Traveling to Southern Ireland?

I think you actually mean Southern Ireland, as in the south of the country which is where all your destinations are located...sorry, we can be a bit sensitive here!

Limerick would probably be ideal to stay or possibly Tipperary. There's a fair distance between these places though so you might want to move around a bit when you're looking for somewhere to stay.

If you don't mind a few hours drive though, anywhere you stay is fine. The good thing about Ireland is that unless you're driving north to south, the journeys are very bearable and last only a maximum of 4 hours or so.

By the way, there really is nothing to see in Shannon...you're probably flying into that airport, right? There's only industrial park after industrial park there, there's nothing to keep anyone interested so it would be best to just get out of there and move on.

There is no such place as Southern Ireland, dear. The name of the country is the Republic of Ireland. Please do not refer to it as Southern Ireland when you're here, it won't make you any friends.

A good location would be south-central Tipperary, you could try Cahir or Cashel, both places are within a couple of hours of where you want to go, you could take the road through the Comeraghs to the Waterford/Cork coast. If you have a clear day, the views are spectacular. The easiest way to get to Kilkenny is to take the N24 to just after Clonmel, then take the main Dublin and Kilkenny road from there.

Shannon has nothing other than the airport and industrial park, why do you want to go there? Or do you mean County Clare? You'd need to get up early to get through Limerick city before 9 am in order to make the most of a day in County Clare, as traffic in Limerick is quite bad between 9 and 10 am.

Given the two @rsey comments above, I'd avoid the place! What's wrong with saying Southern Ireland - all four locations mentioned are in the Southern part of both the island of Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. It's just the same as saying can you please recommend somewhere in Southern France.

Em, nope, you're not travelling to "Southern" anything.....Ireland isn't called "Southern Ireand", just Ireland, thank you. If you really want to you can also say the Republic of Ireland but even this technically isn't correct. But saying "Southern Ireland" is not really appreciated.

Anyway, you don't want to go to Shannon, dear god, lol - unless you wanna work in a call centre or something! There's nothing there, it's a town that was simply created in the 1950's or 60's. Was there once or twice, there's nothing there besides factories and industril premises etc. Co. Cork is lovely, especially west Cork. Cork city is great, you'll like it. Don't know much about Ardmore, it's in Co.Waterford. Kilkenny is nice too, it's very popular with folks who watch South Park, OMG....

So, if you plan to see say Cork city and county and Co. Waterford and Kilkenny town (they'll tell ya it's a city but their lying, lol) your best bet is to stay in Cork city probably. As for holiday homes I'm not too sure but you could check http://www.hotelscombined.com/ for good hotel prices (excellent site) If hotel prices in Cork city are too expensive at that site then you could try staying in Limerick city, hotel prices are cheaper there (and it's near to Shannon just incase you really do wanna go there) Enjoy!

Edit: Btw, try to see the Cliffs of Moher (pronounced "More", moher or less, lol) in Co. Clare (same county as Shannon - easily accessible from Limerick) Co.Kerry is nice too, especially west/southwest Kerry (that's where Cary Grant shot that movie) - lakes of Killarney etc (can be a bit touristy though)

Don't listen to the first two peeps - just being a tad anal I think :)

Enjoy your trip - and say Southern Ireland all you want, I am from the North and have no problem in people saying 'The North of Ireland'.