited) so you can travel even without booking

What I liked:
I found very interesting Northern Ireland, in particular the Catholic and Protestant quarters in Derry ad Belfast. Then Derry with its walls, the peculiarity of the Giant’s causeway, the brand new Titanic museum (in Belfast) and original Guinness (in Dublin) museums. The last but not the least the tiny Aran island Inisheer

What I disliked:
Weather, price/quality food, parking in Dublin (don’t go by car!), entry fee (Titanic museum: 30€): long story short it turned out to be quite an expensive rainy windy holiday :-)

How much daily:
Without counting the baby (for 2 people): accommodation: 70/2 €/pp, lunch: 10 €/pp, dinner: 20 €/pp, car: 45/2 €/pp, tickets/parking: 15€/pp = 105€/pp. While counting the baby ( for 3 people)= 77 €/pp

Baby/ family friendly destination:
I’d say yes: highchair always in the restaurants, kid menu as well, changing table 60% of the times we needed . We never felt our baby unwelcome and
we were impressed by the number and quality of the playgrounds spread everywhere!

Alby

TRAVEL IN IRELAND & NORTHERN IRELAND

Our circle around Ireland started up in Dublin where we spent 2 full days: temple bar quarter, Trinity college, modern art museum and Guinness museum are the main highlights we enjoyed, nevertheless without being too much impressed by the city as we were by the costs (don’t even try to park in the city center, but get there by bus/train!).
By car we headed to Belfast stopping by the most remarkable prehistoric sites in Europe ‘Bru na Boinne’. I’m not fond of such sites, but definitely this is the best you can find in Ireland (among many many others that are just a stone in a green field) and being so near the capital, it makes no sense to miss it (go there in the early morning 9.30am if you want to avoid a looong queue).
In the afternoon we skirted the coast passing by Carlingford, a cute port village well known for his ‘Oyster festival’(around 10th August). That’s why we ate the best (and ‘the cheapest’) oysters in Ireland (1.2€ each) while in the west coast almost everywhere we got charged around 2€ each. 10 km northwest Carlingford we entered the Ulster (UK region) and surprisingly there were no border signs, left alone the one stating that the speed limits from that point on, were meant in miles/h instead of km/h (Damned English friends why do you like to be always different from the rest of the world? :-))
We found Belfast ‘more authentic’ than Dublin: the renovated area of the port with the brand new Titanic museum nearby the dock where the famous ‘vessel’ has been built: I warmly recommend it despite being a 30€ fee hit (including the visit to the dock!)). However I found even more interesting the Catholic (Falls road) and Protestant (Shankill road) quarters (don’t miss!) with their murales and the separation wall (called ‘peace line’) whose gates are still shut down every evening.
From Belfast to Derry (or Londonderry according you are speaking to a Catholic or a Protestant) we drove along the 110 km ‘Causeway Coast Way’ that we found the most scenic route of the travel (more than the Ring of Kerry). On the way we passed by many small villages set on the coast and some interesting highlights (Carrick-A- Rede Bridge, Giant’s causeway, Bushmills distillery Dunluce Castle,...). Finally we reached Derry, the town in the whole trip we liked the most: in particularly the Catholic quarter (‘The Bogside’) and the protestant one (‘The Fountain’) with their unique atmosphere separated, as in Belfast, by a wall. Besides well worth it’s the walk on the wall all around the town.
From Derry to Galway it’s a 370km long way taking 5 boring hours apart the Kids Street Music Festival we enjoyed in Slingo.
Galway turned out to be a nice place even without major highlights; well reccommended is a 2 hours stroll to the Salthill quarter along the seaside in the area where Irishes spent their spare time.
40 min southward Galway the Irish coast rises from the Ocean at his most (more than 250m) in what it’s called the Cliff of Moher. More than the cliff itself we appreciated the Aran island (we did a day trip to the small one (Inisheer) from the Doolin harbour merging the trip with a visit of the Cliff of Moher from the boat).
The island is 30min by boat and it’s so tiny (2km long) you can walk all around, reaching a rusty boat wreckage, the lighthouse, the old tower and getting acquainted with Sandy, the dolphin who swims nearby the coast (no, you cannot ride him!).
We slept nearby the cliff of Moher (Liscannor) and then we headed to the Ring of Kerry (3h by car) sleeping in the forgotten town of Cahersiveen.
The following day we hang around Valentia Island and the Ring of Kerry (I expected more scenic) then we proceeded to the rock of Cashel in the center of Ireland, where we visited the stunning castle; it ahs been our last leg before reaching back Dublin and flying home.