Dublin Walking Tours and Free Routes

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Dublin rewards walking more than almost any capital its size, because the good parts are stacked on top of each other rather than spread out. Four routes below cover the Viking town, the revolution, the Georgian squares and the deer park, and three of the four cost nothing.

Route one: the medieval mile, free

Start at Christ Church Cathedral, founded around 1028 by the Hiberno-Norse king Sitric Silkenbeard and rebuilt in stone by the Normans. Walk down to Wood Quay, where the excavation of the 1970s uncovered the walled Viking town before the Civic Offices went up over it. Past Dublinia, whose full name is Dublinia: Experience Viking and Medieval Dublin, at €16 adult, €14.50 student and senior, €11.50 child, daily 10:00 to 18:00 with last admission 17:00. On to St Audoen’s, the only surviving medieval parish church in the city, and down Nicholas Street to St Patrick’s Cathedral.

Twenty minutes end to end, about a thousand years of it, free unless you go inside. The Christ Church crypt is the oldest building still in use in Dublin, and it is worth the €10 self-guided ticket on its own. Times at christchurchcathedral.ie .

Route two: 1916, on foot

From O’Connell Bridge, up past the Spire to the GPO, which was the headquarters of the Easter Rising, then into Moore Street, where the last outpost surrendered. That is a fifteen minute walk and it is the spine of modern Irish history.

The guided version is the 1916 Rebellion Walking Tour, led by the historian Lorcan Collins and colleagues, two hours, roughly €15 to €19: 1916rising.com .

Finish it properly at Kilmainham Gaol, 3.5 km west on the Luas Red Line to Suir Road. It is a site of political imprisonment and of executions, where the leaders of the Rising were held and fourteen were executed, where Parnell was held in 1881 and 1882, and where de Valera was the last prisoner released when the gaol closed in 1924. Entry is €8 adult, guided-only and online-only, released 28 days ahead at midnight through kilmainhamgaolmuseum.ie , and it sells out within minutes, so book it before you book anything else on this page.

Route three: Georgian Dublin, free

Merrion Square with its Oscar Wilde statue, then Fitzwilliam Square, then the doors, which are the reason everybody photographs this quarter. The National Gallery of Ireland sits on Merrion Square’s west side and is free, holding Caravaggio’s The Taking of Christ. Round the corner, Kildare Street has the free National Museum of Ireland, Archaeology. Behind the National Concert Hall, the Iveagh Gardens are quieter than St Stephen’s Green and half the city does not know they are there.

Route four: the Phoenix Park

Enter at Parkgate Street. The park is 707 hectares, the largest enclosed public park in any European capital, open 24 hours and free. On the route: the Wellington Testimonial, a solid granite obelisk 62 m high, begun in 1817 and finished in 1861, the largest in Europe; the Papal Cross from John Paul II’s 1979 visit; the fallow deer herd; Áras an Uachtaráin from outside the railings; and the Victorian Walled Garden and Glen Pond in the Furry Glen. Maps and opening notes at phoenixpark.ie .

Allow two hours to cross it properly. The Parkgate Street gate is a short walk from Heuston Station, and any bus or tram leg you add is the flat €2 Leap fare.

The guided options, named

  • The Dublin Literary Pub Crawl, running since 1988 and the oldest of its kind here, leaves The Duke on Duke Street, two hours, led by professional actors performing Joyce, Beckett, Wilde and Behan between pubs, roughly €16 to €23. dublinpubcrawl.com .
  • Generation Tours meets outside The Old Storehouse Bar, 3 Crown Alley, Temple Bar, and SANDEMANs New Europe Dublin departs from around City Hall and Trinity’s front gate, both on a tips basis. Free here means €10 to €15 a head at the end, and the guides live on it.
  • Pat Liddy’s Walking Tours covers the medieval city, the Vikings and Georgian Dublin under a long established independent guide.

To compare fixed departures and prices in one place, browse Dublin walking tours on GetYourGuide or see Viator’s list . The city tourism board keeps its own listings at visitdublin.com .

Before you set off

Rain is a year-round baseline rather than a season, so take a waterproof whatever the month. The Temple Bar cobbles are uneven enough to matter over a long day. And the genuine risk on these routes is pickpocketing and phone snatching, concentrated in Temple Bar, Grafton Street and O’Connell Street and worst on Friday and Saturday nights, with distraction teams working outside the busy pubs. Bag zipped and to the front, phone away in a crowd, licensed taxi or a ride app after dark.

Walk route one before you buy a single ticket. It orients you, it is free, and it makes every paid interior afterwards make more sense. Then look at what is open and what it costs , or the things worth doing indoors .