When I took my dad over (both sides of the family come from Ireland), he was really interested in tracing the family tree. Each county has a non profit genealogical service, and he was able to get a preliminary report from one of these centers (County Clare) for about $75, and a more detailed follow up report for about $150. They go through old parish records, and have a surprising amount of detail in their reports. If you can trace back what county your family hails from, this might be something worth pursuing. My dad and sister have even been back to the land our distant relatives occupied in the 1800's, and to cemetery plots, based on the information they obtained from these reports. There should be a listing of these centers on line somewhere. The one in Clare used college students to maintain their records and do their research.

Aside from that, if you're out on the west coast my favorite place to go is Doolin, which has about 3 pubs that have live music each night. It's not far from the Cliffs of Moher, and it's pretty rural out there, but well worth the visit just for the music. There's plenty of B&B's in that area.