Get a friendly introduction to Ireland’s capital city, compliments of your Tour Director. Discover an urban landscape of Georgian buildings, castles and cathedrals. Stroll bustling O’Connell Street, once (at 150 ft wide) the widest street in Europe, and still the busiest thoroughfare in Dublin. Pass shop after shop of local and global wares and flairs, and a lush street-meridian lined with tall trees and ebony statues of Irish leaders. Make your way to the end of the strip to Parnell Square, an antique scape of red brick townhouses and classic Irish theaters. As you wander the streets, take in the international glamour of Ireland’s most cosmopolitan city.

O'Connell Street is the city's main avenue, lined with shopping and monuments, including the Spire (Monument of Light).

Join a professional licensed tour guide on an adventure to Dublin’s finest attractions. Pass the residence of Ireland’s president along your journey through Phoenix Park. Within Europe’s grandest enclosed park, encounter 1,760 undeveloped acres scattered with cricket pitches, grazing cows, and red deer. Stop to eye a stone phoenix rising from flames atop the Corinthian-style Phoenix Column. Tour the roads along the River Liffey to 12th-century St. Patrick’s Cathedral, the largest of its kind in all Ireland. Get a glimpse of the neighboring park where St. Patrick (who brought Christianity to Ireland in the 5th century) baptized converts. Continue on to Trinity College, the stone-clad sprawling campus where Oscar Wilde and Samuel Beckett studied. Stop by the Long Room in the Old Library for a zoom-view of the illuminated edition of four Gospels, the Book of Kells. The original manuscript was penned in Latin around AD 800 by four Irish Monks who used multicolored ink from plants and bugs. Take some time to study the brilliant latticework of curvy Celtic symbols woven with animal figures that enlivens the script.

Visit Phoenix Park, an urban park that is one of the largest walled city parks in Europe at a size of 1,750 acres. The park is filled with large areas of grassland, beautiful tree-lined avenues, and even a herd of wild deer.

Discover Trinity College, the oldest university in Ireland. Trinity was founded in 1592 by Queen Elizabeth I. The beautiful campus features cobbled squares, gardens, a picturesque quadrangle and buildings that date from the 17th to 20th centuries. Trinity College is also home to the Book of Kells, an 8th-century version of the four Gospels decorated with elaborate scripting and illumination. We will view this famous treasure and other early Christian manuscripts in the Colonnades, an exhibition area on the ground floor of the Old Library.

A professional licensed tour guide will introduce you to the historic city of Belfast, Northern Ireland’s capital. It was the birthplace of the RMS Titanic, which famously struck an iceberg and sunk in 1912. This legacy is recalled in the renovated dockyards' Titanic Quarter, which includes the Titanic Belfast, an aluminium-clad museum reminiscent of a ship’s hull, as well as shipbuilder Harland & Wolff’s Drawing Offices and the Titanic Slipways, which now host open-air concerts.

For centuries, countless visitors have marveled at the majesty and mystery of the Giants Causeway. At the heart of one of Europe's most magnificent coastlines its unique rock formations have, for millions of years, stood as a natural rampart against the unbridled ferocity of Atlantic storms. The rugged symmetry of the columns never fails to intrigue and inspire our visitors. The result of an ancient volcanic eruption, to stroll on the Giants Causeway is to voyage back in time.

Set on the southern shore of the Firth of Forth, Edinburgh has been the capital of Scotland since 1492. You can't help but imagine yourself in "auld lang syne" (times gone by) as you wander the cobblestone streets, craggy coast, and lush green spaces of Scotland. Today's Edinburgh is a hub for banking, and also well-known for festivals and universities that bring the city both tourists and acclaim. Described as one of the most beautiful cityscapes in the world, the Old and New Towns in Edinburgh became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1995.

The capital of Scotland, Edinburgh has steep streets and stone buildings zigzagging up hills and down into small valleys, and the brooding Edinburgh Castle looms over the whole thing. Follow your Tour Director through New Town's Charlotte Square, with its elegant Georgian townhouses. See where inventor Alexander Graham Bell was born in 1847, pass Robert Louis Stevenson's birthplace near the Royal Botanic Garden, and stroll by the monument commemorating Scottish poet Robert Burns. Hear the castle's ramparts echo with gunfire at 1 p.m. Gaze out at the steep slopes and craggy cliffs of the northwest Highlands, visible from Edinburgh's highest points. Peer down into the blue sea stretching out beyond the city.

Edinburgh Castle, the historical and emotional heart of the city, is just one of the many sights you will see on this tour, led by a licensed professional guide. Make your way along the Royal Mile, the main thoroughfare of the 16th and 17th centuries. (It's actually one mile and 107 yards long--from Edinburgh Castle to the Palace of Holyrood House). As you make your way along cobbled streets, you'll see a handful of the several thousand buildings officially protected in Edinburgh because of their architectural or historic importance. The 200-foot spire of the Sir Walter Scott monument soars above the East Princes Street Gardens. Grand figures from Scottish history adorn its heights, make sure you also look down -- the figure below the marble statue is Scott's favorite dog, Maida.

From Edinburgh Castle walk the Royal Mile, one of the most famous and scenic city walks in Europe.

Perched high on a volcanic rock, Edinburgh Castle makes for an imposing and impressive sight. Explore this medieval castle, learn about its significance in Scottish history and appreciate its magnificent panoramic views of the city below.

Step outside your hotel for a stroll through the heart of the English-speaking world. In this city of nearly seven million, you'll see everything from 12th-century fortifications to modern skyscrapers, royal parks to street art. Your Tour Director will lead you to some of the most famous sites. Walk along the Thames River. Cross Trafalgar Square. See bustling Piccadilly Circus. Pass trendy shops and cafés in Bohemian Soho on your way to Covent Garden, a 13th-century fruit and vegetable garden transformed into a maze of narrow streets and pedestrian walkways burgeoning with street performers, open-air markets and boutiques

See Trafalgar Square, often used for community gatherings and political demonstrations.

Visit the National Gallery, which contains an unrivaled collection of Western art spanning seven centuries, from the late 13th to the early 20th. The largest portion of the collection is devoted to the Italians, including works by da Vinci, Titian, Veronese, Tintoretto and Botticelli; but the collection also features works by the Spanish giants El Greco, Goya and Velázquez. The Flemish-Dutch school is represented by Brueghel, Jan van Eyck, Vermeer, Rubens and Rembrandt; and there is also an immense French impressionist and post-impressionist collection that includes works by Manet, Monet, Degas, Renoir and Cézanne.

Visit Piccadilly Circus, a shopping and entertainment area brightly lit with video displays and neon signs.

Covent Garden is a district in London, on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit and vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist site, and with the Royal Opera House, which itself may be referred to as "Covent Garden". The district is divided by the main thoroughfare of Long Acre, north of which is given over to independent shops centered on Neal's Yard and Seven Dials, while the south contains the central square with its street performers and most of the historical buildings, theatres and entertainment facilities, including the London Transport Museum and the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane.

Leicester Square is perfectly situated in the heart of London's West End, with Trafalgar Square to the south, Piccadilly Circus to the west, Covent Garden to the east, and China Town to the north.

Nothing's more British than fish and chips-there are eight fish and chips shops ("chippies") for every McDonald's in the county. Head to an authentic pub with your Tour Director for a taste of this national food, generally served with malt vinegar.

Join a licensed local guide for an in-depth look at London, from the royal haunt of Buckingham Palace (the official London residence of King Charles III) to the slightly more democratic Speakers’ Corner of Hyde Park, where anyone can pull up a soapbox and orate to his heart’s content. You’ll see the changing of the guard (season permitting), the clock tower of Big Ben with its 14-ton bell, and Westminster Abbey, where almost every English king and queen since William the Conqueror has been crowned. After a stop at the Houses of Parliament, continue on to the magnificent St. Paul’s Cathedral, the masterpiece of London architect Christopher Wren.