Need a round-trip train from London to northern England? Any tips? Sites, etc.?

thetrainline.com

Where in northern England? For how long? A day trip or several? York and Durham are both nice. I can give recommendations if you can provise more info.

Not Geith, but have similar request for tips &amp; sites, etc. Going from London to York mid-week. First thought was direct, but considering possibility of going London to Chester, staying a day there, then going on to York. Is there a &quot;scenic&quot; perhaps a steam-engine train route in that area? Thanks for the trainline.com site -- It did show me schedules &amp; prices. Is this an &quot;official site&quot; or a vendor?<BR>

If you are a family, pay for a family pass when you purchase your tickets. It saves you a bundle.

MHS, it is certainly quite do-able to take a train to Chester, stay a day and then take a train to York. But you should only do it because you want to see the two places; don’t expect a lot of great scenery. This is the industrial midlands, after all.<BR><BR>Thetrainline.com ticketing system is owned by one of the train operating companies, Virgin Rail. The prices they charge are the same as you would pay for tickets with the same restrictions if you purchase at train stations or by phone to any of the train companies. The other online reservation and ticket sale system is www.qjump.co.uk, owned by National Express, who own about half a dozen of the UK train operating companies. Their prices are the same. Since neither thetrainline nor qjump will mail tickets outside the UK, the choice between the two may depend upon from which train stations they will allow ticket pick up.

MHS - there are several steam train routes in Yorkshire, which (despite what ron thinks) is a very scenic county. Have a look at this site for links - http://www.eyorks17.freeserve.co.uk/trains.htm

Sorry if my reply confused you, Xenos. I was talking about the scenery on train journeys between London and Chester and between Chester and York. I agree with you that there is much that is scenic in North Yorkshire.

http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/pa..._flexipass.htm will probably be a good idea for you.<BR>Do you definitely not want to go into Scotland which has some fabulous rail lines? [I am English by the way!<BR>You will find some of the best scenic routes have websites reached from<BR>http://www.link-rail.com/uk/lines.htm Not all of these are covered by the pass but you should definitely try to include some of those that are. Settle - Carlisle and Heart of Wales are particularly good. Do e-mail me if I can help further - I am pretty keen on trains though I expect you know we have had some bad problems with ours.

Davidx, Last year we went from York to Leeds and then the Settle/Carlisle route. While scenic, it was a little disapointing. We then continued on to Troon from Carlisle. The most scenic trip was between Glasgow and Oban. Love the trains even if service is off from when the State ran them.

<BR>For a round trip within England you can go northwards through Lancashire and come southward through Yorkshire. Fine old towns and cities northbound are Leamington Spa (for day trips to Warwick and Stratford), Shrewsbury, Chester, Edinburgh (sorry: here I take you outside England), Durham, York, Peterborough (for day trips to Stamford, Ely and Cambridge), and so London, <BR><BR>For good country areas you might choose in the northbound sector Moreton in Marsh for a bus ride in the Cotswolds and Oxenholme for the Lake District. You can avoid Scotland if you take the bus in two hours from Carlisle through Galashiels in the border country to Berwick upon Tweed.<BR><BR>If you like industrial heritage I have quite other ideas. Please write in that case, or if I can otherwise help further. Welcome to England.<BR><BR>Ben Haines, London<BR>