3 Star Ireland Tour Reviews — 1 to 7 of 7

The scenery and Guest houses were great! The only bad day was the first day, climbing a 2400 feet gain. The bikes were not up to the challenge, did not get us up some of the steeper inclines, so we had to push the heavy electric assist bikes up those hills, which was very difficult and very slow, so slow in fact that by the time we got to the listed places to eat, they were closed. We called the bike shop, when we got to the guest house, and had them bring out one new bike and one new better charger. I suggest that trip site find a new bike shop.

The ride along the Burren Coast Way. Spectacular views of the sea.
I am not a road biker and I personally found the trip a little more challenging than the "Easy to Moderate" rating posted on the website.
I would suggest you need to be comfortable riding on fairly busy roads at times and train for the hills, some are quite challenging.
Overall a very special way to see Ireland and well worth the challenge.

Riding along the Atlantic coast. Views of the Atlantic Ocean were stupendous. It rained daily so it was a difficult ride at times. When the sun came out and a rainbow appeared it was heartwarming.

The scenery was amazing and everything I have ever hoped for! The hills were beautiful but would have been difficult to enjoy without the help of the e-bikes.

It would be helpful if the bikes were equipped with an odometer so that including distances to the next turn. In addition or instead of a 15 page direction packet with paragraph instructions on where to turn maps of each days recommended rides would have been extraordinarily helpful. Without google gps and our own planning we wouldn’t have reached each destination in our self guided trip without getting lost and having to backtrack to see where we went wrong. The first day was frustrating without knowing we just needed to use google instead of the provided information. In addition a plastics zipper bag to carry the maps was less than adequate in a country with so much rain. We took several wrong turns and didn’t feel directions telling up to look for a blue barn where helpful. A positive is that the locals are super nice and helpful!

I would have enjoyed to have more options of where to ride with a map marked with good routes. It is easy to get turned around in the mountains and one wrong turn not caught leads to a long day.

The highlights: the accommodations were overall great, my favorites included Huntington house (right on the shore, amazing food and cocktails), Coolakay (the best views), and Glendalough (loads of places to explore).

What could be better or I would change: Maps! Maps are a must have to navigate the mountains of Wicklow. When you pick up your bike make sure you check everything over yourself. Don’t trust that you picked it up from the cycle shop. I road about 20 miles with a loose front wheel. I assumed that picking a bike up at a shop my wheels would be secured on the bike but they were not, I feel very lucky I didn’t wreck. Longer ride days would have been fun for those of us that prefer a full day of cycling versus just a couple hours. The names of the reservations at each hotel or bed and breakfast were always different we never knew whose name to give. None of our names were listed on the room at The Bridge Tavern and we were told the room hadn’t been paid for, we were unable to reach our local emergency contact, in fact they never called us back. It was extremely frustrating, the fortunate part is that Tripsite emergency number answered the phone and solved the problem.

The actual biking in Ireland was a once in a lifetime trip for me!

The people we traveled with and the shared adventures as well as the beauty of Ireland

Loved the off day in Clifden. Ireland is beautiful and the people could not be more warm. But do not recommend biking in Connemara. Many, many hills make it moderate at best, and there are no shoulders on very narrow lanes.

We only had 6 in our group so we were self-guided. From day 1, we felt the tour was incorrectly rated as easy-moderate. All 6 of us are seasoned riders but the hills, especially Day 1 were in the “difficult “ category. Four of the riders had been on previous tours with other companies. The directions for each day were lengthy and confusing, often requiring us to stop often to reread them. Some of the restaurants suggested we’re out-of-the-way only for us to later come across a nice one on our route. Caused us to question whether the person writing the directions had ever taken the trip. Luckily, we had a rider who would use his GPS which proved more helpful than the written directions. It was a fantastic trip because of the riders and the beautiful countryside. The ranking of difficulty needs to be changed as a novice biker would not be able to complete this tour.