Georgraphically challenged - need advice

[swilshire]

Hi UK Dissers,

I'm going a bit nuts trying to put together a trip for my family of 6 to your beautiful country. The two oldest kids and I visited once with a high school band group. They marched in the Lord Mayors parade on New Years day about four years ago. I thought it would be a terrific trip for the whole group in June, but I've run into a lot of obstacles that I didn't anticipate.

My current schedule is something like this:

Arrive early on the morning of June 14 at Manchester airport (it was our cheapest option). Try to figure out how to drive on the "wrong side of the road".

Nights of June 14 and 15 - Staying near Cardiff Wales in a timeshare
Night of June 16 - homeless - need to find a room between there and Glasgow.
June 17 - 24 - A timeshare near Glasgow
June 24 - 29 - I have a booking in London that I'm not at all satisfied with. All of us in one room with no bath and an outrageous price. I keep looking for something better that I can afford, but it has been very hard.
June 29 - July 6 - A timeshare in Devon
July 6 - homeless again until our 10A 7/7 flight. I plan on just booking a room near the Manchester airport.

I've tried priceline to see if I could cut back our five nights in London to two or three for that same week and get better rates. That doesn't seem to work Someone finally told me it was Wimbledon time. That's still an option, or I could just book one night in London for June 16. (The 14th and 15th are non-refundable or I could have done three nights then) and spend the five nights I'd planned to be in London somewhere else.

What would you do if your budget was in serious disarray? What's the minimum time you could spend in London to see the highlights. The three who haven't been are DH and sons ages 8 and 13, so the 8 yo could probably care less what we do. DH is pretty agreeable to whatever I suggest as well. Nobody wants to be miserable in terrible lodging.

Hope you can help me find a solution to this first problem, then I'll aggravate you with all the other questions I'm bound to have between now and mid-June.

If you ever need to know anything about Tennessee or lots of other areas in the US, I'll be glad to return the favor.

Thanks.

Sheila

 

[Claire L]

Firstly welcome across to the UK boards I know London can be very expesive at the best of times! What prices have you got and what location are they? Also how are you getting from Glasgow to London as it is a very long way with our road system.

Claire

 

[carolfoy]

Hi Sheila and welcome to the UK, its a good job you're looking at this now rather than leave it til you get here.
your itinerary seems to involve a lot of backtracking,
you arive in manchester and go immediately to Cardiff, if you'd gone to the North of Wales - the Snowdonia region or around there you'd have a shorter drive to get there.
you're then going past manchester again to get to Glasgow
it would have been easier to put glasgow on the end and then you've a shorter distance to go to get out of manchester again,
I would have done the first bit as
arrive manchester, 1 night snowdonia,
2 night cardiff
1 week Devon
4 nights london
fly to glasgow 1 week there
fly back out of manchester, that way you're doing a sort of circular route.
If you need any help on train times/prices or anything please feel free to pm me.
How much are you currently spending on your accom in London?
I'll see what I can find for you

 

[Claire L]

Travelodge at London City airport is working out as being £660, so around $1320 for the 5 nights in two ensuite rooms. Being as it is by the airport should have good transport links to the centre of London. Plus it is outside the congestion zone charge so if you have the car you can leave it there and use public transport, which to be honest is easier knowing how bad London traffic is!!

Travelodge

Claire

 

[Claire L]

Have you had a look at Expedia as they have got some good deals?

Claire

 

[swilshire]

Thanks for the helpful suggestions so far.

To explain the odd itinerary, we try to book as many of our vacations as we can with timeshares because we can get a nice unit for the six of us for around $100 US a day. The downside is that availability is often limited. Also changes and cancellations are usually not possible, except at high cost. The resorts also usually have very specific checkin dates. You can't start your stay just any day of the week.

London has timeshares, but I was never able to grab a week there. I found the weeks in Glasgow and Devon about a year ago and grabbed them. After I had already bought the airfare, I found another week in northern Scotland that I would have also taken, but it was too expensive to change the fare to go a few days earlier.

I added the two nights near Cardiff because my daughter was planning at the time to spend a semester next year at Swansea and wanted to visit the area. I could get those two nights for $299 US, so thought it would be hard to beat for a nice place. (I actually have an entire week there, but will only be using the last two nights.) DD has since changed her mind about studying over there, but the nights are booked and non-refundable. We had already booked our airfare prior to this, so this may have been a bad decision from the get go.

We are planning to rent a van, which is also turning out to be MUCH more expensive over there than what we're used to. I've rented for three weeks here for around $1000. There it's looking like close to four times that amount.

If I didn't have so many non-refundable elements of the trip already booked, I have to confess I'd stay home. I'm sure it will be an adventure, but we spent three weeks in Hawaii last year for a WHOLE lot less effort and cash. This is going to cost us easily three or four times what that trip did.

I hope three months from now I'll come back and tell you it was worth every penny!

Keep those good suggestions coming.

Sheila

 

[Dimplenose]

You're going to be doing a lot of driving so do make sure your budget for petrol is high enough as ours is a lot more expensive than in US - also the pumps show the price per litre (there are about 4 litres to a US gallon) I thinks it's around 90p a litre at the moment so £3.60 a US gallon.

Libby

 

[KayleeUK]

Hi Sheila

Where in Devon are you staying ? We live in Plymouth, Devon .

Hope you manage to get something sorted for the London part of your trip

 

[mark&sue]

Are you really sure you want to bother with London? Perhaps you could stay on the outskirts and travel in by train


Susan

 

[mark&sue]

How are you paying for your accommodation in London for those dates?


Susan

 

[tony64]

Hi
It really is a long drive from Glasgow to London, It may be worth your while dropping off the car and getting a cheap flight up to Glasgow from Swansea and another back, Have a search on Easy Jets web site as they do some really good prices, it can workout cheaper than driving.

 

[scottishsue]

My son has flown Easijet and prices are very reasonable if you book well ahead of time.

Good luck with it all !!

 

[swilshire]

Hi Sheila

Where in Devon are you staying ? We live in Plymouth, Devon .

Hope you manage to get something sorted for the London part of your trip

We'll be at the Osborne Club. Do you know it?

It looks nice in the photos.

Sheila

 

[swilshire]

Are you really sure you want to bother with London? Perhaps you could stay on the outskirts and travel in by train


Susan

That certainly is an option. I found a hotel at Heathrow, but the concensus on another bboard I frequent was that either the ride would be slow or expensive by train from there to London.

I'm certainly open to suggestions along this line.

Sheila

 

[KayleeUK]

No Sheila - I don't know it but it is in Torquay about an hour away from us.

Would you like me to send you some leaflets on things to do in Devon?

 

[swilshire]

How are you paying for your accommodation in London for those dates?


Susan

I'm not sure I understand your question.

Credit card hopefully, but open to other ways. I've been bidding on Priceline and also searched a few sites that require payment up front.

The reservation that I have, but don't like, is cancellable at no penalty until three days prior to check-in.

Sheila

 

[swilshire]

Have you had a look at Expedia as they have got some good deals?

Claire

Yes, along with several other sites. I've read reviews of the possibilities until I'm blue in the face. Most of the "better" places seem to be sold out for our dates. The fact that there are six of us makes it tough. I've mostly been going for two rooms (either 2 sleeping 3 or 1 for 2 and another for 4), though I could take three rooms sleeping two each if I could make it work.

Sheila

 

[swilshire]

No Sheila - I don't know it but it is in Torquay about an hour away from us.

Would you like me to send you some leaflets on things to do in Devon?

What a lovely offer! Yes, thank you.

I've been so bogged down by the logistics of this trip that I've done little planning for what we'll actually DO once we get there.

Sheila

 

[swilshire]

Hi
It really is a long drive from Glasgow to London, It may be worth your while dropping off the car and getting a cheap flight up to Glasgow from Swansea and another back, Have a search on Easy Jets web site as they do some really good prices, it can workout cheaper than driving.

We enjoy driving because of the things we see going from place to place. In this country, it's usually cheaper to do the rental car for a long period than two or three shorter ones, so I was going from that premise. May not be so true over there. And thanks for the reminder. I was aware that the petrol is more than double the scary prices we're paying here now.

We took a three week vacation in the western US a couple of years ago and drove well over a 1000 miles. Our Fall break last year was 1000 miles each way (for a week --- not really long enough). The distances won't be a problem, but I realize that some of the roads may be slower than the Interstate system we're accustomed to.

I live in an area with no public transport, so my family is very tied to their cars.

Sheila

 

[KayleeUK]

LOL Sheila. No problem. PM me your address and I will pick some up this weekend for you.