transport from Central London to Southampton
 

What is the best way to travel to the cruise ship? I hear it is a 90 mile ride? Are there shuttles from center of the city?

There are shuttles and I will look the site up for you. We are cruising in October and are taking the train.

www.silver-fleet.co.uk is just one possibility; there are others easily found using Google

Doesn't your cruise line give you info about this ? It should. I would take the train from Waterloo Station to Southampton, then a cab.

I responded on your other thread.

The train takes 1 hr 20-ish minutes w/o any stops. Then it is a 1.5 mile cab ride.

A car service would cost more and take about 2.5 hours (or more on a weekday).

Stay near Waterloo and take the train (or spend the night near Southampton)

Megabus offers train tickets on the Waterloo-Southampton route which are VERY cheap.

Use this tool
http://www.traveline.info/ for joined up public services

Take a look at Londontoolkit also, we took a transfer with them in July 2013 with a stop at Stonehenge en route.

But do check your bags are offloaded at the correct cruise terminal, DH's bag went on a Princess cruise to the Baltics, though we were reunited with it on our return from Iceland and Norway a fortnight later!

http://www.londontoolkit.com/travel/..._transfers.htm

Trains also go from London Victoria to Southampton. Particularly handy if you are flying into Gatwick.

Buy tickets in advance on...

http://www.southernrailway.com/

...will often get a good discount, whereas I'm pretty sure you can't get discounted tickets on South West Train [from Waterloo to Southampton].

LL - you've made that suggestion before but it's only fair to point out that the direct train from Victoria to Southampton takes <b>2h32m</b> compared with as little as 1h15m on the SWT lines from Waterloo to Southampton (PS: Janis, I think you meant to say this is a <i>direct</i> service, it certainly isn't <i>non-stop</i>).

Wordsmith is apparently staying in London for a couple of days prior to the cruise so the Gatwick bit is not relevant in this case.

Personally, I'd want to be a whole lot closer to the docks the night before my cruise departed (i.e. within a 30 minute taxi journey), just in the unlikely, but not implausible, event of a problem on the railway line.

Oops - I meant 1+ hours without any TRANSFERS

Thanks GordonR

All that said, Bedar is right - the cruise company should provide this info to its customers.

@Gordon_R<<<LL - you've made that suggestion before but it's only fair to point out that the direct train from Victoria to Southampton takes 2h32m compared with as little as 1h15m on the SWT lines from Waterloo to Southampton.>>>

I posted it as an alternative, not as a positive recommendation. And I'll continue to make it tvm!

If it's not the right route for the OP, then so be it.
But it might be a more convenient route for anyone staying near Victoria, or as I stated, just landing at LGW.

I commuted by SWT trains between Waterloo and Portsmouth for a couple of years, and getting stuck around the Wimbledon area [which the Southampton train goes through] was a regular occurrence.

Tbh, the time the journey could take is never a dead cert.

I definitely agree with your last paragraph about where to spend the night before the cruise.

The "cruise company" usually provides ONE thing: the option to use the transfers which IT provides. I have yet to see any cruise line telling people about other company's tours, transfers, or anything else which is going to siphon revenue away from the cruise line. Get real!