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Get to Know Your Private Dublin Tour Guide

The Best Tour You’ll Ever Have!

We offer the highest quality private, custom-made walking tours of Dublin city

Our Private Sightseeing Tours of Dublin cover a wide variety of subjects and themes, ensuring you’re always engaged and never just passively listening to facts. Unlike companies that focus on volume, we focus on quality and connection—each tour is crafted to be a 5-star experience every time.

Our handpicked and expertly trained guides don’t just recite history; they bring it to life with insight, humour, and a deep understanding of Irish culture. Because we only do private tours, we’ve mastered the art of listening to travellers’ expressed and unexpressed needs, anticipating what will make your time in Dublin truly special

You may not know precisely what you want to see when you visit Dublin, but we’re sure we can select sights and experiences to match your interests—we tailor every tour to chime with the passions of our guests.

Choose from our sightseeing, themed, and combination tours, or let us create a Bespoke Dublin Itinerary just for you. Every traveller deserves a tour that feels personal, immersive, and unforgettable.

What Sets Dublin Tour Guide Apart

Quality
Quality: We focus on quality, not quantity.
- We don’t offer dozens of tours; instead, we provide a select few Private Walking Tours of Dublin. By limiting the number of tours we offer, we ensure that we can maintain high quality and continuously improve our tours. Many tour companies attempt to be “jacks of all trades” but often end up being “masters of none.” We set ourselves apart as the leader among those offering walking tours in Dublin.
- Another way we emphasize quality is by keeping our group sizes small and private. While our company could potentially earn more revenue by catering to larger groups or providing public tours, we believe that a smaller, private experience is far superior for our guests, who are our top priority. Consider the difference between a private tour with just four guests and a tour with 30 strangers. The comparison is akin to Michelin dining versus McDonald’s.
Our guides
Our guides are carefully selected from the best tour guides of Dublin. Besides the necessary experience and knowledge, they’re chosen for their personality and ethos – they want to authentically connect with people and truly want to give them the best tour they’ll ever have.
- We, however, believe that it takes a guide with the right mix of personality, listening skills, talents, professionalism, intellect, travel experience, enthusiasm, knowledge and passion to deliver a truly outstanding and memorable experience. Many tour companies just look for a few of those qualities.
- At Dublin Tour Guide, we focus on a guide’s personality over their experience. Tour guiding experience can be acquired through training, but the personality fit for Dublin Tour Guide is grown through years of personal development.
How we choose our guides:
- Recruit trained and experienced guides (we prefer guides who have lived in another, preferably non-Anglophone, country. This perspective change is a difficult personal rite of passage and it has, as a result, a lasting impact on people: it enables them to be more empathic to those of different backgrounds and viewpoints.)
- Demonstrate our ethics and vision to them
- Ascertain their scores on various parameters (from knowledge and experience to communication skills and personality traits)
- Determine their suitability for small, private tours (our core business)
- Take them on as a trial guide until they get 3 stellar reviews
- On-board them as a junior internal guide and nurture them to become even better tour guides. The more 5* reviews they get, the more they’re paid.

Connection

We emphasize the importance of making a personal connection with Ireland through a very personable guide. Travellers don’t want to walk around a destination inside a tourism bubble. They want to experience the destination as much as possible, to really understand and feel the spirit of a place. The best way to do that is, naturally, with a tour guide, but a tour guide that doesn’t just relay cold facts like dates, but one who gives unique cultural insights and, most importantly, one who wants to connect with travellers.

Our guides have warm, extroverted personalities and therefore are sincerely interested in getting to know the traveller. As a result, in the course of just five hours, we establish friendships that have already lasted years. Invitations to come visit have been offered and accepted. In some cases, more than once. These travellers will never forget their Dublin tour.
We don’t focus on the black & white of history – academia. We don’t blabber on endlessly with superfluous information. We believe that the traveller’s attention is limited and so the guide must carefully choose the information. You don’t need to know the architect of a building (our guides do), but you do need to know what that building means to the people. A city without its people is called a ruin. We focus on informing, for example, you about how people feel about a building, what it means to them today and what it meant to them in the past.

	Most Tours	Our Tours
The goal	Share information about Dublin and Ireland	Connect visitors with the country and its people, present and past
The content	History (too many dates)	History (dates kept to a minimum), current affairs, sociology, culture, modern life, language, music, food & drink
The guide	Trained and knowledgeable	Trained, knowledgeable, personable and passionate, good communicator
The delivery	Can be monotonous due the oftentimes scripted and iterative nature of the tour	Animated and varied. We do not offer scripted tours of fixed itineraries: the guide is happy to follow client’s suggestions and requests and to develop the route as they go
The presentation	Spoken only, with occasional maps and images	Spoken, Visual (images, maps etc.), and sometimes poetry and songs will be recited.

The Dublin Tour Guide Story
Garvan Rushe began guiding in 2009 and quickly rose to be the city manager of an international tour company. This experience shaped his vision for a different kind of tour—one rooted in depth, connection, and authenticity.
A New Kind of Tour Experience…
Garvan realized that large group tours lacked depth and personal connection. With his background in Medieval Irish & Celtic Studies, he wanted to engage on a deeper level. Private tours allowed for meaningful conversations, spontaneous curiosity, and a truly personalised experience. He set about creating a tour experience that genuinely went beyond that offered by the average tour company.
- Beyond the Tourist Bubble – Visitors should experience Ireland, not just hear about it. The goal is to immerse them in Irish culture and history.
- More Than Just History – A great guide doesn’t just recount facts but brings history to life, offering insights that deepen understanding.
- Happy Guides, Happy Clients – Passionate, well-supported guides create exceptional tours.
- Fun Over Facts – No scripted, cookie-cutter tours. Every experience is tailored to the guest.
Building a Reputation
With no brand history or marketing budget, Garvan turned to TripAdvisor reviews to establish credibility. By 2013, Dublin Tour Guide ranked #5 in all of Dublin, leading to a surge in demand. But with back-to-back tours, he saw a risk—without fresh enthusiasm, even a great tour could feel ordinary.

From “He” to “We”
Rather than limit bookings, Garvan sought out like-minded guides—those who shared his enthusiasm and ability to connect with guests. Though there were learning curves, Dublin Tour Guide reached #5 again and even climbed to #4.

The Dublin Tour Guide Difference
Today, Dublin Tour Guide is one of Ireland’s most trusted companies. It offers immersive, deeply engaging tours that don’t just show visitors the city—they help them understand, feel, and connect with Ireland like never before.
Explore our Dublin Private Tours for a deeper understanding of what makes us different.
What we believe
- We believe that people don’t just want ‘a tour’, but they want to experience the city like the locals do. They want to truly understand Dublin and her people on a deeper level. They want to know what it feels like to BE Irish.
- We believe that creating unforgettable experiences is what makes life worth living.
- We believe that memories are worth investing in.
- We believe the world needs to know about the cultural treasures of Ireland and how wonderfully unique and passionate the Irish are.
- We believe in connecting curious travellers with passionate and inspiring guides.
We are embarking on a journey to transform ordinary trips into extraordinary ones.
Our goal is to give the client the best tour they’ll ever have.
We want the client to not only see Dublin but feel it. We want every visitor to remember Dublin in five years and recall how they felt when they stood on the cobbles of Dublin Castle or the hallowed ground of the General Post Office. We want the client to recall fondly the charming and lovable guide with whom they made a deep connection. The client will look back on the tour and feel like they didn’t pay for a tour with a professional tour guide, and it was merely a transaction, but rather like they met up with an old friend.
Continue reading to meet the individuals behind Dublin Tour Guide. If you have any questions at all, please get in touch. If you’re ready to embark on your own adventures in Dublin, head over to our Private Walking Tours of Dublin page and find your perfect tour option!

Who we are

Office - Garvan

Garvan is the Founder, Owner and Managing Director of GPR Tours Ltd (with trading name as Dublin Tour Guide). He is a certified tour guide with B. A. Int. in Medieval Irish and Celtic Studies. He spearheads the growth of the Company, identifying new markets, hiring qualified tour guides and strategic financial planning. He works closely with clients, guides and virtual assistants to maintain the quality of tours being offered and see to it that DTG achieve its financial and corporate goals. Garvan is a passionate historian, thespian, linguist, rocker, beer-drinker, as well as an experienced, energetic, passionate, enthusiastic and knowledgeable tour guide of Dublin City.

Learn more

Office - Kathleen G

Kathleen is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA – Philippines). She has over 11 years of experience in accounting and finance. She is currently the Financial Manager of Dublin Tour Guide and has been working with the company for almost 5 years. She is responsible for managing the company’s finances and is responsible for financial reporting, assessing financial risks and opportunities. She also set and tracks the financial goals, objectives, and budgets of the company. Kathleen was a former Senior Accountant of International Manufacturing Company, Project Accountant at Upwork (with Top-Rated Badge), Senior Accounting Analyst at IBM Business Service, and an Accounting Staff at Department of Environment & Natural Resources. Kathleen graduated with a Degree in Accounting from St. Louis College.

Office - Fitri

Fitri has over 10 years of experience in human resources, technical writing, company supervisory and coordination. She is currently the Booking Manager of Dublin Tour Guide and has been working with the company for almost 1 year. She is responsible for communicating with clients which include answering inquiries, providing details of the company, coordinating with tour guides and accounting and booking the tours on different platforms. She also works closely with the accounting and marketing team to achieve the required volume of bookings. Fitri was a former Operations team leader and Fleet Executive of PT Buffalo Tours Indonesia, HR & GA Officer of PT Indo Seleksi Makmur Abadi, Freelance Copywriter of Private Leisure Asia and crewing assistant PT Indoseleksi Makmur Abadi. Fitri graduated with a Degree in Linguistics/Languages from Warmadewa University.

Office - Nicholas

Nicholas is a seasoned professional with 8+ years of expertise in Sales, Marketing, and Customer Experience. Currently serving as the Business Development Representative at Dublin Tour Guide since early 2022, he manages B2B clients, drives sales growth, and collaborates with the bookings department. Nicholas, hailing from Nairobi, Kenya, is passionate about connecting with people and providing exceptional customer experiences. Holding a BCom degree in Marketing from Kenyatta University, he showcases both academic and professional prowess. Previously, he worked as a Business Development Manager at Symmetric Training, focusing on Biopharma Industry training programs across Europe and the USA, and has diverse experience across Entrepreneurship, Transport, Technology, NGO, Customer Service, Construction, Media, Training, and Finance sectors.

Office - Jessica

Jessica stands as a versatile professional, skillfully navigating the intersections of diverse industries with finesse and dedication. In her role as the Booking Manager and Bookkeeper at Dublin Tour Guide since early 2023, she excels in orchestrating client interactions, tour logistics, and financial management. Originally from the scenic province of La Union in the Philippines, she finds inspiration in the exquisite beaches and the dynamic local culture that thrives with energy and vibrancy. Her heart is deeply connected to the lively events and traditions that define her community – she relishes being a part of its spirited festivals, joyous celebrations, and meaningful connections with fellow community members. Holding a Degree in Nursing from Union Christian College, she’s all about complete well-being. Beyond her academic achievements, her innate curiosity fuels a passion for exploring novel horizons and immersing herself in diverse cultures. Whether through nature walks, dancing, or embracing new experiences, she actively broadens her perspective on the world. With a background covering accounting, social media, admin work, and customer service for more than 5 years, she’s skilled at handling a variety of tasks and ensuring customers are satisfied.

Guide - Carl

Carl is a professional and passionate guide who has been giving tours of Dublin since 2012. He is currently an Internal Prime guide of Dublin Tour Guide. Carl has given over a thousand tours of the city covering every topic you can imagine from History, Sights, Traditional sports, Vikings, The Famine, Independence to the recent IT boom and everything in between. He is fortunate to have represented the country at chess throughout his life and he is currently the Irish International chess team captain so it is not just a hobby but a big part of his life. Carl believes that travelling is one of the factors for why he got into this industry and to date he has visited over 40 countries and is still planning to see many more.

Guide - John

John was born and raised on the Northside of Dublin, and has been active professionally as a tour guide since 2015. He is currently an Internal Junior guide of Dublin Tour Guide. He prefers working outdoors – whatever the weather – probably owes something to his provenance from farming folk on Ireland’s rugged Western seaboard. In spite of these earthy origins, He can talk Irish Blarney in any of three languages (Russian, German and our own Gaelic) and has recently published an ebook on door-to-door sales training. He believes Tour guiding is one of the best decisions he ever made, and he just loves the job. He likes to think that it shows too, in the 400+ 5-star reviews which he has logged online to date, across numerous review websites. Outside of tour guiding schedules he is an avid astronomy nerd, likes to maintain a strict keep-fit routine and a French cuisine aficionado.

Guide - Austin

Austin, a native Dubliner with a strong connection to the city’s history, possesses curiosity and a genuine fascination with people. His background in graphic design and IT Publishing led him to explore the world, but his heart always remained with history. He transitioned from being a part-time genealogist to becoming a tour guide after achieving a National Tour Guide Badge in 2017. Austin’s deep devotion to Dublin’s history and essence is evident as he enthusiastically guides walking tours, sharing the city’s captivating stories and embracing its charm. He welcomes you to join him on an enriching journey through Dublin’s culture and narratives.

Guide - Mark

Mark is a dedicated storyteller known for his unique guided tours that bring history to life. He started in 2015 as a U2 walking tour guide in Dublin, sharing the story of the iconic rock band. From 2016 to 2020, he specialised in Haunted History tours, leaving a lasting impact with his expertise in ghost stories and knowledge of haunted sites. Since 2022, Mark has expanded to conducting bus tours across Ireland’s famous locations, carefully crafting each itinerary to highlight rich historical context. Throughout his journey, he’s committed to creating unforgettable moments, blending entertainment, education, and a deep connection to the past for every traveller.

Guide - Brendan

It was his early sales career that led him to explore all 32 counties of Ireland that inspired an interest in becoming a tour guide. His passion for storytelling and connecting with people shines through in his personalised private tours, where he tailors the experience to his clients’ interests. His favourite site is Dublin Castle, where he shares captivating stories about the city’s history. Beyond major sites, Brendan enjoys highlighting Dublin’s intricate details to make the experience enjoyable for all, including children. He holds a QQI level 6 qualification in National Tour Guiding and aims for clients to experience the friendliness and informality of the Irish people during the tour.

Guide - Eamon

Eamon, a former finance professional with a lifelong interest in history and nature, has transitioned into his dream job as a tour guide. He is dedicated to sharing his love for Ireland and its rich culture with visitors. Eamon brings history to life through engaging storytelling and even acts out historical conversations to transport you to pivotal moments in Irish history. While he may not be a professional singer, he’s not shy about singing beloved Irish classics like Molly Malone or the Auld Triangle. Eamon is enthusiastic about showcasing Ireland’s journey over the years, highlighting both its progress and enduring friendly nature. He also brings a wealth of travel experience, having explored various countries and even lived in both New York and London. As your guide, Eamon is committed to making your Irish experience memorable and educational.