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[ SECRET POST #6022 ]

⌈ Secret Post #6022 ⌋

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Anyone from or who travels/travelled around the UK in here?

My mom and I want to go to the UK for ten days in early September. Does anyone have any recommendations on where to go and what to do? We already did a trip around Wales in the past and a few days in London.

We thought about Scotland (hiking?) or maybe the south of England, but we don't have any concrete ideas yet. We'll probably rent a car, but thought about maybe a guided trip (bus tour?) might be fun as well.

The only thing is that I don't want to stay in hostels anymore. Done those during previous trips and I'm more than happy to spend a little more and get a hotel or b&b now that I'm not a poor student anymore.

What kind of thing do you guys enjoy? History, ancient history, museums, scenery...?

We do enjoy anything history related and will often go to museums (science, arts or history related). We also like musicals and theatre. My mom is big on hiking, which is something I don't particularly enjoy but am fine doing occasionally (but nothing extravagant, my mom is almost 70yo, though she's very fit).

When we were in Wales we basically went to all of the castles, as well as some walking tours through the countryside and Snowdonia national park.

My family did Scotland just before covid (with a quick flight over to Iceland). I really enjoyed going out to the Orkneys to see Skara Brae. It's a fascinating site, and there are lots of other historical sites all around including a mound tomb with Viking graffiti. We stayed in an airbnb outside of town and it was the first time I've ever seen the milky way in real life.

It was great being able to get around mainland Scotland by train. Edinburgh also had lots of great historical sites; we got an airbnb right on the royal mile. My mom LOVES castle tours, so naturally we did both on either end of the mile. And since we went in mid Nov they were doing a Christmas market by the train station, which was a lot of fun. In Glasgow we managed to get a walking tour all to ourselves, and the tour guide did a fantastic job of teaching us the history of the city. And we got a great tour of historical sites/Loch Ness when we stayed in Inverness.

The only downside was when we went to Skye. It was the off season, so there weren't any tour buses to take you around the island. My aunt insisted we rent a car and drive ourselves, but the roads are one lane, it's very twisty, and we're American so we were used to driving on the other side so reflexes aren't matching - and the locals who obviously know the roads take the speed limits as guidelines. I didn't really get to enjoy Skye. :(

Did you rent a car at all when you were on Scotland mainland or did you get around just by train? NGL, I'm kinda leery about renting a car since I'm also used to driving on the right and I'll have to do all the driving. So if a train-only trip is an option I really wouldn't mind.

I didn't even consider Iceland! Was it a day trip or did you stay several nights?

We rented a car on Orkney and Skye. Otherwise on the mainland it was all train and bus/cabs. Thankfully we did our practice driving on Orkney, which is tiny and the locals seemed to have a good laugh at all the mistakes. XD So long as you don't visit any of the islands, or have tour groups that will pick you up, train-only is entirely possible!

We went to Iceland for a few days, and did a scenic tour on day one, the hot springs spa/tour cruise for the northern lights (it ended up being too overcast, booo) on day two, and on day three when we were supposed to wander around Reykjavik it ended up raining cats and dogs. We did manage to get to a museum near our airbnb about the history of Reykjavik with old Viking buildings and whatnot, but we didn't get to really look around in town.

Oh! I'm from Cambridge so I have to throw this out as an option, if you like architecture and messing about on the river. :D

Well, this is embarrassing. We might have been to Cambridge already? Either Cambridge or Oxford, I don't actually remember which one. I just remember my allergies absolutely killing me.

It did have a river; I remember watching people paddle on the river while we were taking a break. It was a day trip during our trip to London, we went there via train.

We do like architecture! If we haven't been there yet it goes on the list (my mom will definitely remember lol)

DA But I love Cambridge! I lived in Huntingdon and Godmanchester for years and spent a lot of time in your city xx

Don't bother going to Buckingham palace. Incredibly crowded at peak times and not worth it. Also, London in general is outrageously expensive.

Scotland is beautiful; definitely check out Glasgow as well as Edinburgh. Bring solid shoes because the most efficient way to get places is walking.

We already did all the touristy things in London, including Buckingham palace, so we're definitely good on that front.

And agreed the prices are terrible in London, which is a huge point against going there again. Lots of easily accessible things to do, though... Getting around London and the greater London area without a car was really easy.

I went to York last year and that was a nice place to visit, lots of stuff to do.

What did you do around York? Sightseeing, museums, hiking, etc?

I went to some of the museums in the area, they have a Viking centre I wasn't able to go to, just didn't have the time, and several art and a natural history museum. They also have some spooky ghost tours going on and their variation of a London Dungeon type thing called the York Dungeon.

It was also nice to just walk around the city in general tbh.

Depending on how many gardens and museums that you end up wanting to visit are kept by the National Trust, a membership might be useful because you get free admission to most National Trust properties. So it might end up cheaper (you can cancel the membership afterwards) than paying each admission separately.

Don't.

Rude.

Accurate.

Re: Tips for vacation in the UK?

(Anonymous) - 2023-07-03 01:08 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Tips for vacation in the UK?

(Anonymous) - 2023-07-03 01:14 (UTC) - Expand

Early September is possibly among the best times to visit Scotland. Scottish schools have been back for a few weeks, English schools are back in early September so it's not as crowded with domestic tourists. It's late summer-early autumn so you're not coming at a time where you're going to get your face ripped off by rain being blasted into it by the wind.

It MIGHT (definitely, maybe) rain but there's still enough daylight and the temperatures are still high enough for it not to be much of a problem. There's been a few Septembers since I've lived here where we've definitely got "Indian Summer" conditions and it's still been sunny, warm and reasonably dry. Early October seems to be the turning point into constant miserable weather tbh.

Still long enough days in September that you're not rushing around trying to beat the sunset. If you'd said they were considering e.g. late November I'd say "yikes" because the short daylight hours are brutal by that point.

Anyway, the best advice for a walking-heavy holiday in Scotland is always: bring good shoes and bring LAYERS. Just because the temperature predictions look low comparatively doesn't mean the humidity won't have other ideas.

Not OP

It MIGHT (definitely, maybe) rain but there's still enough daylight and the temperatures are still high enough for it not to be much of a problem. There's been a few Septembers since I've lived here where we've definitely got "Indian Summer" conditions and it's still been sunny, warm and reasonably dry. Early October seems to be the turning point into constant miserable weather tbh.

Oh no. I am going to Scotland in September primarily FOR the rain. (I'm in a part of the US that has been struggling with drought-filled summers for the last few years. I WANT to get caught in a downpour.) Hearing that there have been spells of sunny, reasonably dry weather around that time makes me a bit worried about my trip.

It's really hard to predict honestly. There's the whole joke about where I am (Glasgow) getting four seasons in one day, or if you don't like the current weather...wait 30 minutes. If it's unseasonably warm in September it will still rain from time to time and we only seem to get a handful of days of weirdly wrong temperatures before it goes back to normal.

For reference we had a horrifically dry June by Scottish standards, roughly 3 weeks of 23-28 degrees (that's C not F.) Then the last week in June hit...and it rained. It has rained a lot this past week or so. But it's also humid still so you don't feel much cooler than when the temperature was higher. You probably won't have this issue so much in September!

Please don't worry about it, it will more than likely rain at some point! Having nearly 3 clear weeks of dry last month was VERY weird.

I was in Scotland in September back in 2016 and it rained almost the whole time I was there (three days total). Having gone from Greece up along the eastern border of Europe to Scotland, there were days when it was unbearably warm. The rain was welcomed.

I've been looking into the Cotswolds - specifically for me, walking the 100 miles along the Cotswolds Way but the whole are is really charming and has some lovely sight seeing and day hikes.

Warwick Castle was one of my favorites
Stonehenge was interesting, but I have no idea how close they let you get now
I really liked Kew Gardens (Royal Botanic Gardens)
Brighton is strange, but not a bad strange
Bath was kind of blah for me
If you are into books, Hay-on-Wye should be a stop
I liked the park itself at Greenwich Park more than the Royal Observatory (GMT-Greenwich Mean Time) there
I did like Edinburgh, but the thing I remember most is all the stairs

No museums but lots of history, scenery and walking - Northumberland. There's Lindisfarne, Bamburgh Castle, beaches, beaches, and some of the most beautiful scenery in the UK.

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