Hey Travelers,
It’s time to pack your bags because we’re headed to the land of Castles, Leprechauns and Gold… Okay, so maybe we didn’t find any Leprechauns or Gold, but how many people can say they’ve slept in a castle?
IRELAND
We typically choose our destinations depending on what deals we find. For this particular trip, we had the luck of the Irish when we came across round trip tickets for $298 through WOW Airlines…SOLD. You can also get in on these deals by signing up for their WOW club. It’s free! They regularly email special offers and pop-up sales, so try to keep an eye out in your inbox.
They fly out of the following US cities:
- Boston
- Chicago
- Dallas
- Detroit
- Los Angeles
- New York
- Pittsburgh
- Orlando
- San Francisco
- St Louis
- Washington DC
This was our second time using this airline and have already booked another trip in the future using WOW. You could compare them to any domestic budget airline such as Frontier. The seats are not relatively comfortable but the planes are nice, clean and new! What more could you ask for when booking a ticket for less than $300? Bring a blanket and neck pillow – these can be purchased on Amazon or TJ Maxx fairly cheap, if you wait until the airport they will run you about $25. Most departing flights are at night so this will help you sleep.
What a lot of people don’t realize when booking theses flights are that food and drinks are sold separately and bags are not included. So you should expect to pay extra for baggage, unless you’re only bringing a personal item. Also, all flights on WOW leaving from the USA have a connection in Reykjavik, Iceland. The flight from Chicago to Iceland was only 5 hours and Iceland to Ireland was 2 ½ hours.
Enough about flights, let’s move on to what we did and where we stayed. We stayed in Ireland for 5 nights – 6 days, Tuesday October 16th – Sunday October 21st traveling to the main sights.
Day 1:
We flew all night and arrived to the Dublin Airport at 11am Tuesday morning. Even with the 5 hour time difference, we felt well rested and ready to take on the day.
Rental Car- We rented a car through Avis.
- drivers must be at least 25 years old
- trip insurance with car coverage does not work in Ireland – car insurance must be booked with the rental car agency. There are only 3 countries that do not accept outside insurance policies (Mexico, Jamaica, Ireland). If you do not get insurance you will be fully responsible for the price of the car if damaged. In our case that would have been around $30,000.
- Ireland drives on the left side of the road….we highly suggest adding insurance for this reason.
Our itinerary includes a lot of driving so it is best if you practice before going downtown Dublin where the streets are busy and drivers are reckless (Good luck! We made it out fine).
The rest of our day was spent familiarizing ourselves with the area and touring downtown. We had dinner at one of the local pubs and ended the night with the Iconic Temple Bar.
We did not know what to expect with it being a Tuesday but it was jammed. They had live Irish music, people taking shots of Jameson and obviously Guinness… lots and lots of Guinness. When in ROME.. ugh I mean IRELAND.
Apparently the Irish go out every night like its the weekend or at least the tourists do!
Day 2:
Dublin, Ireland. We woke up fairly late setting multiple alarms trying to adjust to the time change.
First stop of the day, Guinness Storehouse open 9:30am- 7:00pm daily. Tickets can be purchased ahead of time on their website for €18.50. This will allow you to skip the large line to buy tickets. This includes a self guided tour of the Storehouse and a pint of Guinness. Definitely take part of the “taste experience” and learn the proper way to drink Guinness.
This tour took us about 2 hours and then we headed up to the Gravity Bar, located at the top of the storehouse with 360 views of the city.
Now off to Ballycastle! Located in Northern Ireland, about a 3 hours north of Dublin.
(Northern Ireland is part of the UK and their currency is the British Pound)
By the time we arrived it was around 7pm. Time for dinner! Our hotel included breakfast and dinner with our reservation (Tip: book hotels that offer food, this will help save money while you are there). We stayed at Marine Hotel Ballycastle located right on the water. The staff were great, they even called us to make sure we didn’t get lost on the way to the hotel.
Day 3:
Alarms set for 6:30am… 4 girls and one bathroom to get ready in. Our goal was to be at breakfast at 8:00am. We made the deadline with minutes to spare. After breakfast and a quick walk on the beach we were off again.
Dark Hedges – For those Game of Thrones fans like us you have to visit. This was only 15 mins from our hotel. It’s best to arrive early before the tour busses. (Free entry)
Kinbane Castle Ruins – the hike is pretty steep down the mountain to the ruins and quite the trek back up but the view is amazing. We were the only people there at the time, so this was a nice change from typical tourist destinations. And not to mention Free! Several castle ruins in the country charge a fee to tour.
Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge – Before arriving check if it’s open, it can be closed due to high winds. (Adult: £7.00)
Giant’s Causeway – Free entrance to the columns but charges £11.00 for parking…. Pay for the parking. Do not try and be cheap and park on the road because you will get a £90.00 parking ticket (learn from our mistake).
Now off to be a Princess! 3 hours south of Giant’s Causeway was our Castle for the night.
We stayed at Lough Rynn Castle, built in 1749 once the home of the Earl of Leitrim. It may not have been the home of a King but the Castle was definitely fit for a Queen. Our night consisted of touring the Castle and searching for secret passageways. To our disappointment we did not find any secret passageways, but our butler did open the dungeon bar just for us (this did not open until 4am when the normal bar closed… I told you they like to party).
We spent our morning having breakfast in the royal dining room and took a stroll through the gardens. Pretended to be Rapunzel in the grounds tower, then it was time to say goodbye to the royal life.
This was the first day in rained while we were in Ireland. We had been quite lucky up until this point, good thing I had a pair of wellies (hunter rain boots) in the car! We spent the afternoon shopping.
We went to dinner at the number 1 fish restaurant in Galway.
Unexpectedly we went in a few bars in town. We met some fun people from around the world (Switzerland and London). All the way in Ireland we ended up in a “country bar”. It looked like something from Nashville. The nightlife in Galway was the best we had seen.
After making new friends and enjoying Galway we decided it was time to turn in for the night at our Medieval Airbnb.
It was a two lane country road with a car wrecked in the middle of the road. We thought it was odd because it was a 1 car accident… finally after an hour they cleared the car from the road. We then came to a suddenly stop…. there was a cow in the road!! The cops were trying to get the cow out of the road so it didn’t cause another accident…and that’s when it charged our car! Moral of this story is watch out for wildlife and purchase car insurance (thank goodness we did).
Day 5:
Bright and early start to the day because we were off to Cliffs of Moher. This was located 2 hours from our Airbnb in Galway. (try not to fall off) it’s really windy and wear old shoes it can be muddy. (€8.00 entrance)
Blarney Castle – Kiss the stone. Don’t look down… it’s really high up and you think you are going to fall! (€16.00 if booked online normally €18.00)
Cobh- Such a cute little city with colorful houses right on the water. We toured the most beautiful church before heading off to our final hotel of the trip.
We end our last night wondering around Cork. We called it pretty early because we had our final 2 ½ hour journey back to Dublin.
Day 6:
Our flight did not leave until around 5pm. This gave us time to do some last minute shopping and gelato! We made 1 last stop in the Temple bar and even at 11am on a Sunday it was still the place to be!
That’s all for today, see you next Tuesday for the next Adventure!
-Kelsey and Karley the Adventurestine’s
ADVENTURESTINE 