Best way to plan a trip to Ireland

[Lions1988]

Hi everyone, 

I'm looking to plan/book a trip to Ireland and trying to figure out the best way to go about it. Can I do this myself or go thru a golf travel company? If a company 

should be used which is the best one to use. We are traveling from NYC. Thanks in advance.

[Chanceman]

48 minutes ago, Lions1988 said:

Hi everyone, 

I'm looking to plan/book a trip to Ireland and trying to figure out the best way to go about it. Can I do this myself or go thru a golf travel company? If a company 

should be used which is the best one to use. We are traveling from NYC. Thanks in advance.

I planned and booked everything for myself and a mate for a 3 week trip - at least a year ahead. We decided early on to rent a car. Plot out a rough itinerary as you would want it, allowing for travel time, then send emails to each club to get your tee times. That will probably require some adjustments as not all your preferred courses will be available on your dates. Try not to pay upfront without free cancellation. Once the courses are in place then book your hotels or airbnb as needed. You just have to be patient and flexible.

[El Gringo]

My approach is to identify the must see courses. The type of courses that if they are not available I don’t do that trip…I choose another area. Once the must courses are booked I build the rest of the trip around them. I prioritise the supporting courses and book them. I will happily change out the supporting courses to minimise drive time or take advantage of a deal, play with a member or to stay in a town I want to see etc. 

 

I try to avoid paying money in advance which usually means booking directly with secretaries, never online unless the play date is so near it doesn’t matter.

 

Having played well over 500 UK&I courses it’s getting tougher and tougher to find trips of more than a handful of days I want to do. The wanna see courses are so spread out and the cost of seeing some repeat plays is prohibitive. My latest trip was to Arran to play Shiskine for the first time in at least 20 years and Corrie. Then over to Campbeltown for Machrihanish, Mach Dunes (the targeted course I hadn’t played) Dunaverty and Carradale. Good trip!
 

Last year I did I wonderful trip to Scotland. Played a few 9 holers I had been wanting to see…Gatehouse and St Medan…both recommended. Then on to Turnberry then ferries to the islands to play Askernish and Isle of Harris…both long time wanna sees. Back to the mainland for Traigh…another long time wanna see. Planned to play Leadhills on the way home. It was raining so we skipped it, but through the fog and rain it looked interesting. Cracking trip. I want to back and play a few others we missed because of ferry schedules. The riches of 9 hole golf is incredible. 
 

As you can tell, quite a bit of research goes into planning. If that doesn’t interest you then it’s probably best to engage a travel company.

[Hawkeye77]

Check out the cost of various travel companies and decide if the convenience is worth it to you.  Just out of curiosity I looked at some prices from a couple of the more recognizable ones recently and the cost for one person for a relatively short trip and no airfare included is way more than what my wife any I paid for both our flights, lodging, rental car and greens fees for two weeks in Ireland.  

 

I've planned two trips to Scotland, one to Ireland, two to England - the first three were more golf specific but we like to see plenty of other stuff and don't do 36 a day, drive all over death marches, or even play every day.  All depends on why you travel.

 

Plenty of resources including searching this sub-forum for info on courses, but it's really just a matter of deciding what areas you want to visit, what you want to do and how long you will be there.  Our Scotland and Ireland trips have been around two weeks or a little more and generally stay a week in an area and venture out from a "base".  One Scotland trip was based in Dornoch after a short stay in Glenfinnan and then just south of St. Andrews, the other based in Troon (with a drive/ferry/day trip to Belfast) and North Berwick.  Ireland trip started out near Connemara Golf Club and then a little over a week near Killarney, then a couple of days exploring Dublin.  

 

It's pretty easy to contact courses, research their visitor info online (it's all there for the reading) and make reservations.  Buy a big travel map, spread it out on the counter and go to work! 

 

 

[Hawkeye77]

3 hours ago, El Gringo said:

My approach is to identify the must see courses. The type of courses that if they are not available I don’t do that trip…I choose another area. Once the must courses are booked I build the rest of the trip around them. I prioritise the supporting courses and book them. I will happily change out the supporting courses to minimise drive time or take advantage of a deal, play with a member or to stay in a town I want to see etc. 

 

I try to avoid paying money in advance which usually means booking directly with secretaries, never online unless the play date is so near it doesn’t matter.

 

Having played well over 500 UK&I courses it’s getting tougher and tougher to find trips of more than a handful of days I want to do. The wanna see courses are so spread out and the cost of seeing some repeat plays is prohibitive. My latest trip was to Arran to play Shiskine for the first time in at least 20 years and Corrie. Then over to Campbeltown for Machrihanish, Mach Dunes (the targeted course I hadn’t played) Dunaverty and Carradale. Good trip!
 

Last year I did I wonderful trip to Scotland. Played a few 9 holers I had been wanting to see…Gatehouse and St Medan…both recommended. Then on to Turnberry then ferries to the islands to play Askernish and Isle of Harris…both long time wanna sees. Back to the mainland for Traigh…another long time wanna see. Planned to play Leadhills on the way home. It was raining so we skipped it, but through the fog and rain it looked interesting. Cracking trip. I want to back and play a few others we missed because of ferry schedules. The riches of 9 hole golf is incredible. 
 

As you can tell, quite a bit of research goes into planning. If that doesn’t interest you then it’s probably best to engage a travel company.

 

Traigh is the first course we played in Scotland - just happened to start our trip in Glenfinnan because of the Harry Potter railway viaduct for the girls.  It is an absolute gem of a course, IMO.  

 

 

[El Gringo]

39 minutes ago, Hawkeye77 said:

 

Traigh is the first course we played in Scotland - just happened to start our trip in Glenfinnan because of the Harry Potter railway viaduct for the girls.  It is an absolute gem of a course, IMO.  

 

 

I agree. Traigh is high on charm. If you like that make the effort to see Isle of Harris. Lovely course and the is stunning. 

[El Gringo]

39 minutes ago, Hawkeye77 said:

 

Traigh is the first course we played in Scotland - just happened to start our trip in Glenfinnan because of the Harry Potter railway viaduct for the girls.  It is an absolute gem of a course, IMO.  

 

 

I agree. Traigh is high on charm. If you like that make the effort to see Isle of Harris. Lovely course and the island is stunning. 

[hammergolf]

18 hours ago, Lions1988 said:

Hi everyone, 

I'm looking to plan/book a trip to Ireland and trying to figure out the best way to go about it. Can I do this myself or go thru a golf travel company? If a company 

should be used which is the best one to use. We are traveling from NYC. Thanks in advance.

You can plan your trip by yourself. It does take some time and research to work out the logistics of travel, transportation, and tee times butIf you have the time and enjoy that I would recommend doing it yourself. However, a travel company will generally charge about a 30% premium to handle all of that for you. 

[NDSwim]

18 hours ago, Lions1988 said:

Hi everyone, 

I'm looking to plan/book a trip to Ireland and trying to figure out the best way to go about it. Can I do this myself or go thru a golf travel company? If a company 

should be used which is the best one to use. We are traveling from NYC. Thanks in advance.

I’m actually working through this now.  For a trip to Scotland for 8 last year we used a company to get a guaranteed Old Course tee time.  Was very happy with the company (St Andrews Golf Travel) and know we paid a premium.

 

Planning Ireland for 2027.  Debating on either 4 or 8 guys.  Doing my research, if only going with a total of 4, you can plan it yourself.  As others said, be flexible and know your must plays.  If 8, would probably use a company again.  Pricing has certainly increased.

 

Many courses open diaries March/April for the following year.

 

 

[islesmb]

If you decide to go through a booking agent I highly recommend Conn at Real Irish Golf. We did a SW trip last month. It was amazing.

 

https://realirishgolf.com/

[jvincent]

On 7/19/2025 at 9:40 PM, Lions1988 said:

Hi everyone, 

I'm looking to plan/book a trip to Ireland and trying to figure out the best way to go about it. Can I do this myself or go thru a golf travel company? If a company 

should be used which is the best one to use. We are traveling from NYC. Thanks in advance.

 

Depending on the number of golfers it's generally pretty easy to plan a trip by yourself and you will save a ton of $$$ doing it that way vs using a tour company. The key cost savers are driving yourselves and staying in AirBnBs vs hotels. For example, I have organized a group of 6 to Northern Ireland for next year and we are about half what it would have cost using a tour operator.

 

The first thing you need to do is pick a specific area you want to visit. Don't get sucked into playing every top course in one trip. There are a LOT of them in Ireland and they are distributed all over the country.

 

Once you've picked an area, probably determined by proximity to two or three top courses, build an itinerary around other courses in that area. Depending on how long you plan on staying it's OK to move between two locations spending 3 or 4 nights at each location.

 

For the top courses you will may need to book as far as a year in advance.

[Greg_egg]

Easy to do yourself, especially if there is only a couple of you. 

 

Figure out how long the trip will be and then come up with a list of courses. Some courses only allow play on certain days and certain times, so having more courses than you can play is good incase of substitutions. You should also try to book as soon as their books open for the following year to avoid disappointment.

 

The problem with Ireland is there are fantastic courses all around the island. So you need to have a bit of a gameplan.