Romantic Travel Gifts for Valentine's Day

Want to buy the gift of travel for your Valentine, but unable to travel on Valentine’s Day. Here you will find a list of our top Romantic Vacations to get your inner cupid working.

1. Castles and Gardens of South England: Tour the English countryside on this romantic self-drive vacation.

2. Irish Harmony: Share your love on a premier escorted tour of Ireland, visiting Killarney, the crystal city of Waterford, Cork, Blarney and Dublin.

3. Endless Possibilities: Self drive tour that spells love! Tour the modern and cosmopolitan city of Dublin, enjoy 4-nights B&B accommodations throughout Ireland and 1 night CASTLE STAY!

4. Deluxe Deluxe: This leisurely self-drive vacation of Ireland brings you excellent properties: the Lakeside Hotel, Westebury Hotel, Ashford Castle and Dromoland Castle!

5. Dublin & Rome City Stay Package: This 2 Spectacular City Stay Package of Ireland and Italy starts in the eternal city of Rome and ends in cosmopolitan Dublin. Rome-the home of great lovers like Casanova and Romeo and Juliet, makes the perfect first stop on this romantic vacation. Dublin is a wonderful city for romantics to visit. With endless possibilities for romance: art, theater, music, famous gardens and Guinness!

6. Paris City Stay: Paris is easily one of the most romantic cities in Europe. Try romantic spots such as the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, Luxembourg Gardens and the Arc de Triomphe.

7. In a Tuscan Villa: Celtic Tours Tuscan Villa Stay features an authentic Italian Villa stay for four nights, a perfect romantic base for touring and tasting the Tuscan region while enjoying the warmth and charm of Villa Casagrande!

8. Danube River Cruise: Cruise down the Danube with your loved one, tour the cities of Vienna and Budapest!

9. South Pacific Vacation: Take a vacation in the South Pacific. Celtic Tours offers an array of South Pacific Independent and Escorted tours.

10. Glimpse of Scotland: Experience the Highlights of Scotland on this leisurely 5-day tour, which includes a comfortable stay by the banks of Loch Ness, a woodland walk, time to explore awe-inspiring Glen Coe.

Don't see the romantic getaway that you're looking for? Visit our website to see more of Celtic Tours Vacations!

Te Puia Cultural Centre Experience

Gushing waters, steaming vents, boiling mud pools, spectacular geysers and traditional Maori culture breathes at the Te Puia Cultural Centre in New Zealand, a place of powerful energies and Maori beauty. The mission at Te Puia is "To be the centre of knowledge and excellence for the preservation, presentation, education and growth of traditional expressions of Māori arts, crafts and culture".The following are just a few of the Te Puia experiences.

Every day in Te Whakarewarewa Thermal Valley geysers erupt, mud pools bubble and steam hisses. Over 500 pools and 65 geyser vents, each with their own name, are found in the Te Whakarewarewa geothermal valley in Rotorua.

The most famous geyser in the Te Whakarewarewa Thermal Valley in Rotorua, is the awe-inspiring Pohutu Geyser, meaning big splash or explosion. Pohutu erupts up to 100 foot high and up to 20 times per day.

The Pā, commonly referred to today as ‘marae’, is the centre of Māori tribal society and wellbeing. A marae is the traditional meeting place of a tribe. It is where people come to talk, sing and dance, pray, host guests, wed and weep for their dead.

Maori performance art, kappa haka, is one the most entertaining forms of storytelling. Posture dance, song and rhythmic movements of the poi (a light ball on a string), action songs and traditional chants tell the ancient and recent history and stories of the Maori people.

Thanks to the carving and weaving schools at Te Puia, sacred meeting houses across New Zealand have been restored and woven art has been exhibited overseas. But most of all, the ancient teachings of our ancestors have been preserved and continue to thrive.

Pikirangi Māori village was built at Te Puia as a snapshot into pre-European Māori society. The village includes whare punga (houses made from punga trees), waka maumahara (canoe cenotaphs), pātaka (food storage houses), and an array of food cooking and preparation techniques including the traditional Māori hangi (earth oven) pit and drying racks.

Whether you come to the Te Puia Cultural Centre for the natural beauty of the boiling mud pools and spectacular geysers, to learn about the ancient Maori culture or to be entertained by the kappa haka, you will not be disappointed. Join Celtic Tours on a South Pacific Vacation to learn more about the exciting natural beauty and cultural history of New Zealand on our 24 Day Southern Explorer.

Cooking Classes in Ireland

Cookery Schools in Ireland

Want to take a cooking class on your next vacation to Ireland? There are many to choose from with classes ranging from traditional Irish cuisine to fusion cuisine.

Rory O’Connell Cookery School
Snugboro, Ballybraher, Ballycotton, Co Cork

Things are cooking nicely in Ballycotton… Rory O’Connell, ex-Head Chef of Ballymaloe House and one of the principal teachers at Ballymaloe Cookery School, has struck a serious culinary note with his new Bespoke Cookery Classes. Classes at Snugboro are designed for groups from two to twelve people, which gives a really intimate feel. A sample menu: Spicy Moroccan Lentil Soup, Risotto of Autumn Greens, Roast Butterflied Leg of Lamb with Garlic and Herb mayonnaise, creamy Colcannon and a superb Chocolate Meringue Roulade with Blackberries and Sweet Geranium.

Dublin Cookery School
2 Brookfield Terrace, Blackrock, Co Dublin.

It is hard not to be affected by Lynda Booth's enthusiasm. Her passion for food and teaching is apparent immediately and what better place to combine these two loves than in a cookery school? Housed in a dazzling purpose-built premises, the bright, spacious kitchens of the Dublin Cookery Schools are the perfect setting for novice cooks and seasoned chefs alike. With 12 fully-equipped workstations, complete with hobs and ovens, students learn tricks of the trade in a supportive and challenging environment. As they say themselves, ‘serious food in a relaxed atmosphere'. The course list is extensive, including fish and bread courses, barbecue, entertaining, Californian cuisine, teen friendly courses and many more. This, combined with Lynda's exuberant style and the fabulous space makes for a seriously fun learning experience.

Donnybrook Fair Restaurant, Food Hall & Cookery School
89 Morehampton Road, Donnybrook, Dublin 4.

This urban restaurant, cookery school, deli and foodstore has everything a food lover will need from all over the country and even further a field. The extensive food-hall is stocked to the rafters with a mixture of fine artisan and gourmet speciality items and store-cupboard essentials. A dedicated butchery, fish counter and wonderful freshly baked breads, pastries, cakes and take-out hot and cold lunches, and not to mention the wonderful contemporary restaurant upstairs with menus that combine the finest seasonal Irish ingredients with flavours from around the world.

Tannery Cookery School (The)
10 Quay Street, Dungarvan, Co Waterford

Over a decade after Paul and his wife Máire opened their uber-stylish Tannery Restaurant, taking a high end food experience to a small Waterford town, they have now successfully opened, the Tannery Cookery School in pretty Dungarvan. Featuring a state of the art demonstration kitchen and with cookery courses for everybody, whether you are looking for a course to improve your home cooking skills, a short cookery course with friends or a tailored course to suit a corporate event The Tannery Cookery School is for you!

Ballyknocken House and Cookery School
Glenealy, Ashford, Co Wicklow

Set in private tranquil gardens in the heart of the glorious Wicklow countryside you will feel the stresses and strains of your other life melt away as soon as you arrive at Catherine Fulvio’s romantic Victorian country house. Catherine's real passion is for local produce and this is reflected in the stunning breakfasts and dinners served and in the state of the art Cookery School, which is perfectly located in a renovated Milking Parlour. With seven beautifully decorated period bedrooms with Victorian baths and brass beds and a warm welcome awaiting you what better place to re-discover the joys of cooking than at Ballyknocken House and Cookery School.

Orchard Acre Farm
36 Moynaghan North Road, Lisnarick, Irvinestown, Co Fermanagh, BT94 1LQ.

Right at the very heart of Orchard Acre Farm's success and certainly central to its charm is Teresa O'Hare. It is she, together with husband Hugh who is the driving energy of an operation so diverse in its offering that is hard to confine its labeling to any one category. It is a cookery and training centre, a gardening and vegetable hive, a wedding, conference or party venue, a voluntary work opportunity and most of all a sanctuary. Orchard Acre is a world of possibilities with one warm and very dynamic woman at its heart.

Let Celtic Tours help you choose a cooking class for your next culinary tour of Ireland. Visit our website for more details on our tours of Ireland.

Information provided by: Good Food Ireland

Maori Art and Culture

Maori Art and Culture

Gushing waters, steaming vents, boiling mud pools, spectacular geysers and traditional Maori culture breathes at the Te Puia Cultural Centre in New Zealand, a place of powerful energies and Maori beauty.

The East Polynesian ancestors of the Maori were hunters, fishers, and gardeners. After arriving in New Zealand, sometime before 1300AD, Maori had to rapidly adapt their material culture and agricultural practices to suit the climate of their new land - cold and harsh in comparison to tropical island Polynesia. Over several centuries in isolation, the Māori developed a distinct society featuring a rich mythology, a separate language, distinctive crafts and performing arts, and a tribal society with a prominent warrior culture. The Maori culture forms a distinctive part of New Zealand culture and vice versa.

In the Maori language the word maori means "normal" or "natural". In legends and oral traditions, the word distinguished ordinary mortal human beings from deities and spirits. Māori people often use the term tangata whenua (literally, "people of the land") to describe themselves in a way that emphasises their relationship with a particular area of land.

Weaving, carving and performing arts are among the Maori art forms. Maori carving and weaving taught at the Te Puia Culturual Centre in carry on the ancient traditions. In some respects, carving is the written record of the Maori people who traditionaly knew nothing of writing. Carvings preserve much of the history and culture of Māori.

Maori carvings often contain spirals and sea shells. Maori spirals are almost always double, though single spirals are occasionally seen carved on stone objects. There is a theory that the spiral has evolved from interlocking manaia, a mythological bird-headed creature. It is sometimes assumed that every cut in a piece of Maori carving must have a meaning, but in fact probably much of it is purely decorative. It is important to note that the figures in Maori carving, with very rare exceptions, are not religious, but secular. They do not represent idols, but rather renowned ancestors of the tribe. Maori wood carving was often high-lighted with red ochre as a symbolic reference to the birth of the Earth.

Maori performance art, kappa haka, is one the most entertaining forms of storytelling. Posture dance, song and rhythmic movements of the poi (a light ball on a string), action songs and traditional chants tell the ancient and recent history and stories of the Maori people.

Learn more about the Maori people on your Celtic Tours 21 Day Royal Escorted tour of New Zealand and Australia!

Gaelic Proverbs

Gaelic Proverbs

Ireland, like most cultures, has a tradition of proverbs: pithy and concise sayings that express ideas and beliefs commonly held among its people. Many Irish proverbs originated in the Gaelic language, but have come into common usage among the Irish and their descendants in their translated form. In Irish, proverbs are called seanfhocail, which literally means “old words.”

Cha sgal cù roimh chnàimh.
A dog yells not when hit with a bone.

Eiridh tonn air uisge balbh.
A wave will rise on quiet water.

Cha dèan cat miotagach sealg.
A cat in mittens won’t catch mice.

Is treasa dithis a’ dol thar àn àtha na fad’ o chèile.
Two should stay together when crossing a ford.

Am fear nach dèan cur sa Mhàrt, cha bhuain e san Fhoghar.
He who will not sow in March will not reap in autumn.

Bidh cron duine cho mòr ri beinn mun lèir dha fhèin e.
A man’s fault will be as big as a mountain before he sees it.

Is ioma nì a chailleas fear na h-imrich.
Many a thing drops from the man who often flits.

Brìgh gach cluiche gu dheireadh.
The essence of a game is at its end.

Anne Hathaway's Childhood Home

Anne Hathaway, wife of William Shakespeare, grew up in a picturesque cottage and extensive gardens, set in idyllic Stratford-upon-Avon. Explore Anne Hathaway’s childhood home on Celtic Tours Heart of England Tour.

The term “cottage” doesn’t do Anne Hathaway’s former childhood home justice, it is in fact a spacious twelve-roomed Tudor style farmhouse with several bedrooms and is now set in extensive gardens.

Very little is known about Anne beyond a few references in legal documents, but her personality and relationship to Shakespeare have been the subject of much speculation by historians and creative writers. Hathaway married Shakespeare in November 1582 while pregnant with the couple's first child, to whom she gave birth six months later. Hathaway was 26 years of age; Shakespeare was only eighteen. This age difference, together with Hathaway's antenuptial pregnancy, has been employed by some historians as evidence that it was forced on a reluctant Shakespeare by the Hathaway family. There is, however, no evidence for this inference.

Anne Hathaway’s Cottage is owned and cared for by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, it is one of 7 properties that is cared for by the Trust.

Visit this piece of literary history on Celtic Tours Heart of England tour.

Celtic Delight

Premier Escorted Motorcoach Tour!

Celtic Tour's Celtic Delight Vacation is an excellent tour for those with limited time in Ireland. Featured in many publications, this tour takes in some of the most scenic areas in Southern Ireland including Kilkenny Castle, Trinity College and the Book of Kells, Cobh Heritage, Blarney, Killarney, Foynes Flying Boat Museum and Limerick for a farewell Medieval Castle Banquet.

Your Celtic Delight tour includes:

* First Class and Superior First Class hotels throughout.
* Full Irish breakfast daily, except day of arrival.
* Dinner each evening, including a traditional medieval castle banquet and traditional Irish entertainment and dinner in Dublin.
* Full sightseeing by Deluxe Touring Motorcoach.
* Professional Irish driver/guide to escort you through out.
* Visits to: Trinity College and the Book of Kells, Kilkenny Castle, Cobh Heritage Center, Blarney, Dingle Peninsula, Foynes Flying Boat Museum
* Porterage of one (1) suitcase per person.
* Tips and taxes in Ireland. Gratuities to the driver/guide not included.
* Celtic Tours flight bag and portfolio of travel documents.


Learn more about Celtic Tours escorted motorcoach tour of Ireland: the Celtic Delight