UK Spring 2025 - Trips from London - WIP

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are many options traveling out of London, be it day trips or up to Scotland. We did 2 day trips out of London:

• Cambridge - Great Northern Rail from King's Cross to Cambridge under 50 mins for express - remember to include Plus bus when you purchase your train tickets as you can hope on/off any buses in Cambridge except for those Tour buses. You need to redeem your physical tickets from King's Cross
  
• WB Harry Potter Studio - West Midlands Railway from London Euston to Watford Junction around 15-20 mins. Your WB ticket includes a bus from Watford Junction station to the Studio!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And some below which we hopefully will get to in future:

• Dover
• Cornwall
• Oxford - Great Western Rail from Paddington to Oxford under 1 hour

 

There are 2 routes going to Scotland, via East coast or West coast, both serviced by different train operators. Both roughly takes 4 hours and 40 mins depending on whether you are heading for Glasgow or Edinburgh:

• West coast to Glasgow - Avanti West Coast - departs/arrives at London Euston
• East coast to Edinbrugh - LNER - departs/arrives King's Cross

There are Pros and cons for company. We think that the LNER trains are newer and cleaner with better air-conditioning. Avanti West offers Standard premium with quieter and slightly more spacious cabins. If you are going to Lake District, Avanti West is the only option. A detailed write up on Lake District is covered in another post

Luggage space is ample on both trains, we have quite large luggage measuring W55 x H81 x D35 cm. No issues on either services, tip is to try and get onboard early.

 

Between Glasgow (Queen Street Station) and Edinburgh (Waverley Station), ScotRail runs over 180 trains daily with express trains only taking 45-52 mins each way. You don't have to book that much in advance, a day before is perfectly OK. For the 2 trips we did from Glasgow to Edinburgh, we bought the Off-peak day return. Note that Off-peak tickets allow you to travel any time after 9:15am to 4:30pm and 6:30pm onward on weekdays and any time on weekends and bank holidays.