So this trip was a spontaneous trip planned by me and two college friends for Thanksgiving break. So picture mid/late November and having to book everything last minute. A REALLY helpful tool for me was Rome2Rio which is a website that shows you multiple ways to get from Point A to Point B, and how much it would cost. So for me, I was starting at Manchester Airport and needed to get to a town in Wales. I put in the two destinations into the website (like you would Google Maps) and it showed me all my options, how much they would cost, where I would need to transfer, etc. And for someone not used to traveling with trains or transferring so frequently, I found that very helpful for booking train tickets and bus rides. Okay now that that's out of the way...here we go!
Day One:
I flew from Denver to Reykjavik, Iceland, and from Iceland to Manchester, England. My flight cost somewhere around $1,000 roundtrip. When I arrived in Manchester I took a train from Manchester Airport to (get ready for lots of unpronounceable names) Llandudno Junction, and then transferred onto a bus from there to Betws-y-coed, Wales. I met up with my cousin who was studying abroad in Wales, and we got dinner at a pub in town before walking to our bed and breakfast (Oakfield House B&B). I was exhausted by this point so I slept from 8pm to 8am Wales time. The B&B we stayed at was AWESOME, super homey with a lovely breakfast!! We chose a B&B because all the hostels were booked and a B&B is more expensive, but I would highly recommend this one.
Day Two:
We took a 45-minute bus for something like $7 to Conwy to see Conwy Castle, and that was a GREAT castle to explore! It's mostly intact and one of the more affordable castles you can walk around and inside! I'll insert a photo here below, but this was one of my favorite UK stops.
After self-touring the castle we walked around the city itself and spent most of the day here. We got some good pastries and walked down to the water to enjoy people watching and a good walk! We also found a nice little trail across from our B&B once we got back that led into town, and that was a really nice trail to follow if you also happen to be in Betws-y-coed! It's pretty close to Snowdonia, so a good location.
Day Three:
My college friends flew in this day so I met up with them in the morning as my cousin headed back to school. We had been planning on doing Snowdonia, but it was pouring down rain and some locals recommended doing this waterfall hike instead! Well the waterfall was awesome, but we ended up doing a good 5-6 miles in this downpour. It was so wet that every layer I was wearing (two pairs of leggings, raincoat, sweatshirt, long sleeve, etc.) got soaked through!! I'll post Swallow Falls down below which was a great and easy hike/walk mostly along the road.
We went straight to our hostel where we had already dropped off our bags, but no one was there. Like, not a single soul. Also the heat was off, so we took LOONNG hot showers, curled up in as many dry clothes and blankets as possible, then went downstairs for hot tea and a board game! Once the owner came back and showed us how to reset the heat we were all good, but it took forever to warm up! Also, naturally, as soon as we got warm we had to walk back to town for dinner haha. We stayed at the Vagabond Bunkhouse and the bunks were GREAT, that super sturdy oak and very cozy (we just would have enjoyed ourselves more with some heat;)).
Day Four:
We took a train to Llandudno Junction, then transferred (or maybe just made a quick stop there and continued on) to Holyhead. From Holyhead we took a ferry to Dublin. It was a solid half day trip but cost less than $100. The ferry ride was super choppy and a bunch of people were getting sick, but we made it to Dublin and checked into our super cheap hotel. I can't recall the name, but it was like a ten minute walk to Temple Bar. We spent the afternoon and evening walking around Dublin and got dinner at an Irish pub (duh, where else would we go?). On advice from our waiter we went and got drinks afterward at a more local bar rather than the Temple Bar bars and pubs that are flooded with tourists! There I got some Irish whiskey and got hit on by the bartender before walking back to our hotel haha.
Temple Bar
Day Five:
We used Paddywagon Tours to do a full-day tour of Northern Ireland, specifically because we wanted to see Giant's Causeway. The bus picked us up around 8am and we had a FULL day on the charter bus making a few awesome stops. We stopped at Giants's Causeway (below),
Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge, Dunlace Castle, White Park Bay, the Dark Hedges and Ballintoy (below, filming site for Game of Thrones),
the Antrim Coast, and Belfast. We got a full hour in Belfast, and we took full advantage of that to check out their Christmas Market which was AMAZING!! Then straight back to our hotel so we can sleep. The tour costs about $70.
Day Six:
We woke up horrendously early and flew to London, me stopping there for the day and the girls continuing on to Scotland. We took a shuttle bus ordered by the hotel, then got on a 6am flight or something like that for roughly $30? Something pretty cheap. In London I took the train from the airport to Tottenham Hale, then another train from there to Euston, then a third train from Euston to Watford where I got on a bus to the Warners Bros Studio Tour. Took me a good 2.5 hours or something. I did the Studio Tour which was $45 or so and included a guided intro with the rest being self-guided. The whole tour took me roughly two hours but you could easily spend a half day here!! SO cool. They also have a little restaurant where you can get Butterbeer (it's better at Universal Studios).
After the Studio Tour I took a similar route back, but taking the train Euston to Embankment instead of the airport. I met up with a childhood friend living in London and we walked around, seeing Big Ben and a couple other classic London sights (from the outside, we didn't go inside anything), and we got dinner at an overpriced Chinese restaurant. This was how I spent my Thanksgiving by the way, certainly a memorable one!
After an evening with my friend I took a train back to the airport and flew on to Edinburgh, Scotland! I landed around 11:30pm and took the bus for $6 or so to Frederick Street. From there I met back up with my friends and we walked to our hostel, Kick Ass Hostel. I had booked separately from my friends so I was in a different dorm, and I had a 10 or 12 person coed dorm (can't remember the exact number)! It smelled awful but hey it was affordable and the rest of the hostel was great. One thing I'll say is that it seemed like the place for partiers/pub goers. I got in well past midnight and there was only ONE other person in my room (which was marked as full). The rest came in at like 2am and later.
Day Seven:
We spent the day walking around Edinburgh, which was by far my favorite big city we visited. We walked up to the castle (but didn't pay to go in), visited the Elephant House which is the coffee shop where JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter, shopped, and went to a local park! A great day, and much-needed chill after some crazy packed travel days!
We also explored the Edinburgh Christmas Market which was one of my highlights!! It was a giant festive Christmas party and I loved it. I got mulled wine, local food from the booths, and we checked out a bunch of different crafty booths! So fun.
Day Eight:
We did another full day tour, this time with Rabbies. We almost missed our bus due to me taking a wrong turn, but we made it and it was INCREDIBLE!! It cost roughly $50 and was 12 hours long. We hit Rannoch Moor, Glencoe, Great Glen, Fort Augustus, Loch Ness, Grampian Mountains, and Highland Perthshire.
Advice/Thoughts/Conclusion:
- If you're trying to maximize your time, you can stick to public transportation and tours to get to more places. It's pretty spread out if you rent a car!
- Book everything ahead of time!! We had to settle for more expensive accommodation in a few places because they were sold out.
- This is definitely a place you want to plan out ahead of time, especially if you're under a time crunch. We felt like we did very well hitting many different places, but I put hours of time into planning and booking everything.
- Some may disagree, but I would recommend paying to tour just one or two really cool castles, then skipping the rest. To be honest they look cooler from the outside anyway, and after awhile they all kind of look alike. Conwy Castle was a great one!!
- Scotland was SO underrated! Everyone talks about England, especially London, but I enjoyed Scotland the most. Both Edinburgh and our Highlands tour, it was beautiful and less crushing!
- If you can fit everything into a pack, like we did, it's much easier to walk around places and utilize public transportation. I'll include a photo at the very bottom of our packs!
- Be prepared to walk EVERYWHERE.
- Flying into other cities (like how we flew into Manchester) can be a much more affordable option than flying into London!
- If you go in the winter, be prepared for grey skies and cold weather, but definitely go to the Christmas Markets!!! Those were major highlights of mine.
- I think the only things I would do next time would be to spend more time in both Ireland and London (I only got a day in each), and I would love to give summer a try.
That's it!! I had a wonderful time, and really felt like we maximized our time here. We also managed to spend minimal amount of money! WOOOOO!
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