Edinburgh Travel Answers

Are you intending to fly into London and then go directly to Edinburgh? If so, then probably the best way is to fly but only if you don't have to change airports. Look at the Easyjet and Ryanair websites - these are budget airlines and the price becomes more expensive the nearer to the time of departure. Also, read carefully the baggage limitations and so on. If you are going to Edinburgh after staying in London, then train is the way to go. The train company is East Coast MainLine and their website is the place to get the best fares. Some people will recommend Traveline but their fares are usually a couple of pounds more expensive. www.eastcoast.co.uk They have good fares for advance booking. It is always much more expensive to book on the day of travel. With advance fares you have no flexibility as to time of train and day of travel once you have booked. However, the fares are considerably cheaper. You should try and firm up your itinerary as soon as possible, if not NOW. The end of December/start of January is always busy; at least from before Christmas to about 8th January. You can also get a coach from London to Edinburgh, which is the cheapest option. Either National Express or Megabus. It's a long trip but there are express buses that have one or maybe no stops. Probably best to fly from Edinburgh to Dublin and Dublin to Cardiff - look at the budget carriers I gave you.

I travelled from London to Edinbourgh by train long ago. It took around 5-6 hours. !

Perhaps Birtish Airways has some budget fares.

Must have been a long time ago. Average is just over 4 hours.

Yes, It was long ago!

Coach takes about 9 hours, more if you have to change buses. Departs from Victoria Coach Station. Random date aftr Christmas ranged from £22 for a no-change trip, to £66 for a trip with changes. Don't think the change makes the difference. I think it is the hour of travel. Btw, the train station in London for departure for Edinburgh is King's Cross.

Generally speaking London to Edinburgh is faster by train (once you take into account travelling to and from airports and check-in times). It can also be much cheaper if you can take advantage of "Advance" fares. East Coast are the train company who operate this route and putting in a random date (Thursday 5th Jan) they have one-way fares from £25.95 for direct service London Kings Cross to Edinburgh Waverley - www.eastcoast.co.uk With "Advance" fares you must note that these are "train specific" and so are non-refundable and non-changeable once you have bought them. Tickets can be booked online up to 120 days before travel and can be picked up from the ticket machine at the station you are departing from. Note also that train services around the New Year - Dec 31st and Jan 1st will be subject to reduced services and that travel around these dates can be very busy. For Edinburgh - Dublin and Dublin - Cardiff you will probably be better off flying (for Cardiff you will probably be best flying into Bristol). I refuse to mention the name of the cheapo airline that probably does these routes but I'm sure you can find that out for yourself.

For the Edinburgh-Dublin leg check and see if Aer Lingus flies that route. I got a really cheap fare Dublin-London on them, I think all I paid was the tax, and I didn't have to fly with the cheapo airline (I'm guessing Ryan Air is what is being referred to). Check Easyjet as well but with all of these airlines make sure you read their luggage policies as they are very strict on weight and most of them charge even for the 1st bag. London-Edinburgh, do the train, by the time you get to and from the airports, it's so much more convenient to take the train. I haven't been to Cardiff but you might see if a London-Cardiff-Edinburgh-Dublin itinerary with the 1st two legs by train works better than London-Edinburgh-Dublin-Cardiff itineray which requires you to fly twice

You have received some really great advice already. As to booking early, a number of years ago I found that booking a week early was enough to get a meaningful reduction in price, even a few days in some cases. (Being in the holiday period may impact this) However, as soon as the cheap seats were sold out, the increase was substantial. Try skyscanner.com to check for air fares, especially between Edinburgh and Dublin. Also, look at Glasgow as you might find a lower fare and there are regular trains between Glasgow and Edinburgh.

Between Edinburgh (Waverley) and London (Kings Cross) you can buy tickets online from ScotRail.co.uk. I am seeing a one-way fare of GBP 57.00 for non-refundable advance purchases in late December. Definitely buy the tickets well ahead of time--the price nearly triples if you don't! I got my tickets from this source for a sleeper train from Inverness to London two months ago, and it worked out very well. Between Cardiff and London you should also take the train--that one goes from London's Paddington Station. I did this as well in September, and bought my tickets from TheTrainline.com. Incredibly, the train was cheaper than the bus.

Especially be aware that in Scotland there will be virtually no train service on January 1st. East Coast Railway is only operating between Edinburgh and English stations. Scotrail is, so far as I can tell, completely closed down on January 1st. In England there are no trains on December 25th and almost none on the 26th. You may be surprised coming from Argentina, but is normal for public transport in the UK to be completely shut down on certain pubic holidays. There are various reasons, but this is not the place to debate them!

When I look on EastCoast website, there are definitely fares cheaper than £57 one way for that date. As I said, the railway's website is always the cheapest.

For flying between Edinburgh/Dublin try Aer Lingus website as well as Ryanair. Ryanair is usually cheaper, but not always.

> When I look on EastCoast website, there are definitely fares cheaper than £57 one way for that date. As I said, the railway's website is always the cheapest. Good to know, and I wish I had known that when I traveled on the sleeper from Inverness-Euston (although maybe that was a different rail line). I was still pretty happy with the price I paid though.

Hello again, everyone! Sorry if I'm breaching virtualtourist's board ettiquete, but I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who answered, it was really really helpful!

We are always open to and appreciate thanks! Thank you for acknowledging our effort!

Always a pleasure to be appreciated - thank YOU!

If you have the time, consider ferry crossings for reaching and leaving Ireland. I've only ever travelled to and from Ireland that way from the UK. Just to give you an idea of the possibilities here is a summary of a trip I did similar to yours, during one December a few years ago, staying in hostels all the way:- Day 1 National Express coach to Pembroke for a late night crossing to Rosslare -Day 2 Bus Éireann to Cork - Day 3 Bus Éireann to Killarney - Day 4 Bus Éireann to Tralee, then a local bus to Dingle - a couple days in gorgeous Dingle, including walking/cycling around the peninsula - Day 6 local bus to Tralee, then train to Dublin - a couple days in Dublin - Day 8 train to Belfast - Day 9 train to docks, then a ferry to Scotland, where it was then two or three bus journeys via Glasgow to Edinburgh. The highlights were Dingle (lovely village, tremendous scenery full of fantastic stone ruins, brilliant pubs) and Edinbugh, but Glasgow is worth at least a day too. Also, there is a fast catamaran between Holyhead and Dun Laoghaire (for Dublin) which is most faster though with more convenient departure times than the Pembroke crossing. You can often buy a cheap ticket including train travel from London, enquire with Stena Lines.