How To Book A Cheap Theme Park Getaway - Tayto Park


Tayto Park smashed onto the theme park and coaster enthusiast scene back in 2015 with the opening of Cu Chulainn, a HUGE Gravity Group woodie and the first 'proper' rollercoaster ever to be built in Ireland. Over the past two years the park have spent a small fortune turning what was essentially an animal fun park into a fully fledged theme park, a claim further solidified with the addition of the awesome Viking Voyage water ride this year. Who wouldn't want to visit this awesome park? Here's how you can do it on the cheap with enough left over to buy all the Mr. Tayto merch your little heart desires.

As always, this plan will be based off of the following:

- Include an overnight stay at a decent hotel
- Cover at least one day park entry
- Be as close to £100 as possible
- Be based on two sharing

I've touched on how you can visit Tayto Park as a day trip from London very briefly in this post here, however for the purposes of this post (and the fact that I'm old as fuck now and can't handle day trips the way I used to) we'll make this a two dayer. But obviously it'll be cheaper to do as a day trip so bear that in mind!


Flights
With the park being located about 30km north of Dublin, flying into Dublin is your best option. And London- Dublin flights are extremely common with flights for as little as £10 each way. Currently on Skyscanner prices are popping up at £39 return from London Luton to Dublin flying out early at 6.30AM and back late at 9.50PM with Ryanair, so plenty of time for sightseeing in Dublin too to make the most of your trip!

Car
It takes about 30 minutes to drive to Tayto Park from Dublin Airport and parking is free, so I would really recommend hiring a car if you can. On Holiday Autos at the time of writing this the car is coming in at £33, so just £16.50pp which is ridiculously cheap.

Transfer
You can jump on a Bus Eireann from Dublin Airport to Tayto Park although this does involve a change at Ashbourne. You can find out full details of this here. You can expect to pay roughly €10 for this service.

Using the cheapest options for each, that works out at £49 for travel.


There are a few options here and it depends where you would prefer to stay. If you'd like to stay closer to the park out in the countryside you won't find many chain hotels around but will definitely be in with the chance of finding an epic Full Irish Breakfast. A glance at booking.com prices a B&B in the local area at around £80 per night, so £40pp.

Alternatively you could head into the city centre where you'll have plenty more options and the comfort of a chain if that's something you prefer. This does work out slightly pricier though at around £120 per night, so £60pp.

Cheap and cheerful, we'll stick with the £40pp for the hotel!


Finally the park tickets. Not going to lie, I find Tayto's ticket system REALLY confusing. They have lots of different options including entry only and tokens to ride for those who aren't feeling as adventurous. The option you're after is the park entry and wristband choice, which sets you back at a set rate of €30. Keep an eye out though as Tayto Crisps often offer 15% off entry to the park, which brings the total price down to €25.50. And you get to enjoy some delicious crisps as a bonus, so it's win win!

Ticket: €25.50

Let's tally that up:

Travel - £49
Hotel - £40
Tickets - £25.50
Total - £114.50

So there you have it, £114.50pp for a lovely short break to Tayto Park! As I've already mentioned, you could easily do this as a day trip for further savings but as this post clearly shows it's more than affordable to make a bit of a trip of it!

Talk later xoxo,

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