LaurieBee

I am a relative travel newbie... we are hoping to fly from Barcelona to London to catch an international flight out of Heathrow back to Canada. Our Air Canada flight leaves 1230 pm. How early do I need to be at Heathrow? The flight we are looking at from Barcelona has two options of landing in London Luton or London Stanstead, Luton being the cheaper. I am thinking to fly in the night before but then we need a hotel and a 65 minute busride to get to Heathrow the next morning. Anyone have any suggestions? I feel that flying from Barcelona on the same day as our flight back to Canadaseems risky, through there is a flight arriving at 9 AM. Help??

andrews98682

Since it sounds like a separate ticket, I'd probably fly to London the day before. I would hate to have to switch airports to get to a later flight.

rkkwan

Arriving 9am at LHR will be okay. Luton next to impossible, Stansted absolutely impossible.

janisj

Fly to either airport and stay in central London that night. Both have easy train connections into London. Then the next morning you can take the tube to LHR. Best to book a hotel anywhere along the Piccadilly tube line (Kings Cross, Russell Sq, Covent Garden, South Kensington, or several others)

Depending on how far west along the Piccadilly line you stay -- it will take between 45 mins and 1 hour to get to LHR.

Otherwise you could take the direct National Express coach between either airport and LHR. But that would mean spending the night at an LHR hotel and I would always prefer to stay IN London rather than out at the airport if the times worked.

alanRow

Separate tickets, cost of missing your onward flight extremely high, no contest - you get to London the night before.

For future reference you can get "multi city" / "open jaw" tickets so you could have started the return journey at Barcelona.

CarolA

I would get to London the night before.

However, I find the continued "Open jaw" ticket advice kind of less then helpful UNLESS you know that was really an option.

I have a flight to LHR in July when I want to go to Paris... so I will return to London the night before the flight. And why did I not book "open jaw" Well, the flight to London in Business was $1,000 cheaper then the flight to Paris. That pays for the train to and from Paris and hotel for one night in London with lots of $$$ left over!

evecolorado

I'd strongly suggest flying in from Barcelona the night before. With unexpected strikes, traffic delays, and so on, unless you desperately want to do something in central London when you arrive, I think staying at a hotel near T3 would be the most stress-free and cheapest way to go. And as rkkwan says--there's no way you'll make it, arriving at 9 a.m. at Luton or Stansted, to make your flight at T3.

This is from the Heathrow Terminal 3 website: "There are numerous airport hotels surrounding the area around terminal 3, one of the closest being the Renaissance London Heathrow Hotel. This is a contemporary hotel with extensive recreation and business facilities that's well connected with transport links straight to terminal 3. As well as also being close to the airport, The Park Inn Heathrow boasts great value for money on top of the usual facilities you’d expect from four-star accommodation and is also served by the Hotel Hoppa shuttle service." http://www.heathrow-airport-guide.co.uk/hotels.html

xyz123

Sounds like you're flying Easy Jet or an airline like that (they also fly to and from Gatwick from Barcelona)....they're pretty reliable but nowhere near perfect....have you priced a through ticket BCN-LHR-to your final destination in Canada? You mnight find it's not all that more expensive to leave the morning of say on BA with a connection at LHR (and probably a cheaper hotel in BCN); if it's a legal connection as defined say by BA, even if the first flight is late, it will be their responsibility to dela with getting you to Canada and your bags will be checked through.

I am planning a cruise out of BCN for August and it has become obvious that if I want to use Easy Jet, I have to go the night before but booking a complete through ticket via say BA or AA or IB from JFK-LHR (few day stay) - BCN (Saturday night(-JFK is not really going to cost me all that much more for the leg from LHR-BCN than Easy Jet once you factor in all their nickel and dime charges (baggage, using a credit card, yada yada yada).

qwovadis

ba.com and Iberia.com and aa.com

all code share via LHR might try

to connect via Heathrow with them

so no long travel delays changing airports.

Always stay at least an overnite if

connecting from the outlying airports

find good values betterbidding.com Priceline

londontown.com otel.com booking.com if

you have to stay o/n

Good luck!

julia1

Have you looked into BA or Iberia non-stop into Heathrow? When you factor in the extra cost of the coach from Luton/Stansted to Heathrow plus the overnight stay, I would think any extra cost would be minimal, much out-weighed by the convenience.