Thinking about a trip to England

Parent Cafe
1

We are trying to figure out a family vacation this spring, probably in mid-late March. I asked for suggestions, and got blank stares and shrugs…until one of my sons said, “How about England?” So there it is…and I know nothing about traveling there. Maybe we would visit Scotland or Ireland also.

So our situation is two parents, two mid twenties sons. We are a family of geeks, who like active vacations. The only must see is the Harry Potter museum. I HATE planning and research, so we often do cruises or tours, but I don’t know if those are options this time of year. Maybe 7-9 days at the most. It makes me tired thinking about researching this, because though we’ve spent plenty of time in Europe, no significant travel or knowledge of this country. I’ve always avoided it for some weird reason. Italy and Switzerland have been my first choices, but this time, England it is! Any suggestions?

2

The Harry Potter play of course
https://www.harrypottertheplay.com/uk/

London Walks does a HP tour, as well as many other low cost walking tours (Beatles, pubs etc).
https://www.the-magician.co.uk/

Platform 9 3/4 at Kings Cross has become disturbingly commercialized, but you can still do a photo op with a luggage cart going through the wall

Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace is a free must-do. People like the London Eye. There are “backstage” tours of Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament when those buildings are not in use, not sure they would be available on your dates.

I’m a fan of hop on hop off busses in cities I don’t know, and London has several versions.

You must have high tea somewhere, and if the Shakespeare Globe is open (it may be too early in the season) you should see a play there. If not, there’s a tour, which personally I would skip.

British Museum has a nice collection of artifacts appropriated from other countries - Rosetta Stone, Greek stuff, middle eastern stuff. Even if your family is not history oriented, you could spend a good hour there and feel “cultured.” Museums are typically free, and a good rainy day option.

If you can get tickets (free but you need reservations) for the Ceremony of the Keys (the closing up of Tower of London for the night, which has been done for 700 and some years) go for it! https://www.hrp.org.uk/tower-of-london/explore/ceremony-of-the-keys/#gs.riD8s7s If not, the Tower is still a good visit. I brought a group of students to the keys ceremony and it inspired many of them to do the tower tour the next day.

There are day tours to places like Oxford, Windsor, Stonehenge etc that might be of interest.

You’ll want to invest in tube tickets and learn how to travel via underground (mind the gap!).

3

Scotland and Wales might be an option in addition to England. Frommers books lay out a plan for like 5 days, or 2 days, or 7 days, etc and are very helpful to plan a vacation without thinking too much.

4

When you say active vacation, does that mean actively touring museums and tourist attractions or are you more of the type looking to hike 10 miles a day?

You could EASILY spend 5-7 days in London alone. Plenty to do in that city between all the great museums, tourist attractions, great dining, shows, etc.

5

I love England and Scotland. One of the positives of traveling to either is that you probably will have fewer problems communicating with the natives (probably; some accents can be hard to understand).

6

Brexit happens on March 29. Make sure you come and go before then, just in case. They are stockpiling food and medicine.

7

Yikes. It is most likely we would be there over March 29th, there might not be another option. I wonder if that’s a no go sort of problem.

All great suggestions! These things sound fantastic, I shall check into them all.

@doschicos, sure, for us an active vacation could entail 10 mile hikes. But I suspect with the weather and all the things to do, I would lean towards plenty of walking. Don’t want to be completely sedentary, but we probably wouldn’t be hiking on this trip.

8

For 7 days on the ground, I’d stick to London, with maybe a day trip or 2.
My sister and her college-age daughters did the Harry Potter studio tour and loved it. Sister, surprisingly so. Tickets must be purchased well in advance. They did a later in the day tour, allowing them a morning for London stuff. Easy train ride and bus to the studio.

H and I did Greenwich, another easy ride (there in a boat, home via tube), and spent most of a day. We also saw Hamilton, visited a lot of museums, and ate and drank to excess.

After I don’t know how many visits, I have yet to see Stonehenge, go to Windsor or Hampton Court, or visit the Tate. I just keep planning to go back.

9

The Ardabil carpet in the V&A. The Winston Churchill museum.

10

A train to Edinburgh for the castle and hiking

11

You’ve always avoided it because the weather often sucks. I am generally not the paranoid type, but I think I would avoid being there March 29. Could be like Y2K (a nonevent) but I dunno… A friend went to London last year and the highlight of his visit was a tour of the tunnels that were used during WWII as Churchill’s war room.
https://londonist.com/london/museums-and-galleries/secrets-of-the-churchill-war-rooms

12

Well, during Y2K, we took the kids to Disneyworld, so obviously we have no sense. The place was so packed you had to shuffle through the park. I guess we all figured we’d go out in style, watching the fireworks.

Yes I’m always trying to get away from rainy weather in Seattle during that time. But right now I have a direction, so I guess I’ll run with it. Maybe. Flights are cheap and low airmiles. But I don’t know, maybe we should be paranoid.

13

We went with friends to London last month to see the Eagles/Jags game. I knew nothing about it before this trip and it has never been high on my destination list. We loved it! We were only there for 3.5 days and one of those was game day, so we took advantage of the hop-on hop-off bus which was well worth it. The Big Bus ticket also includes a HO-HO river cruise, and because the tickets are good for 24 hours, we took advantage of that the 2nd day. Like @zeebamom, we took the boat to Greenwich and ended up spending most of the day there - lighter crowds, pretty park and views, fun but manageable size market. As active people you would enjoy the walk from the Maritime Museum up through Greenwich Park to the Observatory. We didn’t do any inside tours on this trip due to time constraints, but if we had I would have liked to do Tower of London, St Paul’s Cathedral, and Kensington Palace. If we had lots of time, the Churchill War Rooms too. We’re not museum people but if you are there are tons of free options. Also lots of show to choose from for evening entertainment (we saw Book of Mormon which was great.) As others have said, don’t cut your time in London short! Hope the Brexit issue doesn’t mess up your plans!

14

Frankly I’d go over the week of March 29 just for the experience. The Brits are not exactly going to riot and the idea of everything collapsing is even more far-fetched than during Y2K. Obviously being in London would be best that day - I expect there will be a few marches/vigils around Parliament, but perhaps not much else of note elsewhere.

I’ll always regret not getting on a plane when the Berlin Wall came down (I only got to hack bits out of it a few months later), and I missed Hong Kong being returned to China by a few months too. More recently, from what I hear, being in Barcelona when the Catalans voted for independence a couple of years ago was also a fascinating moment in history.

The weather will probably be too bad for lengthy walks (Seattle-like), but day trips from London are good: Oxford, Cambridge, Windsor, Hampton Court to name but a few that are easy by train.

15

If you like hikes, the UK is ideal, with all sorts of routes planned through the country side and the south coast is not far from London. Weather is unpredictable. Pick some options and have some days of planned hiking with city alternatives. Trains offer “day returns” or used to, where a round trip in one day is reasonable in price. We enjoyed Kew Gardens a few years ago. Decaedes ago I hiked an entire piece of coastline on the Isle of Wight. It was glorious. Britain has a long slow spring, and flowers will be blooming, rain or not. Check out hikes on Hampstead Heath, which is in north London and looks over the city.

16

One week in England for a first trip is best spent only in London and nearby places. We went with son when he was nine and the two of us went in August. Had seen some sites and for me finished my desire for there (H is much more of an Anglophile). We considered visiting some peripheral Indian relatives of H’ in other cities but- the prices of trains and the time spent was too much to be worth it.

We had seen the Tower of London (great) and many of the various (free!) museums our first trip and redid those free museums. Saw Kew Gardens- took a boat trip so saw a lot from the water with good commentary. We took a train to Cambridge- could have chosen Oxford. Did not do other out of town sites since there was far too much to see/do in town each time. We saw the changing of the guard our first trip. This trip we saw the London museum- excellent. Many museums seem to be collections of way too much stuff that is similar. Saw some cathedrals. So much history with familiar names. So many other experiences. Saturday at the flea market- Picadilly Circus? Used the Underground a lot. Currently getting the refillable card is the best bet.

It is fun just to be in another culture, even with a similar language. Feel free to PM me with questions. I recall many of the little things.

17

Addenda- there may be inaccuracies in above. My recall may have jumbled some things- getting to Kew…

We found staying in the Kensington area to be great for walking to many museums.

18

If you want to get out of London - Bath or Salsibury Cathedral or Salisbury Cathedral are less than two hours away with public transportation. Stonehenge is also very close to Salisbury. Even closer is Hampton Court which has beautiful gardens and a hedge maze. I love walking around Oxford (and looking for Lord Peter Wimsey and Peter Pullman landmarks). It’s only an hour away. One of my favorite country houses is Blenheim Palace. It’s the birthplace of Winston Churchill. The palace itself is sort of a horrific Baroque, but the gardens were redone by Capability Brown in the mid 1700s and are stunningly gorgeous.

That said, you could easily spend a week in London if you’ve never been.

19

We went to saw the HMS Victory in the UK (H’s idea). It was interesting. We saw some plays using cheap tickets–saw Mousetrap – longest running play. It was enjoyable. Ate at some pubs. We enjoyed the British Museum, even though we are not normally museum-goers. We caught the train to Bath and stayed there a few nights–saw Raquel Welch in a play, “The Millionairess” (awful but fun to see her “live.” The Cottswolds are where they filmed Dr. Doolittle–very quaint.

20

See the Ceremony of the Keys at the Tower of London!! Tickets are free, but must be arranged in advance. It’s the ceremony that marks the closing of the Tower each night, complete with pomp and ghost stories. We LOVED it!!!