Inchydoney Beach
The fourth of July obviously isn’t celebrated here in Ireland, but we didn’t want the occasion to pass without marking it in some way as it’s important to us. We hemmed and hawed over what to do, and ulitmately we decided it was the perfect excuse to explore a new-to-us area of the country. We kept hearing about West Cork being a really fun and family-friendly destination, so off we went for a 2 night adventure.
We took off Friday evening around 6:30pm after having dinner at home. We got the kids all ready for bed and tucked them into their car seats in the hopes that they would sleep most of the way there. They slept much less on the drive than we would have liked, but they were good little travel companions. We listened to some children’s audio stories over bluetooth on the free app ‘TuneIn Radio’ and the 2.5 hour drive went by quickly.
We chose to stay at a B&B, our first B&B experience ever, and it was absolutely delightful. It was called Ard na Greine Country House and it was located near the town of Clonakilty. Our family room had a double bed and two single beds, and we had our own bathroom. Our area, and the entire house, was sparkling clean, which is basically the only really important thing to us when it comes to accommodation. The incredible breakfast and the friendly staff were icing on the cake. I don’t know if this happens in every B&B, but we chose our breakfast from a menu upon arrival to the B&B, and selected what time we’d like it served to us in the dining room. The menu offered smoked salmon with scrambled egg, sausages, Clonakilty black pudding (a real specialty!), pancakes, eggs any style, toast, oatmeal; and you could order all of those things if you wanted! There were several varieties of cereal, fruits, juices and cheeses available as well. It was a huge spread and a great way to fill up first thing in the morning. Just a note, I am not a fan of oatmeal, but Norma, the owner, insisted we try it and it was absolutely out of this world. I don’t know how she makes it so smooth and creamy and delicious, but definintly try some if you stay here. The total for two night stay in a family room was €240, I do believe she gave us a slight discount for having young children. Book with her directly via email rather than on booking.com, you can find her email address on her website. We weren’t hosted, we paid for our stay ourselves, we were just really happy with the experience.
After breakfast On Saturday morning, we headed to the West Cork Model Railway Village. There they’ve created an exact replica of the town of Clonakilty in miniature form. The details are incredible and we all enjoyed walking around. The price for a family of four was €35 which included a ride through the town of Clonakilty on a train on wheels. Other ammenities included an outdoor playground, a soft play area, a cafe, gift shop and a small pond where you could put coins in and drive remote controlled boats. We arrived at opening, 10am, and pretty much had the place to ourselves which was great. It started to get busy as we were leaving around lunch time. We enjoyed our time here, but I wouldn’t really feel the need to go back. What I would do instead next time is wander through the town of Clonakilty, it is gorgeous and we didn’t make time to see enough of it. I’d have loved to go to a bakery or cafe for a nice cup of coffee.
We headed to Inchydoney Beach next for a picnic lunch and a swim in the ocean. This beach is incredibly beautiful and has the softest sand I think I’ve ever felt. At the time I said that this was my favorite beach in Ireland, but then we visited Malin Beg later in the summer in Donegal and Inchydoney became my second favorite (very close though!). I had packed food for a picnic lunch at the beach, and very kindly Norma was happy to refrigerate the food for us overnight. We enjoyed our lunch and then played in the sunshine for about 3.5 hours building sandcastles and wave jumping. It’s a beach we definitely plan to go back to sometime. There were public toilets available that were quite clean, they were just a little bit of a hike from the beach area (just fyi).
After the beach we drove back to the B&B for a little downtime and to decide where we would go for dinner. Norma suggested Dunmore House Hotel and I have to say that the food and the views were absolutely fantastic! They host weddings here most weekends and we accidently gate crashed the drinks reception of a wedding. Oops. The staff were really friendly and brought us to a room where we could wait for the wedding guests to go to their dining room, then we were seated for dinner. We would definitely eat here again. Again, not hosted, we just loved the food.
We hadn’t stayed in a B&B before with the kids so we were flying blind at bedtime. We didn’t really want to go to bed with the kids at 8pm so we put them down like usual and then went and sat in the downstairs sitting room to relax. Norma offered to turn on the TV for us, but we just chilled with a craft beer that we had picked up from SuperValu and chatted about our plans for the next day.
The following morning after another superb breakfast we packed up and drove towards Kinsale. The drive there was stunning and we stopped off at the Old Head of Kinsale, a beautiful scenic overlook. It was gorgeous, but there were no barriers so we kept tight grips on the preschoolers and we didn’t stay long. Just across the road was a museum commemorating the sinking of the Lusitania, a passenger ship that was torpedoed by a German submarine off the coast of Kinsale in 1915. We enjoyed learning about this, or Julian enjoyed learning about it by reading every.single.sign while I chased the kids around (insert eye roll). We all enjoyed the viewing tower very much, a staff member even loaned us a pair of binoculars to take to the top. Then, when we got back into the car, we made Julian give us a thorough history lesson so we all came away well informed. Total cost for this stop was €10.
After this we drove through Kinsale, but we didn’t stop. It’s a very cute little town, but, unpopular opinion time, I feel it lacks authentic Irish character. It reminded us a lot of the towns on Martha’s Vineyard with expensive and perfect looking shops and restaurants, which is cute, but not the best with kids in tow and quite touristy so we continued on. We headed towards Cross River Ferries to hop on the car ferry which takes you to Cobh. This was really fun and we’d definitely recommend it! It was a tiny ferry that you drive your car onto, and the operators pack you in nice and tight. The cost is €6 for this 5 minute journey. This was our very first car ferry ride as a family, and possibly our favorite part of the whole weekend! We let the kids sit in our laps in the front seats while the ferry took us across to land and they thought that was gas craic. (Look at me with my Irish lingo!)
Cobh is a town we’d been dying to visit and were it not for the ferry which cut the journey almost in half, we wouldn’t have been able to go on this trip. Now don’t get me wrong Cobh is also touristy and has a few very ‘instagramable’ spots with colorful houses and a large cathedral as a backdrop which draw big crowds, but it truly felt more relaxed and real than Kinsale. I’d love to come back and spend the weekend in Cobh and maybe visit Courtmacsherry as well (a little Irish village nearby with only one road in and out!)
We had lunch in a tasty Italian restaurant called Grand Italia Pizzeria Cobh, we came at a very busy time and had to wait, but we all really enjoyed the food. After lunch we walked around the town a bit. The weather was wet and foggy, but we had rain jackets to keep us dry. Cobh is actually the last port of call for the Titanic before it sank in 1912 and they have a museum commemorating that, which we’d love to go to next time. So all in all on this trip we gained lots of knowledge about sinking vessels from the early 20th century.
We eventually got back into the car and planned to drive to Blarney Castle, I had purchased tickets on line in advance. However, google told us it was very busy that day, and with the weather not cooperating we decided we just didn’t want to go. The tickets are good until January 2020 so I think we’ll take a drive down before Christmas, visit some more towns in West Cork and visit Blarney Castle. Overall, this was a fantastic family-friendly getaway that we’ll always look back on with fond memories.
Feel free to connect with us on instagram for more details about this trip or any that we’ve taken! Our instagram handle is @transatlantic_leonards and I also have a story highlight saved with more details and photos from the trip on my profile page. We’d love to hear about your favorite family-friendly activities to do in West Cork, Ireland!
Transatlantic Leonards 