Connemara, Cong & Kylemore Abbey Tour from Galway
Description
Departing from Galway at 10:00 AM, you begin your fully guided tour of Connemara & Cong at our first photo stop near the scenic Inagh Valley. Our main stop is the enchanting Kylemore Abbey & Victorian Walled Gardens. The admission fee for Kylemore Abbey is charged separately at the discounted price of €14 per person (tickets are purchased in cash from your driver). Admission includes entrance to the Abbey, the shuttle bus to the walled gardens and entry to the Neo Gothic Church. There is also a restaurant where you can purchase a hearty lunch and a gift shop for souvenirs. After this visit you explore the wilder Connemara regions visiting Killary Fjord and experience the stark beauty of the valleys of Connemara through the hidden Lough Nafooey route. Arriving in Cong village, you will enjoy a 45-minute break to inspect the ruins of the Old Abbey and take a walk in Cong Woods, wander the streets made famous by the Quiet Man movie before returning to Galway by approximately 18:00
Tour Options
Itinerary
Kylemore Abbey, a beautiful Connemara castle, offers much history of romance and tragedy, captivating visitors who step upon its threshold. The Abbey is a beautiful, neo-gothic, building built-in 1868 by Mitchell Henry for his wife. It is now home to the Benedictine Nuns, and here you can enjoy their excellent home cooking while visiting the Abbey and the restored walled gardens. The grounds and surrounding mountains and lakes are steeped in rich Irish history, and you can learn all about this on our Connemara & Cong Tour. The Abbey and estate are open all year round and include the Abbey, a Gothic Church, the walled gardens, a craft shop, pottery studio, restaurant and tea rooms, as well as the lake and woodland walks.
Lough Corrib is the largest lake within the Republic of Ireland and the second largest on the island of Ireland (after Lough Neagh). ( It covers 176 km² )
Killary Harbour is Ireland’s only true fjord and extends 16km (10 miles) in from the Atlantic .It's extremely deep, over 45m at its centre. This offers a very safe, sheltered anchorage, because of the depth and the mountains to the south and north. It is a centre for shellfish farming, and strings of ropes used to grow mussels are visible for much of its length.
Only an hour’s drive from Westport, Cong is a small village in south Mayo famous for its 12th century abbey, the lavish gold and silver processional Cross of Cong from 1123, the magnificent Ashford Castle, the village’s links with Oscar Wilde and, most popularly, its association with the John Wayne classic movie, The Quiet Man.
A magnificent Augustinian Abbey dating back to the early 12th century
Highlights
What's included
Traveller Ratings
Important Information
- Service animals allowed
- Public transportation options are available nearby
- Infants are required to sit on an adult’s lap
- Suitable for all physical fitness levels
- Public car park near ( Q-Park Eyre Square , Q-Park Hynes Yard)
- Children must be accompanied by an adult
- Seats are not assigned
- Operates in all weather conditions, please dress appropriately
Reviews(1,113)
Beautiful Irish countryside scenery. Kylemore Abbey is stunning and historic. Our bus driver, Mike, kept us entertained with history and Irish humor. The town and woods of Cong were beautiful. Just a lovely day!
A comprehensive day, an attentive driver/guide but may have benefitted from a having a separate guide.
This was such a great tour, we booked so we could go to Cong, which ended up being the most lack luster part of the trip. We were so impressed with the Castle and our guide was amazing.
Excellent driver/ guide who entertained and informed. His local knowledge was impressive and he projected a real awareness of local people and local places Kylemore Abbey was brilliant as a taster for what needs a longer visit. The scenery was amazing in all parts of the trip. Cong was underwhelming. Certainly recommend this tour
The trip through Connemara was pleasant but way too many random stops for smokers. Some smokers taking extra time to finish what they wanted to do so we were all delayed over and over. Not nearly enough time at Kylemore Abbey. Impossible to see everything and have lunch. The stop at Cong wasn’t long enough to even walk to the Abbey for most of the travelers. Again cut short by fellow passengers who were smoking outside the bus. More time at Kylemore Abbey is better choice. Our driver was boring and couldn’t finish a sentence. Disappointed!
Thank you for your feedback. While we are sorry that the tour did not meet your personal expectations, we would like to clarify several points raised in your review. The itinerary, including all scheduled stops and the time allocated at each location, is clearly outlined in our tour description on our website and on the third-party platforms through which the tour is sold. The tour was operated as advertised. Regarding the smoking stops, these are not additional stops created at the discretion of the driver. Passengers are given a specific time to return to the coach, which is clearly announced by the driver. If individual passengers choose to return late because they are smoking, that is unfortunately outside our control and should not be attributed to the driver or the company. Our drivers are responsible for operating the tour according to the published itinerary and cannot reasonably be expected to prevent individual passengers from making poor use of their allocated time. The same applies to the time available at Kylemore Abbey and Cong. Two hours at Kylemore Abbey is the advertised duration, and this is the amount of time provided to our guests. The vast majority of our customers find this sufficient to enjoy the main highlights. As the visit is self-guided, each guest is responsible for deciding how they wish to use that time. Our driver/guide provides recommendations, but cannot dictate which attractions an individual passenger chooses to visit. It is therefore important that guests review the tour description and itinerary before booking, particularly where the amount of time spent at specific attractions is an important consideration. A negative review based on expectations that differ from the published itinerary is somewhat unfair when the advertised service was delivered as described. With regard to our driver, our driver-guides are experienced professionals with extensive knowledge of Connemara and the surrounding areas. They are also tasked with safely navigating narrow and challenging Irish roads while managing a coach full of passengers and providing commentary throughout the journey. We are proud of the professionalism and knowledge of our team. We appreciate that commentary style is subjective and may not suit everyone, but describing a driver as “boring” is a matter of personal preference rather than an indication that the service provided was inadequate. We fully understand that different travellers prefer different types of tours. If you prefer to tailor the itinerary around your own interests, a private hire or private tour would be a much more suitable option. That format allows guests considerably more flexibility than a scheduled group tour. We respect your right to share your opinion, but we also believe it is important to distinguish between shortcomings in the service provided and personal preferences that differ from a clearly advertised itinerary. In this case, the tour operated according to the published schedule and inclusions. Kind regards, Tatiana
What an amazing tour! Connemara is breathtaking. The grounds at kylemore Abbey are truly beautiful. Wish I had a little more time at Cong. Our driver Francis (aka Paddy) was informative, witty and had gifted driving skills. A+++
The tour was amazing and everything we saw wqs great!! Our tour guide was very kind and had a lot of great information!!
I booked this not knowing exactly what we'd see but without a car, I wanted someone to take our group to see more of Ireland than just city sites. Boy was this an amazing find! Kylemore Abbey is stunning, and the gardens, walkways, church, and more on the grounds are spectacular. Even the restaurant was top notch! Cong is a cute little village that is nice to stroll or shop in, and Connemara is the entire region you'll traverse on the bus. Our guide was excellent, funny, extremely knowledgeable, and filled with Irish pride. This day was a highlight of our entire trip!
This was one of the highlights of my trip to Ireland. Connemara, Cong and Kylemore Abbey were all breathtaking, but what truly made the experience exceptional was our guide and chauffeur. He was a genuine local with an incredible knowledge of Irish history, culture and everyday life. He answered every question thoughtfully and spoke with honesty, humour and obvious pride in his country. One of the best moments of the day was something many guides probably wouldn’t think to do. Instead of keeping us on the bus, he let us walk through one of the most beautiful stretches of Connemara while he drove ahead and waited for us. That walk was pure magic. It felt like stepping into every dream and every film I had ever imagined about Ireland, with mountains, stone walls, sheep and endless green landscapes all around us. It gave us time to slow down and truly experience the place instead of just looking at it through a bus window. This wasn’t just sightseeing. It felt like an introduction to the real Ireland. If you’re deciding between tours, choose this one. It was unforgettable.
First of all: the weather was actually mediocre that day. Nevertheless, the tour was a lot of fun, which was mainly due to two things: the beauty of Connemara and the cheerful bus driver Mike. The abbey itself is a quite spectacular building on the edge of a lake. Above all, however, the nature surrounding it impressed us more lastingly, but everyone has to decide that for themselves. Afterwards, we went straight through Connemara, a truly great landscape that captivated us with its rugged beauty. Truly very impressive!
