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London/York/Hastings/Southhampton?


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I need help. We are in the planning stage right now and I would love to get some ideas on our plans. We are flying into London and want to spend about 3 days there. We would love to go back to York for a couple of days also. We have to be in Hastings for a birthday party on April 20th and we are taking the Queen Mary to NYC on April 28th out of Southhampton. Is all of this feasible by train taxi or bus...we do not drive. What order would you suggest we do this in. We are flexible with flying into London. I would appreciate any suggestions anyone can give us. Thanks so much!

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Coach (bus) or train?

 

https://www.nationalexpress.com/en

Coach is the cheaper by a long way, but frequency is poor and journey times longer.

Pricing is pretty simple, but pre-booking is recommended purely because of limited capacity.

 

http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/

Train is much quicker, and more frequent. A good deal more expensive than the coach, but if you can travel at the cheapest time-of-day and you pre-book, the cost difference can be significantly reduced.

The pricing can be quite baffling, but broadly there are three prices......

1. Anytime - is the most expensive.

2. Off-peak - is cheaper, but you are limited to trains outside peak times and some routings (but routings you usually want to take anyway) are excluded.

3. This service only - is the bucket-price, but your pre-purchased ticket is only good for the train day and time that you chose.

I'm no expert on train ticketing, but there are folk on this forum who can help if you have any specific queries.

 

Both websites are spelling-sensitive. It's Southampton

 

Try some dummy journeys now to get the hang of the websites, the pricing, etc. You'll need to use dummy dates within the next few weeks - prices will probably be a little higher next April and there's been a recent excruciating round of timetable changes which will doubtless be fine-tuned in the meantime, but you'll get a general idea.

 

Once you've figured the total train fares for each person, figure if you can save money by buying a railcard

https://www.railcard.co.uk/

(they cost £30 but save one-third off the fares. Altho' each card costs £30, the "two together" card covers two, so effectively costs £15 each)

 

Something similar with coachcards if you're over-60 or disabled.

https://www.nationalexpress.com/en/offers/coachcards

They also save one-third minimum and cost £12.50 per senior

 

No UK residency required for the railcard, I think the same applies to the coachcard.

But for other CC members reading this - they're not worthwhile for a one-off journey such as London to Southampton or Dover.

 

Public transport in England is very London-centric eg York to Southampton is via London (unless you take the more expensive train option via Bristol).

Since you want to spend most of your pre-cruise time in London, best to use London as your base and travel from there to Hastings and to York, and finally to Southampton.

For your couple of days in York, and mebbe for an overnite in Hastings (last train back to London is 10.30pm), ask your London hotel if they will store your main luggage (or use left-luggage facilities at all main London stations), because London hotel prices are too high to keep your room just for your luggage.

Alternatively if by coach make it London, then York. Then York to Southampton the day before your sailing - but it's about a 10 hour journey.

 

Central London's coach station is in Victoria, so if you choose coach travel a hotel in Victoria would be easiest - and a wider selection and slightly lower hotel prices.

If you travel by train it's more difficult to advise because you'll be using several different London stations, but perhaps in the Waterloo area because for the train to Southampton you'll be using Waterloo station and you'll have luggage.

 

Long-haul flights to London are almost all to either Heathrow (LHR) or Gatwick (LGW). Both have excellent public transport to central London - choose by airline, flight fares etc and don't worry whether it's to LHR or LGW.

If it's to LHR you might want your London hotel to be in Paddington, and pre-book the Heathrow Express literally months ahead. https://www.heathrowexpress.com/

Early bookings about £5 each

Late bookings / walk-up over £20 each - and for two people that's close to the cost of a private transfer airport to central London hotel !!

 

Open a big jar of headache pills & brew a pot of strong coffee before you open those websites.

Happy reading ;)

 

JB :)

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Coach (bus) or train?

 

https://www.nationalexpress.com/en

Coach is the cheaper by a long way, but frequency is poor and journey times longer.

Pricing is pretty simple, but pre-booking is recommended purely because of limited capacity.

 

http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/

Train is much quicker, and more frequent. A good deal more expensive than the coach, but if you can travel at the cheapest time-of-day and you pre-book, the cost difference can be significantly reduced.

The pricing can be quite baffling, but broadly there are three prices......

1. Anytime - is the most expensive.

2. Off-peak - is cheaper, but you are limited to trains outside peak times and some routings (but routings you usually want to take anyway) are excluded.

3. This service only - is the bucket-price, but your pre-purchased ticket is only good for the train day and time that you chose.

I'm no expert on train ticketing, but there are folk on this forum who can help if you have any specific queries.

 

Both websites are spelling-sensitive. It's Southampton

 

Try some dummy journeys now to get the hang of the websites, the pricing, etc. You'll need to use dummy dates within the next few weeks - prices will probably be a little higher next April and there's been a recent excruciating round of timetable changes which will doubtless be fine-tuned in the meantime, but you'll get a general idea.

 

Once you've figured the total train fares for each person, figure if you can save money by buying a railcard

https://www.railcard.co.uk/

(they cost £30 but save one-third off the fares. Altho' each card costs £30, the "two together" card covers two, so effectively costs £15 each)

 

Something similar with coachcards if you're over-60 or disabled.

https://www.nationalexpress.com/en/offers/coachcards

They also save one-third minimum and cost £12.50 per senior

 

No UK residency required for the railcard, I think the same applies to the coachcard.

But for other CC members reading this - they're not worthwhile for a one-off journey such as London to Southampton or Dover.

 

Public transport in England is very London-centric eg York to Southampton is via London (unless you take the more expensive train option via Bristol).

Since you want to spend most of your pre-cruise time in London, best to use London as your base and travel from there to Hastings and to York, and finally to Southampton.

For your couple of days in York, and mebbe for an overnite in Hastings (last train back to London is 10.30pm), ask your London hotel if they will store your main luggage (or use left-luggage facilities at all main London stations), because London hotel prices are too high to keep your room just for your luggage.

Alternatively if by coach make it London, then York. Then York to Southampton the day before your sailing - but it's about a 10 hour journey.

 

Central London's coach station is in Victoria, so if you choose coach travel a hotel in Victoria would be easiest - and a wider selection and slightly lower hotel prices.

If you travel by train it's more difficult to advise because you'll be using several different London stations, but perhaps in the Waterloo area because for the train to Southampton you'll be using Waterloo station and you'll have luggage.

 

Long-haul flights to London are almost all to either Heathrow (LHR) or Gatwick (LGW). Both have excellent public transport to central London - choose by airline, flight fares etc and don't worry whether it's to LHR or LGW.

If it's to LHR you might want your London hotel to be in Paddington, and pre-book the Heathrow Express literally months ahead. https://www.heathrowexpress.com/

Early bookings about £5 each

Late bookings / walk-up over £20 each - and for two people that's close to the cost of a private transfer airport to central London hotel !!

 

Open a big jar of headache pills & brew a pot of strong coffee before you open those websites.

Happy reading ;)

 

JB :)

 

 

WOW John....thanks so much for all that info. Giving me the website addresses is terrific. Now I can start looking into the transportation we want to do. You have given me a lot of choices to look into and I appreciate the time you took to do this. Thank again....looks like I will be busy for awhile now lol.

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Train is much quicker, and more frequent.
Only a quick note to add: For London <--> York, I think that the train is a no-brainer because of the journey time. The service to York is particularly good, and many trains take less than 2 hours (ie at an average speed of over 100 mph). In contrast, the fastest coaches take about 5½ hours.

 

If you then stick to trains, you'll get the most out of your railcard.

 

FWIW, if you choose to stay near Waterloo for the train to Southampton, then it's also easy to get to Hastings. One of the options is direct trains that start at Charing Cross. That is directly across the river from Waterloo, but more importantly, most Charing Cross trains call at Waterloo East which is just across the road (Waterloo Road) from the main Waterloo station. So that would add to the convenience of a hotel in that area, which is not a bad place to be for sightseeing in London anyway.

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Only a quick note to add: For London <--> York, I think that the train is a no-brainer because of the journey time. The service to York is particularly good, and many trains take less than 2 hours (ie at an average speed of over 100 mph). In contrast, the fastest coaches take about 5½ hours.

 

If you then stick to trains, you'll get the most out of your railcard.

 

FWIW, if you choose to stay near Waterloo for the train to Southampton, then it's also easy to get to Hastings. One of the options is direct trains that start at Charing Cross. That is directly across the river from Waterloo, but more importantly, most Charing Cross trains call at Waterloo East which is just across the road (Waterloo Road) from the main Waterloo station. So that would add to the convenience of a hotel in that area, which is not a bad place to be for sightseeing in London anyway.

 

Thanks so much for your suggestions also Globaliser. Waterloo sounds like a great suggestion. I might look into an apartment rental for a week or more and make that our base to travel to and from. Thanks again for your help. I appreciate it a lot!

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Highly recommend the two together rail card. We used it to go from Southampton to Manchester in first class on the Cross Country line. I agree that basing yourself in London is a good idea so you are not hauling cruise luggage around.

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Highly recommend the two together rail card. We used it to go from Southampton to Manchester in first class on the Cross Country line. I agree that basing yourself in London is a good idea so you are not hauling cruise luggage around.

 

Thank you Alaskanb I will look into that rail card.

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London Kings Cross to York 2 hours journey and best fares online in advance a couple of months prior if you book a specific train

 

run by LNER

 

Thank you for that info fabnfortysomething. It is always great to know how long it takes to get to places you don't know about. Thanks again.

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