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A white castle facing a body of water

A Step-by-Step Guide to Visiting Your Family’s Irish Homestead

Exploring the land your ancestors once called home is a deeply moving experience. For many, visiting your Irish homestead brings Irish family history to life in a way that genealogy research alone cannot. By carefully planning a journey to your ancestral townland, you’ll uncover meaningful insights and perhaps even discover long-lost family connections.

Here’s how to begin this life-changing journey:

Step 1: Begin with Thorough Genealogy Research

The first step to discovering your family’s original Irish homestead is thorough genealogy research. Knowing your ancestors’ precise townland, parish, and county is essential to locating your family’s specific origins. At My Ireland Family Heritage, we help people identify these critical details through comprehensive genealogy research. Whether your roots lie in County Meath, Clare or Wexford, we can help pinpoint your ancestral townland.

Step 2: Gather Historical and Family Documents

Gather family records, photographs, or letters to give you a clearer picture of your ancestors’ lives in Ireland. Civil records, church records, and even local archives are vital resources, as are the best genealogy sites Ireland has to offer. Documentation may reveal clues about specific locations and family members, which will enhance your experience once you arrive at your Irish family heritage site.

Step 3: Choose a Personalized Irish Heritage Tour

While traveling independently can be enriching, joining a personalized guided Irish genealogical tour offers several advantages. Our Irish ancestry tours are tailored to your family’s specific story, allowing you to focus on your heritage without the stress of organizing logistics. By booking a one-day family heritage tour, you’ll access local insights that bring your history to life.

Colourful houses facing a body of water

Step 4: Plan Your Stay Near the Ancestral Townland

The countryside surrounding your family’s homestead holds the echoes of past generations. Staying nearby enables you to spend quality time exploring significant sites, with the opportunity to learn more about local customs and traditions. We encourage our clients to stay in nearby towns like Trim, celebrated as Ireland’s tidiest town in 2022, for easy access to the beautiful landscapes and historical sites.

Step 5: Connect with Local Experts and Historians

Connecting with local historians or genealogists is key to understanding your ancestral townland. As part of our genealogy tourism services, we introduce you to locals who offer insights beyond standard historical facts, sharing stories of their own families and the land’s heritage. For those tracing your Irish heritage back hundreds of years, meeting a local historian or walking through the fields where your ancestors worked brings the past to life.

Step 6: Capture Memories and Reflect

Whether you’re standing before a cultural tours landmark or the ruins of a historical tours site, capture these moments in photos, journals, or even sketches. This pilgrimage often stirs emotions that reconnect families across generations. You’ll leave with a deeper understanding of your Irish family heritage and stories to share with future generations.

Ready to Reconnect with Your Roots?

At My Ireland Family Heritage, we’re dedicated to making your dream of visiting your Irish homestead a reality. With our tailored Irish genealogy tours and in-depth genealogy research, we guide you every step of the way. Begin your genealogy tours experience, discover your Irish ancestry research, and create lifelong memories on a unique heritage trip. Connect with us today for expert ancestry & genealogy tours and start tracing your Irish roots with a personalized journey through the heart of Ireland.

 

Experts in finding all available records and your ancestor’s original home from the 1800’s

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Customised Genealogy & Historical Tour

Review of My Ireland Heritage Tours Presented on Trip adviser Oct 2024 By • Family TomBarron2013 New York City, NY2

Once in a lifetime experience

Oct 2024 • Family

We highly recommend My Ireland Heritage for anyone who wants to learn and be guided to their Irish “roots” and much, much more. Sean Quinn and Ian Darragh of My Ireland Family Heritage have deep knowledge or the areas we wanted to visit in Meath, Sligo and Kilkenny. While we knew about one side of the family history back to 1690, there was nothing known about the other that arrived in the US in the 1870s.

Ian, Sean, and Nicola did thorough research on our localities and locations from which our ancestors left for America in 1849 and later. In addition, Ian and Sean did separate day-long “recons” in advance of our time with them, seeking out local people and the specific properties with maps and whatever records still available. Their results were absolutely outstanding! In both our cases, they found and took us to our still-existing cottages and shops from the early 1820s.

It was so enjoyable to be with Ian for three days and for a special day with Sean. Whether it was the Newgrange World Heritage sites 5,500 years old , the Battle of the Boyne 1690 , or the local cemeteries and churches of our ancestors. Ian was especially attentive to my wife throughout the travels after she twisted her ankle in a rain-soaked old cemetery.

Throughout the process of trip preparation over months to giving us the final, wonderful books of Meath and Sligo, Aisling was highly professional and responsive with all the many details. The bound books she prepared are treasures! Thanks to all for truly exceptional experiences.

Newgrange World Unesco Site 5500 years old
Battle of the Boyne 1690 AD
Customised Historical Tours Trim Castle
Entrance stone at Newgrange

Self Drive Product

Review of My Ireland Heritage Tours Presented on Trip adviser by Shelley L @ sjlively

Exceptional in every way!

Over the last few months of preparing for our trip, every single detail was meticulously attended, not only professionally, but helpfully, and in such a friendly manner, that I felt as if I knew Sean, Aisling and Ian before I even stepped off the plane.

The amount of work these wonderful people put into our personal history is mindboggling. My mother was an avid amateur genealogist, and had worked for decades to bring to light the trail our family took, but our resources are limited.

Sean knows exactly where to look, and was able to fill in so many gaps that had eluded us for generations. Some of the information he found, unbeknownst even to him, actually solidified the findings we had amassed over the years. Ours was a family in coal mining – I only found on our tour that they had originated from a mining area, and their arrival on the  border coincided exactly with the decline in the mining industry in County Wicklow.

I would have been overjoyed simply with the knowledge of why they left when they did, about 12 years before the famine. Breaking through our brick wall of great grandparents even farther back on the family tree was a dream come true, but to be able to set foot on not only the area they lived, and find that the house is still there was overwhelming. Seeing the family church and cemetery where our ancestors and extended family still rest is a truly moving experience.

The care taken by this company in each and every aspect of the journey cannot be overstated. Only about 2 weeks prior to my trip, Sean contacted me to let me know that he had also stumbled across some of my husband’s family name in the process and included them as well in his research. How often can anyone say that they not only got what they paid for, but more than they ever imagined? I can say that. They were even kind enough to answer a few follow-up questions after my return home, as I was so stunned on my tour with Ian that I didn’t think ask at the time.If you have the opportunity to make the trip to Ireland, contact My Ireland Family Heritage before you go.

If your family was there, Sean will go above and beyond to find them. Even without family, contact them anyway. Ian is a walking encyclopedia of history, and so fun to talk to. Aisling will make sure every “I” is dotted, and every “T” is crossed.  Thank you so much for the trip of a lifetime, and the opportunity to pass on everything we have discovered to future generations

The Consultation at Hotel / Office or by Phone opens all doors
Genealogy gets you off the Beaten Track to see the Real Ireland

Unique to Every Address with My Ireland Family Research