Most people assume the good part ends once the Christmas lights come down.
In Scotland and Ireland, that’s roughly when it starts. There’s a poet to toast, a Viking galley to burn, a fortnight of music in Glasgow, traditional players filling Dublin’s churches, and by March the whole of Ireland is getting ready for its biggest week of the year.
Part one covered October to Hogmanay. Here’s what happens next.
January: get your tartan on, it’s Burns Night
On 25 January, Scotland toasts a poet. Properly.
A Burns Supper has a running order and it doesn’t vary much: the haggis piped in to a standing room, the Address to a Haggis delivered with a knife and considerable drama, the whisky going round, the poems, the toasts getting funnier and then the tables pushed back for a ceilidh. Wear the tartan. Bring shoes you can dance in.
There will also be someone at the table explaining to a first-time visitor, entirely straight-faced, that the haggis is a small three-legged creature that runs round the hills in one direction only.
Ayrshire is where to go deeper. Burns was born in Alloway, and the cottage, the Auld Kirk and the Brig o’ Doon from Tam o’ Shanter are all within a short walk of each other.
And while you’re here in January
Celtic Connections fills Glasgow from 14 to 31 January 2027 with folk, traditional, roots and Americana from around the world, more than 300 events across the city and Burns Night lands right in the middle of it. The night after, on 26 January 2027, Up Helly Aa brings fire, torchlight and a burning galley to Lerwick. In Dublin, TradFest runs from 20 to 24 January 2027, putting traditional musicians into the city’s churches and cathedrals.
February: St Valentine, spas and having the islands to yourself
Here’s something most people don’t know: St Valentine is buried in Glasgow. Relics of the saint have been kept in the city since the nineteenth century, which gives a February weekend there a better story than dinner somewhere nice.
February is the month to slow down and reconnect after a busy few months and Scotland is well set up for it: world-class spas in country house hotels and lochside retreats, woodland trails that make a properly romantic morning walk, and long dinners where the food is the point.
It’s also a lovely month to see Scotland by train. There’s often snow on the hills and low light over the lochs, all of it best watched from a warm carriage. Our Highlands, Castles & Whisky By Train holiday brings together mountain scenery, castles and a dram or two along the way, while Scottish Castles & Coasts By Train follows the coast north from Edinburgh over the Forth and Tay bridges to Aberdeen, then on through castle country to Inverness and Stirling.
If whisky is more your love language, Fife Whisky Festival runs from 26 to 28 February 2027, with an opening dinner, tastings and events across the weekend.
March: there is only one place to spend St Patrick’s Day
Chicago dyes an entire river green. Sydney lights the Opera House. There are parades in New York, Boston and Tokyo.
None of it is quite the same as being in Ireland for it.
Dublin’s St Patrick’s Festival runs from 13 to 17 March 2027, with the parade on 17 March and street performance, music and events across the city for five days. The opening Saturday is also Six Nations closing weekend, with Ireland playing France at the Aviva Stadium, so the city is at full volume before the festival has properly started.
The pubs are where it actually happens. The Brazen Head has been claiming the title of Ireland’s oldest pub since 1198 and has music most nights, Tigh Neachtain in Galway is the one musicians head for and Belfast’s Crown Liquor Saloon is worth seeing for the snugs and gas lamps alone.
Our Ireland Icons Tour, Your St Patrick’s Week
Make the celebrations the centrepiece, then build the rest of Ireland around them. St Patrick’s Day is marked with celebrations and parades in towns and communities across Ireland, so the day can fall wherever suits your route, whether that’s a big city parade or a small-town one where everyone turns out.
Ireland carries a deeper pull for many travellers: family roots, stories handed down through generations or somewhere you’ve always meant to see properly. That connection is what shapes the best tailor-made routes.
One thing worth doing now
Burns Night, Celtic Connections, Up Helly Aa and St Patrick’s week all sell out their accommodation long before anything else does and Dublin fills up especially early for March. If any of those are on your list, it’s worth getting your trip booked in now.
Start planning your trip with McKinlay Kidd
There are still places we’d rather show you in January than in July.
Tell us roughly when you can travel and what you enjoy and one of our team will talk it through properly.
Get in touch to start planning your trip. And if you missed it, part one covers October to Hogmanay.
