Road Trip through the United Kingdom and Ireland

“I know of no single formula for success. But over the years I have observed that some attributes of leadership are universal and are often about finding ways of encouraging people to combine their efforts, their talents, their insights, their enthusiasm and their inspiration to work together.”

– Queen Elizabeth II

We spent two weeks across the pond exploring the United Kingdom and Ireland (England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Ireland.) Our weeks were immersed in haggis, black pudding, whisky, roaming sheep, unbelievable landscapes, and too many laughs to remember. With so much to share, several blog posts will be compiled to cover the entire the road trip. Here are all of the cities we visited (including day trips) and where we stayed overnight.

1. Stonehenge and Bath, England (Day trip from Heathrow Airport on our way to stay in Cardiff, Wales)
2. Cardiff, Wales (1-night), Snowdonia National Park , and Conwy, Wales (1-night)
3. Dublin. Ireland (3-nights)
4. Kilkenny, Ireland (Day Trip from Dublin)
5. Limerick and Cliffs of Moher, Ireland (Stops between Dublin and Galway)
6. Galway, Ireland (1-night)
7. Giant’s Causeway, Northern Ireland (Stop between Galway and Belfast)
8. Belfast, Northern Ireland (1-night)
9. Glasgow, Scotland (1-night)
10. Edinburgh, Scotland (2-nights)
11. York, England (1-night)
12. London, England (3-nights)

Below is a map of the cities we stayed in, the red dots indicate overnight stays and the small blue dots were pit stops or day trips. There were so many extra places we stopped along the way: countless beautiful scenic overlooks, waterfalls, and sheep sightings.

Planning with a group??

When we began preparing for this two-week vacation we only thought about the flights in and out of London, and we knew we wanted to go to Dublin, and that got the ball rolling. Then we each individually looked around and researched where else we wanted to travel while in the U.K. When traveling with a group, it is important to make sure everyone gets to see and do what they want, so I organized a couple “meetings” to discuss all the things we wanted to accomplish. The first meeting was more general about locations and cities, then we did some more research, and came back to finalize details and reserve tickets. Planning trips with a group is also made easy by having a shared google document to add all ideas and information (which is later translated into a blog post).

Everything was planned out really well if I do say so myself! Everything went swimmingly- the flights, ferries, nine different Airbnbs (minus the dud in Cardiff)/Hotels/Bed and Breakfasts, and easily 2,000 miles traveled! This was an absolutely incredible journey!