highlanderfil

After four years of moving on or around her birthday (ironically, two of those were to/from London), Ms. HighlanderFil deserves a dream fulfilled. So, this year, on July 9th, we've got tickets booked to the Game of Thrones Studio Tour in Belfast. Given that there are no direct flights (for which I have a strong preference) between Detroit and any of the UK bar London, I've put together this tentative itinerary for us. Would appreciate any feedback you're willing to provide. Just for context - we are two mid-to-late non-drinking (important given the planned travel location) thirtysomethings with passion for all things Harry Potter and GoT, as well as theatre (her), motor racing/football (me), furry creatures and lovely nature walks/drives (both). We lived in Essex between the summers of 2018 and 2019 and had a chance to check out a few things in England (e.g., the Leavesden Studio Tour, which we'll be skipping this time), but that's barely begun to scratch the surface of all we've wanted to see.

June 28: Fly to London. Ended up booking two Delta Premium Plus award seats for 108K miles and $331 each. Roughly 2 cents/mile in value, not too bad for Delta.
June 29 - July 4: Hang around London. Could always use suggestions, but we know the city well enough to be able to entertain ourselves. I have the new Hyatt Place Stratford booked on points (12K points/night, just over 2 cents/point: cash rates were £368 at the time of booking but have come down to £200) - it's not exactly central, but has good tube/national rail access, plus the other, more conveniently located Hyatt (and Hilton) properties are way more expensive. Update 5/11/2022: Gave in and dropped 280K Hilton points on Hilton Paddington instead of staying in Stratford. Much more central to everything, especially the Heathrow Express. On one of the days, take a day trip to the Fenn Bell Conservation Project in Kent for a binturong experience. We've been to one at a different zoo three years ago - it was awesome.
July 3 (afternoon): Train back to Heathrow, pick up a rental car, drive to Watford, spend the night there.
July 4: Train back to Heathrow in the morning, pick up a car, head to the Leavesden Studios Tour. We weren't going to go there originally, but starting July 1st, the Greenhouses are added as a new feature and who could say no to Mandrakes? We'd plan to leave there at around 5 pm (in at 11:00, afternoon tea at 15:00) and make our way over to the Cotswolds. In the evening, drive to Badminton. Found a Best Western right on the edge of the Cotswolds close to Castle Combe.
July 5: Assuming we spend the night somewhere around Castle Combe, our next destination (via Bibury, Bourton-on-the-Water and the Broadway Tower) would be Telford and Hoo Zoo, the site of our first binturong encounter three years ago. They no longer have it available (apparently, one of the handlers got bitten), but they still have others. Total driving time - around 3 hours, which leaves time to stop, walk around and take in the scenery (weather willing).
July 6-7: Morning at the zoo. Afternoon drive to Keswick. Rick Steves sold me on the 20 mile scenic loop south of the town, so we'd probably stay there for two nights and depart in the morning of the 8th.
July 5-8: By happenstance, I discovered an IHG-related Mr. and Mrs. Smith property in the Lake District. Cost us loads of points (145K for three nights, to be exact on a £240-260 nightly rate, which loosely translates to 0.66 cents/point), but rather than hopping around the Midlands and Scotland, it looks like a decent enough place to set up camp (although the drive in one day will be a bit of a task). And it's only about two hours away from Cairnryan, so we won't have to wake up too early the next morning to make the sailing - especially given it's now been pushed by an hour.
July 8: 11:00 (update: now 12:00) sailing to Larne. Return trip ended up costing £359. It doesn't look like there are too many hotels with great point redemption values in Belfast, but we were able to grab a room at the HIE Belfast for 60K points (fourth night free); cash rate was £143/night, so around 1.2 cents/point. The Holiday Inn Belfast City Centre looks a bit nicer, but no free breakfast or parking and 12K points more, all in. Update: The HI Belfast City Centre is exactly where we're going to end up staying after the HIE e-mailed us to say they're switching the reservation over there due to their hotel being unavailable. Free parking, free breakfast.
July 9: Studio tour in the morning/afternoon, walk around the city in the evening.
July 10: Driving tour of GoT locations in the north.
July 11: Hang around Belfast.
July 12:12:00 sailing back to Scotland.
July 12-14: Drive to Heathrow (about four hours), fly home.

Comments, suggestions, criticisms, etc. welcome, as always!

NWIFlyer

This may well come across as sacrilege, but I've never seen GoT. However, I have driven much of the route in the recent past and I can promise you that the scenery is absolutely spectacular.

I would strongly recommend that you combine the drive with a visit to the Causeway Coast attractions - Giant's Causeway and Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge are two of the best. The latter of those was closed due to Covid for a considerable period.

If you're driving back to Belfast, take the A2 rather than the motorway - you'll mostly be driving along the coast and there are a number of small villages which are worth a wander around on the way (and if you sail into Larne you'll be on that road anyway).

A word of warning on car hire - if you plan to visit the Republic, many hire companies (certainly those in Northern Ireland) will charge you a surcharge to do so. If you opt for a one-way rental that becomes eye-watering.

You might also consider the bus between Dublin and Belfast - it's cheaper than the train (considerably so travelling from Dublin to Belfast), more frequent, and actually generally quicker depending on where you're staying in Belfast - Lanyon Place station in Belfast isn't particularly central, whereas the bus stations at both ends of the journey are.

highlanderfil

Duly noted, thank you!

Yeah, I noted as much. Hertz wants 179 quid. Not sure about the other companies, though I suspect it's something similar. But that's why we've relegated those thoughts to distant memory. Not worth it.

Nah, no need. We'll keep the car for the entire journey, looks like. Easier this way - the only reason to split rentals into two was to fly to Turkey directly from Belfast and we're unlikely to need to do that.

On the subject of one-ways, I thought the drop-off fee for NI would be similar to that for other parts of the UK. Nope. Same as for Ireland, which is to say, exorbitant. Scotland is no issue, though.

USA_flyer

The drive from Kent to the Cotswolds will be longer than 2.5h unless you're driving in the middle of the night. From the port to Edinburgh will also be longer than you propose.

I note you have a night planned in Edinburgh. If you've not been before, I would suggest sacking off a night elsewhere and spending a day in that beautiful city.

highlanderfil

I'm going off Google maps and prior experience, but yeah, if we go in rush hour the M25 is going to be murder. We'll work around that and I'll update the OP. How long do you figure from port to Edinburgh?Yeah, we have two nights planned there, the 12th and the 13th. I have been before, but when my wife heard about Edinburgh, she insisted on the same, so we hacked off a day from Turkey.

Redhead

In Belfast the Black Cab tour is well worth it!

USA_flyer

For port to Edinburgh, again it depends on time of day. You'll potentially be going through the middle of Glasgow motorway which can get really busy. I'd add another hour and if it's less, call it a win.

highlanderfil

We'd probably set off around lunchtime or so. Thank you, I appreciate the advice.

highlanderfil

Thanks, I'll give it a look!

rcspeirs

Car rental locations.
All the rental companies (including Hertz) have seriously reduced their footprint. Far fewer locations than before the pandemic. Any Hertz location marked as a 24/7 location isn’t a “real” location – it’s where they offer van hire (van in UK English, a commercial vehicle to move goods) at B&Q stores.
The Hertz depot at City airport is bigger than the one at Dartford (which is not really in Dartford, it’s the back end of Erith, middle of nowhere) but it is not big in any sense you are used to. Probably 25 cars spaces available, so not many cars on site at any one time.

Crossing the Thames
City airport is north of the Thames. Your first stop is south of the Thames. Your options are (1) Blackwall tunnel, free but horrific queues in weekday rush hours (2) Woolwich ferry, free, fun thing to do, should be the easiest option as it is within spitting distance of the airport but laughable unreliable or (3) Dartford crossing. Toll charge but no toll gates, you must pay on line or face a hefty fine. Queues can be bad in rush hour.
I think the point I’m making is you need to time your river crossing carefully to avoid an hour of nose to tail frustration.

I thought the drop-off fee for NI would be similar to that for other parts of the UK
While Northern Ireland is part of the UK, it has a totally separate vehicle registration system from other parts of the UK. So if you dropped a car there, Hertz either needs to get it back across the Irish Sea or get it re-registered under the NI system – hence the high drop off fee.

Crossing the Irish Sea by ferry.
Would you consider dropping this? You are paying a lot of money for a dull ferry crossing and for additional rental car insurance fees. It would likely be cheaper to drop the car at Glasgow or Edinburgh airport, fly over and rent a car locally. Belfast has two airports, City airport is (as the name suggests) very central. The air route between Scotland and Belfast is fiercely competitive.

Stay near Cairnryan
No – don’t. Working port. Nothing to recommend it to a visit
If you persist with the ferry and want to stay near the ferry, Portpatrick (south of Stranraer) is very pretty.

Turnberry
Tiny hamlet, barely a village. The famous hotel is the only thing there. If you are not staying at that place, not really anything else in the area.

Edinburgh
If you do make it part of the tour (and it’s a great city) get rid of the car on arrival. Having a rental car in Edinburgh is just an expensive exercise in frustration.

highlanderfil

Yeah, that's what I've gathered, even from the types of cars they have available. Hertz seems to only have economy, compact, electric and vans. Avis seems to be somewhat more diverse, at least at LCY. I've tried looking for different pickup locations for Avis, but so far haven't been successful - most city locations give an error when selected.
Yeah, I've rented from LCY before. Ended up with a Merc E-series convertible when renting a compact back in October 2019. That was...interesting.
Dartford is what we've done before when living in Essex (except Blackwall once or twice and, yeah, that was..."fun"). I didn't even know about the Woolwich ferry. Might actually be worthwhile to check it out.
Agreed. Good looking out.
Thanks - appreciate the explanation. Makes total sense.
I would definitely consider dropping the ferry as an option, but I really don't like flying (much less on puddle jumpers Aer Lingus and LoganAir operate out of the area), so anything I can do to avoid it is worth it to me (plus, it adds an extra stop on the way to Turkey/wherever, unless we fly from Dublin, which, I suppose, we could do). That said, maybe I can convince myself to bite the bullet, but driving from Keswick just for a flight doesn't look like a good way to spend the time. Is there another airport closer than Manchester or Newcastle with direct flights to Belfast? (It doesn't look like it from looking at the Wiki page.) We can then drop Edinburgh altogether and look for things to do for one or two more days in NI (or maybe take a train down to Dublin for a day and fly out of there). Something to think about for sure.
Check. I looked at the map - Portpatrick definitely fits under my definition of "near".I honestly just wanted to take a photo of something that said "Turnberry" as a keepsake. We have lived either on or intersecting a street with the same name for the past five years, so it was just a neat thing to do that won't take up a lot of time.
Yep, already modified my reservation to drop it off early. As I recall from my first trip there, getting to the airport is about a half-hour affair on either Uber or a bus.

highlanderfil

Thinking about skipping the ferry and I wanted to put costs down to "paper".

Option 1: Stick with the ferry, fly to Turkey from Edinburgh
Rental car: $330
Ferry: $430
EDI-AYT: $400
Total: $1,160

Option 2: Return rental car to Manchester/Edinburgh/Glasgow/etc. on the 8th, pick a new one up in Belfast on the 9th, train to Dublin on the 11th in the evening, fly to Turkey from there on the 13th (essentially replacing Edinburgh with Dublin)
Rental car 1: $200
Flight: EasyJet from Edinburgh at 10:15 a.m. or BA/EI at 11:25/11:40: around $330
Rental car 2: $325
Train to Dublin: about $70
DUB-AYT: $550
Total: $1,475

Welp, that makes it easy enough...

rcspeirs

You're quoting return the car to MAN but flight prices from EDI? A typo?
I'm seeing flights from MAN to BFS for £38 (plus hold luggage) with easyjet on 8 July

From Keswick, it'll take between two and three hours to drive to MAN EDI NCL or GLA airport, same time for Cairnryan port.

highlanderfil

No, not a typo - I had overcomplicated my Kayak search a bit, so it returned both EDI and MAN and I hadn’t edited the car return line (which I've done now). Not that it really matters - the cost is the same irrespective of where I drop the car.

That said, I just looked at Kayak again. I see the flights you’re referring to (I must have filtered them out due to takeoff times). The cheapest ($111 per person; I’m including bag fees) is at 6:35 am. That’s a complete nonstarter. There is one that takes off at 16:15 and costs $129, which is a little late for our purposes (ideally we’d like to get to Belfast by 3-4 pm), but might be OK. So, all in, that saves $70 vs my original Scenario 2. Still not really worth it.

highlanderfil

By the way (as is evident from the discussion above), the route to Belfast isn't set in stone. If there are other places we should be looking at besides Cotswolds and Keswick, I'm very much open to suggestions. It's also entirely conceivable we'll front-load a couple more days and arrive either on the 28th or 29th, depending on ticket prices, so we might have a bit longer to play with.

The zoo thing in Kent doesn't necessarily need to be on the 4th, either. In fact, if there's a relatively easy way to get there without a car, it could be a day trip from London just as easily (on one of the first days, so that we can ride the wave of jet lag and wake up early naturally). Looking at the map, it appears there's a Southeastern train that goes from Stratford to Strood, from which we can either catch the 191 bus (which runs once every hour or so and seems pretty convenient vs. the train's schedule) or take a cab to the zoo.

This then opens up alternatives for getting out of London and doesn't necessarily tie us to LCY as the place to pick up the rental car. E.g., if there's a good direct way for us to get to Chippenham, Swindon, Bath or even Bristol from Stratford and pick up a rental car there, that might be a more optimal solution than trying to brave the M25 in the afternoon. There appear to be a couple of Hertz locations in Swindon, but none seem to be bookable online. The only nearby Avis I see is at the Bristol Airport, which isn't exactly ideal...