brianpeitz9252

Planning a trip for a wedding we have in Peckforton UK summer of 2022. Our family of 3 would like to visit Amserdam, London, and Scotland and I am trying to figure out the best route. I prefer train for a more fun experience than plane for my 9 year old but we are also a family of convince and I don't want to take a super long route or spend whole days on a train. I was originally thinking starting in Amsterdam, spend a few days....Train to London, spend 2 days....Train to crewe and then bus to Peckforton for wedding....Then somehow a train to Edinburgh for a few days. Then we can fly out from there and go home. What I dont know, is that the best route? backwards better? Is Amsterdam just too far away to make this all work? We are coming from the US so i am really hoping for non stop flights.

janisj

First off all (assuming you are coming from the USA) the order of London/Scotland/Amsterdam essentially makes no difference. There are efficient ways of doing the three areas in just about anyorder you choose. Fly in to AMS, train or fly to London, train to Edinburgh, Fly home. Fly in to Edinburgh, fly to AMS, train or fly to London, fly home. Fly into London, train to Edinburgh, fly to AMS, fly home (and several other permutations) - all are about equal in convenience and cost. So the decider would be connections to Peckforton and the actual dates of travel which would determine the order of things.

Since there isn't much of anything in Peckforton I assume (probably wrongly ) that the wedding is at Peckforton Castle.The nearest stations are at Chester, and Nantwich. But to get to either one you'd be changing at Crewe anyway. Chester is a very interesting place to visit so I'd depending on your timing I might try to work it into my plans either coming or going.

There are good connections to Chester from either Edinburgh/Glasgow or London. So maybe something like fly into AMS > London > Crewe/Peckforton > Chester > Scotland > fly home from EDI or GLA (or the whole thing in reverse)

Jean

How many days do you have besides the time in Peckforton?

Have you been to these cities before? For a first-time visitor, two days in London is the blink of an eye, and there is so much more to Scotland than Edinburgh. If your trip is in August, Edinburgh will be drowning in visitors for the Military Tattoo and the Fringe Festival.

janisj

Re Jean's post - I completely missed the '2 days in London'. Three important questions:

1) When exactly is this trip? August in Edinburgh is more than a 'special case' and has huge logistics issues. So dates of travel is really important.

2) Have you been to London before? If not, 2 days (assuming you mean 3 nights) is absolutely nothing for the largest city in western Europe (by a huge margin) with more family friendly sites/attractions than almost anywhere on Earth . . . If you have visited London a few times -- than a 2-day break would be fine, but if this is the first time you'd want considerably more than 2 days.

3) How may days total are you planning for the entire trip?

brianpeitz9252

Thank you for that information. That is helpful and I will check out Chester. Yes it is the castle so you were right on the wedding

janisj

to give any sort of useful advice we really do need the requested info . . .

brianpeitz9252

janisj. So we are thinking like 12ish days in total. In general we are unlike most people...We are fast, efficient, and don't like to linger at any type of sightseeing. For example: we were able to do Italy (rome/florence/Venics/Capri) in 9 days and were perfectly happy. So my thoughts were to give london about 2.5 days based on on the wedding schedule. RIght now we can do any order that makes the most sense. For me non stop flights from Phx/AZ is the priority as well as being on trains in-between our stops that are fast. The train will be fun for my kid but I really don't want it to take up the whole day nor do i want to take a plane to often eating into our time. So the only thing I am required to do is an event at Hyde park (London) on June 22nd in the afternoon and then being at the Peckforton Castle Friday afternoon the 24th through Sunday am the 26th. My thoughts are to take Tuesday the 21st, half day 22nd in the am, and all day 23rd to explore London and then off to the wedding. The wedding could be the beginning or end of my trip....doesn't matter. Thoughts are to Amsterdam-London-Wedding-Scotland.....but if going backwards is better I could skip the event on wed at Hyde park and do the opposite.

spiral

I think that the nearest bus stop to Peckforton Castle is about a 30 minute walk away up a steep hill so I would suggest you contact the hotel to see if they offer a transport service from Chester or Crewe

laurie_ann

I don't know that you will find nonstop PHX-EDI or PHX-AMS. I quick search of Kayak I found none for June next year and non for October this year. But could be that full schedules aren't back yet due to Covid. If only London is a nonstop you might consider most efficient to fly between EDI and AMS in one or the other direction (AMS is quite a hub for all of Europe) and so at one end of your trip in or out of AMS with a one stop in USA. Good resource for various travel methods between points is www.rome2rio.com and for train specifically is www.seat61.com.

In the end if you find Amsterdam too far to fit in, or you absolutely require nonstop across the Atlantic, there are many family friendly UK sites, like these https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2...t-summer-trips

janisj

A June time frame is a big help.

There are very good connections between PHX (an AA hub) and LHR so no worries there.

I do think you are very seriously underestimating the logistics (London in particular, the trains in general). To give you just a bit of an idea -- you say you did Rome/Florence/Venice/Capri in 9 days . . .All four of those cities would fit inside Greater London with room to spare - and all four lumped together have about 1/3 the population. No comparison at all.

I would seriously consider adding several days to London. Just a very short list: Your Hyde Park event, Tower of London, British Museum, V&A, Hampton Court Palace, Westminster Abbey, Cabinet War Rooms, St Paul's Cathedral, Theatre, Harry Potter Studio (if there is interest) one or two other major galleries/museums (National/Imperial War/Museum of London/one of the Tates, etc). There are scores more major sites but this is probably the main 'box checking' list for first timers and would easily take 5 very full/exhausting days to accomplish.

janisj

ps: as I mentioned up thread, the order really doesn't make much difference. PHX/LHR is a very easy connection (assuming flight schedules get back to a semblance of 'normal' by next June) . . . However with just 12 days (2.5 of which will be transatlantic flights, immigration formalities, and jet lag recovery - something has to give.

IMO you'll need to either add several days or drop something - Simplify things and drop either Amsterdam or Scotland.

bilboburgler

London in 2.5 days.

"When a man is tired of London he is tired of life"

https://www.visitlondon.com/things-t...eums-in-london 26 top museums
https://traveltriangle.com/blog/castles-in-london/ 10 top castles
https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/enjoy.../regents-canal london canals
https://www.visitlondon.com/things-t...ns-top-markets
https://www.visitlondon.com/things-t...hops-in-london