martoon

Hi everybody, Boy what a process this has been. My husband and i have decided to take your advice and do London and Paris for our first big trip. The dates i've picked are departure of Sep. 6th and return on Sep. 22nd.
We would like to stay in london for half that time doing day trips, some I've come up with are
stonehenge
St. Albans
The Cotswolds , mentioned was upper and lower slaughter, and Bibury
Hampshire for The new forest
Bath
What do you think of these places? Of course we are open to any suggestions!

Then any suggestions for day trips from Paris?

I thought i'd make our air reservations next month, I looked on Expedia for those days i came up with $2711 for the two of us , total. That was non refundable. The prices for refundable tickets were a lot more. Do you think we can do better than that?

Lastly, for now.... where should we stay in London and Paris. Nothing fancy, but would want one in a good location that is quiet and clean.

Do you think its possible to do this as low as $8000. We would go as high as $10,000.
Thanks for putting up with all my indecision on how to a trip!!

thursdaysd

Do not, repeat not, rely on Expedia! You certainly should be able to do better. Try kayak, skyscanner and itasoftware. When you've found a routing you like, go to the airline's web site and book with them.

Also, don't set your dates in stone. You said you could be gone for a month, and you are looking at less than that, so be flexible with your dates. Mid-week is often cheaper, but sometimes Saturday is. Be flexible with airports, too. Based on your profile, you're going to have to travel to get to an airport. Maybe it would be cheaper to fly in or out of Montreal instead of Boston.

Several threads here on day trips from London and Paris, but maybe you'd like to start new ones - this one has gotten rather long, and the title is about group travel.

janisj

London and Paris is a FANTASTIC choice for a first, toe in the water trip.

Look on kayak for open jaw (multi city) routes. I would fly into London and home from Paris and take the Eurostar from London to Paris.

Now the bad news . . . That is far too many day trips with just a week in London. In fact if you spent the entire week in London w/o a single day trip you still wouldn't see even all the major sites.

The Cotswolds are best seen staying a night or two. I also wouldn't try the New Forest as a day trip.

Bath is OK as a day trip - but an over night is much better if possible.

So as you can see, you could spend the entire two weeks in London and the countryside.

Maybe add another week just for Paris. . .

annhig

hi martoon - great plan. 16 days spread between London and Paris is a terrific idea - perhaps slightly longer in London than Paris to allow you to recover from jet lag and find your feet.

Also, there is a huge amount to do in London so you might be hard pressed to fit in all of the day trips you have listed, especially as most of them would be a very long day, if not better as an over night.

there are others closer to London which are easier to do as a day trip, such as Windsor Castle, Hampton Court Palace, Cambridge, & Hever Castle to name but a few.

janisj

With your dates you will have 14.5 days 'on the ground'.

isabel

For flights out of Boston that are somewhat lower cost try Aer Lingus and Iceland Air. In both cases you will need to change (In Dublin for Aer Lingus and Reykjavik for Iceland) but they are easy transfers.

My favorite 'easy' day trips from London are Oxford, Cambridge, and Warwick. I usually plan for three, even four, knowing I won't take them all. Then I decide when I get there how many and which ones I'm interested in. There are even good 'half-day' trips such as Greenwich and Windsor. If you really want to see the Cotwolds there are day tours you could take that would be easier than doing those on your own (not great public transportation to the small towns).

There are also some good day trips from Paris if you want to get a feel for the French countryside. If you put "Paris day trips" into the search bar you'll get several threads with ideas.

Mimar

Fodorite FrenchMystiqueTours has contributed a number of posts with exhaustive lists of day trips from Paris. Here's my bookmark, not necessarily the latest such post: http://www.fodors.com/community/euro...from-paris.cfm

Thanks again to FMT for his great advice.

martoon

Again, thanks to all! I will check out the above. Thursdaysd, I will check out other posts on London and Paris, or start a new one if i need to.