twina49

What's the average cost to travel by train from Moreton-in-Marsh to Paddington Station? I checked some web sites and was getting costs of $120, which made me hope I was looking in the wrong place! And do the trains leave on a regular schedule? Will we be able to leave the Cotswolds early in the morning and return later in the evening? Thanks!

Roger

For cost and schedules I suggest you try Qjump. Trains to Paddington about every hour or so and lots back, every 1/2 hour or so. Total time is 1& 1/2hours.

flanneruk

Assuming you're talking weekdays, the prices depend on the train you're taking (prices at weekends are the same as the 0924) .

A day return on the 0607, 0634 or 0717, with a tube pass, is about £45. On the 0924 it's about £20 (again including a tube pass). There's a complication about tube passes on the 0822 which the ticket office will explain to you.

There isn't a regular schedule: subsequent trains are at 1111, 1235, and 1415 and irregularly roughly every 70 mins thereafter till 2138.

The last train back is 2148, arriving MIM 2326. Again, trains roughly every 70 mins, but irregular.

The $120 price is roughly the price of a first class return ticket (there aren't any discounts on 1st on this line). Getting on as far up the line as you are, there's no point in buying 1st, though it's often the only way of getting a seat at Oxford during the peak hours.

Coming back, you MUST get to the station early for the 1618, 1712, 1718, 1827 and 1918 departures, or you'll have to stand most of the way in standard class.

twina49

Thank you for the information. Although we are renting a car for most of the time while in the U.K., it seems prudent to take the train into London, rather than drive.

Airlawgirl

Well, yes, quite. the congestion charge to drive into central London is apparently onerous enough that many of the restaurants in and around Covent Garden are complaining that they may go out of business, as Londoners won't pay to come to central London to eat on account of having to pay the charge, but rather, now opt to stay just in their neighborhood or on the outskirts.

flanneruk

Getting the train on this route might make sense on weekdays. It rarely does at weekends.

The last train back (at 2148) means you can't get to an opera, concert or play.

If that matters, then on weekdays drive to Oxford and park at the station (last train back to Oxford is around midnight, and it's less than an hour's drive from there to MIM).

At weekends, drive into London. When you get onto the Marylebone Road, turn off to the north and park virtually anywhere (it's free almost everywhere north of this road on Sats and Suns, and there's no congestion charge). Buy a tube card, and enjoy your day. Collect your car at the end, and it's under 2 hours back to MIM

Ignore this nonsense about how the congestion charge is destroying restaurants. It stops at 7pm and no Londoner eats dinner for at least an hour after. Restaurants whingeing about it should look at their extortionate prices, incompetent - and often offensive - service and third-rate food as better explanations for their problems.

But it's always easier to blame someone else, isn't it?

Spygirl

Your explanation on London restaurants "whingeing" (a variation on the word "whining&quot definitely makes more sense to me, Flanneruk, as I could NOT agree more about the incompetent service, high prices and generally quite mediocre food one is presented with on the London food scene!

flanneruk

Whingeing is NOT a variation on whining.

Its an essential, mainstream, Australo-Britto-Irish word.

The subtle difference between 'whinge' and 'whine' may elude Americans (and neither word is used in Indlish, whose speakers are above either form of behaviour.)

But it's a crucial word in relations between the rest of the English-speaking world. It was our whingers we sent to Oz in the 1950s, which is why the term 'Pom' must never, according to the Les Patterson Grammar Of Antipodean English, be used without the prefix "whingeing".

Unlike whining, whingeing is determined genetically, which is why it is universal among all young Australians doing OE in Europe: they've inherited it from the people we expelled.

We thought we'd more or less wiped it out here, but it's re-emerged recently - probably from those Antipodeans interbreeding.

Spygirl

Flanneruk-I've heard the term "whingeing" in Scotland and in England since first arriving in London in 1981. What are you talking about that it had almost been "wiped out here?" Now the word "snogging" I would probably agree went out of use for awhile, but it came back sometime in the 90's, I was told.

P.S. Are you an English teacher, perchance?

Spygirl

P.S. Although I was greatly amused by your explanation, and that the subtle difference between the two words may well escape Americans, I do recall a discussion I had on this topic some years back with a certain British professor with whom I was well acquainted, and he advised that "whinge" and "whine" were functionally equivalent. However, in the interests of full disclosure, I should add that he was originally from Canada.