Results 1 to 9 of 9
  1. #1
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Southern Pines, NC

    Help Wanted for Touring England

    This Summer, Mrs. Jarhead and I have booked passage on Cunard's Queen Mary 2 to Southampton and back, originally with a one week stay in London. We have visited London on several occasions in the past, and we have enjoyed each of them. This time though, we decided that a five day coach tour of England would be more interesting. We could book such a tour through the Cunard Line, but they would charge an arm and a leg. Renting a car and touring on our own is not an option at our age.

    That's where you all come in. The internet has failed us. What we come up with is an array of confusing ill-maintained websites lined up like hucksters at a carnival. One alternative might be to book a hotel in London, and take day trips to the country. We could probably go through the concierge at the hotel, but that could end up as the most expensive choice. Going to a travel agent may work, too. What have you all experienced? Anything that might help?

  2. #2

    just a guess

    I'd take a look at booking with a coach tour company directly. You might save some $ that way, rather than go through someone else, who will get paid to make the deal (sometimes it's worth it though - they may know better who to use). Trafalgar Tours is one name you see a lot over there (and the name's got a nice British ring to it). Gray Line is another biggie, and they do have English tours as well.

    I would recommend finding a Fodor's or similar tour book for England at your local bookstore or library; there is probably a section in there on coach tours. A site like tripadvisor.com may prove useful for reviews of tour lines as well.

    Finally, consider using the travel agents at AAA. Their offices are jam-packed with brochures on stuff like this.

    best,
    cspan

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Steamboat Springs, CO

    Talking England Swings, It Surely Does

    Quote Originally Posted by Jarhead View Post
    This Summer, Mrs. Jarhead and I have booked passage on Cunard's Queen Mary 2 to Southampton and back, originally with a one week stay in London. We have visited London on several occasions in the past, and we have enjoyed each of them. This time though, we decided that a five day coach tour of England would be more interesting. We could book such a tour through the Cunard Line, but they would charge an arm and a leg. Renting a car and touring on our own is not an option at our age.

    That's where you all come in. The internet has failed us. What we come up with is an array of confusing ill-maintained websites lined up like hucksters at a carnival. One alternative might be to book a hotel in London, and take day trips to the country. We could probably go through the concierge at the hotel, but that could end up as the most expensive choice. Going to a travel agent may work, too. What have you all experienced? Anything that might help?
    When I saw your post, I thought, "What's the problem?" London is one of the great cities of the world, and you can take day trips to Oxford or other close by locations. Then I read that you had seen much of London and were looking for an alternative.

    I faced a similar problem in 2008, but in New Zealand, not England. Mrs. Sagegrouse and I were taking a rwo-week birding (bird-watching) tour to Australia and tacked on a week in NZ to take advantage of being so close. We never could figure out what to do. So, after already arriving in Australia, I picked a tour company at random and had a good phone conversation with the agent. She gave us a couple of alternatives, and we settled on the South Island itinerary. Worked out great. The traffic is not very bad away from the cities, so I was comfortable driving. Saved some money too because the Australia and NZ currencies had cratered after we arrived. and, of course, the South Island of NZ is incredibly beautiful.

    I looked at motor coach tours for England, and there are clearly are some affordable choices that may fit your schedule. The first, however, seemed bloody awful -- a five-day tour (meaning four nights) that got as far north as Edinburgh, went to Liverpool and a couple of other locations. Mostly riding in the coach and ticking off the cities I expect. There was another set of tours that went to Devon and Cornwall that is probably more workable, since the points of attraction are close.

    You should probably try to specialize in one part of England or another. Then, if you contact a tour company, the folks there will have lots of ideas. As you know from your military assignments, that while the European countries are much, much smaller than the US, they are still pretty big, so or our preference has been to specialize on a smaller area where we can see things but still enjoy ourselves.

    Along those lines, you might pick a secondary HQ outside of London, take a train to get there, and use that as a base. Take day trips by car bus from there. You might feel comfortable driving under those circumstances.

    Or, you can take the Chunnel train to Paris and enjoy a few days there.

    sagegrouse

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Back in the dirty Jerz
    Both times I've been to England, I've gone around on my own. I did however go on a coach tour with Trafalgar Tours in Italy, and I found them to be a very nice, stand-up organization.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Decatur, GA
    5 years ago my son & his wife, my mom and I went to England. Most of the planning was done by my son's wife. We spend a few days in London, then rented a car and a lovely cottage in the Cotswolds village of Broadway. Took day trips to Bath, Stratford, and other places from there. We all did research into what we wanted to see and do (within reason, since we had an 80 yr old with us).We were able to go at our own pace. Since we were in a cottage, we could fix breakfast, a picnic lunch and dinners if we wanted to. (saved a little money).Of course, there was a pub directly across the street from the cottage, and we had a good time there a couple of nights!

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Southern Pines, NC
    Thanks for the input, folks. We are just waiting for confirmation of a motor tour from London to Edinburgh, and other places in England such as Liverpool and the Lake District. We expect the same people to handle transfers from Southampton to London and return for re-boarding the QM2. The cost of the total package stays below the cost we expected to get slapped with. We got some pretty good help from our AAA Travel agent who understands the intricacies of booking travel in England.

    It seems to me that doing a google search is not the smart way to do things. Just try searching for a five day tour of England. You will get such things as safari in South Africa, or the Autumn colors in New England. Also, one of the sites hadn't been purged of tours from 2005, or were for Europeans traveling from Mainland Europe. Trafalgar Tours is the company that booked our tour, by phone via the quite knowledgeable AAA Travel lady. She got us a couple of nice discounts, too.
    Last edited by Jarhead; 02-28-2011 at 05:47 PM. Reason: Confirmatio just came in with an adjustment for $384, and a discount of $500 for paying before Mar 1, 2011

  7. #7
    very glad to hear that you've found something that looks promising. I hope you revive this thread upon your return and tell us how it all went! Best wishes, cspan

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Feb 2007
    Location
    Southern Pines, NC
    Quote Originally Posted by cspan37421 View Post
    very glad to hear that you've found something that looks promising. I hope you revive this thread upon your return and tell us how it all went! Best wishes, cspan
    Will do. It is turning out better than we could hope. We knew we were getting some discount, but to learn that discounts and adjustments would come to $884 was exciting. Then the AAA lady told us that since they are covering our whole vacation, our on-board credit would increase to $100 apiece for each leg on the Queen Mary. Then there's this, the 2 night stay in Edinburgh will be in a hotel located just a five minute walk from the Royal Mile. Here's some pictures ahead of time.



  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Jarhead View Post
    Will do. It is turning out better than we could hope. We knew we were getting some discount, but to learn that discounts and adjustments would come to $884 was exciting. Then the AAA lady told us that since they are covering our whole vacation, our on-board credit would increase to $100 apiece for each leg on the Queen Mary. Then there's this, the 2 night stay in Edinburgh will be in a hotel located just a five minute walk from the Royal Mile. Here's some pictures ahead of time.
    awesome. I lived in the UK as a middle schooler, and though I've been back a couple of times for a week apiece, I really feel that I'd get so much more out of it now, as an adult. Almost as much as with great literature, foreign travel is a bit wasted on the young. To be sure, I had my own favorite things about living abroad - I started as a numismatist, which was a lot more fun then (in Europe) than it is now with a unified currency. I loved trains too, so the different styles (BR vs. Tube vs. the various ones on the EUR continent)- those captured my fascination. But I'm sure I missed much and just skimmed the surface of much more.

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