Johnnie Fox's Hooley tickets

What the ticket covers

The ticket is for the Hooley Night at Johnnie Fox's, a pub and restaurant in Glencullen, in the Dublin Mountains. It covers entry, a reserved seat for the music and dance show, a three-course Irish dinner followed by tea or coffee, live traditional music through the evening and the dance show itself. Free parking is on site. Drinks are not included, and neither is transport from the city, so both are your own plans. The booking page marks the ticket wheelchair accessible, gives the host language as English and shows a start time for each date.

What a hooley is

Hooley is an Irish word for a noisy celebration or party, and in Ireland it can also mean an evening of traditional music and dance. The origin of the word is unknown, which keeps it a word of the party rather than the page. The pub uses it for a room as well as an event: its own site describes the hooley as a slightly wild party in the parlour, once the best room of the farmhouse and kept for special guests. So the name promises a lively night, not a quiet recital. Expect a party with a running order, where you are seated and fed before the stage comes alive.

How the night runs

The pub sets out the evening in four steps, and the shape matters more than any clock. Start times differ by date, so your confirmation is the guide to when each part begins. Treat the list as the order of events, not a timetable. One consequence is worth knowing: dinner comes first and the show follows, so the evening is built to be taken in order, from your arrival at the table to the final bow. Plan around that order: a light lunch is sensible, since a full dinner is coming, and the late evening should be kept free.

• Welcome: you are greeted and shown to your table for drinks before dinner
• Dinner: you eat while the atmosphere in the room builds
• Music: traditional Irish music starts, with plenty of humour
• Dance: the lights go down, the stage rises and the show begins

The dinner

The ticket lists a three-course Irish dinner followed by tea or coffee. The pub's published Hooley menu offers a choice at each course, marks allergens, flags some dishes as vegetarian and says items can change on the day with supplies. Desserts come from the pub's own bakery. Drinks are bought separately, so budget for them. Treat the published menu as a guide, not a promise, and never assume a dish is free of an allergen. Anyone with an allergy or a dietary rule should tell the pub before the night, not at the table; the menu's allergen key includes a request-gluten-free code.

The music

The pub plays live traditional music seven nights a week, and for the Hooley it describes experienced traditional musicians who bring plenty of humour to the evening. Irish traditional music leans on the fiddle, tin whistle, flute and uilleann pipes, often with a bodhrán frame drum keeping the beat, but which instruments play on a given night is the band's choice. Treat any one instrument as a possibility, not a promise. The pub's live-music page lists a separate weekly schedule of sessions in the bar, which is not the Hooley show. If the music is what you came for, the instruments guide explains what each sound is, so you can follow who is playing what.

Read next: Irish trad instruments guide

The dancing

The dancers are the pub's own troupe, which it describes as traditionally and classically trained and choreographed for the show. Irish dance splits into hard-shoe dances, where the shoes make a drumming sound, and softer, lighter dances. The stage style most visitors know, with a rigid upper body and fast footwork, spread widely after Riverdance in 1994. A show built on that style is as much theatre as tradition, with costume, lighting and tightly drilled formations. The dance guide explains the styles and what to watch for.

Read next: Irish dance styles explained

Choosing a night

Each date on the booking calendar has its own start time, and the pub says the Hooley runs all year. The booking page carries a likely-to-sell-out flag, so popular dates can go early, and groups are likely to find fewer open tables on a given night. Because cancelling is free until a day before and payment can wait, holding a place before your flights or hotel are final costs nothing today. Choose a night when you do not need an early start next morning, because the evening is long and the ride home takes time. If you are weighing a weekday against a weekend, remember that the pub's shuttle may run on only some nights, which can decide it for you.

Booking here or with the pub

The buttons on this site open GetYourGuide, which takes the booking and the payment; the site itself is an independent guide, not the pub. The pub also takes Hooley bookings on its own site, with its own terms, including a deposit and a cancellation schedule for groups; it lists group bookings of 20 or more on a set menu. The 24-hour free-cancellation window described here belongs to bookings made through GetYourGuide. Questions about large groups, celebrations or a table plan are better put to the pub itself, whose contact details are on its website.

What visitors say

Reviews of the Hooley keep returning to the same things: lively music, skilled dancers and generous meals. The complaints are practical, not artistic, and they concern the ride. Some visitors found the shuttle details and pick-up points hard to work out, while others took a taxi without trouble. Reviews also describe a group of eight enjoying the night together and recommend it for all ages, which fits an evening built around a shared meal. Read the transport complaints as a signal to settle your ride before you arrive, not as a reason to avoid the night. The getting-there guide sets out the pub's own advice step by step.

Read next: How to get to Johnnie Fox's

How it compares

A dinner show in the mountains is one of several ways to spend an Irish evening in Dublin. A shorter show in the city centre means a quicker evening and a shorter ride; some, such as a house-party format in a townhouse or a dance lesson followed by a show, are built around a smaller room or a taster of the steps. A pub session costs nothing and needs no booking, but has no fixed programme and no dinner. This ticket is the full-evening option: a table, a meal, a stage and an audience in one room. The table at the top sets the main types side by side.

Who this isn't for

This is the wrong ticket if you want a short evening, because the Hooley is a full night out. It also fails if you cannot arrange transport, since the pub sits in the hills and public transport is thin. It does not suit children under five, who are not admitted. And if you want a quiet concert, know that the room is lively, with a party mood and humour in the show. It is also a poor fit for a tight itinerary, such as a stopover with an early flight. A city-centre show or an informal session will suit those wishes better.