The 2010 Baltic Thread--Cruise Tips and Planning

[epcotrulz]

Hi all ... Arrived safe and sound in England! Silverline cars was great. B&B is nice .. Going out for a walk soon to try to stay awake!

see you soon!

 

[Rogillio]

Thanks for all the well wishes! It paid off as we had pretty uneventful flights. We flew in a brand new Boeing 777 to London. We were in row 1 and the first class seats on this plan recline to 180 degrees and are 6'6" long. So we managed to get a couple of hours sleep.

We bought Oyster cards at Heathrow and put 20 lbs on each of the 4 cards. There is also a 3 lbs deposit on each card. I'm not sure how we get the deposit and any unused balance back after we are done using the cards.

Per Andrew's direction, we took the Picaliddly line to the Victorian line and then Victoria to Pemlico station. We then wandered around a little lookin for the Melbourne House. The Medlbourne house is a nice place - small but very clean looks like it's been remodled recently. This was one of the few hotel we found were four of us could get one room so we did not have to book two rooms.

Getting ready to go explore. We were totally spent when we got here so took a nap. I got up after 1:30, took a shower and am ready to go. Now I just need to get everyone else up.

It's funny, for the longest time I tried to think of everything that could go wrong while traveling but everything went great....except the one thing we did not inticipate. My daughter is even more prone to motion sickness than I am and got airsick and made a mess of her shirt and pants. I washed them out as best I could but we had only packed a change of underwear in our carry on, not a full change of clothes. It would really have been nice if we had a change of clothes. Fortunately this happened only about a hr before landing in London so, after we cleared customs, we got her some fresh clothes.

Off to rouse the family again so we can go explore. The weather is cool. Not cold but it's jeans, not shorts now.

~Mike

 

[NancyIL]

We bought Oyster cards at Heathrow and put 20 lbs on each of the 4 cards. There is also a 3 lbs deposit on each card. I'm not sure how we get the deposit and any unused balance back after we are done using the cards.

Glad you got to London safely. It's too bad your daughter got sick on the plane. Had she taken motion sickness medicine before the flight departed? My bottle of Meclizine will be close at hand when we fly and for our cruise.

I think you turn in the Oyster cards at a tube station to get the deposit refunded. That's why I'm not messing with Oyster cards! I will buy one-day travel cards for each of the two days that we will be using public transportation.

 

[mom_rules]

Glad you got to London safely. It's too bad your daughter got sick on the plane. Had she taken motion sickness medicine before the flight departed? My bottle of Meclizine will be close at hand when we fly and for our cruise.

I think you turn in the Oyster cards at a tube station to get the deposit refunded. That's why I'm not messing with Oyster cards! I will buy one-day travel cards for each of the two days that we will be using public transportation.

One day travel cards? Can you point me in the right direction for these?

 

[Toocoolmom]

I have been following along with everyone's conversations and have loved all the great information. We are on the July 18th cruise and trying to finalize some plans.
We are flying into Heathrow and staying in Mayfair at the Holiday Inn. How should we get there? Train? Private Vehicle? Can anyone give me some advise. Thanks so much.

 

[NancyIL]

One day travel cards? Can you point me in the right direction for these?

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/14416.aspx Off-peak is for weekends, and weekdays after 9:30 a.m.

 

[NancyIL]

I have been following along with everyone's conversations and have loved all the great information. We are on the July 18th cruise and trying to finalize some plans.
We are flying into Heathrow and staying in Mayfair at the Holiday Inn. How should we get there? Train? Private Vehicle? Can anyone give me some advise. Thanks so much.

You could take the tube (subway) from Heathrow. Unfortunately, some stations have escalators that don't always work! We took the Heathrow Connect to Paddington Station in September (https://www.heathrowconnect.com - about half the price of Heathrow Express but takes longer), and then a taxi from there to our hotel. You could also check with private transfer companies. We used Eddie Manning in 2005: http://www.eddiemanning.com/

Welcome to the DIS!

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

One day travel cards? Can you point me in the right direction for these?

We have Oyster cards and old style Tickets called and some called travelcards.

If you only want to do a few journeys it maybe cheaper.

First you can purchase at any ticket office, or self service ticket machines in the ticket hall.

Care choose the Zones you require, Zone 1 is Central London inside the circle line. Zone two warps around that, and outwards to the normal last Zone 6, (few exceptions).

You can buy in cash or credit card.

If you buy after 9.30am Weekdays or all Weekend its cheaper. Buy you can buy them before 9.30am, weekdays but thoose are circa double the price.

Travelcard covers Tube, Bus and rail in that Zone, for that day for a fixed price.

 

[Madisonznana]

I have been following along with everyone's conversations and have loved all the great information. We are on the July 18th cruise and trying to finalize some plans.
We are flying into Heathrow and staying in Mayfair at the Holiday Inn. How should we get there? Train? Private Vehicle? Can anyone give me some advise. Thanks so much.

Come join us on the July 18th thread. We have a lot of helpful info on page 1 of our thread. http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2453129&page=63

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

I have been following along with everyone's conversations and have loved all the great information. We are on the July 18th cruise and trying to finalize some plans.
We are flying into Heathrow and staying in Mayfair at the Holiday Inn. How should we get there? Train? Private Vehicle? Can anyone give me some advise. Thanks so much.

Piccadilly line from any Heathrow terminal.

They all have either Escalator access, or elevators at Heathrow, inc Disability access.

Then all the way on that line to Hyde Park corner. That is the bottom of Mayfair, not sure of your hotel location but it could be *there* or a small taxi ride.

The Escalators service on that line are all working as of today.

Piccadilly line for you is the most direct, see Mikes entries he did what I said and posted it went fine.

Heathrow Express leaves you at Paddington then another two tubes or a reasonable Taxi ride.

Note Heathrow connect is the stopping service, it stops at about 5 stations I know I was on it today and saw people from Heathrow (had luggage labels) going to Paddington as three HE overtook!! I didnt have an alternative.

Black cabs are at Heathrow

 

[NancyIL]

If you buy after 9.30am Weekdays or all Weekend its cheaper. Buy you can buy them before 9.30am, weekdays but thoose are circa double the price.

Travelcard covers Tube, Bus and rail in that Zone, for that day for a fixed price.

I think you can BUY an off-peak travel card before 9:30, but you have to wait until 9:30 to use it.

Off-Peak Day Travelcards can be used

From 09:30 Monday to Friday or all day Saturday, Sunday and public holidays on the day of validity and for any journey that starts before 04:30 on the following day.

On:

* Tube, DLR, London Overground and National Rail† services within the zones covered by the ticket
* All London buses in all zones
* Trams if it includes Zones 3, 4, 5, or 6
* Scheduled boat services at 1/3 discount

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

I think you can BUY an off-peak travel card before 9:30, but you have to wait until 9:30 to use it.

No.

 

[Celestine]

I think you can BUY an off-peak travel card before 9:30, but you have to wait until 9:30 to use it.

In my experience that depends upon the person selling the tickets. Not sure about the machines, I guess they are preprogrammed to start to sell those after a certain time only

Celestine

 

[NancyIL]

In my experience that depends upon the person selling the tickets. Not sure about the machines, I guess they are preprogrammed to start to sell those after a certain time only

Celestine

I won't be buying our tickets from a machine, because I don't have a chip and pin credit card. I'll go to a ticket booth.

 

[NancyIL]

The Escalators service on that line are all working as of today.

Having experienced taking the tube from Heathrow when the escalators weren't working at the end tube stop - I wouldn't count on that being a sure thing!

 

[NancyIL]

Heathrow Express leaves you at Paddington then another two tubes or a reasonable Taxi ride.

Note Heathrow connect is the stopping service, it stops at about 5 stations I know I was on it today and saw people from Heathrow (had luggage labels) going to Paddington as three HE overtook!! I didnt have an alternative.

Heathrow Connect (7.90 GBP) is half the price of Heathrow Express(16.50 GBP). I didn't mind an extra ~15 minutes on the train to save money.

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

In my experience that depends upon the person selling the tickets. Not sure about the machines, I guess they are preprogrammed to start to sell those after a certain time only

Celestine

I won't be buying our tickets from a machine, because I don't have a chip and pin credit card. I'll go to a ticket booth.

Self service machines and also ticket offices all work on the same basis, and on the same clock they cannot do it before 9.30am, you have to wait until it turns over at 9.30am.

A number of years back, when the system wasn't fully automated, you could find a friendly ticket person to issue it 5 mins or so early. They cant do that now as it looses revenue for LTF.

I know as when my season ticket is out, and i think cheap day is better than Oyster I do it and wait at TO until it turns 9.30am as my fast train is 9.32

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

Heathrow Connect is half the price of Heathrow Express. I didn't mind an extra ~15 minutes on the train to save money.

Understand thats worth considering but wanted to cover the full alternatives as people make mistakes, it is at least 15 mins more and tonight I saw 3 HE overtake when I had to use the local service on that line.

My guess is many of people after a 8 hour flight would fine the quicker route better.

For Mayfair Piccadilly even with a small taxi ride will be cheaper.

 

[NancyIL]

Self service machines and also ticket offices all work on the same basis, and on the same clock they cannot do it before 9.30am, you have to wait until it turns over at 9.30am.

A number of years back, when the system wasn't fully automated, you could find a friendly ticket person to issue it 5 mins or so early. They cant do that now as it looses revenue for LTF.

I know as when my season ticket is out, and i think cheap day is better than Oyster I do it and wait at TO until it turns 9.30am as my fast train is 9.32

Thanks, Andrew - I stand corrected!

 

[NancyIL]

Understand thats worth considering but wanted to cover the full alternatives as people make mistakes, it is at least 15 mins more and tonight I saw 3 HE overtake when I had to use the local service on that line.

My guess is many of people after a 8 hour flight would fine the quicker route better.

For Mayfair Piccadilly even with a small taxi ride will be cheaper.

Taking the tube will be an even slower option than Heathrow Connect plus a taxi.