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Exclusive Brewery Tour and Tasting at Kildare Brewing Co, Sallins
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From €20 per person
Kildare Brewing Company sits along the Grand Canal in Sallins, and that location is part of the story. The canal was once the main artery of Ireland’s brewing trade, and the brewery leans into that history before getting into the real business of the day: how craft beer is actually made.
The tour runs for about an hour - sometimes up to an hour and a half - and takes you through the brewery’s custom 1,000L brewhouse. Your guide walks you through the full process from malt selection and hops through to fermentation, and you get to handle the ingredients along the way. It’s hands-on rather than a lecture.
The tasting at the end is a guided sample paddle of four beers, led by someone who knows the subtleties of each one. You’ll leave with a Kildare Brewing Co. Certificate of Completion, which is a genuinely nice touch.
Groups are kept to a maximum of 12. To find your way there: come into Lock 13 Brewpub and tell a member of the team you’re there for the brewery tour. They’ll take you through.
Alcoholic beverages are available to guests aged 18 and over only.
Get here by train if you can. Irish Rail’s Dublin-Kildare line stops at Sallins station, about 30 to 35 minutes from Dublin Connolly. The walk from the station to Lock 13 Brewpub is less than ten minutes through the village. It’s a straightforward journey and it means you won’t have to think about driving after four beers, which is the sensible arrangement.
Book in advance, especially in summer. The brewery keeps groups to 12, which means it fills up fast on weekends from June through August. A quick check-in ahead of time saves the disappointment of turning up to a sold-out session. Weekday afternoons tend to have more availability if you’ve got flexibility.
Arrive before your tour time and walk the lock first. The Grand Canal harbour and Lock 13 are right there - the same lock and water infrastructure that barges used when carrying goods between Dublin and the Shannon in the 1790s. Give yourself 15 minutes to walk the towpath before your tour starts. It puts the history section of the tour into context and makes the canal section of the brewery’s story land properly when the guide gets to it.
If you’re combining this with the Grand Canal barge cruise on the same day, do the tour first. The Digby Lock cruise departs from Sallins too, and the history your brewery guide covers about the canal trade makes what you see on the water more interesting. The two experiences sit alongside each other naturally - towpath, lock, barge, beer, in that order.
Stick around for the taproom on a Friday evening. The Kildare Brewery taproom at Lock 13 is, by local account, where Sallins goes on a Friday night. If your timing allows, the tour flows naturally into an evening at the source. The canal is right outside, the pace is right, and the beer you’ve just learned to appreciate is on tap.