Hello,
We are planning a trip next year and we will be arriving at London Heathrow at 9pm and we want to proceed to Birmingham for Crufts 2016 and then head back to London for the rest of the trip.
Where do you guys suggest we stay for the first night that will be convenient to take the train to Birmingham in the morning? Or can we take a midnight train?
Thanks :)
Take a tube train direct to Kings Cross. Stay in a hotel anywhere between there to Euston (10 min walk) , next morning take a train from Euston to Birmingham (2 hours).
Pity you aren't arriving a little earlier, the last direct coach seem to leave at 10pm which is too tight. There are trains running late from Euston but they are also tight, I see no point rushing if you might miss them and end up booking a last minute hotel at midnight.
Trains run from London Euston direct to Birmingham International, most services take around 1hr 10 minutes. The timetable for next year won't be fixed yet, but you can get an indication by looking at the equivalent day of the week, for say next week, on the National Rail journey planner:
Birmingham's Airport is linked to the station/exhibition area - have you researched flying there?
Is your Crufts trip for one day or longer - ie is the London hotel for one night (and you're then staying in B'ham for a while) or are you staying there longer? As Joe has said the Euston/Kings Cross/St Pancras area would be convenient for the train to B'ham, but may not suit the rest of your plans.
We will be staying in Birmingham for 3-4 days and London for 4 days.
Unfortunately, there is only 1 direct flight from our airport to UK so we can't choose a different time or airport. It will be a 15-hr flight so I don't want to have stopovers because we will waste a lot of time.
I'll look at the hotels near Euston. Do we have to books the trains in advance or will there be plenty of seats available if we go in the morning?
Where are you flying in from? Can you fly direct into Birmingham and back from London? It would save a lot of hassle and add at least half a day to your trip.
It will be much cheaper to book the trains in advance. Start here http://www.nationalrail.co.uk
Best prices start from about 10-12 weeks out and are for a specific timed train miss that and your ticket is lost..
The train will not sell out, but tickets will be considerably more expensive closer to the date. The cheapest fares are Advance singles. These tie you to taking a particular train and come with a seat reservation as standard. With a big event like Crufts on, it is possible -- particularly if you travel first thing in the morning, which is peak time -- that there would be no seats available should you purchase walk-up tickets so you will have paid over the odds to stand for the whole journey.
To give you an example of the price difference: booked well in advance, you can get 2 advance singles (i.e. to Birmingham and back) for £12. An anytime return (purchased on the day and valid on both peak and off-peak services) for the fastest trains on the route is £168. These prices will likely go up slightly in the new year, but that should give you a general idea of what you can expect to pay.
But effectively you are having a stopover but with the added disadvantage of an overnight hotel stay and having to move from LHR to Euston.
A good point john, thats a much worse stopover than say a 3 hour wait at an airport!
There are direct coaches from Heathrow Airport (Central Bus Station) to Birmingham City Centre at 22.00, 23.59 and 00.45, if arriving in Birmingham in the middle of the night isn't an issue for you.
If you book a coach and miss it due to flight or airport delays, you can transfer your booking to a later coach for £5 per person.
You also have the option fo staying at an Airport hotel and catching a coach the following morning.
Here's the timetable;
http://www.nationalexpress.com/assets/uploads/pdf/timetables/R210.pdf
