Worldwide Car Rentals, Irish Hotels and Irish Car Rentals

Tour Clare is a travel site for the Irish and for those who are travelling to Ireland. Here you will find great prices on Irish Hotels and B&B's as well as Irish and Worldwide Car Rentals.

We have tried to write a bit about each county as well as provide pages on activities you can find here, especially those that promote a sustainable Ireland.

The difficulty of writing anything about this land is it lies so heavily on the heart. Whether you are Irish or a frequent visitor to this plateau of green in the Atlantic Ocean, the experience of being here is all consuming.

And Ireland is changing, much of it for the good.

Many Irish hotels have now added hotel spas (known as Leisure Centres) with little or no increase in cost. Spas, full Irish breakfast and craic-laden pubs make Irish hotels an excellent value.

We welcome you to a land competing in beauty with the kindness of its citizens.

Rest, relax and have a bit of craic in our Irish hotels

All right then, we admit it. We do enjoy staying in Irish hotels (could you tell). The Irish are excellent innkeepers and will do whatever is possible to help make your stay comfortable.

Whether you are travelling throughout Ireland or getting out of Dublin for a bank holiday, an easy way to locate convenient hotels is on our Irish Counties page.

The easy interactive map makes finding a hotel or guesthouse as simple as finding a Guinness in an Irish pub. By moving your cursor over the counties on the map, you can also root out the best room rates (can't do that for a Guinness).

You can book a hotel room directly from our Irish county pages or from our Irish Hotels page.

We suggest you reserve your room well in advance, especially if there is a local festival during the time you need lodging.

Most Irish hotels and guesthouses include the famous Irish breakfast with the room rate. These breakfasts are substantial, including eggs, a variety of meats, coffee or tea, toast, cereal, mushrooms, pastries and whatever the specialty of the house might be.

Most important of all, the Irish are keen on making your stay an overall grand experience. This feature, alone, can make the daily room rate quite a bargain indeed.

We recommend spending the night in a nearby hotel before and after flying into and out of Shannon Airport or Dublin Airport.

Irish Car Hire

For Irish car hire, you can book through Irish Car Rentals on this page. Our special Internet quotes are "Drive Away Prices" and include all of the compulsory insurances you require under Irish Law to drive a rental vehicle in Ireland.

All rental rates include local tax @13.5%, unlimited free mileage and all our cars are covered by 24 Hour AA Roadside assistance. Your email confirmation will contain all of the information you require.

Car Rentals made easy with CarTrawler

If you need a car for a rental anywhere else in the world, you'll find CarTrawler the easiest way to hire the vehicle of your choice. You know what you want... we give it to you.

CarTrawler, Irish and International Car Rentals

CarTrawler's easy-to-use booking engine for car hire offers secure booking for car rentals around the world. CarTrawler makes it easy to rent a car anywhere you might want to go.

With 50 years of experience in car hire, it is one of the oldest and most respected car-rental companies in Europe.

When travelling to a foreign country, using CarTrawler is also the most convenient way to find the car you need because they give you access to over 450 suppliers in over 9,000 locations.

The booking engine produces a quote with all-inclusive prices so you don't have to worry about hidden charges when you arrive to pick up your car. When you're on holiday, let us handle your car hire.

We offer worldwide car hire bookings in the following languages:

Czech	Danish		Dutch		Finnish		French		German
Greek	Hungarian		Italian		Japanese		Norwegian		Polish
Portuguese		Romanian		Spanish		Swedish		Swiss

Car Hire Tips (for car rentals)

Our best suggestion when travelling anywhere is to rent a car in advance of your travel date.

If you are visiting Ireland, we feel renting a car on your holiday is the only reasonable way to visit all the castles, abbeys and other bits of antiquity you might want to explore.

Stay in a hotel with a good pub if you want to drink. This is just good common sense, of course. If you want to hear trad music in a local pub, take a taxi and ask the publican if he can provide you with one for the return to your hotel.

Check with your insurance carrier before your holiday to see what excess coverage (if any) you will need on your car hire. Many times it will be completely covered and you will know in advance so you won't be sold any insurance you don't need.

Read a little about the local laws and blood alcohol levels that constitute DUI.

Irish Tours - Please email us for availability and reservation options

Tour Clare is happy to offer the following Land Rover tours:

Our price includes your accommodation and breakfasts. Other meals and drinks you simply pay for at the time.

Lunches tend to be a mixture of picnics, BBQ's and pub lunches and then in the evening we normally head to a good pub or restaurant for our meals. It is easily possible to eat well for E25pp per day. The Guinness may be another story, lads and ladies.

(For a limited time only, Tour Clare is offering a discount of �50 for the 5-day tours and �75 for the 7-day tours)

3 day whirlwind Introduction to Ireland: A 3-day-long weekend break across to the West Coast of Ireland to Counties Galway, Sligo and Mayo.

Tour Cost: �389 Single supplement: �40
(Including 2 nights Hotel and B&B Accommodation - based on two sharing)
(Departing: Fridays)

5-7 day Southwest and western Ireland; 5 and 7 day tours (which we would highly recommend for a really good look at Ireland). Both head down to the South-West of Ireland to cover the Cork and Kerry areas and the Dingle, Beara and Iveragh peninsulas. The 7 day tour then heads north to cover the western areas included in the 3 and 4 day tours.

Five days "To the Edge of the World" down to the South West
Tour Cost: �659 Single supplement: �75
(Including 4 nights Hotel and B&B Accommodation based on two sharing)
(Departing: Sundays)
Seven Day "World Tour of Ireland"
Tour Cost: �889 Single supplement: �100
(6 nights Hotel and B&B Accommodation based on two sharing)
(Departing: Sundays)

5-7 Northern, Northwest and western Ireland: Our "Northern Island" tour for five days which includes Northern Ireland and the North West. This is a superb trip and possibly our most off-the-beaten-track tour.

What we are also offering in 2008 is a 7 day tour, which is a combination of the 5 day NI tour and the three day trip to the west. It leaves on Mondays, gets back on Sundays and costs the same as the 7 day s/w trip.

Five days Northern Ireland Tour to the North and North West
Tour Cost: �659 Single supplement: �75
(Including 4 nights B&B Accommodation based on two sharing)
(Departing: Mondays)
Seven Day "North by North West" Tour
Tour Cost: �889 Single supplement: �100
(6 nights Hotel and B&B Accommodation based on two sharing)
(Departing: Mondays)

11 day Giant Irish Adventure: An amazing expedition that covers the north, northwest, west and southwest of Ireland by combining our 5 day NI and 7 day southern trip.

Tour Cost: �1399 Single supplement: �175
(Including 10 nights Hotel and B&B Accommodation based on two sharing)
(Departing: Mondays)

If you have a group of 20 or more, please contact us for other Irish tours. We have a number of options available throughout the country for large groups.

Attractions in Ireland

In Western Ireland, alone, there are over 3,000 earthen and stone forts, 130 megalithic tombs, 300 castles, 250 ancient churches, seven cathedrals, 12 monasteries, 20 stone crosses.

This is not to mention 15 round towers, delights to behold, and a panoply lesser monuments.

In fact, County Clare, where this site originated, is practically in ruins with all the castles abbeys, and other bits and pieces of antiquity lying around.

On a clear day, you might want to visit the Burren, one of the most beautiful and haunting geological wonders in Europe.

Contact us at Tour Clare

If you have a specific request for lodging, car hire or need other information on Ireland, please feel free to email us.

We adhere to the good advice of our now departed friend, Pony O'Niell, who was fond of saying to tourists, "Don't try to find Ireland, lad. Let Ireland find you."

Because this was loosely translated from his native tongue, Irish, it could also have meant, "Don't bruise your knee on a barstool that's not in your way."

While not certain of what meaning the Pony actually had in mind, these words always sound grand to us after we've had a pint or two of Guinness.

We hope you'll have a lovely visit to Ireland but be careful when stepping behind those rock walls.

You never know where the stray leprechaun might be waiting to collect you.

Slan go foill,

Jim Kelly