devarae
100+ Posts
Hello folks! I am back from this trip and we had an amazing time! I am not sure if/when I will manage a real trip report, but if you are curious I have a photo album on Google Photos: https://photos.app.goo.gl/yAhukQeHghQMhPAn9
If you click on the first photo and then click the white "i" info button in the upper right corner, you can see the notes I wrote on each. Then you can just click through with the arrow to see each photo in turn. Not every photo has a note, but I tried to outline what we did each day and identify major sites.
Things I might do differently:
~ Looked into a National Trust membership before going. I suspect we would have saved money based on the number of sites we visited. Oh well!
~ Brought more long pants (I forgot about stinging nettles and they were EVERYWHERE and I only had brought one pair of jeans since it was so hot)
~ Maybe a different car rental service. Is it normal to arrange for a car pickup at a certain time and then arrive and be told you need to wait over an hour for an available car? I found that incredibly frustrating but it was really the only wrinkle in our entire trip so small in the grand scheme of things.
~ Paid more attention to how close the major highways were to the rentals we chose. Granted I didn't have a lot of choice as I had to make plans relatively late, but in retrospect I would have preferred to be able to go outside (in the country, not Bath or London, obviously) and not heard the distant hum of traffic, as I did in both West Overton and Windrush. Then again, it was also very convenient to be able to reach nearby towns!
~ Brought my own travel mug. Only one place had what I would consider decent-sized tea mugs! Also then I could have brought tea with me on early morning drives.
~ I probably would not have bothered to stop at Kelmscott if I could do it over. It was pleasant but a bit too crowded, and it ended up being too long of a day (we started with a 5AM, hour long drive to Stonehenge, then an hour to Wayland's Smithy/Uffington Horse, then thirty minutes to Kelmscott + more for a detour, then thirty minutes to Burford. Not terrible, but I would have been happier cutting Kelmscott.
~I would have tried harder/spent more for a full apartment rather than a studio in the Cotswolds. While our place in Windrush was lovely and comfortable, I was missing space. And while it was nice to have a fridge and microwave, I really would have liked to be able to cook some pasta and bean or scramble some eggs on the stovetop by that point!
Things that worked out!
~ I am very happy I spent the extra money for the Stonehenge early access. It made huge difference, compared to, say, our visit to Avebury. The combination of being able to walk in the circle, with only about 30 other people, in the relative calm of the early morning... It made it a much more powerful experience than I think it would have been otherwise.
~ I was pretty worried the London Residence would be an utter dive, but it wasn't that bad. It was definitely average: sort of weird, no front desk, just a woman who let you in the unmarked door. And the room was basically just big enough for the bed and nothing more. But it was clean, the bed was comfortable, and the location was ideal for our needs.
~ Driving was much less stressful than I expected! Bob did all the driving, as I was using my phone for navigation, but even as a passenger I had been freaking out the last time we tried driving oversees (in Ireland). I think partly it was just that there were fewer situations where the narrow road had stone walls or open chasms to the sea on either side! At least where we were, most of the time it was just fields or sidewalks! Also it really helped that I had my offline maps app and GPS location to help find our way. I feel a lot more confident now about future trips with rental cars in the UK!
~ While I could have done without the heat wave, traveling in July/August was not bad. It was hot, but as long as we kept hydrated we were okay. There were places where the crowds made things unfun (in particular, Lacock and Avebury) but overall it wasn't that different than our previous trip in September. And the long days were very nice! Especially in Bath where we were able to visit in the evening, after all the big tours, and see night falling as the torches burned over the large pool. I don't know if it would have been such a moving experience if we'd been there in November... That said, I think our future vacations will go back to the shoulder and off-season again, if possible!
If you click on the first photo and then click the white "i" info button in the upper right corner, you can see the notes I wrote on each. Then you can just click through with the arrow to see each photo in turn. Not every photo has a note, but I tried to outline what we did each day and identify major sites.
Things I might do differently:
~ Looked into a National Trust membership before going. I suspect we would have saved money based on the number of sites we visited. Oh well!
~ Brought more long pants (I forgot about stinging nettles and they were EVERYWHERE and I only had brought one pair of jeans since it was so hot)
~ Maybe a different car rental service. Is it normal to arrange for a car pickup at a certain time and then arrive and be told you need to wait over an hour for an available car? I found that incredibly frustrating but it was really the only wrinkle in our entire trip so small in the grand scheme of things.
~ Paid more attention to how close the major highways were to the rentals we chose. Granted I didn't have a lot of choice as I had to make plans relatively late, but in retrospect I would have preferred to be able to go outside (in the country, not Bath or London, obviously) and not heard the distant hum of traffic, as I did in both West Overton and Windrush. Then again, it was also very convenient to be able to reach nearby towns!
~ Brought my own travel mug. Only one place had what I would consider decent-sized tea mugs! Also then I could have brought tea with me on early morning drives.
~ I probably would not have bothered to stop at Kelmscott if I could do it over. It was pleasant but a bit too crowded, and it ended up being too long of a day (we started with a 5AM, hour long drive to Stonehenge, then an hour to Wayland's Smithy/Uffington Horse, then thirty minutes to Kelmscott + more for a detour, then thirty minutes to Burford. Not terrible, but I would have been happier cutting Kelmscott.
~I would have tried harder/spent more for a full apartment rather than a studio in the Cotswolds. While our place in Windrush was lovely and comfortable, I was missing space. And while it was nice to have a fridge and microwave, I really would have liked to be able to cook some pasta and bean or scramble some eggs on the stovetop by that point!
Things that worked out!
~ I am very happy I spent the extra money for the Stonehenge early access. It made huge difference, compared to, say, our visit to Avebury. The combination of being able to walk in the circle, with only about 30 other people, in the relative calm of the early morning... It made it a much more powerful experience than I think it would have been otherwise.
~ I was pretty worried the London Residence would be an utter dive, but it wasn't that bad. It was definitely average: sort of weird, no front desk, just a woman who let you in the unmarked door. And the room was basically just big enough for the bed and nothing more. But it was clean, the bed was comfortable, and the location was ideal for our needs.
~ Driving was much less stressful than I expected! Bob did all the driving, as I was using my phone for navigation, but even as a passenger I had been freaking out the last time we tried driving oversees (in Ireland). I think partly it was just that there were fewer situations where the narrow road had stone walls or open chasms to the sea on either side! At least where we were, most of the time it was just fields or sidewalks! Also it really helped that I had my offline maps app and GPS location to help find our way. I feel a lot more confident now about future trips with rental cars in the UK!
~ While I could have done without the heat wave, traveling in July/August was not bad. It was hot, but as long as we kept hydrated we were okay. There were places where the crowds made things unfun (in particular, Lacock and Avebury) but overall it wasn't that different than our previous trip in September. And the long days were very nice! Especially in Bath where we were able to visit in the evening, after all the big tours, and see night falling as the torches burned over the large pool. I don't know if it would have been such a moving experience if we'd been there in November... That said, I think our future vacations will go back to the shoulder and off-season again, if possible!
