travelmonkey

My husband and I are looking for suggestions on where to travel when we leave Brighton. We'll have 5 more days before we fly back out of London. We will be traveling by train and are spending the first half of the trip in London. We spent a week in Cornwall last year so we are looking for suggestions either along the central or Eastern coast. We had considered Dover to see the White Cliffs? We've also considered the Isle of Wight and the possibility of returning to London?

ParisAmsterdam

Battle for Battle of Hastings?

Canterbury?

Portsmouth for the Victory?

sofarsogood

the jurassic coast

http://jurassiccoast.org/visiting-th.../gateway-towns

Hooameye

Portsmouth:
http://www.visitportsmouth.co.uk/

willit

Do you want to stay in one place for the whole 5 days - or move around?

You could stay in Portsmouth and use that as a base - although there is plenty to do there. I would probably prefer Winchester. From both you could do a day trip to the IOW (direct from Portsmouth, or via Southampton from Winchester)

ESW

When are you planning to travel?

Relying on the train will limit where you can go. Have you thought about Devon?

From Exeter there is a branch line to Exmouth.

Alternatively take the line to the North Devon coast at Barnstaple. From here there are buses to Ilfracombe or Lynmouth and Lynton.

From Taunton you can catch a bus to Bishop's Lydyard. From here you can catch the preserved West Somerset railway which takes you to Watchet and Minehead.

The main line to Cornwall runs along the coast from Dawlish Warren to Paignton. Torquay would be a nice base for the south coast. There are buses to the lovely small town of Totnes with its ruined castle, Here you can get the South Devon preserved railway to Buckfastleigh.
http://www.southdevonrailway.co.uk/
There is also the Dartmouth Steam Railway from Paignton to kingswear and the ferry across to Dartmouth. Where you can do a river cruise on the River Dart.
http://www.dartmouthrailriver.co.uk/

Either spend the five days in one location or split between two.

travelmonkey

Thanks for the ideas! I will check them out. We are open to either, willit. I've not looked into Devon ESW, but will definitely check it out. We'll be traveling in May.

texasbookworm

Well, you probably can't go wrong by heading back to London; I'm going back for my 6th trip this June, and while I've seen almost all my "gotta see" sites, many more than once, I'm finding way too many new ideas to fit in my week (which will probably include 3 or 3.5 day trips)--if a man is tired of London....!

However, I can sooooo highly recommend Dover. The castle is definitely a highlight of our several trips--been twice. Incredible, historic, beautiful vistas (we did have two gorgeous days for views, which isn't always true). And my walks along the White Cliffs--two of them, one long and one short--remain in my top favorite memories of England. "Seeing" the White Cliffs isn't best done from on them--I guess you need to be in a ferry to get those iconic views--but the trails along them are terrific and you do get several views of them. I really can't recommend Dover highly enough. (It is a lonnnnnnnggg slog up to the castle and a looonnnngggg trek --ok I'm past....40!ha----to the Cliffs park parking lot--once we had a car and so that was great. If I ever went again without a car, I'd be looking at taxis for some of those legs.)

Also Canterbury would be great. As I teach history and literature, the Cathedral holds especial interest for me and it didn't disappoint even on a dreary drippy day. All we got to see of the town was the Cathedral, mostly, so I can't speak of anything else.

We loved Battle, too--the Abbey and the Battle site.

ESW

May is a lovely time to travel.