Planning a trip to England. Pro tips?

[GoinAllTheWay]

So I've been using an app on my phone called Hopper which tracks the trend in prices for where/when you are going. A bit hit or miss but it did notify me of o/w tickets to London from Calgary for $320/person all in. Jumped all over that so we have our tickets there, may worry about getting back home once there.

Which leads to the next part. Accommodations. I think what I'll want to do is make sure at least the first couple of nights we are booked into somewhere in London and figure we'd take our chances with B&B's along the way once we leave the city and head into the countryside.

[bigtmac19]

We stayed in Bloomsbury area, just around the corner from the British Museum. Very good area, within walking distance of a lot of things.

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by jwslam

I was looking fwd to this.

Tried it 3 times. Fish was nothing to write home about. And "chips" are nothing like fries. They're like the new A&W fries that are consistently soggy.

Finally tried it a 4th time which was remarkable; but that was at a French restaurant so even though the experience was in England, it doesn't count as English Fish & Chips.

I loved walking around Windsor? Didn't pay to experience the Wimbledon stadium. In case you're going there, FYI, it's nowhere near the station. Highly suggest getting a data plan + uber.

I did a few day trip to Netherlands (Amsterdam) via EasyJet. Do not recommend. There's a reason why it was discounted. On the way there, I received no notification that the flight was 1 hour delayed until I was checking in at the kiosk. On the way back, we sat on the tarmac for 1.5 hours unexplained why. The planes are old with zero entertainment; it felt like my corporate planes that go to fort mac. Plus I got a middle seat between two larger guys which solidified that feeling. Also, don't fly in/out of Luton if you're in London and plan on bussing/training. Pretty well the most inconvenient place to get to/from.

The trick with cheap flights in Europe is not to try and go somewhere specific, just catch a flight to where ever its cheap, we flew Stansted to Venice for around 50 dollars return, Naples for around 40, last minute seat clearances, find a hotel when you get there, best trips I ever took with my daughter.

[Rautakallio]

Just returned from London and there for 10 days. I must admit this is now my favorite City (it was New York). You could spend an entire month in London and you would only skim the surface. First get an Oyster card at Heathrow and take the Piccadilly Line to London and do not take the express (not worth it). We used two excellent apps when there that did not require cellular or Wi-Fi (London Travel Guide by Ulmon and Tubemap by MapWay).

Also, used a credit card with no Exchange fees (Amazon.ca Rewards Visa Card) and has no monthly fees.

Go look at the English Heritage Site. We bought a visitor membership and it gets you into a long list of sites rather than paying individually.

Landed there on the day of the Terror Attack so had to adjust our plans. Took British Airways and would definitely would go with them again.


My list and recommendations:

1. London Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. Highly Recommended
2. London Eye – Recommended as it gives you a good lay of the land so do it early. We bought the tickets online and took the fast trak.
3. Buckingham Palace and the Canada Gates are recommended but not really that impressed with Changing of the Guard. Apparently, crowds were light but we still had to be there 45 minutes early and stand around. If I did it again I would watch them March in to the Palace and then leave.
4. Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus and Oxford are great to see and you can do all those easily in a day. We also went to the National Portrait Gallery, its free and very impressive.
5. Greenwich is highly recommended. My biggest regret was not going into the Royal Observatory. That is where the GMT line is and everyone said it was well worth it. Greenwich Park is beautiful and lots to see and shop around there. We took the Ferry (run by the Tube and you can use your Oyster Card) from there back to Westminster and great way to see London from the River.
6. Drove down to Dover and again highly recommended. Viewed and walked the cliffs and also did a tour of Dover Castle which is amazing.
7. Drove to Brighton (recommended) but stopped in a town called Rye (Highly Recommended). We then drove to Stonehenge which I would recommend. They have a great interpretive center and just seeing it was well worth it. We spent a couple of hours there and that was enough.
8. Went to an area called Brixton. Great markets, shopping and food. Highly recommended.
9. St. Paul’s Cathedral is highly recommended. One of the most beautiful and interesting places I have ever seen. You could spend lots of time there and lots to do around that area.
10. If you have time go to the Royal Vauxhall Tavern on Monday night for Drag Queen Bingo. You will not regret it. Go get dinner before hand across the street at Nandos (amazing Chicken).


With the exchange rate, we found London to be quite reasonable and I had two teenagers in tow.
Hope this helps and have a great vacation!

John

[afc wimbledon]

Royal Vauxhall Tavern is actually one of the oldest gay meeting places in, well the world, its been a drag bar since the second world war and was likely a gay meeting place long before then.

[Addick]

Originally Posted by Rautakallio

8. Went to an area called Brixton. Great markets, shopping and food. Highly recommended.

Did you check out Pop Brixton? It is a great place to spend an afternoon/evening.

[Kipper is King]

Originally Posted by Rautakallio

First get an Oyster card at Heathrow

You also can have a visitor oyster card shipped to you ahead of time in Calgary, which saves a few minutes at the airport.

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by Kipper is King

You also can have a visitor oyster card shipped to you ahead of time in Calgary, which saves a few minutes at the airport.

While true it literally takes seconds to buy and load up an oyster card at any Underground station, you don't need ID or anything like that.

[Resolute 14]

I bought one with my London Pass. Was nice to literally just tap and go.

[Addick]

Originally Posted by Kipper is King

You also can have a visitor oyster card shipped to you ahead of time in Calgary, which saves a few minutes at the airport.

Has anyone tried using their Canadian contactless credit card? If it works, that would be super simple.

[GoinAllTheWay]

Thanks for all the info so far! Think we have our 3 or 4 days in London all settled. Still not sure where we intend to fly back from but that's part of the fun. Our anniversary will be on this trip and we are looking at booking a night in an actual castle. Man that would be cool. Bit pricey but worth it.

Also looking at trying to plan time out in the country. Our big thing is castles, we both love them and want to see as many as we can. B&B prices are a bit more than expected, at times almost on par with hotels in city.

[afc wimbledon]

Best place for Castles is Wales and the West Country, its the most fought over part of the country.
My personal favourite is Ludlow, Warwick is stunning as well.

[GoinAllTheWay]

Ok,

Think we are all set, just trying to figure out car rental. Who did you guys use? We have received some rather surprising quotes. For 2 drivers for 6 days in an automatic transmission we are looking at $650ish Canadian? Found a rental place called GreenMotion that is quite a bit cheaper but are a little put off with some of the reviews. We are planning on picking up and dropping off at Gatwick.

I know it's a lot cheaper to rent manual but I'm the only one that can drive stick and would like to share the driving so we need automatic.

[wooohooo]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

So I've been using an app on my phone called Hopper which tracks the trend in prices for where/when you are going. A bit hit or miss but it did notify me of o/w tickets to London from Calgary for $320/person all in. Jumped all over that so we have our tickets there, may worry about getting back home once there.

Which leads to the next part. Accommodations. I think what I'll want to do is make sure at least the first couple of nights we are booked into somewhere in London and figure we'd take our chances with B&B's along the way once we leave the city and head into the countryside.

I would only use hopper to get the price notifications but I wouldn't book through them. I was waiting for deals to paris this summer and missed the low time but the prices would dip every so often so I used Hopper to notify me. It dipped again so I 'hopped' on and bought through their app. Everything seemed to go through but the next day I got a your credit card was declined message, so i called my credit card company and they had no issues. It turned out that Hopper has a delay in that when you purchase the tickets, it goes to their agents that will then purchase it on your behalf or something to that matter. However this was a 6 hour wait and the prices went back up so they could not lock in the price.

I saw the same price on Air Canada and if I just bought through their website I could have had the sale price. But I thought I would try to use Hopper but I got burned doing that.

Just a FYI. Doesn't happen often, but it does happen...