FSU Girl

16 minutes ago, tartanexile81 said:

A number of questions have been posed which I'll try to answer. Because I use trains in and out of Edinburgh all the time, I should be able to help you flu.

 

I always buy single tickets so if you chose one way by train and one flying it wouldn't be a problem at all. However as has been said the main station Waverley is in the heart of the city, so in fact time wise it would be no different to flying really. If you travel first class you will be well looked after. Great prices to be had 12 weeks out. Keep checking the LNER website

 

I've travelled with luggage regularly to and from London, Southampton (and elsewhere on holiday) and it's not a problem. As I'm joining the train at Kings Cross where it starts and in Edinburgh where the train starts, I just make sure I arrive early at the station so I can be one of the first to board and get my luggage stored successfully.  When you are buying your tickets, you will automatically be allocated seats. You can however just click on the button that says 'change your seats' and you get a picture of the train layout. I just choose a seat next to the luggage racks. If you were really worried FSUgirl, you could always send your cases up with thebaggageman.com from hotel to hotel.

 

I don't want to be a scare-monger but I met a lady on  train from Leeds who'd had her bag stolen. It is VERY rare however and it is the only case I've ever heard of. 

Ideally I would rather not have to do both train and plane since I'll get the hang of traveling one way and then have to learn something different. I figure there is always a chance for something to happen, sitting near the baggage room would definitely help put my mind at ease. The train station in Edinburgh is right next to our hotel so it would definitely be the easier option there. 

48 minutes ago, tring said:

I was only commenting on your wish to keep your luggage near to you and giving the practicalities of train travel.  I have never heard of asking for luggage to be put in the guards van so cannot comment on that.  I have also never heard of luggage going missing from the normal luggage racks which are commonly used, but I would not leave any valuables in them.

 

Sunday can be a quieter day on the trains as there is no commuters, though we have travelled out of another big city to London on the 1pm train last summer and shared it with a fair number of people, including a couple of stag party groups (and a large number of cans of beer).  Dawned on us that many weekenders will have checked out of their hotels at midday, so it was a popular train.  If you go for one of the cheaper trains (ticket prices vary) it is also likely to be one of the less busy trains as the prices go up according to number of bookings.  No worry if you are not fed in first class on a Sunday as there will still be a buffet carriage where you can buy food/drinks.  Weekend likley to be cheaper for first class.

 

Often the effect of engineering works is that the trains take a lot longer to complete the journey rather than be cancelled and cancellation of part of a journey will probably be replaced by a bus between two stations.  Train is quite doable - just that flights take a lot less time, though as you say go out/into the city centres, rather than an out of town airport.

I wonder if the trains first thing in the morning or late at night would be busy or not. Our hopes are to get the most time we can in Edinburgh on the travel days. Traveling first class seems like a great way to do it. Hopefully the prices are reasonable. 

1 hour ago, Bob++ said:

You are over-thinking this. Thousands of people take their luggage on these trains without problems so there is no real reason to worry. (so long as you can handle it yourself).  

 

Here is a link to the website for future engineering work, and you should check nearer the date. There is a box under the heading "Engineering work for" and you enter the date. In the next box, click on "London North Eastern Rail". At the moment it only goes as far as March 2019.

 

http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/service_disruptions/currentAndFuture.aspx

Thank you for the link. I definitely over think things when I'm planning a trip and can be a bit of a worrier. 

1 hour ago, tring said:

 

Highly unlikely, as mentioned by someone else you need a seat near to a luggage rack.  The seats are tight and the aisle narrow (like on a plane) so unless the train is fairly empty and you could find an empty seat next to the one you sit on for your bag to 'sit' there is no room at all.  You do not have to occupy the seat you have booked (which will likely have other nearby seats booked).  If you can find a seat that is not labelled as booked for some stage of the journey and you may find an cabin that is more sparsely occupied.  That would still be a big gamble though as if the train became busier and you need to take your bag off the seat it is sitting on then there will not be any space left on the luggage racks.  At times like that it is normal to see people in the spaces at the end of the carriages sitting on their cases. 

 

To ensure space on the luggage racks, (which are not really big enough), you will have to be waiting by the boards in the London station (so you can see as soon as the platform is listed for your train and then make a very speedy walk to the platform, especially if travelling at a busy time of day/season.  Long distance trains are rarely not busy, but travelling first class will make the journey a whole lot better regards both luggage and the journey - I would recommend that if the prices are not ridiculously high, as first class carriages are not normally fully occupied if you travel off peak and the seating much better, often with snacks/drinks included and possible use of a first class lounge in London station.  Snacks not always included at weekends.  

 

Air travel does have it's advantages.

I'm afraid of flying so would love to avoid getting on a plane four times in two weeks lol. We would be travelling to Edinburgh on a Monday, but back to London on a Sunday because the following Monday is my birthday and I don't want to travel on that day. The whole luggage process sounds confusing. Are the bags safe in the luggage room or are there issues of people having their bags stolen? I'll look into doing first class if it isn't crazy expensive. Maybe we should do the train up and a flight back, although that sounds a little complicated. 

5 hours ago, PhilbeachTraveller said:

Train maintenance is usually at weekends (Sundays are usually the most painful!). The National Rail website posts what engineering works are happening (as do the train websites) so keep an eye on them. Other delays/cancellations can be down to weather, accidents or whatever!

Hmm, we would be going up to Edinburgh on a Monday, but back down on a Sunday because my birthday is the following Monday and I didn't want to spend my birthday travelling. How far out would they say the train isn't running on a day due to maintenance?

Thanks everyone! That sounds shady that the other website would sell tickets when potentially the train won't even be running that day. Is train maintenance common, or is it being done in February because its an off season? 

For the luggage I guess our only option is to put them in the luggage area, I'll pick seats that are close to it so I can keep an eye on my stuff. Now I need to find luggage that meets the size requirements, I think the ones I have now are too large.

38 minutes ago, fabnfortysomething said:

depends what you mean about keeping your suitcase with you

the overhead luggage racks are only big enough for cabin size bggage

larger cases to be stored on racks at either end of compartment and you may not be able to keep an eye on them from your seat if you can even find room

that's why I suggested using guards compartment as they have responsibility for them

If the train isn't full so there isn't anyone near us could we keep the full sized luggage next to us? Or they make you put them in the luggage areas?What exactly is the guards compartment? Is that something you pay extra and they make sure only you come back to take your bag?

7 minutes ago, fabnfortysomething said:

LNER are the actual train operator between London ans Scotland on the East coast rail line

best prices usually bookable 12 weeks out if you buy advance fares ie for a particular train with free seat reservations

travel time about 5 hours from London Kings cross to Edinburgh Waverley

scenery varies along route-some countryside and other times long stretches of travelling between cut out areas with nothing to see but high hedges

however the coastal route around Berwick is well worth seeing

sometimes the first class fares are very little more than standard class depending on your travel time and that includes wider seats and free drinks and meals

luggage storage at each end of train compartment can be limited but you can arrange online to have your luggage stored on guards compartment -useful if you have large cases  

Can you keep your suitcase with you instead of putting it in a different location?

I bet it would have to do with school schedules. Kids are out for the summer so more families can take longer trips then. In May people are still in school and it makes travelling limited. If the May dates work for you I'd go with that one. 

1 hour ago, Morgans said:

We always use Lner - the tickets are marginally cheaper as you are not paying a little commission to the Trainline. Tickets with Lner are usually available from approx 3 months out. That said, Trainline are perfectly legitimate and many people use them. I wouldn't have thought there would be any rush, however, as tickets won't be sold out with 3 months to go.

Our trip is in May so the dates aren't out yet. I was checking for March to get an idea of cost. Is it normal that Lner has a lot of weekend dates that can't be booked for February, but if I go to Trainline I could book those dates just fine?

1 hour ago, Globaliser said:

 

I've not yet taken the train from London to Edinburgh because I've always flown. It helps that I can easily get to London City Airport where the absolute minimum check-in time is typically 20 minutes; and if I'm not checking a bag and I have my boarding pass, I know I can arrive at the airport 20 minutes before scheduled departure time and usually still have near-zero stress in getting to the gate and aircraft on time. Getting to many places in central Edinburgh is a lot easier than it used to be because the tram is now operating. And although I don't get the scenery, I do get many hours back from not sitting on the train.

 

Having said that, when I do buy train tickets I usually buy from the train operator in question or another train operator, because they don't impose the booking fee that Trainline charges.

We will have big bags that will need to be checked if we fly. When I figure the time it'll take us to get from the city center of London to the airport and fly and then get to the city center of Edinburgh the time between flying and train will be about the same time. 

When you say another train operator what do you mean? When I googled it, it looked like there's just the one train from Kings Cross to Edinburgh. 

I'm wondering if anyone has bought a train ticket from London to Edinburgh. What website did you use? There are two I've looked at, lner.co.uk and thetrainline.com. When I look at the later it shows me dates available that say are unavailable yet to book on the first site, but isn't that the main train site? I'm wondering if the second site is reliable to book with? We would be booking round trip tickets and are debating doing the train or flying. The train seems more direct with nicer scenery though. I would love to hear people's opinions. 

Has anyone ever booked a day tour through Highland Explorer Tours that are based out of Edinburgh? 

10 hours ago, geoherb said:

We took the National Express coach (bus) from Victoria Coach Station in September. It's the most affordable option. We paid $16.22 for the two of us. Last year we took a train from Paddington. We had to change trains in Reading. It was not that difficult even with our luggage. I booked our hotel near Waterloo this year so that we could take the train. But it turned out that they had planned to do maintenance on the tracks between Romsey and Southampton the weekend we were going. We could have taken the train to Romsey and transferred to a coach to get to Southampton. I decided to go with the cheaper coach ride the whole way.

Would the website mention when booking tickets if there will be maintenance preventing us from getting there? The train sounds pretty easy to take, but I want to make sure we don't get there and then find out it actually isn't running that day or something.

Thanks everyone! I wasn't sure you were allowed to book the transfer picking up at a hotel you weren't staying at. It does sound like doing either a train or private transfer is the way to go. For the train is it direct from London to Southampton? 

I'm trying to decide when to book my hotel for my cruise in May leaving from Southampton. I'm going to spend 2 days in London before the cruise. I was thinking about doing a cruise transfer, but the hotels they have listed aren't ones I want to stay at. Is there a way for me to book the hotel I'd like and then go to the hotel they are picking up from? Or go to the airport? Or is it easier to just take a train from London to Southampton on our own? Using the Princess transfer seems like the easiest option, but I've never done any of this before so unsure.

3 minutes ago, Globaliser said:

 

I have certainly managed to have starter, soup and salad in one meal without any issue, and I think that enough of the items in the "starters" section are loaded so that you're not expected necessarily to limit yourself to one from that section. And the cheese plate can definitely have all three cheeses. For main courses, I think it's good manners to be sensitive to the need to make sure that everyone who wants one gets one that they like, but if there are spares left over there's no reason why you couldn't have more than one. Ditto for desserts.

Good to know! I was mostly talking about the starters since I'd like a soup and a salad. I don't think I'd want to main meals. And I love cheese so that's great that I can have them all lol

6 minutes ago, Globaliser said:

 

Oh yes, there will be dinner. You can make quite a meal of it if you want: starter, soup, salad, main, dessert, cheese. And plenty of decent wine - including a dessert wine which IME is seldom taken advantage of by others.

 

Here's an example menu, from a Miami-Heathrow flight in September (taken from FlyerTalk):-

 

 

 

That menu looks delicious! Is it one item under each category or could we order more than one? 

23 minutes ago, Globaliser said:

One interesting thing about being in the nose of a 747: you are very close to a lot of very grunty engineering. When you taxi and take off, you will hear a lot of mechanical noise. Similarly, just before landing it will get very noisy when the landing gear is lowered, and on touchdown there are also other noises from above like the automatic spoiler deployment being triggered. In between - from as soon as the gear doors are shut after take-off - it is blissfully quiet. So don't be put off by the noise levels at the beginning, or be frightened when the noise comes back at the end. The aircraft is a fabulous piece of engineering and for those few minutes at each end of the flight, you're almost taking part in it.

Thank you for warning me about this. I'm afraid of flying and knowing ahead of time that this noise is normal will definitely help me. 

24 minutes ago, Globaliser said:

On the flight from Miami, you may well want to stick with the conventional approach as it will be dinner time (and beyond) at the start of the flight. But this is definitely something to bear in mind for the flight back to the US. When I've flown back to London from Hong Kong or Singapore, I've often asked to have my dinner at 3 am after I've slept and woken up. What is served for dinner - on any airline, in any cabin, on any route - is usually rather better than breakfast. And flying to London, you can undoubtedly get a better breakfast in the arrivals lounge before you head into the city.

Is dinner guaranteed on the flight? Ours takes off close to 9pm so it's a bit past the dinner time. 

1 hour ago, fbgd said:

At MIA you will be directed to a lounge that BA use (it's currently closed for renovation). Don't, instead head to American's Flagship Lounge by gate D30. As AA are oneworld partners they honour tickets on BA for lounge access. It is ENORMOUS and usually fairly quiet, or big enough that it doesn't matter how busy it is. Full bar setup with food that is not bad at all. There is a separate Flagship Dining lounge that technically you don't have access to when flying BA (although if you're on an AA codeshare flight number you might) that has upgraded sit down dining and much better drinks too. AA have starting serving Krug in these mini lounges in the last couple of months! You could plead ignorance and you might be allowed in. Technically it is for AA international FC passengers but some other partner airlines, such as Cathay Pacific at JFK, have arrangements for their First passengers so you can always try. Give yourself plenty of time to get back to your gate though.

 

In terms of seat selection onboard you'll be in the nose on the 747. Unless you both have oneworld Emerald status (AA Executive Platinum or equivalent) you won't be able to pre-assign row 1 more than 72hrs before the flight, no great loss IMO. I personally would avoid selecting 4E/F or 5E/F which are traditionally viewed as the couple seats, they don't have much personal space. Instead I would pick 2A/K. You have loads of space and are just about close enough that you can reach across for a quiet word. 

 

The BA First seat does have a footstool area and a large table that allows you to dine with your companion. The crew may ask if you want to dine together but I would mention it when they take your first drink order after takeoff if they do not. The further forward you are the less room there is for the buddy because of the way the fuselage curves. Row 1 would be nigh on impossible unless you're about 4ft tall, row 2 is manageable unless your other half is on the tall side.

 

Miami flights at Heathrow use Terminal 3. AA have an Arrivals Lounge in the landside area upstairs just after customs where you can get a shower and surprisingly good breakfast (last time I was there they had splits of Moet champagne which was a nice touch). Having a decent shower and breakfast after an overnight flight makes a huge difference for me. 

 

Coming back there are several lounges you can use in Terminal 3. BA have a First and Business class lounge, Qantas have a business class lounge with a very nice gin bar (by all accounts I'm yet to try it), American have a first class and business class lounge but my favourite are the Cathay Pacific lounges. They have both a first and business class side and it's excellent. Great views of the southern runway and a mini restaurant inside with table service. The Dan Dan noodles are one of my favourite lounge dishes anywhere in the world. Besides that the decor is just superb and it's a very relaxing place to hang....unless it's rammed around the time that one of their numerous flights to Hong Kong departs. They have superb showers too.

 

If there are any specific questions you have let me know. Globaliser and myself probably have in the hundreds of BA First flights between us and are happy to share the knowledge.

Thank you this is really helpful! If we go to the American Airline lounge will we be far from our gate or are they near each other in the airport? I've never taken a shower at an airport before. That sounds like a fun adventure lol. I'll share all this with my Fiance, it is going to be so helpful!!

14 minutes ago, Globaliser said:

 

I'll echo that! Depending on how much information you're prepared to post about your actual flights, there are suggestions we can make for all sorts of things. For example, if you know which aircraft types you'll be flying on, we can make suggestions about preferred seats and so on.

It's a boeing 747 jet 🙂 

1 hour ago, fbgd said:

 

Nicely done, and $5k per person return isn't half bad for paid First on BA across the Atlantic. I've paid a fair percentage above that! 

 

Whilst BA First isn't as industry leading as it once was it's still a very nice way to fly and I'm sure you'll have a decent set of flights. If you're looking to maximise the experience feel free to post your flight routing and myself and the few other BA regulars that we have on here would be happy to share some tips.  

We are flying direct from Miami to London Heathrow. I'm happy it wasn't higher it wouldn't have been possible then.

The flight is on British Airways. We ended up booking first class for both legs of the trip really excited about that. 

18 hours ago, Coral said:

I was able to book Business class and saved several thousand with Princess Air. It costs me $2700 and direct it was $8000 through United.

 

I have expensive air where I live. I booked a trip with Business Air for $2400 this summer. 

 

Sometimes First class is quite a bit more than Business Air - I would aim for Business Air. Some airlines just have Business air.

 

You obviously changed your plans again :). You can fly in early or stay late with EZ Air. Just make sure you look at flight words. They use "arrive on" when going I believe.

Yes we ended up going back to this cruise 🙂 I hadn't cancelled it and the land trip was getting complicated and really expensive. I'm excited to go to Scotland. We compared the prices between British Airways direct and Princess and the price came out cheaper direct with British Airways so we are booking that. Flights are nonrefundable so this trip is now locked in 🙂 

5 minutes ago, Coral said:

FSUGirl - have you checked EZ Air prices? Sometimes there is a pretty good discount.

No I haven’t checked that yet. We’re looking to book first class to splurge for our honeymoon. Can you book that through EZ Air?