Grad Trip to the UK--Day 1

Day 1

Sunday, July 21

Our flight was at night and so we made sure to eat before we left for the airport although they fed us dinner on the plane. First class is really the way to go when it is an 8 hour flight over the Atlantic from Dallas/Ft Worth to Heathrow London.

 Our seats swiveled and they reclined back flat for a bed and also a foot rest and lumbar support. We were given slippers, pjs if you wanted them, and a little zippered pouch with toothpaste, floss, and toothbrush. Also your own tv screen that offered a choice of many movies and tv shows to watch, including new release movies! We were glad to have our own snacks although the food was good, it was odd items that we were not used to. There were several appetizers, a soup, and salad and then a few different entrees to choose from. Alot of 'little food'.

Of course pillow and blankets were supplied. I had my own cozy soft socks.

It was a really nice flight and the flight attendants were really nice and attentive. Real linen and silverware...wine....all part of it and they also gave you earbuds to keep too and offered Bose headsets to borrow. Although again, I had my own and mine were noise cancelling so I had to take them off to talk to the flight attendants and to hear them.

One good note, if they offer you something on the plane in first class, just say yes. Be careful when you turn down food especially because you may not want one particular item item but it came with everything else so when you said no, that meant to it all! Besides, don't be afraid to try something new and never know if your taste buds have changed.

***Special Note***
Remember as you leave your phone at home, make sure to bring a watch so you can know what the time is.

Grad Trip to the UK--Itinerary

 Before I go off on a trip, I like to sit down and run thru the trip in my mind and write it down on paper and try to think about every little thing I would use, wear, or what we will be doing so I can try to be sure that I don't forget to take anything. This trip in particular, I really wanted to be sure that it went off without a hitch. So this is my itinerary that I had set down to be sure I had it all.

UK trip

21 days: 

Things to do before trip: (this got erased here as I wrote everything on my notes here on the iPad and then erased it as I completed whatever task or errand I had to do before we left.)

Itinerary:

Sunday-July 21: leave Dallas at 9:20 pm.

Airport--1 suitcase each, one carry-on:

Gogo pillow, passports, old pound money, itinerary and reservations, iPad, iPod, Druid journal, pen, rechargers for iPad, iPod, ID, snacks, business/calling cards, wear sneakers, comfortable but nice clothes

Monday--July 22: arrive in London, get luggage, go thru customs, get taxi to take us to hotel, relax, get something to eat, try to hook up to wifi and email Lloyd and Trey and Facebook that we made it there. Get pound cash withdraw for tomorrow. Call tours to confirm.

Tuesday--July 23: morning 2 hour tour Harry Potter, take reservations, iPad and camera, passport and ID and money and cc,  have fun! Afternoon: relax and/or go exploring, take more money out of bank, can wear sandals

See about getting some Euros. If back in time, go to Highgate Cemetery, Go to bed early!!

Wednesday--July 24: Get to Euston train station for Paris all day tour via taxi, take reservations, iPad, camera, passport and ID, money and cc, ( pounds for taxi and euros for Paris), wear sandals, taxi back to hotel, get to bed early!!

Thursday--July 25: Go 1-2 blocks south to other hotel for EARLY morning pickup for Stonehenge and Bath tour. Take reservations, camera, iPad, passports, ID, money and cc, wear sneakers for all the walking, take money out of ATM

Friday--July 26: Pack and check out of hotel and get to train station for train to Dublin, take money and reservations, ID, can wear sandals, taxi to Temple Bar hotel, relax for night, go to bed early!!

Saturday--July 27: Taxi to train station for all day trip to Aran islands, take reservations, iPad, camera, money, passports, ID, wear sneakers

Sunday--July 28:  Relax in Dublin, shop on Grafton St, see library at Trinity college, wear sneakers or sandals, go to bed early!!

Monday--July 29: Check out of Temple Bar hotel and taxi to train station to train up to Belfast, taxi to fancy hotel, relax and explore, can wear sandals or sneakers, take reservations and money, cc and passport etc,  go to bed early!!

Tuesday--July 30: Hotel pickup for Giant's Causeway and rope bridge tour, bring reservations, ID, cc and money, camera and iPad, wear sneakers,

Wednesday--July 31st: my birthday!! Check out of hotel and taxi to airport to fly to Glasgow. Take reservations, passport, cc, money. Can wear sandals. Meet Billy and Jan at airport--- relax

Thursday---August 1: Relax

Friday--August 2: Relax 

Saturday---August 3: Off to Callanish Standing Stones on isle of Lewis, take passport, ID, cc, money, camera and iPad, can wear sneakers probably

Sunday--August 4: Relax

Monday--August 5: Possible bus to Inverness and b&b overnight stay.

Tuesday--August 6: Catch coach tour to Orkney isles, wear sneakers, take camera, iPad, money, passport, ID

Wednesday--August 7: Return via bus to Fort William

Thursday--August 8: Relax

Friday--August 9: Leave for train for overnight train trip to London, say goodbye, pack all

Saturday--August 10: Arrive in London and taxi to hotel at Heathrow airport, relax

Sunday--August 11: Relax, possible tour, repack for trip home, can wear sandals or sneakers if touring

Monday--August 12: Taxi or shuttle to airport, fly home to Dallas, can wear sandals

Graduation Trip to the UK---Part 1--Setup

I had been planning this trip for the better part of over 2 years now, a graduation trip for my daughter, Madalyn. She was given a choice between money or a trip to anywhere she wanted to go in the world, and she chose the trip and she chose the UK.

The places that she wanted to go to and see and do were:
Stand on the inside of Stonehenge
Shop in Bath
Shop on Grafton Street in Dublin
See the Giant's Causeway
Walk across the Carrick-A-Rede Rope Bridge
Visit with our friend Billy in the Highlands of Scotland

This would be my 4th time going over there and her 2nd as the last time she was in the UK, she was 3 years old, some 16 years ago. We had stayed with Billy when he lived in Mallaig and we were in the UK when Princess Diana had died, we were just down the road from Balmoral, where the Prince and the sons were staying.
Now, returning back again, we were there when the baby was born who would have been Princess Diana's first grandchild! We had landed and got to the hotel just as they announced on the tv that Kate had had the baby. Although they had not named him yet, I had guessed they would name him George. For some reason, I just thought after seeing the distant past relatives of their's scrolling past on the tv, George stuck out to me. They would call him Georgie boy for short and I thought yea, King George. Wouldn't that be amazing?! :)

Anyway, back to the trip! I love to plan for trips! The planning is almost as much fun as going on the trip itself! After having done a coach tour for 2 weeks, I knew this trip, I would have to put it together on my own as the places Madz wanted to go to, were not all a part of just one tour. I also wanted to avoid driving as much as I could and completely if I could help it. I can drive over there, just would rather sit and relax and not have to worry about the car nor petrol nor any of that.

I figured this should be a good 3 week trip to really get to see everything and set it all up properly. I also wanted to add in a few places that she had not thought of and one (Paris), I wanted to make a surprise for her.

So here is what got added in:

Harry Potter tour--2.5 hour black cab taxi tour
Day trip to Paris---2 course champagne brunch atop the Eiffel Tower, cruise along the Seine and into the Louvre to see the Mona Lisa
Stop at Lacock in England for breakfast--part of the Stonehenge/Bath tour
Train across Ireland and then fly over to the Aran Islands
Tour to the Isle of Lewis to see the Callanish Standing Stones
Tour to the Orkneys to see the Ring of Brodgar and Skara Brae
Tour through Highgate cemetery
And last minute, I tossed in a Jack the Ripper tour.

The Setup:

The first thing to worry about is the air fare and reservations. Flying across the Atlantic Ocean, fondly called 'the pond', is really not that expensive when you plan and schedule it way ahead of time.
As this was her graduation trip, I wanted to really spoil her rotten and fly First Class but of course, that is just crazy, silly money to toss away.
However! her father travels a lot for his job and he saved for about 2 years for enough frequent flyer points to fly us both over first class for free! And when I say free, yes, the tickets were free, we only had to pay taxes. Oh man! Those taxes were about how much a flight would have cost us to fly a domestic flight if we paid in full! So yup, the cost for that was: $598.60 total for two people. I booked and paid for it in October 2012 for the July departure date.
We chose American Airlines, since we had the points with them, and also chose them and not British Airways as it would actually cost more in taxes than American Airlines. Funny that, as I would have thought it the other way around but no, American Airlines was the cheaper one.

The tours were next to set up and I was able to make a lot of them with Premium Tours and I'll have a link off to the side for them. Those I could set up fairly early, however a lot of the other tours and the train travel, I had to wait as they do not open up those dates we were to travel until it was much closer. So every now and then, I would check to see if the dates were released so that I could make the reservation and pay for the tour. This made it so that the paying for each tour would be staggered out for me as only one or two would be available each month or few weeks and so it made the costs very affordable in that way rather than paying for the entire trip all at once.

The trains were last to get reserved only because they were the last to open up for reservations. I had gotten the hotels fairly early on and most just reserved the amount they were to charge on the card and not actually charge tho' I would have rathered they just charged it but that was ok.

One thing to take note of here is that when you look at a calendar for the UK tours, you have to be careful to take note what day it is you are booking because their week starts with Monday, not Sunday so their calendars were off. I almost made a mistake because of that.

Now to set this up, I pulled out a map and a calendar and marked what day we were to do what and tracked what we would need to do to make that happen, what hotel, or would we need a taxi or train to get there? How close was the hotel to the train station? All these questions and locations had to get mapped out strategically to make the transitions be as smooth and easy as possible.

I almost set up an account with a taxi company for I knew I would probably be using them a lot but I felt that might be too expensive and most of the places I was choosing seemed to be in relative close proximity to each other and at times, we might walk, take the train or take the underground (the London subway kind of system). What I should have done was to have gotten a season travel pass on the underground as we ended up using that quite often as it was the cheapest way to get around London and if you are not in a hurry and don't mind the frequent stops, it is very convenient.

So nearly all tours and travel and hotels were paid for before the actual trip! That was really great! All we would have to spend our money on then was food and fun basically! How grand that is!

Now for what to pack?

21 days, actually was 23 days away when I recounted it. We wanted to travel as light as we could so we took half the tops and figured to wear them twice and then a few pants, shorts, skirts and just wear some of those a few times. As for shoes, we are lucky in that we have about the same size foot so we could share the two pair of sandals we took and then we wore our own sneakers. Brought socks of course, bras...etc. We would share the shampoo, cream rinse, soap, and other assorted toiletries and then we took our own makeup.

Camera and rechargers, headphones, iPod, and I picked up an iPad too so she would be able to Skype with her boyfriend and I could keep in touch with her dad who was covering for me at work and I could answer questions and of course to post pics along the way on Facebook. (If you would like my Facebook, feel free to look me up at: ghostpeeker@hotmail.com and add me. Tons of pics there!)
We also brought an umbrella for each of us as I knew it got rainy at times in the UK. Brought all the reservations and credit cards we would use and had used for the reservations.

She had a backpack and I had a carryon luggage as well as a purse that could hold the iPad and I had a smaller purse/wallet. Billy's address in case customs was a pain.
A light, thin jacket/sweater type of thing, two of those.

We left our cell phones at home for they would not be of much use without an international plan and I thought that the iPad would cover us as to keep in touch with family and friends.

This was an overnight flight, so we would be sleeping on the plane. We made sure we ate before we left that evening.

Picked up some snacks for the plane and during the trip.

That is all I can think of for setup, if more comes to mind, I'll edit and add it in here. :)

I took notes each day on my iPad and I will share these here of our journey as well as pics!
Blog posts to come!!

New Traveler Tips--Airlines, Car Rentals, Hotels

Before I go too much further into posting of the many trips I have been on, I wanted to touch base on a few things that you need to know about and be aware of as a new traveler, especially if you are a young traveler but especially starting out.

First and foremost is to sign up for every airline's frequent flyer mileage clubs, whether you think you will fly with them or not, do so, as long as it does not cost you anything to do it.

Second, sign up for every rental car agency's frequent renter clubs as well. No matter how expensive their cars are to rent or not, again, so long as it does not cost you anything, then do so.

Third, yes, time for the hotels too. Find a hotel chain that you really like and try to always stay with them as much as you can but still, make sure you are a member of all the hotel frequent stay clubs.

When starting out in life, you want to do this right away, especially if you are just becoming an adult and have not really travelled yet. It's very important as it may not seem like you will ever rack up enough points to gain any benefits but you would be surprised how fast they can accumulate. Sometimes you may get a job that will require you to travel and that's when you want to take full advantage of trying to stay as much as possible at the same chain and rent from the same car rental company and fly the same airlines.

Some good ones that we have used:

Airlines
Southwest--They have an excellent frequent flyer mileage club and you can get free flights easily! The further in advance you schedule your trip, the less points it costs. The only fee you would pay would be the tax and it's normally $5.00 a leg. (A leg is from one point to another) They will also send you free drink coupons in the mail and send offers if you want to see them for various trips. Their site is also one of the best and easiest to look to see how much it might cost for hotel and car rentals. Definitely the most user friendly!

American Airlines--They also have a great frequent flyer mileage club but they are more difficult to earn free flights, however, they DO go overseas.

United Airlines--Good program but still hard to accumulate enough points for free trips.

Each airline will also have other incentives and ways to earn those mileage points and some of them are to apply for one of their credit cards. Be forewarned here as I will be talking about credit cards as well, they usually have annual fees just to have the card and a high interest rate.
I'll go over credit cards here in another post.


Car Rental Agencies
Dollar, Budget, Enterprise, National and other local car rental companies, are going to normally be your cheaper ones. Each one has a nice program to where you can earn points and you can also get emails for specials they are running or coupons for free upgrades, etc etc. And yes, you can earn enough for free car rental days and just pay the taxes.

Hertz is probably one of the more expensive but they are also have very nice cars and take care of their frequent customers with class A service. The others will too, but you can tell Hertz is just one of the bigger and more expensive companies.

Most of these car rental places will try to sell you the insurance and it really jacks up the price. This is one of those damned if you do and damned if you don't type of deals because you never know when you might get into a car accident or some fool hits you and it's not even your fault. Many of your own personal car insurance policies do not cover the rental cars so you have to really make sure they do and how much and know what is and isn't covered before you roll the dice and take your chances.
Also, they will try to have you rent a GPS so it's best to have your own handy and they are cheap enough these days with a lot of great features and becoming familiar with it, you can personalize it and make it your own and save special places.


Hotels
Find one that isn't too terribly expensive and yet offers nice upgrades. We really enjoy the Holiday Inn chain. The hotels are clean and nice and many include continental breakfast and as you stay with them more often, they do offer points for free night stays  and they have many specials for bonus point opportunities throughout the year. Once you become a member of the Priority Club, many times when you check in, the front desk will have a special welcoming goodie bag with water, crackers or special coupons for thanking you for checking in with their hotel. Not all of them will do this, but it's nice when they do. They also at times, will upgrade you for free up to a nicer room or even an executive suite! One hotel we stayed at in FL, upgraded us up to the Executive level where we had are our own special area for breakfast in the morning and every night at 10pm, they would bring up fresh out of oven baked cookies and cold milk!! Talk about spoiling you to death!! You had to have a special key to get up to that level of the hotel too! Holiday Inn owns several different named hotels and some suite hotels such as Staybridge and if you stay there, its like a mini apartment! They are just gorgeous and come with a complete kitchen and washer/dryer, big screen tv, Jacuzzi tub...the works!
What else is nice is that when you accumulate so many points, you can actually book some nights for your friends to use as they don't normally require you as the member, to be the one to check in.


Hilton is another that has frequent stay programs but they are very picky about who can use the free nights and only allow the member to be the one to check in. It's harder to get the free nights as well.

Best Western is another hotel similar to the Holiday Inn and their hotels are fairly nice.

I have also stayed at the Ramada but I am not too familiar with their frequent stay programs.



Sometimes this information seems to be one of those lost, unspoken secrets because yes, it CAN be free! :)  Because of our jobs, we have been able to get a lot of points and used them for free trips to Vegas, FL and even overseas and just paying for the taxes. Also free rental cars and so many hotel stays it's not funny!

So why would they do this? To reward you for your loyalty with that particular company. You could choose any different company but you chose theirs and if your stay or flight or rental is so great, you are going to recommend them to your friends, word of mouth can be a powerful advertisement!

Don't forget, sign up with them all! :) You just never know!

Ocean City, MD --July/August 2011

Normally, at this time of the year, my family and I head off to the Jersey shore for our summertime vacation. We fly into Philly and rent a car, go to see family in PA and then drive on over to the shore and stay there for a couple of nights and then drive down to Delaware to see my uncle and stay with him for a few days and then drive on back up to Philly to fly home.

Last year, my favorite place in Jersey was packed full of people! It was a madhouse! It seems that the show, Jersey Shore was filming there! YIKES! It also seemed that so many foreigners were hired in the shops and stands instead of the local Jersey kids that I was used to seeing. I had noticed this trend over the years, so many exchange students or young people from Russia and other countries coming over to work the stands and shops during the summer. It was a bit disheartening to see as I missed the Jersey guys calling out to us as we'd pass the stands to try to get our attention to come on over to play their game of chance to possibly win this prize or that.

But yikes! Jersey Shore....as we had walked down the boardwalk too, they had Snookie and some other girl on the shore walking in front of us as they were filming while we were there. It was hard to see my favorite childhood spot infiltrated by the media and mobbed with people.

So this year, we decided to take a break from the shore and spend our time at Ocean City, MD. We had noticed that along the main strip were a ton of miniature golf courses! We have not played putt-putt as some call it, for a long time!

We flew Southwest on free tickets that were saved up and stayed at the Holiday Inn right on the beach, also using points too that were saved. We didn't really have a good plan like we were used to doing with the NJ jaunt but we had a really great time!

The hotel itself is right on the beach and the water was nice. Temperatures were really great although there was not much of a challenge for waves. I didn't get to see it at low tide at all but the water felt great. One of the only things I didn't like was that there was a live band that played the same beat over and over again one night. It was a bit obnoxious.

We got to play about 4 different miniature golfs and had a blast tho' we found out if you are going to go play them there, be sure and go before 5 pm because after that time, you pay a much higher rate as most people will play at that time or later so that they are not burning under the heat of the sun.

There were lots of little souvenir beach and surf shops, many were the same and tons of Candy Kitchen stores! WOW! Of course Dunkin Donuts were scattered all over too.


We met up with my uncle and ate with him a few times at a few places like Seacrets which is a wonderful restaurant on the bay side. The owner transplants palm trees every year and the whole
 
 

floor of the place is the sandy beach. One section has tables right in the water that you can sit at and have your feet in there. Several bars and dance floors, it's just a really fun, fun place to go!

 

Of course we had to go into the arcade and I had to play the coin slide games that I am really good at. I ended up winning enough points to get some great Halloween props! Take a peek over at my Halloween blog: Under the Crooked Hat and you can see the pics of all that I got! It was great fun! We went on the Haunted House ride and enjoyed shopping along the stores on the boardwalk.

Ocean City was a great alternative to the Jersey shore. Having the beach right on the beach itself was really bonus but I still missed Seaside.

To Share a Room or Not?

I wanted to talk a bit about the pros and cons of sharing a room when you travel.
I have been in both situations where I went alone and when I have shared a room.

PROS:
The pros of sharing a room with another person is of course, the most obvious, sharing the costs. This makes your trip a lot more affordable when you have someone to share half the costs of the hotel rooms as lets face it, it's fairly expensive to stay in a moderate hotel these days. You'll pay $100 at the bare minimum and if you are lucky or have discounts you can apply, AAA or Military...etc etc.

Also another pro is that you have someone there to talk to, share of your experience with right away, a nice travel companion as it always makes it nice to share your adventures with another person.

And who likes to eat alone? Always nicer to have a companion or friend to share dinner with.

CONS:
The cons of sharing a room is that if you do not know the person well you decide to share with, you can end up with someone who does not shut up and talk your ear off though you are so tired, all you want to do is collapse in bed and go to sleep.

You also have to worry about them dirtying up your bathroom or taking it over and leaving you no towels or cluttering up the sink with all of their tolietries and whatnot.

If you happen to have a small room, you will need to be mindful of how much luggage that not only you are taking but the person who is to share the room, how much luggage they will take.

There is also snoring, talking or even walking in their sleep that could very well be obstacles you may have to suffer through. I won't even talk about the 'gas' issue.

I have also not even touched on what if there is only one bed and you have to share? That brings a whole other issue as to the other person a bed hogger, cover stealer, roller, a blanket fluffer....the list goes on.

If there is a tv in the room, will the other person have to have it on to sleep? A light on to sleep?

Also, will they invade your privacy or invite others up to your room without even asking you and then you have to worry over your things being gone thru or items stolen.



As you can see, I can think of more cons than pros at this point. From all of my years and years of travelling, I do prefer to have my own room when I travel, unless travelling with my immediate family. Even eating alone, although that can be sad, I can get over it by just reminding myself of what I am avoiding by doing so. I know it sounds a bit sad, but I would still rather my own room unless travelling with someone you are either intimate with or family.

So, I would definitely recommend that when you travel to an event or going anywhere on your own, do not fall into the trap in thinking to save yourself some money by sharing. Instead, save yourself some aggravation and pay the extra if there is a cost, and get your own room. You will be glad you did so that you have your own space and privacy.


I think this clip from Trains, Planes, and Automobiles, starring John Candy and Steve Martin, shows exactly what I am talking about....!!!