All about Sean’s Bar, the oldest pub in Ireland and maybe even the world

Old time Irish pubs remind me of Starbucks in the Pacific Northwest, like where my dad has his Grande Americano every morning with a crew he’s somehow gathered over days that have become years and maybe even decades. I don’t know how we even started looking for the oldest pub in Ireland on our five day trip with our teenage boys but I think it started with our visit to Temple Bar Pub in Dublin which felt way too crowded to actually go in.

So what is the oldest pub in Dublin?

I had my son look up the oldest pub in Dublin and he found the Brazen Head, a pub that dates back to 1198 AD. It was a bit of a walk from the Temple Bar area, and by the time we got there we couldn’t find any tables at all. So we didn’t actually eat or drink anything here even though we really wanted to and we walked back to our hotel where we ate pizza nearby at Little Pyg because we stumbled on it in the center of a really neat old building and it felt very spacious and garden-like.

And is the Guinness Storehouse a good place to take kids?

And then we had to decide what we wanted to do for our last morning in Dublin before we headed to the coast and my teenagers chose to go to the Guinness Storehouse because they had seen so many Guinness trucks and signs all around the city. This ended up being a suprisingly kid-friendly and interactive museum and we saw quite a few little kids too. We went right at opening and the guys really enjoyed their soda drinks overlooking all of Dublin from the rooftop bar. I think going right at opening with young kids would help the experience. (Of course, kid-free would probably be a better experience but chances are like us, this is the only time we may ever be in Dublin Ireland, so we did this at a faster pace and it we all had a pretty good time.)

And where is the oldest pub in Ireland?

So I think we found the oldest pub in Ireland quite by accident because we had all these pub-like experiences but the guys still wanted to feel what it was like to sit in an old Irish pub (and why not the oldest?). So when one of the guys googled the “oldest pub in Ireland” and got “Sean’s Bar” and we realized it was in a place called Athlone almost mid-way between Dublin and the Cliffs of Moher we decided it would make a great stop on our roadtrip. Apparently Sean’s Bar is from 900 AD and it was officially recognized as Ireland’s Oldest Extant Public House in 2020 by the Guinness Book of World Records.

We ended up picking two different road routes back and forth from Dublin to the Cliffs of Moher: on the way there we would drive through Limerick City (we ended up not stopping there because we spent time at the Rock of Dunamase and didn’t want to get into our Airbnb near Doolin too late) and on the way back we decided to pass through Athlone so that we could make it to Sean’s bar, the oldest pub in Ireland (and also Hazel Mountain chocolate factory in the Burren Mountains)

Athlone is a good place to stop between Dublin and the Cliffs of Moher

We found easy parking near the castle in the middle of the city (we’ve found parking in cities is one of the toughest things when traveling). Then we stopped at Sean’s Bar first for a drink. Then we went to Fine coffee for sandwiches, coffee and porridge. We also found quite a few food options in Athlone as well as adorable shops and colorful buildings. I wish we had time to stop at the castle there too.

Are you traveling to Ireland? This stop is part of a 5 day Ireland family trip. We picked this trip because Dublin is one place that has a direct flight from Seattle.

Terumi

Terumi Pong is a Seattle-based family travel writer and mom of twin teenage boys.  She loves coffee and pastries, shopping local and looking for greener ways to live.  She is also known as Scout’s mom (Scout is a 5ish pound little black yorkie-poo)