Quick overnight LGW -- time for London?
 

We arrive at LGW at 6 pm on a Monday, depart LGW at noon on Tuesday. Would you suggest trying to pop into London for the evening and overnight, or stay out in a town near Gatwick?

If the latter, which town, what B&B or hotel? (Trying to avoid spending the 18 hrs. in an airport hotel just killing time.)

Click on my name to read the recent email inquiring about Rye and Haversham. In one of the answers to it Mr. Ben Haines suggests spending the night before a Gatwick flight in Brighton. It is approximately 30 minutes from the airport. I think we may do that.

An alternative suggestion is the Victorian Thistle close to Victoria Station in London.

I would take the Gatwick Express in to Victoria Station. It takes 30-35 minutes and a roundtrip ticket is 23.50 GBP per person. You can buy tickets at the desk, which is just outside of passport control, or you can purchase them on the train (credit cards accepted).

The Thistle Victoria is a great suggestion, since you'll never even have to cross a street to get there. Here's a website:

http://www.thistlehotels.com/thistle...Link/index.jsp

Sorry about the length of that, but if it creates an issue, you can just go to:

www.thistlehotels.com

and then drill in. There are often good rates at the Thistle, but there are a couple of other possibilities within very close walking distance. One is the Hesperia - London Victoria Hotel (2 Bridge Place, I believe -- it's formerly the Holiday Inn Victoria); another is the Comfort Inn Victoria which is nearby on Belgrave Road (E-Z walk, not too pricey).

w/ a noon departure I agree w/ flyboy. Stay at or near victoria. Besides the Thistle he mentions (which is a good choice), there is also a Holiday Inn just out a side door of the station - less than a block's walk. And there are many other B&Bs and hotels w/ a 3 or 4 block walk.

It is only 30+ mins in on the Gatwick Express driectly from the terminal to Victoria. So w/ a 6 p.m. landing you can easily be at your hotel by 7 or 7:30 p.m.

Then you can wander around London all evening - have a nice dinner and all of the major bldgs are illuminated so either walking or taking a cab tour will let you see a lot. You would be w/i walking distance of Buckingham Palace. You could even squeeze in a ride on the London Eye and then walk along the south bank seeing Big Ben, St Paul's, Tate Modern, the Globe etc. None of the sites will be open but you can still have a nice evening.

Another area you could easily get to is Covent Garden, lots of pubs/cafes/restaurants, enjoy the street performers and great people watching.

The next day you can take an early morning walk before you check out, walk to Victoria station and hop on the train back to LGW by about 9-9:30 a.m.

If you are energetic, definitely head straight into London. If you haven't been there before, Janis's ideas are good. If you have been, then I'd suggest (unless you've traveled 12 hours by plane, then never mind!) going to a play or checking out ticketmaster.uk to find out what's on and do something fun.

janis, that Holiday Inn that you mentioned is the one I was talking about that is no longer a Holiday Inn (although it's obviously still a very convenient choice). To find it on the web now, go to:

http://www.hesperia-londonvictoria.com/

Thanks for the update flyboy - I was just in that area just a few months ago but never walked down Bridge Place and past the hotel so did not know that.

We have a similar layover in August, but arrive at Heathrow at 5 pm, and leave from Gatwick at noon. Another post suggested this wouldn't leave time to see anything, but your suggestion sounds great, Janis. I assume staying at the Thistle would work well, then take the Gatwick express by 9:30 or so?

NatalieM: Yes - in your case staying at the Thistle or some other hotel close to Victoria Station would work well.

Just transferring from LHR to LGW w/o going into central London takes 1 to 2 hours. But you could be at a Victoria area hotel in less than an hour. So even w/ delays/baggage at LHR you could still be checked in by 7 p.m. or a bit after.

Since you don't have to be at LGW until around 10 or 10:30 a.m. you can jump on the Gatwick Express by about 9:30. You will have enough time to wander around London the night before, have a nice dinner, some late night drinks and/or a stroll along the river and be able to get a full night's sleep.

(If your flight out of LGW was very early in the morning I'd recommend staying at the airport - but w/ a noon flight, I'd take the opportunity see a bit of London)

When you say 6, do you mean when you touch down? If so, you won't be out of the airport till 7 at the very earliest, meaning you won't be at your hotel till 8, again, at the earliest. Is it worth the expense and the faff after a long flight? If so, then go for it, if not, then take advice on a nice hotel/b+b near to Gatwick. A nice dinner, a pint of the local brew, a decent night's sleep and a full English breakfast (or just toast and marmalade) and then back on the plane could be equally as memorable as a night in the city.

we have a similar layover in July (arrive 3pm on a sunday and leave 12:20p the next day) and have decided to take the advice to stay in Victoria Station - we have never been to London, so just walking about and seeing some of the major sites for a night is attractive to us.

I have looked into the hotels mentioned and the Thistle Victoria has the best rates - but a look on tripadvisor.com brings up lots of bad reviews of dirty bathrooms and rooms, peeling wallpaper, etc. Can anyone support or refute this? We will have our 2 year old twins with us and I certainly don't want them in a room that isn't clean.

We had quite a nice room with a large bath at the Thistle Victoria a couple of years ago, which we got through Priceline.

If you type the name in the search box, I think you will get a lot of information. All the Thistle hotels come up quite often on the forum.

An update: Our flight actually landed at 7 pm, and it took more than an hour to emerge. What we actually did was go to at The Lawn Guest House in Horley (had made reservations in Feb.). Mr. Grinsted -- a character and hearty fellow -- picked us up when we called him from Gatwick and delivered us to the inn. We checked in and found a wonderful long list with map of restaurants in the area. I can't say Horley has all that charming a downtown (it's all right but bifurcated by the commuter train line) but the Khushboo Indian restaurant was quite good, and it looks like a couple of the others might have been good. Had we not been exhausted, we might have walked around some of the more residential area of Horley, which is chockablock with similar guest houses. Rhododendrons were in bloom everywhere. Mr. Grinsted happily drove us back to the airport in the morning -- he advocated checking in 3 hrs. ahead, which didn't turn out to be necessary, but could easily have been on a busy day.

I think you'd have to land a few hours earlier in the day to make staying overnight in London worth the trip back out in the morning, and ditto going into London for the evening and coming back out for the night.