• 7 Dinner (D)
• 13 Breakfast (B)

• Dublin: A stunning combination of cobblestone walkways, emerald-green lawns and 18th-century architectural gems, Trinity College is one of Europe’s elite universities and counts poet Oscar Wilde among its alumni. See the enchanting college campus and discover insights into its impressive history. Enjoy access to view the famous Book of Kells, an exquisite manuscript of the four gospels of the Christian New Testament, renowned for the intricacy, detail and majesty of the illustrations.
• Kildare: Horse racing is key part of Irish culture; and you’ll gain a rare insight into it on your visit to the Irish National Stud. Set in Kildare at the breeding ground of champions and the birthplace of legends, explore the foaling unit, museum and the stallions that continue to make racing history. As the only stud farm in Ireland open to the public, learn the insights of horse-racing at a site whose former visitors include queens and presidents. 
• Derry/Londonderry: There’s no better way to experience sightseeing than with one of Northern Ireland’s best storytellers, Ronan, as he takes you on a tour inside the city walls. See the Gothic Guildhall and the Georgian houses of Shipquay Street.
• Edinburgh: Create a bespoke Islander Harris Tweed® handbag in Edinburgh, choosing the body color, Harris Tweed® lid and decorative strap before assembling it with tools provided. Handwoven in the Outer Hebrides, Harris Tweed® gives your finished bag a direct link to Scottish textile craft.

• Hand sanitizer is freely available on board for you to use throughout the day.

Insight Vacations

• Business class coach with extended leg room
• Top-rated dining, from farm-to-table to local restaurants
• Premium regional accommodation

Meet your Travel Director and fellow travellers over a small-group welcome dinner in Dublin. Conversation around the table offers a relaxed introduction to the people who will share your journey through Ireland and Scotland.

Dining together is a chance to settle into the rhythm of the tour and hear your Travel Director’s local perspective. The evening is hosted, rather than a meal left for you to arrange independently.

Explore Dublin with your Travel Director on a guided city orientation following the River Liffey. Pass the neoclassical Custom House and see St Patrick’s Cathedral, associated with Ireland’s patron saint.

The Custom House recalls Dublin’s late-18th-century commercial growth, while the cathedral’s medieval stonework speaks to a much older religious history. Together, these landmarks provide a clear introduction to the capital’s civic and spiritual heritage.

Visit Trinity College Library and view the Book of Kells, a richly illuminated manuscript of the Christian Gospels created by monks around the ninth century. Explore the historic college campus, with its cobbled walkways and 18th-century buildings.

The manuscript’s intricate decoration offers a close look at early medieval artistry and scholarship. Trinity College, founded in 1592, remains one of Dublin’s defining institutions and counts Oscar Wilde among its former students.

Go behind the scenes at the Irish National Stud in County Kildare to learn how racehorses are bred and raised. Explore the public stud farm’s equine heritage before walking through the neighbouring Japanese Gardens.

Designed by Tassa and Minoru Eida, the gardens use winding paths and carefully placed planting to represent the journey of life. The pairing reveals two distinctive traditions in one setting: Ireland’s deep connection with horse racing and the contemplative art of garden design.

Discover Rebel Cork on an orientation led by your Travel Director. Travel along Grand Parade and see City Hall and the Opera House, taking in the streets of Ireland’s second city beside the River Lee.

Cork grew from an early religious settlement associated with St Finbarr into a Viking trading place and a Norman city. Its civic buildings and commercial streets offer visible clues to those successive chapters and to the merchants who shaped its later prosperity.

Visit Blarney Castle, the 15th-century stronghold built by the McCarthy dynasty. See the famous Blarney Stone set high in its battlements and, if you wish, take your turn at the tradition of kissing it.

Legend holds that the stone bestows the ‘gift of the gab’: a talent for persuasive speech. The castle’s weathered stone and elevated setting give this enduring Irish tale a tangible home, beyond the familiar phrase it inspired.

Get to know Killarney with your Travel Director before taking a horse-drawn jaunting car ride with a local jarvey. See the town’s shopfronts and church spires against the mountains that frame this corner of County Kerry.

Jaunting cars have carried visitors around Killarney since the 19th century. Hearing a jarvey’s local perspective from the carriage brings a living tradition into focus, while the gentle pace lets you take in the town’s streets and surroundings.

Experience the Ring of Kerry, a circular journey around the Iveragh Peninsula. Look out for rocky coastline, beaches, sheep-dotted fields and remote villages, with the mountains and lakes of Killarney adding to the changing views.

This route brings together several of southwest Ireland’s defining landscapes within a compact stretch of countryside. Its contrasts are the draw: sheltered lakelands give way to open Atlantic scenery, while small communities remain part of the picture throughout.

Stand above the Atlantic at the Cliffs of Moher, where the rock rises to about 214 metres along County Clare’s coast. Visit the exhibition centre and take in the scale of the cliffs and the sea below.

Your Travel Director adds insight into the geology, history and wildlife of this celebrated stretch of the Wild Atlantic Way. The exposed cliff edge and layered rock make the forces that shaped Ireland’s western coastline strikingly visible.

Walk through Galway’s historic heart with your Travel Director, visiting the Lynch Memorial Window and seeing St Nicholas’ Church, the Spanish Arch and Eyre Square. Stories of local people help bring the city’s streets into focus.

Galway’s medieval merchant heritage survives among its lively public spaces. St Nicholas’ is Ireland’s largest medieval parish church still in continuous use, while the Spanish Arch recalls the city’s long relationship with maritime trade.

Explore Sligo on an orientation with your Travel Director, seeing the town’s streets and landmarks while hearing about its links to poet W. B. Yeats. The surrounding scenery helps explain the region’s hold on his imagination.

Sligo’s literary associations sit alongside a much longer local history, including its medieval past. This guided introduction gives context to both the town and the landscape that became a recurring presence in Yeats’s work.

Join local storyteller Ronan for a guided walk along Derry/Londonderry’s 17th-century city walls. See their surviving cannons, follow Shipquay Street past Georgian houses and pause outside the red-sandstone Guildhall.

Ronan’s stories bring a personal perspective to a city whose walls have witnessed centuries of change. The walk pairs close-up views of its architecture with the history and lived experience behind one of Northern Ireland’s most distinctive cityscapes.

Walk among the interlocking basalt columns of the Giant’s Causeway on Northern Ireland’s Antrim Coast. More than 40,000 columns form an extraordinary geometric shoreline where dark stone meets the sea.

This UNESCO World Heritage Site was shaped by volcanic activity millions of years ago, though its name comes from stories of the giant Finn McCool. Seeing the columns at ground level makes both the geological scale and the power of the folklore easier to grasp.

Follow the curve of Ballygally Bay on a gentle orientation walk with your Travel Director. Take in the pale sand, village cottages and views opening towards Northern Ireland’s Antrim Coast.

Ballygally sits between shoreline and rising ground, giving this short hosted walk a strong sense of place. The salty air and close views of the water offer a quieter perspective on the coast beyond its better-known geological landmarks.

Cross the Irish Sea by ferry with your small group, leaving the Northern Irish coast for Scotland. From the water, watch the changing shoreline and, in clear weather, look for the distinctive outline of Ailsa Craig.

This sea route has linked Ireland and Britain through centuries of trade, migration and cultural exchange. Ailsa Craig adds an unusual detail to the crossing: its granite has long been used to make curling stones.

Visit Craufurdland Castle in Scotland and meet the 29th Laird and Lady for a tour of their home. Hear about the place from its custodians and enjoy a traditional afternoon tea featuring classic British fare.

The combination of a hosted house visit and tea makes this more personal than a passing view of a historic building. It offers a glimpse of how a long-established family home remains part of Scottish life today.

Explore Glasgow with your Travel Director, taking in its broad streets and Victorian architecture. Pause at George Square, with its statues and grand civic buildings, and continue to St Mungo’s Cathedral.

The cathedral points to Glasgow’s medieval origins, while the surrounding city reflects the wealth generated by later trade and industry. This orientation connects those contrasting eras, offering a useful introduction to Scotland’s largest city and its distinctive architectural character.

Travel through the dramatic Highland landscape of Glencoe, where steep mountain slopes enclose a narrow glen. Take in the changing views as your journey passes through one of Scotland’s most recognisable mountain settings.

Glencoe’s scenery carries a weight of history as well as natural grandeur. The glen is closely associated with the 1692 massacre of members of the MacDonald clan, a story that gives added meaning to its imposing, often sombre atmosphere.

Stop at the Commando Memorial near Fort William, where bronze figures stand against a wide Highland backdrop. Look across the landscape towards Ben Nevis, Britain’s highest mountain.

The memorial honours the commandos who trained in this region during the Second World War. Its open hillside setting creates space to consider that history while taking in the ridges and glens that make this part of the Highlands so distinctive.

Board a cruise on Loch Ness to see its long, dark waters and Highland shores from the loch itself. Look out for waterside landmarks as you hear about the landscape and the enduring legend of Nessie.

Loch Ness stretches through the Great Glen, a geological fault shaped over millions of years. Its remarkable depth and peat-darkened water have helped sustain stories of the elusive monster, lending folklore to an already striking natural setting.

Explore Inverness with your Travel Director, seeing the River Ness and Inverness Castle while learning about the city’s place in Highland history. The river and surrounding scenery give Scotland’s northern city its distinctive setting.

As a longstanding meeting point and regional centre, Inverness offers a useful introduction to the Highlands beyond its landscapes. This orientation brings its landmarks and local stories together in a compact guided experience.

Visit the Culloden Visitor Centre at Culloden Moor to explore the events of the 1746 battle. Voices, maps and personal stories help explain the opposing forces and the human consequences of their confrontation.

The Battle of Culloden was the final pitched battle fought on British soil and marked the end of the Jacobite rising of 1745. Its aftermath profoundly affected Highland communities, making this a significant stop for understanding Scotland’s history.

Explore Uile-bheist distillery in Inverness and taste its creations, including a ‘wee dram’. Hear how Highland folklore, whisky-making traditions and beer brewing inform its approach to craft.

This MAKE TRAVEL MATTER® Experience also examines the distillery’s sustainability ambitions. Designed with lower-carbon production in mind and aiming for net zero by 2030, Uile-bheist offers a look at how an established Scottish tradition can adapt to environmental priorities.

Spend time in coastal St Andrews, looking across the Old Course and walking towards West Sands Beach. University buildings, open links and sea air give the town its distinctive character.

The Old Course has been central to golf for centuries and is closely associated with the game’s development. West Sands has a different cultural claim to fame: its broad shoreline featured in the opening sequence of the film Chariots of Fire.

Join a Local Expert for a guided exploration of Edinburgh, travelling along Princes Street to see the Scott Monument and the Georgian facades of the New Town. See the Palace of Holyroodhouse in the Old Town.

Edinburgh’s contrasting districts reveal why its Old and New Towns are recognised as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Medieval streets and planned Georgian avenues tell different chapters of the Scottish capital’s development within a remarkably compact cityscape.

Explore Edinburgh Castle with a Local Expert and see the Scottish Crown Jewels and Mons Meg, a formidable 15th-century siege gun. The fortress rises above the Old Town at the end of the Royal Mile.

Built on volcanic rock, the castle has served as a royal residence, military stronghold and symbol of Scottish history. Seeing its historic objects in this setting brings the country’s monarchy and centuries of conflict into sharper focus.

Create a bespoke Islander Harris Tweed® handbag in a hands-on Edinburgh workshop. Choose its body colour, Harris Tweed® lid and decorative strap, then assemble your design using the tools provided.

Harris Tweed® is handwoven in the Outer Hebrides, giving the finished bag a direct connection to Scotland’s textile heritage. Making your own piece turns that craft tradition into something tangible that you can take home and use.

Share a hosted dinner with your small group in Edinburgh, featuring modern Scottish flavours paired with wine. Gather with your Travel Director and fellow travellers for conversation around the table.

The meal offers a sociable setting in Scotland’s capital to reflect on the places, people and traditions encountered across Ireland and Scotland. Its regional menu gives the evening a sense of place beyond a standard dinner arranged independently.

Experience the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo on a select August departure, with massed pipes, drums and military performers appearing against the backdrop of Edinburgh Castle. Music and ceremony fill the open-air arena as darkness falls.

This seasonal spectacle brings Scottish pageantry to one of the city’s most historic settings. Attendance is available only on select departures; this optional experience is at additional cost and bookable on tour, subject to availability.