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Belfast Dublin Guided Scenic Tour of the East Coast of Ireland
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From €821 per person
Skip the motorway. This private drive between Belfast and Dublin follows the back roads that most visitors never get to see - winding through the Cooley Mountains, along the coast of County Louth and past ancient sites that predate written history. Your chauffeur-guide knows every twist in the road and the stories behind the landscape.
The route is entirely flexible. Want to stop at a harbour village for fish and chips? No problem. Fancy a detour to photograph a ruined abbey? Done. This is the kind of relaxed, personal experience that turns what could be a straightforward transfer into one of the highlights of your trip. The journey typically takes three to five hours, depending on how many stops you make along the way.
You travel in a comfortable, air-conditioned private vehicle, with someone who has spent years getting to know the hidden corners of Ireland’s east coast. It’s a world away from a tour bus, and a great way to arrive in either city having actually seen something of the country between them.
Ask for the inland Louth detour. The village of Louth - the small settlement that actually gave the county its name - sits just off the back roads between Dundalk and Ardee. On a low hill at its edge, you’ll find St Mochta’s House, a 12th-century stone-roofed oratory that is genuinely one of the most intact Romanesque buildings in Ireland. Both the oratory and the ruined 14th-century St Mary’s Augustinian Priory fifty metres away are National Monuments, open and free. The whole stop takes half an hour and most visitors who’ve driven past for years have never seen it.
Belfast is worth an early start if you’re heading south. Leaving Belfast by 9am puts you on the coastal back roads before the day-tripper traffic builds. The M1 to Dublin is always there if you run short on time - your chauffeur-guide will know where to cut in and where to linger. Carlingford is one of the natural lunch stops on the Louth coast, and the estuary views from the Cooley Peninsula are the ones that stick.
The Cooley Mountains are on the County Louth side of the border, not the Mourne side. It’s easy to confuse the two ranges - the Mournes are further north in Down, the Cooleys are the ridge you see from Carlingford Lough south of Newry. Your guide will have the geography sorted, but knowing the distinction means you’ll understand what you’re looking at when you get there.
October light on the east coast is the best light. The Louth shoreline, the hill at St Mochta’s oratory, the long view across the lough - all of them repay an autumn visit when the summer coach parties have gone and the roads are quiet again.