Hello -

My fiancee and I are planning a trip to Scotland for late May 2007. We plan on traveling for a little over 2 weeks. Our only constraint is that we need to be in SW Scotland by May 27th. What we are struggling with is the front-end of our trip. We'd like to leave the States on the 23rd or 24th and either:
a) Fly into Glasgow and spend a couple days in Glasgow and then on to Stranraer and the rest of our trip OR
b) Fly into Heathrow and spend a couple days in London and then move on to Scotland for the remaining two weeks. After SW Scotland we plan on traveling to Edinburgh, Perth, and Stirling.

Neither one of us has seen London, but we definitely do not want to squeeze too much in and exhaust ourselves. We keep hearing mixed reviews on Glasgow which is why we are even contemplating skipping it. Any thoughts/feedback would be appreciated.

to me it is like asking chicago or Dallas.... both great cities but very different.
I think you should research a little bit more and see what meets your needs better.
You will have to consider the travel time obviously if you choose London. London is one of my favorite cities, been there aobut 6 or 7 times. It offers a ton to do ...
If you have reservations about glasgow I would say go with London. glasgow is a great city, lots of great Museums and culture. At one point it was considered more of an industrial city, but not now.
A train ride from London to Scotland is delightful!!

I think annesherrod had a great reply...
If you've not been to London then you should see it.
People on these threads often say: "leave it till another trip", but you dont' know when that will be.
Two or three days in London would be fun . YOu can fly into London and out of Glasgow...open Jaw, and it doesn't cost a penny more. The train to Edinburgh is lovely and you'll see a lot of England..........OR fly on up to Scotland, quick hop. Perhaps you can manage a "stopover in London" , and flight on to Glasgow with the same ticket. LOts of possibilities.

Do allow the first day of arrival to almost be a "lost day" of jet lag. BUt you can see a lot of London by riding an open air bus OR by walking the streets, which is a good idea after flying all night anyway. Some say, "don't nap the first day,but get to bed early that night"

< to me it is like asking chicago or Dallas.... both great cities but very different >

I wouldn't consider visiting either - or consider them "great cities".

London is a Great City, Glasgow - even today - is 2nd division.

Hi A,

I would leave for London on the 23rd.

Hi!

Definitely, I´d suggest to see London, you will miss a lot of things, but it is better than nothing. On the other side, if you are staying for two weeks in Scotland you can find the time to visit Glasgow in one day, for example. If it can help you to decide, I may suggest you to visit the next page about Glasgow and what to see.
http://www.europefortourism.com/en/c...om/glasgow.htm

Good trip!

As much as I LOVE London - I'd think long and hard before choosing London as your stop immediately before Stranraer. It would be a very long journey up from London. Assuming you need to be in Stranraer during the day on the 27th - you would barely have 1.5 days in London - and it would be a jet lagged day at that.

If you have the option - think about flying into Glasgow on the 26th, spend the night in Glasgow, go to Stranraer on the 27th, do the rest of your itinerary in Scotland -- and then add the extra 2 days for London at the <u>end</u> of your trip.

You could do open jaw into GLA/out of London and take either a train ot fly to London for a couple of days before flying home

If shifting the dates isn't possible - I'd just use those extra 2 days to explore Ayrshire and the Southwest.

I'd vote for London, and I would fly to Glasgow on a cheap carrier like Ryan Air unless you just happen to like trains. We did the London-Glasgow trip and there was really not all that much to see. The countryside was pretty, but much the same. The train trip was fairly expensive, but our Glasgow-London return trip was about $20 per person, including all fees.

Sorry, that was unclear. Our return trip from Glasgow to London on Ryanair was about $20.

Going by Ryanair means you fly Stansted to Prestwick - which for you may be useful as you can catch a train via Ayr to Stranraer

Alanrow - Funny,.. I was not asking you if you wanted to visit either city or if you even like them. I was merely trying to make a point. two very different cities.

AllyO- I think you got some very valuable repilies.
I love Scotland, we were there in march and I just was looking at osme of my pictures.

AllyO,

Short answer. Glasgow.

Long answer. As others have said decide on your interests, do some Googling on Glasgow, get some literature. You have some time yet to plan.

Sure, London has a lot to offer. It is also big, crowded, busy, expensive and full of tourists. It's a long way from Stranraer (OK it's a short flight, but how much total time would you lose?).

Glasgow may have fewer attractions to offer, but what it has is good. It is quieter, cheaper and smaller than London. It is easy to get out into good countryside very quickly. The people are great.

As you will have gathered I am a contrarian in matters like this. Don't fall into the 'must see list' trap. The UK is not just London, there are many other places which will give you a much better feeling for the country and be less tiring and so more enjoyable. For my money Glasgow is one such place.

Michael

The train journey up the east coast, between London &amp; Edinburgh, has some stunning sections. The train journey up the west coast, which is the way you'd usually travel between London &amp; Glasgow, doesn't.

I'd say with 2 weeks in late May, just tour Scotland. It's one of the best times to be here with the days almost at their longest, &amp; hopefully no midges yet. There is plenty to see &amp; a lot of ground to cover in Scotland, without even including Glasgow - although personally I really like Glasgow &amp; go there quite a bit.

I'd do Glasgow just because of the shortness of time available.

I don't agree with alanRow that it's 2nd division. It's not my favouriste Scottish city, but that's because we've got Edinburgh.

It has fantastic people, fantastic shopping, great architecture and great museums and art. But mainly it's a people watching city.

An alternative would be to fly into Belfast and get the ferry to Stranraer.

It's not up there with London though

Diff'rent strokes.

I'd rather spend 3 days in Glasgow than London, but maybe I fit Dr Johnston's aphorism.

A timely question from AllyO.

Some friends recently spent 10 days vacation in the UK, split between London and Glasgow. First time visitors to both cities. They preferred Glasgow.

'It's not up there with London though'

I'm really pleased about that. I'd hate it if Glasgow was. For me, it's smaller, unique, friendly and has some of the most beautiful parks and Victorian buildings in the UK. Oh, and a fantastic gateway to the rest of Scotland.

I worked in London for seven years. One month would have been enough.

Joe