Our Greater London Megathread

Boxcar_Willie

You can do Gatwick for €40 return then £8 for your train into Victoria , takes about 40mins.

Prominent_Dawg

Prominent_Dawg wrote: »

Lambeth

Then i would go for Gatwick and catch the London Bridge/Clapham Junction train

Fogmatic

Just wondering if you looked at London City fares at the times/days that aren’t much use for commuting/business meetings etc?  I’ve found some surprisingly competitive ones in recent years. E.g. in August last year I went Dublin-London around 8pm on a Friday, returning lunchtime on a Sunday (and I was confined to times that meshed with buses from/to Donegal).  Also, did you factor in extras when comparing airlines? (Cityjet’s fares are all-in, and economy fares include a checked bag).

troyzer

Luton is fine. The bus to the train station is only five or ten minutes and then you can get a train straight to King's Cross. From there, you can go pretty much anywhere in London. It's not expensive. Use Trainline.co.uk and book return offpeak super saver tickets.

It's great if you're staying for a few days on holiday. For business? No. Go with City Airport or Heathrow. These places are more expensive but chances are if it's more business someone else is paying anyway.

coylemj

PM me nudes wrote: »

Heathrow can also be quite pricey to be fair, and that tube journey feels like it never ends!

Screw the expense, fly to Heathrow and get the Heathrow Express to Paddington.

PM me nudes

coylemj wrote: »

Screw the expense, fly to Heathrow and get the Heathrow Express to Paddington.

Considering they raised the cost of a flight to LCY as a problem, money must be somewhat of a deciding factor. To top it off, I don't think they'll want to pay over £30 return per person for a 15 minute train journey

off.the.walls

I tend to go through gatwick when I go to london, its only 20ish minutes on the gatwick express into the city. Well worth it.

grimm2005

Depends on your budget to convenience flexibility really. Like others, I'd suggest London City if you want ultimate convenience but you'll likely pay a decent chunk more to get that close to the city.

Personally I normally use Stansted although have been through most at some point and also mix and match airports if it's cheaper or more convenient to fly into one and out of another.

The reason I choose Stansted normally is that it's usually very cheap to fly to (generally between €30 - 50 return) with plenty of flight times to suit and the train is quick, comfortable and frequent (about 45mins to central London and can be booked for under £20 return if booked in advance) or failing that there's frequent coach services about £10 one way if bought on the spot, also under an hour to the city.

Luton is okay but the connections aren't as good and there's less frequent flights.

Gatwick is alright as well but I find the trains are often prohibitively expensive (about £36 return last few times I flew, same price as GW express) and the bus takes far too long at around 90 minutes into London but there's plenty of flights to choose from.

Heathrow is just far too expensive to fly into so I pretty much never fly there and I've yet to try Southend.

Mint Sauce

grimm2005 wrote: »

Depends on your budget to convenience flexibility really. Like others, I'd suggest London City if you want ultimate convenience but you'll likely pay a decent chunk more to get that close to the city.

Personally I normally use Stansted although have been through most at some point and also mix and match airports if it's cheaper or more convenient to fly into one and out of another.

The reason I choose Stansted normally is that it's usually very cheap to fly to (generally between €30 - 50 return) with plenty of flight times to suit and the train is quick, comfortable and frequent (about 45mins to central London and can be booked for under £20 return if booked in advance) or failing that there's frequent coach services about £10 one way if bought on the spot, also under an hour to the city.

Luton is okay but the connections aren't as good and there's less frequent flights.

Gatwick is alright as well but I find the trains are often prohibitively expensive (about £36 return last few times I flew, same price as GW express) and the bus takes far too long at around 90 minutes into London but there's plenty of flights to choose from.

Heathrow is just far too expensive to fly into so I pretty much never fly there and I've yet to try Southend.

If you get Southern Rail or the other operater on the route (Thameslink I think) into Victoria/London Bridge, I think its only half that, or even less. May take a little longer, about 40 minutes, and Southern only stops Croydon and Clapham on the way. Gatwick is also on the London Travel Network so Oyster can be used on London bound services.

The only downside is, that its Southern. Not the best rep.

srsly78

London City is by far the best, none of the others are even in London.

LCY is so small you just get off the plane and straight onto Docklands Light Rail - no waiting around. Central London is only a few stops away.

The rail prices for the other airports are a bit of a scam. The special airport express train is often a tourist-trap - you can just get a normal train for half the price which takes the same route in many cases.

Mint Sauce

srsly78 wrote: »

London City is by far the best, none of the others are even in London.

LCY is so small you just get off the plane and straight onto Docklands Light Rail - no waiting around. Central London is only a few stops away.

The rail prices for the other airports are a bit of a scam. The special airport express train is often a tourist-trap - you can just get a normal train for half the price which takes the same route in many cases.

Heathrow is very questionable. Whilst it may not have a London Post Code, its telephone number is a London Code, and it is in a London Borough.



I wouldn't use the arguement of it being on the London Underground my self, because fecking Watford is on that!

Prominent_Dawg

Think London city with cityjet had only checked it with aer lingus

Tar.Aldarion

Gatwick is the handiest in my experience and cheap. Don't get the gatwick express, it's over twice as expensive as a southern train which takes 5 minutes longer.

PM me nudes

To add on, don't get the Gatwick Express. If you're arriving outside of peak hours, i.e between 9.30am and 4pm, and after 7pm, don't buy a train ticket. Tap your contactless debit card, it's £8.40 into the city this way, but £10.70 if you buy an actual paper ticket.

lovelyhurler

PM me nudes wrote: »

To add on, don't get the Gatwick Express. If you're arriving outside of peak hours, i.e between 9.30am and 4pm, and after 7pm, don't buy a train ticket. Tap your contactless debit card, it's £8.40 into the city this way, but £10.70 if you buy an actual paper ticket.

I've a further question to this.
If you've got an oyster card can you use that now on this line?


The last time I flew into Gatwick (about 14 months ago), I wasn't able to use an oyster card for the train into Victoria.

Fogmatic

Prominent_Dawg wrote: »

Think London city with cityjet had only checked it with aer lingus

Yes, Cityjet among others.  But not Aer Lingus, it seems. https://www.londoncityairport.com/airlines

But it's sometimes possible to book a flight *through* an airline that doesn't do that flight - at a cost.  E.g. when I looked at a comparison website last year re Dublin-Paris, the price shown by Aer Lingus was modest and BA's very expensive, for the same flight, which was in Aer Lingus's plane.  (It's a little complicated, and can catch people out - I have an explanation bookmarked somewhere).

Fogmatic

Found it
https://abcnews.go.com/Business/FlyingHigh/story?id=865304&page=1

Prominent_Dawg

Thank you I have noticed that with Aer Lingus and BA, the same flights will be priced completely differently depending which official website you book though which is strange

Padraig Mor

theteal wrote: »

Yeah, nobody that lives here/is frequent visitor gets the tube from Heathrow, youd waste half your weekend on that journey. There are much quicker trains.

Don't forget that the Heathrow Connect train has now been rebranded as TfL Rail and Oyster / contactless can be used, keeping overall price low with the daily cap. Not sure of time - think it's 30 minutes to Paddington?

PM me nudes

lovelyhurler wrote: »

I've a further question to this.
If you've got an oyster card can you use that now on this line?


The last time I flew into Gatwick (about 14 months ago), I wasn't able to use an oyster card for the train into Victoria.

Yup

dechol

Hi. Has anyone visited the Harry Potter studios in London. Wondering if possible to do as a day trip from Dublin? Luton seems the closest airport and then a taxi? If anyone has been there can they advise?

I've been but I went from central London, so can't say about luton.
I got train to watford station I believe, then there are shuttle buses every 15 mins to the studio, from there.
You also need to buy tickets in advance, tours are at certain times.

runningbuddy

Hi folks, visiting next week with my teenage daughter. Am debating the London Eye. Is it worth it?? Have heard mixed reports

Cienciano

Definitely worth it. It's been a while since I did it, but I would definitely recommend it, it's a world famous landmark at this stage and will be one of the parts of the trip that will always stick in your mind.

pjproby

absolutely

vectorvictor

It's nice to do and does offer lovely views and nice photo opportunities.

A ticket on its own is pricey so look online for packages you can generally get good value bundles like London eye, a river cruise and other attractions etc.

One of the more expensive options is this one but it's brilliant value for what you get (no connection to nor have ever used the site it's the first result google threw up)

https://www.londontickets.ie/p/23972/the-big-london-adventure--attractions

Makes it alot easier to have a nice stack of things planned and booked before you arrive.

theteal

I’ll vote against the London Eye, it’s been a good few years since we did it but all I remember is it being expensive and the only thing I saw of interest up there was Wembley Stadium in the distance. If you want a view of the city there are much cheaper ways of achieving it in with the likes of the Walkie Talkie building or the Shard etc where you can enjoy a drink with the view.

Morini

Not worth it on its own. I didn't think seeing London form up high-ish was better than seeing it from the ground. The whole area there is very lively.

From a cost point of view, probably better value if you choose a 2 or 3 item package? https://www.londoneye.com/tickets-and-prices/

finbarrk

It's well worth it. She won't forget it.

SCOOP 64

Was on it years ago, going to London next week,just checked price on line 4 of us to go on over £100!, 1 child ,3 adults as 1 son now 17, cant believe i paid that last time ,remember last time it was good,not not paying that to do it again.