mich44

I am in the process of planning our second trip to Ireland and have some questions (our first trip was planned by a travel agent).

How many hours of daylight will there be in March? We arrive in Dublin on the 13th and are staying one night there. We are then going to Waterford to do the crystal tour and plan on staying in Tramore. Should we travel to Waterford through the Wicklow Mountains or should we go through Kilkenny?

We plan on staying a night in Tramore and Kinsale before heading to Killarney for 2 nights and ending up at Bunratty. We will be in Killarney on 03-16-05 and 03-17-05. Are there any suggestions about where we should go for a St. Patrick's celebration?

Judy_in_Calgary

I've never been to Ireland, but one piece of information that is readily available is the number of daylight hours in Dublin on St. Patrick's day, i.e., very close to 12 hours. Sunrise will occur at 6.35 a.m. and sunset at 6.33 p.m. Here's the website:

http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/city.html?n=78

Also, I suspect (but don't know for sure) that Ireland uses the same convention for abbreviating the date as England, Australia, etc., and that is DD/MM/YYYY. So you might want to keep that in mind when you communicate with staff at lodgings when you make your reservations. In fact, because I've witnessed some really unfortunate misunderstandings (one was reported on the Fodors Australia forum a while back), I consider it to be safer not to abbreviate dates but to write out the name of the month.

Sorry, I didn't mean to hijack your serious questions about Ireland.

rkkwan

March 20, 2005 is Spring Equinox. You get 12 hours of daylight anywhere in the world.

IrishEyes

You can get all the info you want about weather, daylight, etc. at Met Éireann the Irish Meterological Service website: http://www.met.ie/

If the weather is good I would prefer seeing the sights in the Wicklow Mountains. If the weather is not that great Kilkenny would be preferable. I suggest reservations for Dublin, Killarney and Bunratty.

There will be plenty of celebrations in Killarney. You might consider a pub crawl till you find one that appeals to you.

wojazz3

Another site for daylight hours:

http://www.onlineweather.com/v4/uk/sun/index.html

There should be plenty going on in KIllarney on St. Patrick's Day and it's not so big that you won't be able to figure out where to go.

I agree with Irish Eyes on the route to Waterford. Depends on the weather.

Have a great time.

Bill

lizard

I was in Ireland in March a few years ago and thought it was a great time to go - less tourist ( though their are always tourist in Ireland) St Pats is a religous day in Ireland not NYC - also I would go through Kilkenny(personal preference)-- have fun
bob