We are set to leave on 3/23. We are staying near the V&A museum. We have some kind of Britrail pass, which we will use to get to Dover Castle during the week.
We also want to see Leeds. Yes, I know that both of these places could be all day all by themselves, but UK has too many historical, interesting, must see type places! So, we are doing the somewhat condensed version. (we really just want to see Leeds Castle, do the maze and grab a bite. In Dover, we have planned the tunnels tour and roaming over the keep etc).
Query: how would we use the train to get from Dover to Leeds? Or should we do Leeds first, then Dover? I realize we might need a cab or coach(I’m assuming that means a bus) to Leeds Castle. I don’t recall needing any transport to Dover Castle, but it’s been 10 years, at least since I was there. Folkestone or Maidstone or Beardsten(?) stations?
Thank you in advance for the help. Also, do my older kids need to bring their student IDs or do we have to get them a special student ID once there? They are 16 and 14 (14 year old looks 17).
And one last question (sorry)–can we all eat in the pubs? Third child is only 7
Thanks again. I guess I need a personal travel agent.
I meant that I don’t recall needing any transport to the castle ONCE we were in Dover. I understand that once we arrive at Maidstone, we might need to catch a bus(coach) or taxi to Leeds Castle.
Now I need a personal secretary as well! :rolleyes:
I went to the website and that is what confused me. I’ve never heard of Beardsten station (I’m sure it’s very nice)–and since we already have tix, I really don’t want to pony up for another type of rail ticket. But thank you for your help.
You could do both in one day, buying the rail tickets separately to travel on from there to Dover (you’re right that Dover castle is close to the town)
Student IDs: bring along those they have, which may or may not be accepted for things like reduced entrance fees, at least for the 16-year-old. The 14-year-old should qualify as a child for most things anyway, including rail travel. (Student IDs don’t get 16-year-olds reduced rail travel, they need to buy a Young Person’s Railcard for that, which probably won’t be economical)
Pubs: the kind of pub where you’d want to sit with the family are generally OK for children, and the way they’re licensed has recently changed, in many cases making it easier for them. It does no harm to just go in ahead and ask if it’s OK to bring the kids in. (Many will have ‘families welcome’ etc. signs visible anyway)
Oh, and I meant to give you a couple of links for train times: this is the usual one, but this Europe-wide search has the handy extra feature that it’ll show every station a train stops at en-route, so you can figure out multiple-destination journies more easily.
If travelling by train in the UK, bring patience and a flexible schedule. They are generally OK, but a one-hour delay here or there isn’t that uncommon, so don’t time things to the last minute.
As for kids and pubs, I would agree that any pub that can’t accommodate a small child is generally not going to be worth going into. Around Dover/Leeds castle you should find that they fall into the “Every tourist penny warmly greeted” category.
One word of warning - don’t plan on doing anything in the town of Dover itself. It’s just a giant truckstop squashed in between the cliffs and the Channel. One of the most miserable places in the UK, in my opinion.
FYI - You probably know this already, but if you are staying near the V&A, you are also staying near the Science Museum and the Natural History Museum.
slaphead -thanks. We do know about the Science Museum, but (forgive me), we don’t want to travel all this way to go to a Science Museum–we have a great one right downtown, here. Hope that’s not churlish of me–I want to go to the V&A because of the eccentricities there.
I was hoping Bletchley Park would be open, (thanks, ivylass, for that other thread!), but not til 4/1. Damn.
I have to remember that while we share quite a bit, England is so very different than Chicago/USA. I am not afraid we’ll be bored, it’s more that almost every minute transaction is just that little bit different. I remember taking my daughter to London when she was 13. Even going into a Boots and looking at the products was interesting for her. (yes, we are lame!).
I am a littel concerned re shopping for food in London–not restaurants, but stuff for breakfast and snacks. I’ve always stayed in B&Bs and taken full advantage of the breakfasts there, but now-?
Right now I am trying (desperately and with no success) to convince my husband that the Tube is just fine and we don’t need to take cabs everywhere(!). He’s not one for public transport here. :rolleyes:
You’ll have no problem. Plenty of sandwich shops, cafes etc. where you can stock up on caffeine & carbohydrates. And there’s a growing number of small stores in cities which are run by the big supermarkets, selling a big range of snacks & ready-to-eat stuff.
Thank you, Gorilla man --you have been very helpful.
I wish I could get together with all of you with matt_mcl, but I don’t want to promise and then not show due to the kids or just plain travel fatigue. Hell, I’m already tired just packing for this trip…
But but but but it’s the SCIENCE MUSEUM!!! Just like the V&A but full of sciency stuff and an IMAX cinema. Just next door to Imperial College, the only university in the UK with its own nuclear reactor. Everything on Exhibition Road is worth seeing…
Hah. If nothing else there’s approx 745,326 branches of McDonalds/Burger King/Starbucks/Subway and so on, plus approx five times that many independent coffee/sandwich places. Then there’s all the proper english cafes that will serve you a pound of assorted fried pig parts with beans and chips (fries) for a fiver. Or if that’s not sufficient there’s the assorted ethnic places.
Since you are staying in kensington, the heart of London’s Petit Paris district, there are plenty of little french-style boulangerie places where you can get a coffee and croissant easily.
If you are going to take the tube you MUST have an A-Z street map with gazette and learn how to use it. Otherwise you will get lost on the 200 yard walk from the nearest tube station to wherever you are going. Cabbies will drop you off pretty much exactly where you want to go, but they can get expensive. On the other hand, a tube trip for several people ain’t cheap whereas cabs don’t charge by the person. £10 for a cab ride is cheaper than £3 x 5 people, so it can be worthwhile trying to figure out how much a cab ride is likely to be. And for pity’s sake, avoid public transport between 0800-0900 and 1630-1800 - you won’t want commuters trampling you and they won’t want you underfoot. Londoners are not at their best during the stampede to and from work…
Yes, but you can get things like Oyster cards for the Tube, where you pay a refundable deposit per card, load it up with money, and pay per trip, which works out a lot cheaper than buying individual tickets (£1.50/person/trip versus £3, and if you go over the amount it costs to buy a day travelcard, it caps it at the price of a travelcard). Or, there are always week or day long travelcards which will certainly work out an awful lot cheaper than a cab.
Dang. They are getting clever these days. I miss out on all this stuff since I just give them £600 every year and an extra £20 every 6 months or so to cover trips outside zone 2. In fact, the other day we paused to allow a foreigner from Burgess Hill to buy a ticket and I was because return tickets have disappeared.
But I still maintain that sometimes a short cab ride will be cheaper than five people paying for a tube ride. The theory of affirmations backs me up.
No no no. To get from the City to St Pauls you have to take the tube from Moorgate to Farringdon, wait for a Thameslink train, get off at City Thameslink, and then you’re right by the cathedral. Or you can take the Circle line to Monument, walk through the tunnel to Bank for the Central Line and then get off at St Pauls.
Believe me, when I was a freshly arrived student I actually used to do this sort of thing. 25 mins on the tube and then “but that building looks familiar…”
Probably too late for this, or for futreu reference…but Beardsten station is the station you’d get off at to go to the Leeds Castle, which is not in Leeds. train from London goes there, you get off, 5 minutes later a bus comes and picks all of you up and takes you straight to the castle, takes 10-15 minutes by bus. Going back it’s the same way. When you buy your tix in London train station, tell them you’re going to the castle and the bus tip is included. Real easy to do this in one day.
and be careful in that maze, it’s hard to get out of.
