first time in Ireland
 

My husband and I will be going to Ireland for the first time from April 1st to April 10th. We will be flying in and out of Dublin. We would like any suggestions/feedback regaring our tentative itinerary. Here is the plan:

Dublin -1 night
Galway - 2 nights
Dingle Peninsula - 2 nights
Killarney - 1 night
Cork - 1 night
Kilkenny - 1 night
Dublin - 1 night
(in that order)

Is this too much to cover in this amount of time? Are we missing anything that we should include instead of the places listed above? Can anyone suggest some nice places to stay along the way? We are willing to pay mid-range prices. I know there are a lot of questions here. We would appreciate any feedback!

Sounds like you two are planning the same sort of trip. Good luck. We will e-mail you when we get back to let you know what we found out.

I would leave Cork out and add a night in Killarney, or Kenmare, even better. I know Cork is scheduled to be the cultural hub of Europe this year, but I would need to hear more glowing reviews of it. It has always been very difficult to drive in. Cork is a big city.

Bill

Ireland is wonderful -

I would recommend 2 nights in Killarney - it is a great town and a nice "homebase" for trips to the Ring of Kerry and Dingle Peninsula. Have dinner at Gaby's.

I would also recommend (if possible) a tour of the Waterford factory in Waterford- probably the best factory tour I have ever taken, and at the end you can buy Waterford crystal for over 50% off US prices. I would not recommend spending the night in Waterford - it is a bit of an "industrial" town - little charm.

A last recommendation - Skip a night in Galway and stay at the Dromoland Castle near Shannon - it is a magical hotel!

Have fun

Thanks for the feedback! Does the trip include too much driving or do you think it is a reasonable amount of traveling?

I wouldn't even spend one night in Killarney. It is just one big tourist trap. Even the pubs have folding tables and chairs to squeeze in the bus tours. The restaurants served less-than-adequate food for very high prices.

The countryside around the town is lovely, so it would be worth it to spend a night somewhere out of town.

The rest of the itinerary looks good. You'll enjoy Dublin and Galway (city, I'm assuming), and Kilkenny's a great place to spend a night. I've only been through Cork so can't comment.

I would also vote to eliminate Killarney and Cork, replacing them with Kenmare and adding a day in Clifden or Westport in Connemara. Under no circumstance should you eliminate Galway, Dingle or Kilkenny, though. They are all great towns with plenty to explore within and around.

In place of Cork, we stayed in Kinsale, a lovely little town. Found Killarney too "touristy" - a big disappointment although many interesting stops in the area.

In Kilkenny there is a wonderful restaurant called Breathnach's -- it is upstairs from a club, and had wonderful food when we were there in 2002.