An Epic 8 Day Ireland Itinerary Circumnavigating the Island!
An epic 8 day Ireland itinerary that circumnavigates the whole Emerald Isle! While Dublin is great, the REAL charm of Ireland is in the smaller towns!
Circumnavigating Ireland means you get to see all of the amazing highlights around the coast (including Dublin and Galway), but also all the beauty between!
Though it is a bit of a chore to circumnavigate the island in only 8 days, it is doable and SUCH a fun road trip!
Here is a great Ireland road trip itinerary, starting in Dublin, heading west along the coast, seeing highlights such as the Wild Atlantic Way, going north from Galway to see the AMAZING sites in Northern Ireland before heading back to Dublin!
- The Best Way to Get Around Ireland
- Summary of Your 8 day Ireland Itinerary
- Day 1: Kilkenny and Cork
- Day 2: Blarney Castle and Killarney
- Day 3: Wild Atlantic Way and Cliffs of Moher
- Day 4: Galway
- Day 5: Derry/Londonderry
- Day 6: Giant's Causeway, Carrick-A-Rede Bridge, Dark Hedges
- Day 7: Belfast, Northern Ireland
- Day 8: Dublin for St Patrick's Day
- Takeaways from our 8 day ireland itinerary
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The Best Way to Get Around Ireland
You can see a lot of Ireland via bus or tours. However, in my humble opinion, the best way to see Ireland is to rent a car!
First, to circumnavigate the island in a little over a week, you will need to move quick and be on YOUR OWN schedule and not dependent on a bus system.
Plus, Ireland is FULL of gems that are just not accessible by bus or tour.
Book a car to drive around the Emerald Isle!
Fair warning: If you plan to circumnavigate the Island (which is so fun and beautiful), then there will be a lot of driving involved!
Summary of Your 8 day Ireland Itinerary
Our ultimate goal was to end our trip in Dublin to celebrate St Patrick’s Day
More on celebrating St Patrick’s Day in Dublin!
We wanted to see the cities of Dublin and Galway. However, we really wanted to also get into the smaller Irish towns also and we REALLY wanted to see the epic landscapes of Northern Ireland.
Therefore, we decided we would circumnavigate the island and get ALL that the Emerald Isle has to offer!
Upon landing in Dublin, we rented a car and set-out to circumnavigate the island heading in a clockwise direction!
Day 1: Kilkenny & Cork
Day 2: Blarney Castle & Killarney
Day 3: Wild Atlantic Way to Cliffs of Moher
Day 4: Galway
Day 5: Derry/Londonderry
Day 6: Giant’s Causeway, Carrick-a-Rede Bridge and Dark Hedges
Day 7: Belfast
Day 8: Dublin (for St Patrick’s Day)
Day 1: Kilkenny and Cork
Our overnight flight landed in Dublin early in the morning. Day 1 of our 8 day Ireland itinerary included Cork with a pitstop for lunch in Kilkenny.
We immediately drove one hour and 25 minutes to Kilkenny from the Dublin airport.
morning: Kilkenny
Kilkenny is a small, cute town that will take you back in time with its old-world feel located between Dublin and Cork. It is known as the medieval capital of Ireland, and you can get see why as you walk the streets.
Spend the morning taking a walk around the cobbled streets of Kilkenny. Highlights in Kilkenny include:
- Kilkenny Castle
- St. Canice’s Cathedral
- Rothe House and Gardens
- St Mary’s Medieval Mile Museum
- Smithwicks Experience
You can visit the Kilkenny Castle and Rose Garden for free if you want to do a self-guided tour.
Afternoon: Cork
After exploring Kilkenny, drive the hour and 40 minute drive to Cork, Ireland.
Cork is Ireland’s second largest city, even larger than Galway. So, you won’t be able to see the whole town in the short time you have there. However, it is a great place to stay to be close to the Blarney Castle.
Highlights in Cork include:
- Grabbing food at the English Market
- St. Fin Barre’s Cathedral
- St. Anne’s Church and the Shandon Bells
- Shopping on St. Patrick’s Street & Opera Lane
Day 2: Blarney Castle and Killarney
The main reasoning for stopping in Cork was the proximity to Blarney Castle (about a 15 minute drive)
Morning: Blarney Castle
After an early breakfast, head straight to Blarney Castle in order to be there when it opened to beat the crowds (Recommend!)
There are SO MANY castles in Ireland. You can find one in nearly every town. However, the most popular is likely Blarney Castle due to the legend of kissing the Blarney Stone. It’s said that kissing the stone will bring you eloquence and persuasiveness. There have been many well-known people including Winston Churchill to lay upside down and kiss the stone!
Price: Around 16 euros to enter the grounds. If you prefer, you can book a guided tour of the Blarney Castle to get more history of the castle.
Afternoon: Killarney
Once done exploring Blarney Castle and Gardens, head to Killarney for the night.
Killarney is much more quaint than Cork and, thus, easier to explore with less time. The downtown area is small enough to walk the city center in about an hour.
However, I also recommend stopping to see St Mary’s Cathedral, which is little outside the city center and Ross Castle which is about an 8 minute drive from central Killarney.
Killarney is a great place to stay to prep for driving the Ring of Kerry on the Wild Atlantic Way!
Day 3: Wild Atlantic Way and Cliffs of Moher
Spend day 3 tackling the Wild Atlantic Way! Staying in Killarney will allow you to get an early start on Ring of Kerry!
Morning: Drive the Ring of Kerry on the Wild Atlantic Way
The Wild Atlantic Way is miles and miles of coastal road in the southern and western portions of Ireland. Warning: once you’re on the Wild Atlantic Way, there can be limited exits, so be prepared for a long journey.
We opted to drive the Ring of Kerry round trip from Killarney.
It takes about 3.5 hours to drive the Ring of Kerry due to the winding road and speed limits. However, there are great views for the whole drive!
You can also visit Skellig Michael, which is a rocky island found along the peninsula. However, it is only open during the warmer months (mid-May through September-ish)!
Another route is to go along the Dingle peninsula. Both provide dramatic coastline views, but the Dingle Peninsula is a shorter drive.
**If you opt to visit the Dingle Peninsula, you should skip Killarney and stay closer to the Dingle Peninsula or in Dingle, on the peninsula itself.**
Again, to have the most freedom when viewing the coastline, take a rental car. However, if you are still not sold on renting a car, there are tour buses that go around the Ring of Kerry and Dingle Peninsula.
Afternoon: Cliffs of Moher
The Cliffs of Moher are a MUST see in Ireland. Touristy or not, they are incredible to see in person.
You can technically take the Wild Atlantic Way all the way up to The Cliffs of Moher. But it is the long route; I recommend taking the more inland route around Limerick to get there quicker!
The drive from near Killarney to the Cliffs of Moher is about 2 hours and 40 minutes (which is why I recommend getting that early start on the Ring of Kerry!)
The Cliffs of Moher are WORTH seeing, but you don’t need a lot of time to see them. Within an hour to two hours you can walk down the short paths on either side of the cliffs and visit the visitor’s center.
From the cliffs, head to Galway to spend the next two nights! (about an hour and a half, scenic drive.)
Everything to know about visiting the Cliffs of Moher!
Day 4: Galway
Any 8 day Ireland itinerary needs to include Galway! Galway is such a cute city (as many of the Irish towns are 😍). It will be one of the larger cities on the route and one of the cutest! Thus, I recommend staying at least two nights here.
Start your day having breakfast at Ard Bia at Nimmos; it is delicious!
Galway is easy to navigate by foot, so get lost in the roads and shops of Galway. Highlights in Galway include:
- Eyre Square
- Charlie Byrne’s Bookstore
- The harbor
- Galway Cathedral
- The Latin Quarter
I also recommend doing a pub crawl in the evening! There are loads of amazing pubs in Galway, many of which have live, traditional music that you will want to sit and listen to for hours!
Don’t miss O’Connel’s pub where Ed Sheerens music video to Galway Girl was shot!
Day 5: Derry/Londonderry
This 8 day Ireland itinerary technically includes Northern Ireland as well. If you are going to visit the area, I believe Northern Ireland should be visited as well; it holds a lot of amazing natural phenomena as well as some great cities!
The first stop in Northern Ireland is Derry/Londonderry.
The drive from Galway to Derry/Londonderry is a bit of a hefty one at 2.5 hours, so I recommend getting an early start. However, the views are great so it helps!
Derry/Londonderry is the only medieval city wall still fully intact in Ireland (and one of only a few in all of Europe.) The wall is wide and easily navigated with great views within and outside of the city! Truly a beautiful city!
There is deep history in the city of Derry/Londonderry between those of the Catholics/Protestants or nationalist/unionists. The history is recent and fresh. Feel free to read more about the history before visiting!
You can visit places like the Peace Bridge, The Museum of Free Derry and the Free Derry corner to learn more while you are visiting as well.
Day 6: Giant’s Causeway, Carrick-A-Rede Bridge, Dark Hedges
A shorter drive is required on day 6! After breakfast in Derry/Londonderry head north (hour drive) to some of the prettiest sites on this 8 day Ireland itinerary!
Giant’s Causeway
Along with the Cliffs of Moher, Giant’s Causeway is a must-see natural site in Ireland.
The causeway is an area full of basalt columns created by an ancient volcanic fissure eruption. Most of the are hexagonal and lie so intricately placed, it is unfathomable how the causeway was created so naturally.
It was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1986.
Price: 15 pounds
Carrick-A-Rede Bridge
15 minutes from Giant’s Causeway is Carrick-A-Rede rope bridge. It is simply, just a rope bridge.
However, when the weather is good you can cross the bridge to an island for views of the coastline. We weren’t fortunate enough to have said “good weather,” so may the odds be ever in your favor!
Dark Hedges
There are about 28 filming sites for Game of Thrones in Northern Ireland, and the Dark Hedges are one of them.
However, even if you aren’t a GOT fan, the trees really are pretty cool!
And, they are only about a 15 minute drive from the Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge.
A Game of Thrones door
In 2016, Storm Gertrude destroyed two of the famous Dark Hedge trees and a local artist carved them into 10 doors, one for each episode of season 6 of Game of Thrones.
The doors are now in various parts of Northern Ireland. You can get a “passport” of sorts to mark off each door as you go. It’s almost like a treasure hunt!
Two of these are doors are quite close to both Giant’s Causeway and the Dark Hedges.
However, I’ll be the first to tell you, I am not your go-to person for all things GOT. Truthfully, I saved KevMRC’s post about all of the locations and used his map of all of the filming and door locations!
I recommend staying in Ballycastle. It is only 20 minutes from Giant’s Causeway and 12 minutes from the Carrick-a-Rede Bridge. We were able to see all of these easily in the day with a nice dinner in Ballycastle afterward.
Day 7: Belfast, Northern Ireland
More exploring in Northern Ireland in Belfast! Drive from Ballycastle to Belfast, which is only about an hour.
Morning: Black Taxi Tour
Belfast is big; second largest city on the Emerald Isle behind Dublin. Therefore, we decided to take a Black Taxi Tour in order to make the most of our time
Belfast is another city with fresh history similar to Derry/Londonderry. I found the Black Taxi Tour to provide information on both sides of the conflict.
Belfast has a peace wall built between the predominantly Catholic/nationalist and Protestant/unionist communities.
The tour takes you on both sides of the wall, displaying the murals of each side and the view point of those who wave the Union Jack flag and those who wave the Irish flag.
The tour makes a pitstop for you to sign the peace wall. Be sensitive to the subject, but learn and help make yourself knowledgable of the history
Book a Black Taxi Tour
Afternoon: Explore Belfast
Don’t miss Commercial Court road (aka Umbrella Street that I’m sure you’ve seen!)
Also, there is another GOT Dark Hedge Door in Belfast! This one requires you ask the bartender about the door in order to get it marked off your list of doors! Its a little nerdy, but still fun lol.
Did you know the Titanic was built in Belfast? Visit the Titanic Museum & Experience to learn more about the building of the ship and see the slipway from where the Titanic launched.
After finishing Belfast explorations, drive 1 hour and 50 minutes to Dublin have some dinner, a Guinness and prepare for the next day’s festivities!
Day 8: Dublin for St Patrick’s Day
Spend your last day exploring Dublin! We strategically planned for our last day to fall on St Patrick’s Day, which was a bucket list item!
St Patrick’s Day festivities in Dublin was such a blast! Highlights were:
- Parade in the morning
- Pub Crawl during the day
- More Pub Crawling during the evening
For everything you need to know about celebrating Saint Patrick’s Day in Dublin!
If you are not planning to visit Ireland during St Patrick’s Day, spend your day exploring the beautiful city of Dublin.
My biggest complaint of our itinerary was that all of our time in Dublin was taken up by the St Patrick’s Day festivities, so I would love to return to Dublin to see more of it!
Takeaways from our 8 day ireland itinerary
This itinerary for Ireland is a fast-paced 8 day Ireland itinerary, I’ll admit. But it covers all the highlights we were excited to see.
Each part of the trip had its own beauty and added something to the trip. Obviously if you can get more days from work you can slow this itinerary down a little, but overall the blueprint is a great one to follow! To note, though:
- We felt a little rushed in some locations, mostly at the beginning of the itinerary. You may choose to not make the pitstop in Kilkenny in order to have more time in Cork.
- The biggest change I would have made to this 8 day Ireland itinerary would have been to add one more day in Dublin. Our day was full of St. Patrick’s Day festivities which didn’t allow for us to see everything we wanted.
- We were also unable to tour the Guinness brewery due to tickets being sold out. I recommend buying your tickets early if you are traveling around St. Patrick’s Day or plan to be in Dublin on the weekend!
- In retrospect, if you really want to circumnavigate Ireland (which I recommend, because each part of Ireland is so beautiful and offers something great), I would suggest making it at least a 10-12 day trip if you can (we couldn’t, hence the fast-paced itinerary)
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