Duration: 8 Days | Start/Finish: Dublin City | Group Size: Max 20 | Average Daily Drive Time: Hours
There is a version of Ireland that doesn’t make it onto the postcard – the one that takes time to reach. The north coast where basalt columns emerge from the sea like something from a different world. The Donegal headlands where the cliffs drop 600 metres and there’s barely another soul around. The surf-battered coast of Sligo, where the mountains behind Mullaghmore watch the Atlantic the way they have for ten thousand years.
This 8 day tour of Ireland covers the island’s north and west in full – starting in Dublin, spending two nights in Belfast, crossing into Donegal, tracking south through Sligo and into Connacht, and finishing with two nights in Galway. Eight days. One immersive loop. Designed and led by a Galway-based family that has been guiding guests through this country since 1988.
One of the most complete small group tours of Ireland available, this route keeps groups to a maximum of 20 guests with guaranteed departures and every activity that matters is included. There are no add-on charges, no hidden extras, and no large coaches. Just a small, well-matched group, a guide who genuinely loves this route, and some of the most extraordinary landscapes in Europe.
Still weighing up your options? Browse our full range of Multi-Day Tours of Ireland.
Most guided tours of Ireland cover the south and west – Kerry, Killarney, the Cliffs of Moher. This tour goes north, and that matters. Northern Ireland’s coastline is genuinely one of the most spectacular stretches of road in the world. Donegal is the kind of place that stops you mid-sentence. And arriving into Galway at the end of eight days, having moved through so many different faces of Ireland, hits differently than arriving on Day 1.
For anyone looking at multi-day tours of Ireland, the north and west combination is the route that consistently surprises people. The landscapes are less visited, more varied, and in many cases more dramatic than the well-worn south.
The 8 Day West & North is structured with proper breathing space – two nights in Belfast so you’re not just passing through, two nights in Donegal to properly explore the northwest, and two nights in Galway to finish the trip at pace. Every destination on this route earns its place.
Overnights: 2 nights Belfast · 2 nights Donegal · 1 night Westport · 2 nights Galway City
Key Destinations: Belfast · Causeway Coast · Derry · Donegal · Slieve League · Sligo · Mullaghmore · Downpatrick Head · Westport · Connemara · Galway City
From Dublin, the road heads north and the tour begins – with one of Ireland’s most complex, compelling, and misunderstood cities waiting at the end of it.
The journey starts at our Dublin City Centre meeting point. Meet your guide, board the tour coach, and settle in for the drive north as the landscape shifts – the midlands giving way to drumlin country and eventually the approaches to Belfast. Your guide will set the scene on the way in: the city’s history, its transformation, and what to look out for.
On arrival, drop your bags and head out to get the first feel of the place. 48-hour City Sightseeing Hop On Hop Off tickets are included, so the afternoon is yours to pick your first few stops at your own pace. Your guide is nearby throughout if you want recommendations.
Overnight: Belfast City Centre
Belfast rewards the people who take their time with it. Today, that’s you.
A full free day in Belfast to explore exactly as you choose. The city has more layers than most people expect, and a day here barely scratches the surface – which is precisely why we give you two nights.
Options include a Black Cab Tour through the murals and political history of the Falls and Shankill Roads – raw, honest, and unlike any tour experience in Ireland. The Titanic Belfast experience is world-class. The Game of Thrones Studio Tour at Linen Mill Studios draws fans from across the globe and consistently delivers.
Or you might prefer to wander the Cathedral Quarter, pick up lunch in the St George’s Market, and find a barstool in one of the old linen district pubs. Your guide can help you plan the day in the morning if you want a steer – but there’s no wrong answer.
Overnight: Belfast City Centre
One of the great driving days in Europe – a coastline that swings between terror and beauty with very little warning.
The morning starts with the Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge: a narrow suspension bridge strung between the mainland cliff and a small island, 30 metres above the sea. It was originally rigged by salmon fishermen who needed to reach their nets – they crossed it without thinking twice. You might feel differently.
Once across, the views along the Antrim coast are extraordinary in every direction. From there, the road leads to the Giant’s Causeway – a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the genuine wonders of Ireland. Around 40,000 interlocking basalt columns, formed by ancient volcanic activity, emerge from the sea in geometric patterns that look designed rather than natural. Irish mythology has a better explanation: the giant Fionn mac Cumhaill built it as a bridge to Scotland to fight a rival. Both stories are worth hearing.
The afternoon takes you to Derry – officially Derry, sometimes Londonderry, always interesting – for a guided walking tour of the city’s 17th-century walls, the only fully intact walled city on the island of Ireland. The Bogside murals, the Peace Bridge, and the view from the walls over the Guildhall are all part of the story your guide will tell.
The day ends with a comfortable drive into Donegal as the sun drops over the Atlantic. Days like this are the reason people choose an 8 day tour of Ireland over a shorter trip – you need the time to get here, and it’s worth every hour.
Overnight: Donegal
Into the most remote corner of Ireland – where the cliffs are bigger than you expect and the quiet goes deeper than you’re used to.
Donegal is the county that surprises people most on this tour. It’s off the main circuit, rarely overrun, and staggeringly beautiful. Today heads along the coast to Slieve League – at nearly 600 metres, the highest sea cliffs on the Irish mainland, and on a clear day, one of the most humbling views in the country.
They rise from the Atlantic in sheer, banded rock faces of red and grey, with the ocean churning far below. Far fewer people come here than to the Cliffs of Moher, which makes the experience feel all the more yours. The walk to the viewing point is achievable for most guests; your guide will assess conditions and advise on the day.
The afternoon returns to Donegal Town – a compact, traditional Irish market town built around a diamond-shaped square, with a 15th-century castle and some of the best tweed shops in the country. The evening is free to explore, eat well, and settle into the particular peace that Donegal evenings tend to produce. It’s the kind of day that separates the best Ireland multi-day tours from a standard itinerary – geography that most visitors never reach, and time to actually stand in it.
Overnight: Donegal Town
South through Sligo – where the sea is serious, the landscape is literary, and one of the strangest geological formations in Ireland is waiting at the cliff edge.
The route south from Donegal follows the coast into Sligo, passing through some of the most atmospheric scenery on the whole tour. A stop at Mullaghmore – a small coastal village on a rocky headland, with the turrets of Classiebawn Castle visible across the bay and Atlantic swells rolling in from thousands of miles of open ocean – sets the tone.
Surfers know this stretch of coast well. From there, the route heads to Downpatrick Head, a dramatic sea cliff walk that leads to one of the most striking geological features in Ireland: Dún Briste, a sea stack that was once connected to the mainland and broke away in a storm in 1393.
It still stands, vertical and isolated, rising from the sea like a remnant of something much older. The blowholes nearby add a soundtrack. W.B. Yeats spent much of his life in Sligo and wrote about this landscape with a reverence that still makes sense when you stand in it.
The day ends with arrival in Westport, a Georgian planned town on the shores of Clew Bay with great food, genuine character, and a music scene that punches above its size. This stretch of the west coast – Sligo, Mayo, the edges of Connacht – is one of the great under-told stories of multi-day tours in Ireland, and it earns its place on this route.
Overnight: Westport, Co. Mayo
The road to Galway runs through some of the wildest, most beautiful country in Ireland – and there’s no better way to arrive in a city than by earning it.
One of the things that distinguishes small group tours in Ireland from larger operators is the ability to stop where the landscape demands it – and Connemara demands it constantly.
Today the tour passes through the Gaeltacht region of Connemara – one of the few remaining parts of Ireland where Irish is the first language, spoken in homes, shops, and on the road. The landscape out here is treeless, boggy, and magnificent: black lakes, quartzite mountains, and Atlantic light that painters have been chasing for centuries.
Meet a local farmer and watch a sheepdog demonstration that’s been refined across generations of working the Connemara hills – fast, precise, and genuinely impressive. Then on to the gothic splendour of Kylemore Abbey, a 19th-century castle turned Benedictine monastery set beside a lake in a mountain pass, with restored Victorian Walled Gardens worth every minute of exploration.
Round off Connemara with a small glass of Poitín – the spirit of the west – and let the afternoon carry you into Galway as the city starts to come alive for the evening.
Overnight: Galway City Centre
Seven days in, and the best city on the tour is waiting – start with a proper introduction, then make it your own.
The morning begins with a Galway City guided walking tour – through the medieval quarter, along the canal, past the Claddagh and the Spanish Arch, with the full story of what makes Galway the City of the Tribes. After that, the rest of the day is yours.
Galway is a brilliant city to wander without a plan: the shops on Shop Street and Quay Street, the food scene around the Westend, the buskers, the markets, the pubs where a session can start at any hour. If you have a restaurant you want to try, your guide will know whether it’s worth the queue. The evening is entirely free – and Galway evenings have a way of going exactly the way you hope they will.
Overnight: Galway City Centre
Eight days well spent – with one more quiet morning in a city that makes leaving difficult.
A leisurely final morning in Galway. No schedule, no rush. Grab a proper Irish breakfast, walk down to the water, pick up anything you forgot to buy. Your guide will see you onto your train from Galway Ceannt Station back to Dublin Heuston – a comfortable 2.5-hour cross-country journey included in the tour price.
It’s a good chance to look back at everything the last eight days covered: the murals in Belfast, the basalt columns at the Causeway, the silence at Slieve League, the rain on Connemara bog, the music in Galway. That’s what a proper 8 day tour of Ireland feels like.
Tour concludes – Dublin Heuston Station
Looking for a fully tailored route? See our Private Tours of Ireland.
Want to read more? See all Lally Tours reviews from guests across every tour.
