alcpa1 Posted October 23, 2013 #1 Share Posted October 23, 2013 We will arrive in Cork in May, 2014 and are seeking a small group tour. After scouring the boards both here and on TripAdvisor, there do not seem to be many options. Does anyone have some recommendations? Thank you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phabric Posted October 23, 2013 #2 Share Posted October 23, 2013 (edited) We used http://www.ecoach.ie for our tour of Cork in August. It is a coach. It cost us 19.99Euro/pp for an all day tour. You purchase the tickets online and print out information. People learned from our Roll Call to purchase early as the price did go up and then a waitlist and later a bus was added. We had 3 coaches going from our Roll Call. They send out further information closer to the date. If your ship & date are not mentioned, inquire and they will add it to their list. They ask you to get off the ship as fast as possible to get ahead of the Princess coaches. Once a coach is full they leave and our coach was the first to arrive at Blarney Castle. All the coaches park at the Blarney Woolen Mill. They park at Blarney Woolen Mills and you walk a short distance to Blarney Castle. There are over 100 stairs up/down. You purchase your own tickets for Blarney Castle and your own lunch. Blarney Castle is cash only, ATM is at the Blarney Woolen Mill or order tickets online with credit card. If you plan on kissing the Blarney stone, go directly there as it gets very long lines. The Blarney Woolen Mills is a EXCELLENT place to purchase woolen items. They have very good prices. They had if you purchase over 250(?), they would ship to the USA from. I could not do this as I am Canadian. We stopped at Kinsale for lunch at our own expense. Kinsale is a picturesque habour village. After lunch, there was time to walk around the village. We had an excellent all day tour for only 19.99E compared to Princess (included price of Blarney Castle ticket) over $130+ that was only a few hours. Check out the Roll Calls for the 2013 British Isles cruise on the Caribbean Princess. Our Roll Call was August 16, 2013, post #2965 show the list of the private tours we used for that cruise. You might want to ask over on the Port of Call - Britain. Edited October 23, 2013 by phabric Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alcpa1 Posted October 24, 2013 Author #3 Share Posted October 24, 2013 Thank you for your response. I am aware of ecoach and Paddywagon Tours. I am looking for a 8-14 van type tour. Again, thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
4774Papa Posted October 24, 2013 #4 Share Posted October 24, 2013 We used www.ecoach.ie for our tour of Cork in August. It is a coach. It cost us 19.99Euro/pp for an all day tour. You purchase the tickets online and print out information. People learned from our Roll Call to purchase early as the price did go up and then a waitlist and later a bus was added. We had 3 coaches going from our Roll Call. They send out further information closer to the date. If your ship & date are not mentioned, inquire and they will add it to their list. They ask you to get off the ship as fast as possible to get ahead of the Princess coaches. Once a coach is full they leave and our coach was the first to arrive at Blarney Castle. All the coaches park at the Blarney Woolen Mill. They park at Blarney Woolen Mills and you walk a short distance to Blarney Castle. There are over 100 stairs up/down. You purchase your own tickets for Blarney Castle and your own lunch. Blarney Castle is cash only, ATM is at the Blarney Woolen Mill or order tickets online with credit card. If you plan on kissing the Blarney stone, go directly there as it gets very long lines. The Blarney Woolen Mills is a EXCELLENT place to purchase woolen items. They have very good prices. They had if you purchase over 250(?), they would ship to the USA from. I could not do this as I am Canadian. We stopped at Kinsale for lunch at our own expense. Kinsale is a picturesque habour village. After lunch, there was time to walk around the village. We had an excellent all day tour for only 19.99E compared to Princess (included price of Blarney Castle ticket) over $130+ that was only a few hours. Check out the Roll Calls for the 2013 British Isles cruise on the Caribbean Princess. Our Roll Call was August 16, 2013, post #2965 show the list of the private tours we used for that cruise. You might want to ask over on the Port of Call - Britain. We did the same tour and it was excellent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hubofhockey Posted October 27, 2013 #5 Share Posted October 27, 2013 We will arrive in Cork in May, 2014 and are seeking a small group tour. After scouring the boards both here and on TripAdvisor, there do not seem to be many options.Does anyone have some recommendations? Thank you Instead of the Northern Europe ports of call boards, you might have better luck with the British Isles boards. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
In Retirement Posted November 26, 2013 #6 Share Posted November 26, 2013 Thank you for your response.I am aware of ecoach and Paddywagon Tours. I am looking for a 8-14 van type tour. Again, thanks We did British Isles on the Caribbean Princess late May 2012 and almost all of our tours plus DIY Dublin were very fine. Our poorest experience was with ecoach because of the lack of proper activity selection. Kinsale was great for lunch, but we are from Houston and didn't do the month's vacation to buy knitted goods! Also, we had/were doing great castles and manor homes. Beware that you cannot even see the castle without paying admission. Should have walked the village as we waited. The one historic site we visited was a famous fort, and we were given 5 minutes to stretch our legs. Our tour of Cork was like driving around Peoria and made no sense. What we should have done, that we did several other ports, was to do proper research and develop a days plan recruiting on Roll Call and then paying for driver and van for the day. This can be arranged through the same company that provides ecoach tours. By the way, do you dock in Cork or is it the harbor at Cobh? DJ:) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KateDen Posted December 3, 2013 #7 Share Posted December 3, 2013 Thank you for your response.I am aware of ecoach and Paddywagon Tours. I am looking for a 8-14 van type tour. Again, thanks Contact Butlers Buses. They are the same folks who run the eCoach tours. They also offer smaller van and bus tours are are great to work with. We took the group tour on our first visit then took a small group tour just to Kinsale on the second trip in September. All of their buses and vans are top notch and their drivers are great fun. Their prices are reasonable too. Highly recommended. Kate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
holidayfun2014 Posted January 30, 2014 #8 Share Posted January 30, 2014 We will arrive in Cork in May, 2014 and are seeking a small group tour. After scouring the boards both here and on TripAdvisor, there do not seem to be many options.Does anyone have some recommendations? Thank you When my friend visited Cork City last year, she loved Cork City, mainly due to its relaxed nature and of course friendly Irish people . She decided to do many tours in Cork but her favourite was Paddywagon Tours. She had organised a small group tour with them of about 8 people and of course it was a sucess,she told me you can order with the company exactly where you would like to go and then you can visit the places near to Cork. For example, Blarney Castle, or Cobh. She highly recommended their tour and it was a really good way to see the Irish countryside too. My friend really recommended Paddywagon Tours. Her tour was more of a private tour but she said they do main stream tours too to other parts of the country aswell. Prices were very good value too as they catered for her family's needs as she had a small child and a baby, and child seats were provided by the tour company. She said ,it was a fun experience with a witty tour guide! I think I would try them out if I was going there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blarneybob Posted May 14, 2014 #9 Share Posted May 14, 2014 Try aboutcorktaxitours We used them 3 years ago and found then excellent our driver made the day for us Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
In Retirement Posted May 14, 2014 #10 Share Posted May 14, 2014 Our memories of Princess British Isles was great and the Roll Call eventually "woke up" and most port experiences were spectacular (hope to go back in a couple of years with family in tow). My thoughts about Cobh was the selection of ecoach was too easy and as it was the first port needing "planning" I was not persistent enough in either planning or recruiting. Ecoach uses the very efficient method of starting with a very competitive individual price and threatening to raise prices as more people sign up (like buying train tickets in Europe?). On return, would not waste time driving through Cork. No understanding of what the "experiences" there were about? Obviously, the opportunity to meet people would be wonderful -- also easily met at Dublin or Belfast! For me, just an example of inadequate planning? DJ:o Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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