Extended opening hours announced by Hook Lighthouse
Due to popular demand the world’s oldest operational lighthouse ‘Hook Lighthouse’ is announcing late opening for the summer season.
Hook has just been awarded the Excellence in Tourism Award from the Public Sector awards, earlier this year the brunch menu at Hook was awarded as the best in Ireland by Georgina Campbell and in 2018 Hook Lighthouse was the only Irish tourism attraction shortlisted and commended at the British Guild of Travel Writers World Tourism Awards 2018 & was shortlisted for ‘Ireland’s Favourite Local Attraction’ category in the Irish Independent Reader Travel Awards 2019 plus the newly developed Sunset Tour and Food Experience is presently in the top 5 shortlist for the ‘Best Food and Beverage Experience’ category in the Failte Ireland Irish Tourism Industry Awards 2019 so, it’s really no surprise that Hook Lighthouse is extending its summer opening hours in order to facilitate visitor demand.
The historic visitor attraction drew over 262,000 visitors last year making it the busiest year on record to date. The 800-year-old protected medieval structure is of limited size with the maximum capacity for each tour at 30 persons, therefore the ability for visitors to book online in advance or arrive for an evening tour is of great benefit.
71% of visitors to Hook Lighthouse are from all across Ireland with 29 % arriving to tour the lighthouse from all across the world. The number of visitors from the USA overtook the UK for the first time last year with the remaining visitors from the rest of Europe and the rest of the world.
Ann Waters, Manager at Hook Lighthouse says, “We are delighted to announce late opening hours for the summer season 2019. Visitor numbers have been on a steady incline over the last number of years at Hook Lighthouse and we want to facilitate the space in the market for later evening activities and in particular demand for late evening activities which is the norm for the international market.”
“We have been working hard on building our international visitor numbers and this work is really coming to fruition with European and US visitor numbers up and we look forward to drawing even more international visitors to Wexford in the future.”
Guided tours at Hook Lighthouse are on offer 7 days a week, sharing with visitors one of the greatest stories on Ireland’s Ancient East. The opening hours are from 9.30am to 7 pm from July 1st to September 1st and the Visitor Centre including the gift shop and Café will be open to 7pm daily with a guided tour every half hour from 10am to 7pm. For further details or to book a tour call 051 397055 or see www.hookheritage.ie
