Pre-cruise Southampton advice

We arrive into LHR and have one night before embarking a cruise ship in Southampton. I know this doesn’t leave us much time to explore. We need advice all sorts of advice!

1. Since my husband has never been to London, we would like to spend our one day there, but have no idea where to stay. Which area is best for a London newbie to stay?
   
2. What is the best way to get from LHR to wherever we stay and then on to the cruise ship the next day? I did scan the forum. It was all a little confusing. We will have luggage to consider. We don’t want anything too complicated.
   
3. Is renting a car from LHR and returning it in Southampton the next day feasible?
   

Thank you for any advice!

1. For such a short stay I suggest that somewhere in easy reach of Victoria Coach Station would probably be best, although there is a wide choice of alternatives. You could try the Premier Inn Victoria https://www.premierinn.com/gb/en/hotels/england/greater-london/london/london-victoria.html which is reasonably priced and used by many on this board. Easy access from there to Buckingham Palace. Westminster Abbey and The Houses of Parliament.

2. Take a coach https://www.nationalexpress.com/en from Heathrow to Victoria.

3.You can rent a car from LHR and return it to Southampton, but not if you want to go to London. London is a nightmare to drive in and parking (if you can find a space) is very expensive.

On departure day there are several options: Cheapest is to take the direct coach from Victoria. You could use a pre-booked car from one of the Southampton based companies, or you could book a tour through https://www.londontoolkit.com/whattodo/stonehenge_tours.htm.

http://www.smithsairportcars.co.uk/

http://www.aquacars.co.uk/

http://westquaycars.com/

I hope that gives you an idea of what's possible. Much might depend on your budget and what you want to see in the very short time you will be in London.

Bob's suggestion of https://www.nationalexpress.com/en coach (bus) from Heathrow to London Victoria coach station, a hotel in Victoria, then coach from that same Victoria coach station to Southampton next morning is by far the best compromise of simplicity + cost.

There's a wide selection of lodgings in Victoria, from small family hotels to major chains.

Victoria is near Buckingham Palace. It's also tolerably close to Big Ben, Westminster Abbey and a few other sights but London's sights are spread over a wide area so with your short time-frame I'd recommend a ho-ho tour. Check out how convenient your various hotel options are to the Victoria stop for the ho-ho's of the two most-frequent ho-ho operators, https://www.theoriginaltour.com/routes-and-times/tour-times/ or https://www.bigbustours.com/en/london/london-routes-and-tour-maps/

Both ho-ho's finish around 6pm. Other tour operators probably offer night tours, depending what time of year.

Coach takes 50 minutes from Heathrow to Victoria & costs £5 pp.

Booking a private transfer from Heathrow to Victoria would save about half-an-hour in total but cost mebbe £40 more for two people.

Booking the Heathrow Express to Paddington and a hotel in Paddington (again, a good selection of lodgings) would save time (Hex takes only 15 minutes), but depending on the location of the hotel you'd lose a chunk of that time by having to take a ho-ho feeder route to Marble Arch and switch there to a sight-seeing route. Fare on Hex is as low as £5 if booked months in advance but the walk-up fare is over £20pp. Paddington is also inconvenient for coach or train to Southampton next morning - the extra time that morning is no big deal but it adds to the cost & complication.

To Southampton .............

Coach from London Victoria to Southampton costs just £5 pp.

By train http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/ from London Waterloo to Southampton the walk-up fare is over £40 pp but it's only £13.70 if you pre-book for a specified time.

Heathrow to Waterloo with luggage isn't easy by public transport so if you stayed in the Waterloo area (very handy for sight-seeing & on ho-ho sight-seeing routes, as well as ideal for the train to Southampton) I'd suggest a door-to-door private transfer for about £55.

A private transfer from central London to Southampton would cost significantly north of £100 for the car.

Staying at a Heathrow hotel and going into London by tube (metro) is another option. Tube takes about 40 minutes & costs about £12 pp round-trip. Then coach or private transfer next morning to Southampton. Coach from Heathrow to Southampton costs about £17 pp (that's 3x the price of a coach from Victoria even tho its a shorter journey), a private transfer from Heathrow to Southampton would cost toward £100 for the car.

A Heathrow hotel is probably not the best option, but depends on your flight arrival time, airport terminal and which Heathrow hotel.

When is your flight scheduled to land?

As Bob says, renting a car to go into central London is a big no-no. Even if the rental were free!!

In London a rented car is an encumbrance, not an asset.

Don't expect to do any sight-seeing in the morning before you head to Southampton - you have ample time for the journey whether by coach or train or car, but not enough to also sight-see altho the tour-transfer mentioned by Bob from central London or Heathrow via Stonehenge is worth considering. But if you have an evening flight back home post-cruise that same operator's tour-transfer from Southampton is much better value because it fits in both Stonehenge and Windsor.

JB :)

Yikes, you don’t have much time. We did the British Isles cruise in June so I’ll give you my take. First of all, after you land which I’m assuming is early, passport control is a slow process for non EU citizens. Our line was upwards of 90 minutes. Tip: go to the restroom before getting in the line!! I had private transportation arranged, we used a company called Blackberry Cars. This would certainly save you some time over the bus and is so much easier than schlepping your luggage around. I seem to remember the price was around 45£ and you can prepay it on their website. I think the ride to central London took around an hour or so. We were very pleased with Blackberry Cars.

The next day you might want to look into the Cruise line transfer to Southampton. I think on princess it was $59 per person and left from Victoria Coach Station ( which is very close to Victoria Station but not the same building). We did private transportation but had a group of six so could split it up. Therefore I would look for a hotel in the area of Victoria. This will make it easier to get over to the bus the next day. Victoria is also convenient for taking in the sights. Many are walkable from there if you are walkers, or the HOHO bus.

Sent from my iPad using Forums

My take!

What you propose can be done but a few things to ponder on:

How do you cope with jet lag?

Will you be able to sleep on the plane?

What do you specifically want to see in London?

Could you visit London post-cruise?

Could you arrive a day earlier and have a full day in London after a good nights sleep?

Whatever you decide have a great time.

Wow, you all are awesome! Thanks for the great information. Now I feel a plan forming!

I know it isn’t much time in London. I wish we had more, but we don’t. We arrive at 6am. We won’t be able to check into our hotel then, so the plan is to drop off the luggage at the hotel and tour. I know there will be jet-lag, but we’ll power through. We’ll have to since we won’t have a place to sleep until we can check into the hotel. I like the idea of the Ho-Ho. It will make touring easy for our tired bodies. Lol

I still have a few questions. It sounds like staying near the Victoria coach station is the best way to go. We saw a hotel that we like that is close, but might be a little far with luggage if we take the coach. Are there cabs readily available outside the station? If so, how expensive are they? Is it better just to find a hotel we can walk to with luggage? If so, do you have any other 4* hotel suggestions?

Also, how hard is it to catch the national express coach? Is it far from the terminal? I saw from the link that you can buy tickets in advance, but with what SussetBeachGirl said, I’m not sure I feel comfortable doing that. We might get hung up in passport control, or we might breeze right through. It’s hard to know in advance the right bus to take. Can you book it when you arrive?

Thank you again for all your help!

There will be plenty of London's iconic "black cabs" at the coach station, or to be hailed in the street.

If your hotel is within a mile or two (and if it's in Victoria it will be) then the fare shouldn't be more than about £10 - in the greater scheme of things that's no big deal. How handy is the hotel to a ho-ho stop?

Nat. Express coaches pick up right outside Heathrow's T4 and T5 terminals.

For T2 & T3 (there's currently no T1) its a covered and well-signed easy ten-minute walk to Heathrow central bus station.

Yes, timing at LHR can be very variable - mainly due to late/early flight arrivals and varying immigration lines. No delay at all at customs unless her majesty's finest pull you to one side.

For long-distance coaches pre-booking is strongly advised due to limited frequency. Coaches between LHR and Victoria are much more frequent, but I don't know enough about them to give you good advice.

Early-morning trans-Atlantic flights tend to arrive early rather than late, but I'd be inclined to book for about 8am. That guarantees your seats but if all goes well you can switch to an earlier (or later) coach, subject to availability and probably a small admin fee. But I'll defer to better advice from others.

sbgal mentioned ships' transfer coaches. The central London ones usually go from that same Nat Express Victoria coach station. So you're paying extra to avoid a £6 to £10 taxi fare from Southampton coach station to ship - plus the comfort that once on the cruiseline's transfer bus getting you to the ship is the cruiseline's responsibility, and that's a big comfort to some folk.

sbgal mentioned that Princess charge $59 pp, and I've seen other Princess cruisers posting $59 to $65.

But Royal Caribbean charge $101 !!!!

You don't mention your cruise line, but whether you opt for cruise line's transfer coach may well depend on which cruise line it is.

You should have a pretty long day to see London - if you don't fall asleep on the ho-ho. :D

JB :)

I’ve cruised out of Southampton a few times now after flying 8 hours from the PNW. We usually get into London by train from Gatwick but did use National Express on our first trip. I usually can’t sleep on the flight because of excitement. My advice is to get to the Victoria Coach Station area from Heathrow by National Express. Book the reservation for about 90-120 minutes after arrival depending on the bus schedule. I think I missed the time once and they honored it on the next bus. If they don’t, you’re only out $5 and can buy a ticket at the bus area and it would still be cheaper than any other transportation. You can sleep on the bus knowing your luggage is secure. On the train you have to keep your eyes on your luggage and it’s hard when you are tired. You will also be dropped off at Victoria Coach Station so you’ll be familiar with where to go the next morning. Book a hotel near the Coach station to make things easier as you’ll basically just sleep in it. For our upcoming September cruise we’re booked into the Comfort Inn Buckingham Palace which is a block from the Coach station and 3-4 blocks from Victoria train/tube station.

Force yourself to stay up till 7-8pm so that you can sleep well and book an early bus to Southampton. I’ve actually departed on a National Express bus next to the cruise transfer bus .

You can sleep on the bus knowing your luggage is secure. .

............ and Victoria is the coach's terminus. So if you do drift off into the land of nod, there's no risk of sailing past a stop where you meant to get off. :rolleyes:

If your hotel is tolerably close to the ho-ho stop at Buckingham Gate, that's the best place to board.

Whilst you can see all the other sights on the ho-ho route from your seat on the bus, buses aren't allowed past the front of Buckingham Palace so lots of folk get off there to walk round the corner to the Palace & then board the next ho-ho. So a much better chance of a good seat - in fact if you're among the last to board you could let others go ahead of you and be first in line for the next ho-ho, they run at about 10-minute intervals.

JB :)

I can’t thank you enough for the advice! You all have made planning this trip easy when there are so many options. We will take your advice and use national express, a hotel near Victoria coach station, and the ho-ho. Now if only the day would arrive. It can’t here soon enough since I’m so excited!

The St James Court Hotel in Buckingham Gate would be ideal - very well placed for all your plans.

Cruising Princess from Southampton. How close is the National Express Coach station to the ship terminal?

Cruising Princess from Southampton. How close is the National Express Coach station to the ship terminal?

Princess mainly use Ocean cruise terminal (berth 46) or Mayflower (105/6)

http://www.southamptonvts.co.uk/Live_Information/Shipping_Movements_and_Cruise_Ship_Schedule/Cruise_Ship_Schedule/

Both are a little over a mile, about 25 mins on foot, on level ground with good sidewalks and pedestrian lights at road crossings. To Mayflower much of that walk is inside the docks & very boring. There's no restrictions on walking thro the port.

With luggage a £6 to £8 taxi ride is probably better - and if you disagree, our unreliable British weather might change your mind :D

Taxi rank at the coach station - if there's not one waiting and available, they swing by frequently. If you don't have UK currency, check if they accept plastic before boarding - most now do, some don't.

Or use Uber.

JB :)

Thank you :cool: