Mayo is 'write on' with French bloggers

FOUR popular travel and lifestyle bloggers from France are taking in some of the highlights of the Wild Atlantic Way this week as guests of Tourism Ireland and Fáilte Ireland.

The group’s action-packed programme includes activities in the grounds of Westport House followed by a craft beer and gourmet tapas tour of Westport. They will have the chance to cycle along the Great Western Greenway and take the morning ferry to Clare Island to go hiking. They will also cycle through Dollough Valley to Killary Fjord.

The bloggers - who are staying at Lurgan House B&B in Westport and at Helen O’Grady’s B&B on Clare Island - have a combined social media audience of more than 200,000 and are posting news and updates of their Irish visit on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest, as well as on their blogs.

Elmagh Killeen, Tourism Ireland’s manager for Southern Europe, said: “The French bloggers will be documenting their visit to the Wild Atlantic Way throughout the week. Their blogs and social media accounts are extremely popular, so their visit is a really good opportunity to showcase Mayo and the Wild Atlantic Way to a wide audience of prospective French holidaymakers. Their posts and photos will be seen and shared by their online followers, inspiring them to come and sample the destination for themselves.

“Tourism Ireland undertakes a busy publicity programme around the world each year to raise the profile of the island of Ireland. Visits by journalists and social influencers, such as these travel and lifestyle bloggers from France, are a key element of that programme.”

France is one of our top four tourism markets and 2015 was the third consecutive record-breaking year for French visitors to Ireland, delivering about 505,000 visitors (+11% growth on 2014).