Could we rent a GPS in Ireland??
 

We are 2 seniors (72+) traveling to Ireland in late August (20th to 29th) and planning on mostly train and bus,travel after we get to Galway.. but it seems we will really need to rent a car also...(eechh) Since we need a GPS here in the states , I know it will be a disaster for us without one driving in the West. Has anyone rented a GPS in Ireland?? ( I thought I would be able to download a map on my Magellen but its older and it looks like I would either have to buy a costly new GPS and/or it would be a technical problem for me. Fodors is is the best site I know for information and friendly advice!

Yes, you can rent a GPS from your car rental company. Try www.kemwel.com. And, rent from an off-airport location for cheaper prices.

Thank you, joannyc-I'm trying to get prices there now..the sie doesn't seem to recognize a pick-up at a "city"...but keeps giving me airport rates...(I'm working on it!)

Keep a good map as a back-up!

If your current unit is old, you may be surprised at the price for a new one... prices on these types of things drop all the time.

Check out new ones before you go...

Where do you want to go from Galway?
The West is not exactly densely populated and with a decent map you should be very much okay.

IMO, GPS makes sense for driving in or through cities like Dublin, Cork, maybe Limerick. But to go from Galway to the Cliffs of Moher or to Ennis, I find it rather optional.

At this point (today) we don't have more than two destination and that is to seek out friends in Salt Hill and North in Carraroe. I am (sort of, kind of) thinking about other places or sites we haven't been. Last time we were there was about 5 yrs ago..and had better memory, eyesight & reflexes :)

With all due respect, but Salthill (if you mean that Salthill) is like a suburb of Galway. If you were my friends and did not remember how to get there, I'd simply pick you up in Galway and pilot you there. And would not let you spend one lousy Euro on GPS for a 5km drive.
Carraroe is also not hard to find from Salthill.

But if GPS gives you peace of mind, go for it. But if you rent one with your car, consider for yourself if you will familiarize easily yourself with the new system. It might be better to buy a new one in the States, and take some time to get used to it.

But I doubt that anyone will blow the horn at you when you go slow at intersections to check the traffic signs. There are enough Nissan Micras on the road, so you won't stand out with a more defensive style of driving.

If you have another smaller destinations, you should also check that you pick the right place, since many villages have names like Springfield in the US, i.e. there is more than one, or several which are spelled almost identical. Remember which county you need to go to. So you won't end up at the wrong side of the island :-)

On Kemwel's site, on the second page, under where you select the pickup and dropoff cities, you can select which locations that you want to include in your search results. It defaults to airports... click on 'All Locations'.

Thank you Cowboy1968 I did indeed mean Salthill near Galway...(and yes, I believe they would pick us up in Galway..)
After reading all the replies to me...I believe we could do this with a good map. And a sincere thank you to all,,
I will again try kenwell site for a rental..

One other thing. I just returned from Ireland and we drove with a GPS. A warning about them. There were times when the GPS was very helpful the key was having a numbered address. Now that may sound strange but in Ireland many, many places do not have a numbered address. For example our B&B in Killarney simply said Fassa, no number. This is not something the GPS could account for. There is a book with GPS coordinates for most hotels in Ireland however. Even then the GPS didn't always take the full coordinate in which case we entered a known site (i.e. Eyre Square in Galway) and were able to find our place from there. Having said all that, having the ordinance map was the most important thing and we used it as much if not more than the GPS for navigation. FInally, there were times when the GPS took us literally on what felt like driveways instead of the main roads; hence the reason for the ordinance map.

I used a GPS in Scotland last summer, but it was one I had in the states, and bought European maps for it. It was very useful, but yes, common sense sometimes was needed. We had backup atlas book at the ready, and sometimes the GPS simply couldn't get signal (like in Grantown-on-Spey, which was near an RAF base), and we had to make do.