Enlightening Emerald Island Tour
We took the 6 day tour which took us to the Killarney area, Galway, and Northern Ireland. We visited Blarney and Bunratty Castles, Ring of Kerry, Connemara, a Folk park, the Cliffs of Moher, the Burren, St. Colman’s Cathedral and the Heritage Center at Cobh, Kylemore Abbey, Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge and Giant’s Causeway. Due to the remnants of Hurricane Lorenzo, our day trip to Inis Mor in the Aran islands was canceled. John Scott provided history as we Cork and Cobh the first day, helping us get oriented to his country. Jonathan Beaumont was our guide for the remainder of the trip. He has an excellent command of Ireland’s history, an appreciation for the connection created through music, a talent for sharing the legends and folklore. He interjects all this with “ myths” about Ireland and a sense of humor with his jokes. All of this was well- balanced to keep our interest. On our Aran Island canceled tour day, he offered to come up with other activities. I thoroughly enjoyed him as a guide. The country is about the vibrant green pastures with sheep, the folklore, the music, the excellent pub food. Traveling long distance by train, then having two days to tour the area was nice. I felt we had ample time to explore each area....and see as much as we could of this country. Hats of to the team in bright yellow: Railtours Ireland!
The Royal Atlantic Tour
The latter part of September, my husband and I toured with Railtours, 3 nights in Dublin and from there Cork, Killarney, Ring of Kerry, Cliffs of Moher, Connemara, Galway, and the Aran Island. We were impressed with most of the trip. The day before the flight, we got a call from Jonathan to confirm our tour and to assure us that a representative would be waiting for us upon arrival at the airport. Even though our flight arrived early, we were greeted by representative named Paddy, a very nice courteous man holding a sign with our names on it. We were transported to the North Star Hotel, our luggage taken to the front check-in desk and from there, we got checked in quickly. Our time in Dublin for those three days was self directed using the Hop on Hop Off bus around Dublin. It was a nice way to get around Dublin, learning history of the area and enjoying the Irish humor by a few of the bus drivers. Saturday morning at approximately 6:30AM, we arrived at Dublin Heuston station and greeted by Jonathan wearing his bright yellow vest. All was organized, and the train departed promptly to begin the Royal Atlantic Tour. It was Saturday morning so we missed out on the usual free breakfast on the train. The coffee on the train was the most expensive cup of coffee that we had throughout our stay in Ireland. It was nice having reserved seats on the train and that’s when we got to meet our tour guide David. David conducted the first 3 days of our tour. He was excellent with a great knowledge of history. Many other people taking tours got on at Heuston station, getting off at various locations to begin their particular tours. All the hotels were good, especially the Great Southern Killarney. We have no regrets that we booked with Railtours. The bus drivers, guides were all very pleasant.
Hello
I would like to thank you for giving fabulous experience to my parents of rail tourism.
My parents were on your blarney castle and cork rail tour this summer and they were super happy with the tour arrangements.
Back in India my father wrote an article in Marathi ( my mother tongue)about your tour and it was published in news paper. He got overwhelming response from readers of this news paper.
I’m sure people who read this article if at any time happen to visit Ireland they will opt your blarney tour over any other tour.
Regards
Shilpa
We really enjoyed this tour everything was on schedule. Such beautiful scenery a great way to see Ireland and learn a lot about their history. The hotel in Kilarny was beautiful. Our tour guide Brian was the absolute best he made the tour so much fun made us laugh all the time and the gang of people we were with were also great. Awesome memories. We will be back. Thank you so much from Canada
This was a fantastic trip. Everything was well organised and on schedule. Our railtours guide Peter was great as was Paul who was our driver and guide in Northern Ireland (Mc Comb's). They really made the trip great - it was the best day trip we had (out of 4). Will definitely use railtours ireland again.
Our guide Andy Geraghty was great. He was knowledgeable, fun and very responsive to our needs. He made sure we had a great time and we’re on time and helped out with accommodations and admissions to the sights.
So easy! Great guides, very comfortable with wonderful sight seeing:)!! I would highly recommend taking this tour from Dublin to Northern Ireland.
"As a first time visitor to Ireland, I appreciated having someone to take me to the correct train and reserved seating, and then to give me an overview of the town of Galway. We had 4 hours in Galway. Galway was charming once you got past the tourist shops. Good places to eat. I enjoyed seeing the bits of the old walls and Lynch's castle. I did enjoy the shopping, but you need to plan ahead and decide what is worth getting in Galway (I recommend Claddagh rings and Aran knits.) We then took a motorcoach to Bunratty. It was awesome to see the castle from the highway. The excursion price included the Medieval Banquet at Bunratty Castle. It was a good show with excellent musicians.
The next day, a couple of hours in the Bunratty Folk park was included before getting on the motorcoach to the Cliffs of Moher. The drive back to Galway passed more ruined castles and a lovely view of Galway Bay. We had plenty of time for dinner in Galway before boarding the train back to Dublin. I can't say enough about the friendly Railtours Hosts who looked after us. It made the trip more comfortable and fun."
"My sister and I had a great time on our Northern Ireland day tour. We were celebrating her birthday and our tour guide Paul with McCombs Coach Company, a partner of Railtours Ireland, was a terrific driver and a great tour guide. He made the time between stops tolerable with his interesting facts and great sense of humor. He also had a special surprise to commemorate my sisters big day. David with Railtours made sure we got from Dublin to Belfast with zero problems. Highly recommend the rope bridge and Giants Causeway! Great views! Thanks to Paul and David for making our trip memorable."
"We chose the 6 day tour that included Blarney Castle, Cobh, Killarney, Ring of Kerry, Bunratty castle, Cliffs of Moher, Aran islands, Connemara and Giants causeway. The guides (Brian and Andy) were wonderfully informative and friendly. The hotels excellent (we booked directly with rail tours and got free upgrades to 4 star hotels). The weather was sunny most of the time and the countryside delightful. We were glad we chose this way to see Ireland. Highly recommended!"