Driving around Bath, Glastonbury and Tintagel
 

My husband and I will be making a trip to Bath from London. We will be taking train from Paddington to Bath Spa, (11am to 12.29pm train).
From Bath, we plan to rent a car to drive to Glastonbury and Tintagel.
Our itinerary is as below:
Option 1:
15th May: London to Bath Spa (spend 1 night in Bath)
16th May: Bath to Tintagel (Spend 1 night in Tintagel)
17th May: Tintagel to Glastonbury (1 night in Glastonbury)
18th May: Glastonbury back to Bath (Spend the night in Bath)
19th May: Bath to Heathrow Airport (Flight departs at 4pm)

Option 2:
15th May: London to Bath Spa
16th May: Bath to Glastonbury
17th May: Glastonbury to Tintagel
18th May: Tintagel back to Bath
19th May: Bath to Heathrow Airport

I am not sure which option is better in this case. Whether we should drive all the way to Tintagel first, then slowly back to Bath or stop by Glastonbury first and then all the way from Tintagel back to Bath.

Too much too-ing and fro-ing IMO. All one night stands and two one night stands in Bath. Plus the drive from Bath to Tintagel takes about 4 hours w/o any stops. That doesn't make sense to me.

If this was my trip, I'd take the train to Exeter. Pick up a car and spend the first night near Tintagel. Exeter to Tintagel is only about a 90minute drive

2nd night in Glastonbury or Wells.

Drive to Bath in the late afternoon and turn in the car. 3rd and 4th nights in Bath.

Express coach from Bath to LHR.

Are you dead set on Tintagel? The scenery at the site is wonderful, but not much else going on. It would be nice to visit Dartmoor since you are going that far.

Why go back to Bath? Couldn't you get to Heathrow from Exeter? It seems like such a slog to go all the way back to Bath.

janisj has a good plan. I was posting as she was.

You could easily see Glastonbury from Bath, or from Wells, which is very nice.

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your reply. I did not know that someone replied because there was no notification. Maybe I did not set my settings correctly. I only saw the reply now and I have pre-booked all my train tickets + accomodation and it's a little hard to change them now :(. Anyhow, thanks again for your advice.

Hi janisj,

When I searched for Exeter, it shows 3 different stations: Exeter Central, Exeter St David's and Exeter St Thomas. Which is the station that I should choose?

St David's is the principal Exeter station and is on the main line from London Paddington to Cornwall. Central is in the city centre on the branch line from London Waterloo to St. David's. St Thomas is just a local commuter station. Where are you coming from and/or going to?

Hi Ron,

I have already bought the train ticket from Paddington to Bath. I am thinking of going by train from Bath Spa to Exeter.

In that case you'd be taking the train to Exeter St Davids. If you are going into the city centre, you could then transfer to a train to Exeter Central (a 4 minute train ride) or simply walk or take a taxi the the city centre - it is up hill! If you are just renting a car there, I think you'll find the rental offices near St Davids station.

"<i>I did not know that someone replied because there was no notification. Maybe I did not set my settings correctly</i>"

Not quite sure what you mean by 'settings'. AFAIK there is no notification function on Fodors. One can subscribe to an RSS feed, but that only alerts to new topics, not individual posts. When you have an active thread and you need the info . . . you should click on your name (at least daily) -- threads with recent response will be at the top of the lists.

My bad. I have posted on other forums before and usually there is a notification by email by ticking a checkbox that says send email notification when someone replies to the thread. I now know that I am supposed to check the replies myself :P.
Thanks.