What a trip looks like

There’s no set menu here. These are the five regions I build most trips around — usually two or three of them, never all five at once. The right mix depends on your dates, your pace, and your people.

● Cliffs of Moher, Co. Clare

The Wild Atlantic Way

Fifteen hundred miles of ocean road from Cork to Donegal. Most tours give you twenty minutes at the Cliffs of Moher; I’d rather you stand there at sunset when the coaches are gone.

● Gap of Dunloe, Co. Kerry

The Ring of Kerry

Everyone drives the Ring. Almost nobody gets out of the car at the Gap of Dunloe and goes through it the old way — by pony and trap, then by open boat across the three lakes to Killarney.

● Kylemore, Co. Galway

Conamara & Galway

Bog, granite, and forty shades of brown that turn out to be more beautiful than the green. Conamara is where Irish is still a living language on the street — my kind of country.

● Ballybunion · Lahinch · Old Head

Links Golf

Ireland has more true links courses than almost anywhere on earth, and Americans cross an ocean just to play them. Tell me the courses on your list and we’ll build the trip around tee times — not the other way round.

● Celtic Steps, Killarney

Music, Dance & Celtic Steps

A night of champion Irish dancing and live traditional music — Celtic Steps in Killarney is the show I send everyone to. And remember who’s bringing you: a two-time All-Ireland dancer who knows a good hard shoe when he hears one.