England and (possibly) Wales in May2009

Old Apr 21st, 2009, 09:45 PM
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England and (possibly) Wales in May2009

My husband and I are visiting the U.K. for 13 days (15 including travel from U.S.). We just doing England and possibly Wales if we can figure it out, which we are having trouble doing at the moment. We arrive at Heathrow, but due to the fact that we will attend the Chelsea Flower show on May 20, we plan to save the last 5 days for London, with one day reserved for a day trip outside of London, if necessary. We are interested in gardens (if I could find a bluebell wood in mid-May...sigh...), easy-moderate walks/hikes/cycling, literary sites (for example, the Brontes' moors, Austen's Lake District, things like that), World Heritage, history, architecture, mostly medieval to Victorian including castles, good food, and tasting a wide variety of beer/cider. Almost anything really. We had hoped to take a train directly to York once we arrived at the airport (arriving at York around noon after a 3 hour nap. Can you nap on a train? , and spend the next day or so exploring key features of York before heading to the Lake District via the Settle-Carlisle line for scenery. We thought we'd take it up to Carlisle to visit Hadrian's Wall, then go back to somewhere around the eastern Lake District for the night (a town to be our base for the next two days, then rent a car and explore. We do not know where would be best, nor if we should keep the car and drive to our next destination, which hopefully will be Wales around Snowdonia and/or Cambrian Mountains. Or, should we drive the car around the Lake District and take the train to Wales? Or is this too much already so we should skip Wales and go straight to Bath or another nearby town and drive to Salisbury, Stonehenge, and other area sites for two days before ending up in London for the last 5 days? It seems like we'd be changing accomodations often, and spending a lot of time traveling, and I can't figure out what to do with our luggage (although we'll be pretty minimalist, carry-ons only most likely). It feels like we'll be lugging our luggage around with us a lot since we don't have one good base. I've seen some itineraries where folks include England, Scotland, and Wales in 2 weeks so, it must be doable if we omit Scotland (this time around at least).

Can you offer any suggestions? Is this too much? Are we leaving out something major that is a must-see/do? Our only hotel accomodations booked so far are in London, so any gems for that would be fantastic. Thanks so much in advance. We'll be checking in often because we are getting a bit frantic as we finalize our plans.
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Old Apr 21st, 2009, 11:51 PM
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So you really have 7 days outside of London. I woudl pick two areas...Lakes and Yorkshire sound perfect for you. You can take the train to York (I personally find trains quite easy to sleep on). We are doing the Lakes and Yorkshire in a couple of weeks and here's our itinerary (you could flip it). We have 10 days, so you would have to miss some things, and I highly recommend renting a car to explore the country side...it will be more difficult by public transit.

Saturday - Drive to Hawkshead Cumbria from London

Lunch at the Hedgehog http://www.vintageinn.co.uk/thehedgehoglichfield/
Stafford Road, Lichfield, WS13 8JB

Sunday - Hawkshead and area

Lunch with everyone at the Punchbowl

Monday - Carlisle and Hadrian’s Wall

Tuesday - Lakes

Wednesday - Lakes

Thursday – Lakes to Yorkshire Dales

Drive Hawkshead Cumbria to Skipton and do drive here: http://www.skiptonweb.co.uk/tourist/...rive/index.htm
Stopping at Bolton Abbey and Malham Cove (maybe Jervaulx abbey)

Lunch: Burnsall at the Red Lion http://www.redlion.co.uk/menus_view.cfm?mID=11

Drive Skipton to Knaresborough and dinner at hotel, Gallon House.
47 Kirkgate, Knaresborough
North Yorkshire HG15 8BZ

Friday – York

Don’t forget to order picnic lunch!

Railway Museum (by York station)

Lunch at Henshalwood’s Deli http://www.deliyork.co.uk/picnics.php
10 Newgate
York YO1 7LA
0194 673877

York Minster (£5.50 each)

Dinner at www.generaltarleton.co.uk
Boroughbridge Road
Ferrensby Knaresborough
HG5 0PZ

Saturday - Fountains Abbey/Studley Royal and Castle Howard

Dinner at www.themaltshovelbrearton.co.uk
Main St
Brearton, Harrogate, HG3 3BX

Sunday - Yorkshire Moors/Coast
Drive via Thirsk to the Steam Railway at Pickering and ride the steam rail.

Head to Whitby for lunch at www.magpiecafe.co.uk.
14 Pier Road, Whitby
North Yorkshire, YO21 3PU

Robin Hood’s Bay for walk and then drive around Moors.

Dinner at www.ripleycastle.co.uk/hotel.html
Ripley, Nr Harrogate
North Yorkshire HG3 3AY

Monday – drive back to London via Peak District

You lose at least 1/2 a day when you change locations so dont spread yourself so think that you spend all your time on the road!

Hope this helps!
J
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Old Apr 21st, 2009, 11:59 PM
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Lets be realistic, you will not "do" England or Wales in the time you have available, which appears to be 8 days. Forget the area around Haworth, it's a bit boring and you would see all that there is to see there in an hour.

If you intend starting in York, then travel from there to the Lake District. I'd suggest Ambleside or Windermere as a base. Here there is Wordsworth's cottage, Beatrix Potter's house etc. From the lakes, head for at least a night in Manchester, so much history going back to 79AD, the year Pompeii had a little problem and a great city for hotels, restaurants, Victorian buildings etc.

From Manchester, head for Bath and then back to the airport. Car Hire would be the best way from York, dropping the car back at Heathrow(?). Just work out how long you need to spend in each place, but I'd suggest:

York 2 nights
Lake District 2 nights
Manchester 2 nights
Bath 2 nights

An action packed time!

Cheers
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Old Apr 22nd, 2009, 07:11 AM
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Would it be best then to drop Wales altogether for this trip? It seems so, and maybe I could pair it with Scotland or something next time. I had not considered Manchester but we'll definitely keep that in mind. What do you think about heading straight to London after the Lake District, spending 5-6 days in the North of England, and then day tripping to Bath, Salisbury, etc for the touristy things? We'd add 2-3 days staying in London for that. Is that feasible, or too far for a day trip?
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Old Apr 22nd, 2009, 07:16 AM
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So you have 13 days

5-7 days in London - I would only do 1 day trip, either bath or salisbury/stonehenge if you are only staying 5 days in london

5-6 days to do the north of england.

That is reasonable.

Sorry, I hated Manchester, it has been heavily revitalised in recent years and centre of town is now basically a horrible open shopping district with chain stores everywhere. If you are into nightlife maybe I would recommend it, but I personally found 2 nights there more than enough and would never recommend it to a tourist (we went because thats where my dad was born). But thats just me!
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Old Apr 22nd, 2009, 07:46 AM
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Well good. This helps a lot. We'll rent a car for the North of England for sure. Should we keep the car to drive to London, and drop it off there, or should we drop it off in the north of England and take the train down? It looks like a 4-4.5 hour drive from Windermere to London, and we could stop along the way and make the day of it. We have never driven in England, so I have no idea if this is a worthwhile drive (from Windermere to London) or if we'd be better off with the train.
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Old Apr 22nd, 2009, 07:49 AM
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It looks like 4-5 hours, but will most likely take 7-8 hours with traffic depending on the day of the week (with a stop for lunch). Distances are deceiving in England The motorway around Birmingham can be a parking lot...not to mention the M25 around London.

I would drive. We researched taking the train and found it to be really expensive. Cheaper for us to keep the car for the day and drive it. Maybe drop it at Heathrow and tube back into London so you dont have to drive.
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Old Apr 22nd, 2009, 07:50 AM
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Oh and we use Sixt to rent our cars, we like automatics in the UK and they seem to have a good supply.
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Old Apr 23rd, 2009, 08:28 PM
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You mention "Austen's Lake District" - do you mean the Peak District, which Elizabeth Bennet visits with the Gardners in Pride and Prejudice? It's really lovely.

Lee Ann
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Old Apr 25th, 2009, 09:38 AM
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I think I do mean the Lake District. I always think that's where she goes with the Gardners but the Lake District trip gets canceled, doesn't it?
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Old Apr 25th, 2009, 10:19 AM
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Just a comment on your day of arrival. You mention going up to York A town that I like a lot. First the train only takes 2 hours from Kings Cross station. Second, are purchasing before hand? The reason I ask is that walk up fares are very expensive and you really should buy on line 8/12 weeks in advance. Leave plenty of time to get to the stations as you ticket is for a specific train only. This would apply for all train travel.
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Old Apr 25th, 2009, 10:32 AM
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" . . . . We had hoped to take a train directly to York once we arrived at the airport (arriving at York around noon . . . ."

To do that you'd have to be on pretty much a dead run from the moment you land. Assuming you land 0730-ish, get through the formalities at LHR by 0930, hike to the tube or train station, take an hour+ to get to Kings Cross and wait for the next train it will likely be close to noon before you board the train to York.

Also - as rogeruktm mentions, you need to book a specific train ahead of time to get a reasonable fare - so be sure to allow adequate time to catch that train.
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Old Apr 25th, 2009, 09:03 PM
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Right - they plan to visit the Lake District, but end up having to go to the Peak District instead, where she meets up with Mr. Darcy again and hijinks ensue.

Lee Ann
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Old Apr 26th, 2009, 06:32 AM
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We rented a car at Gatwick, drove to Windsor, visited the castle and stayed overnight. Next day to Stonehenge, on to Stratford for 2 nights. We then drove to Betws-y-Coed in northern Wales. This is a great area. We did day trips from Betws-y-Coed. We then drove to East Midlands Airport and flew to the west coast of France. Perhaps you could train or fly back to London to save driving time returning to London.

Northern Wales with the castles, scenery etc is not to be missed. We loved it.
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Old Apr 26th, 2009, 12:27 PM
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I was wondering which train to take. The advance fares have been about GBP 28-29 or so for a while now, but we didn't know how long it would take to get through everything. Originally we had planned to go to London first, but then we found out the Chelsea Flower show was going on during the latter part of our trip so we moved London to last. There is the alternative of changing our flight to Leeds, because prices have actually decreased since we bought them and it wouldn't be much different. Too crazy to do now?
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Old Apr 26th, 2009, 12:47 PM
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Definitely fly into Leeds if that's an option. A no brainer IMO since you are trying to get to York. Getting from LHR to Kings Cross to York would be a huge hassle.
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Old Apr 26th, 2009, 01:12 PM
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A few thoughts on transport:

- LHR to Kings Cross isn't too bad if you don't have tonnes of luggage: take the Paddington Express train to Paddington and then a tube to Kings Cross. Allow an hour to be on the safe side although the TFL website says it's only a 35 minute journey.

- I'd really recommend buying your train ticket to York in advance as it can be as much as £150 if you buy it on the day!

- The train from Manchester to London Euston takes around 2 hours, which is much quicker than driving, and if you buy your ticket in advance it can be as little as £10 single on a weekday.
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Old Apr 26th, 2009, 01:20 PM
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Well, flying into Leeds was a bit more expensive than I thought, so that option is out. We won't have much luggage at all; we are minimalist travelers, so it looks like LHR to Kings Cross to York. It does sound like a huge hassle janisj, but, at least it's a learning experience. We'll just plan on loads of time and if we have extra we'll grab a bite to eat or something. We're usually reasonably well-rested after overnight flights so it should be okay if not ideal.

Thanks everyone! Anyone have a suggestion for the best base of operations for 3-4 days in the Lake District, with a car?
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Old Apr 26th, 2009, 01:24 PM
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I forgot; booking my train ticket on national rail enquiries, there is an option to include the ticket on the tube to King's Cross, then the train ticket itself. Should I buy both on national rail, or buy just the train ticket to york and wait to buy the tube pass, or does it matter?
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