holidays in england, cheap place to stay?

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I'd like to go to england for a week with one kid, not too far from London preferably (so i can go and visit the Tate gallery)
but I'm not much of a traveller (and quite poor actually), does anyone have any cheap suggestions to stay?

thanks in advance !

Don't go to London it's expensive, noisy and horrible.

Go to Cornwall.

You can rent a caravan by the sea for less than £200 per week some times of the year.

Crantock Bay is a nice place:



And it's only about 30 minutes drive from St Ives

Forget Tate London visit Tate St Ives

The Tate St Ives

(and take me)

Cornwall is indeed a charming place, and parts of it are cheap to stay in, but it's quite a trek from Belgium.

London is unfortunately very expensive too, there are Youth Hostels available but i'm not sure about how good they are with kids.

It might be worth scouring the internet for special package holiday deals, they can sometimes work out a little cheaper.

You can go Belgium ~ Newquay in Cornwall by train. Crantock Bay is about 2 miles from Newquay (a short taxi ride).

I know.

I was just thinking of the sentance "but I'm not much of a traveller (and quite poor actually)". Assuming that lemon were to travel by public transport she would have to take the Eurostar from Brussels to London, cross London and then take the train from Paddington to Newquay. Even if her child is under five years old I would expect the cost of that journey to be pushing (if not exceeding - trains aren't cheap - let alone Eurostar) £200 for lemon alone, never mind throwing in an extra fare if her child is older.

I suppose it depends how much she is willing to spend.

eurostar is 80 € (london and back) (so 160 for two, the 'kid' is almost 13), eurolines (=bus) is 66 €.

when i say i'm not used to travel, it doesn't mean i never took a train or something, just that i never really go on holidays and don't know anything about staying and finding a place to stay.
(i mostly go and visit friends)


i'm open to other interesting places but as you already mentioned, not if that is going to cost me a lot. (in belgium one can take the train from any station to any station, for 7€ with a card for 10 travels)

and i'm looking more for a city(for secondhand bookshops and things) cause i live in the countryside myself. (it doesn't need to be in the city though)

i suppose just walking around won't cost me any money, will it?

Why not look at places such as essex/kent to stay; close to london but not quite as expensive...

I can't tell you much about accomodation but I do know about travel in London.

Central London is comparatively small and many key features are within walking distance of one another (though maybe not with a small child). An authentic London A-Z street map is a useful little book to have. Many commuters can only navigate by "tube" [London Underground] train, but the tube map is schematic rather than geographically accurate so this can be misleading. In some cases stations are actually very close together although they seem distant on the Underground map.

Ordinary buses are cheaper than tube or overground train services, run frequently, and only get really crowded in the rush hours (7-9am and 5-7pm). Sightseeing buses are very expensive, though! One of the best ways of paying for travel within London is either with a Travelcard or even better an Oyster card, which is a pre-paid swipe card that can be used on both regular buses and underground trains, at a cheaper rate than the standard fares. This also allows you to avoid queuing up and buying a ticket each time you want to travel.

Have a look on the Transport for London (TfL) website which has really good maps and travel planners and basically tells you everything you need to know about travel within London.

Eurostar and long distance train operators within the UK very often sell heavily-discounted tickets for specific trains online, just like the airlines. The cheapest fares are normally available at about 6 weeks from the date of travel, but obviously you have to be sure which train you'll be catching. There are also websites for cheap hotel rooms such as lastminute.com but these have the opposite characteristic - they're a gamble as nothing is available until very short notice.

School summer holidays in the UK normally = August. This means that everywhere is twice as busy and twice as expensive in August, so avoid that month if you can.

Yeah don't go to London. I've been a few times and (in famed narrow-minded style!) can't wait to be back under the dear old red rose. Cornwall is a lovely part of the country. North Yorkshire is nice too but a long way away from Belgium.

sorry to go off topic, .....

how much does it cost to cross the channel?

how long does it take?

Could you visit the Tate Gallery as a day trip?

If you go as a foot passenger by boat it's not too expensive. It depends where you're coming from on the continental side and by what means you want to get the the UK.

If you're from a coastal area of Northern France or Belgium you can simply get the Calais-Dover or Ostend-Dover boat (I don't know if the Boulogne-Folkestone still runs - but sailing time for all is about an hour and a half) and then take the train from Dover up to London in a couple of hours.

Failing that, the Eurostar from Paris/Brussels to London is quick, but not all that cheap. Advance booking or a special deal will usually get you something at a good price, but otherwise you're looking at shelling out a bit.

But I know that day trips from all those places (Calais/Ostend/Paris/Brussels - London) are perfectly possible, because i've done day trips from London to all of them.

Don't they have a tunnel under the channel that you can drive thru now?

Stay home until the bloody weather changes ! !! It's torrents ! !!

The Channel Tunnel is a double track railway line used by Eurostar long-distance trains and Le Shuttle roll-on roll-off car transporter services. It's a very quick journey but boring. Ferries are more fun but much slower.

Yer a bit old to still believe in ferries, aren't you sociable?

are your feet still dry?

Are you in a flood area?