Train from London to Southhampton

[twoatsea]

You folks have already helped me with so much & I thank you. Sorry to impose, but now I am working on getting to S.Hampton from London.

 

Am I correct to assume that our options are a private car (about $110 total for the 2 of us) with Smiths (take us to the dock), or the train from London to the S.H. train station. Is that correct?

 

What link do I use to book the train?

 

Where in London would we board the train?

 

How do we get from the S.H. train station to the dock? Taxi?

 

Do the trains run regularly?

 

For those of you who take the train, do you do so on the day of sailing, or do you feel more secure taking it the day before & staying overnight in S.H.?

 

Thanks

p.s. the private car sounds so much easier, doesn't it!?

[twoatsea]

Uh Oh! I just tried to view Smithsforairport.com/Smithforairports.com & it's not there? Did google search & didn't find it?

 

Anyone have the website address?

 

Do they only provide service from the London airports? We will already be in London at a hotel.

 

Thanks again

[KarenR_UK]

Uh Oh! I just tried to view Smithsforairport.com/Smithforairports.com & it's not there? Did google search & didn't find it?

 

Anyone have the website address?

 

Do they only provide service from the London airports? We will already be in London at a hotel.

 

Thanks again

 

try

http://www.smithsforairports.co.uk/

[Cruise NH]

You folks have already helped me with so much & I thank you. Sorry to impose, but now I am working on getting to S.Hampton from London.

 

Am I correct to assume that our options are a private car (about $110 total for the 2 of us) with Smiths (take us to the dock), or the train from London to the S.H. train station. Is that correct?

 

What link do I use to book the train?

 

Where in London would we board the train?

 

How do we get from the S.H. train station to the dock? Taxi?

 

Do the trains run regularly?

 

For those of you who take the train, do you do so on the day of sailing, or do you feel more secure taking it the day before & staying overnight in S.H.?

 

Thanks

p.s. the private car sounds so much easier, doesn't it!?

 

We took the train when we did our TA. The link is http://www.southwesttrains.co.uk/SWTrains

 

The trains leave from Waterloo Station and leave at least once and hour if not more. The ride takes about 1 1/2 and is pretty cheap (compared to the alternatives).

 

We had our luggage and had no problem finding a place for it on the train (there is no checked luggage).

 

There were taxis right at the Southampton train station and the ride from the station to the ship was about 10 minutes. We did share a cab with a nice english couple also going on the QM2. We were in the taxi queue together and the next taxi coming up was a van so we just asked them if they'd like to share.

 

Unless you want to spend the night in Southampton...there's no reason to go a day early.

 

While in London we stayed at a hotel close to Waterloo and actually walked over to the train station the day we left. Since we were close to the station, we did go over the day before and got reserved seats (not really necessary but nice to have and no additional cost).

 

Waterloo is near the London Eye, Parliament, etc.

[Q-step]

Although not exactly on topic, when we tooks Smith's in August the driver told us that for about 60 pounds more they will take you over to visit Stonehenge on the way to Soton. Having never been there, we would have opted for this had we known it was available. It adds 1.5 hours plus whatever time you spend walking around Stonehenge.

[fromtheplains]

twoatsea,

 

I second everything that Cruise NH said. We have taken the train to Southampton at least three times and it has always been easy. No problem with luggage. There are always taxis waiting to get you to the ship quickly. It is much cheaper this way and very relaxing to just sit back and ride. Also you can get up and move around if you want to, which you can't do in a car. Enjoy your cruise.

 

Steve

[Bigmike911]

You folks have already helped me with so much & I thank you. Sorry to impose, but now I am working on getting to S.Hampton from London.

 

Am I correct to assume that our options are a private car (about $110 total for the 2 of us) with Smiths (take us to the dock), or the train from London to the S.H. train station. Is that correct?

 

What link do I use to book the train?

 

Where in London would we board the train?

 

How do we get from the S.H. train station to the dock? Taxi?

 

Do the trains run regularly?

 

For those of you who take the train, do you do so on the day of sailing, or do you feel more secure taking it the day before & staying overnight in S.H.?

 

Thanks

p.s. the private car sounds so much easier, doesn't it!?

Two at Sea, Take the train. Southwest Trains have trains every 15 minutes from London Waterloo. The cost is about 31 pounds or 55 for first. You can get to Waterloo easily from anywhere in central London by taxi for about 6-8 pounds, or you can take the Bakerloo or Northern underground lines if you don't have much luggage.

 

You buy your ticket at Waterloo. Pre booking is probably not required but if you want to visit http://www.nationalrail.co.uk. There are places to go to pre book. I recommend you take a train with out connections.

 

The trains take from 1:20 to 1:25 hours and go to Southampton Central, then a short and cheap taxi trip to the crusie terminals. There are 4 terminals in Southampton and cunard uses all of the, so make sure you have the correct terminal. it will be in your ticket.

 

The train will be much faster than a private car and less stress. I advise taking a train about 11 am to be at the terminal for check in by 1 pm. You can of course take an earlier train if you would like, but remember the ship usually sail at 4:30 so don't be late.

 

Enjoy,

 

Mike

[southwestie]

Some good tips above, i would add that you should not have to pay any more than £10 for a single ticket for standard seats if you book early as possible, booking is open now for your dates,

 

use south west trains or raileasy to book, you should get good prices.

if you buy on the day it is a lot more money

 

please join the roll call for that voyage

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=873713&page=32

 

rob

[guernseyguy]

1. Take the train
   
2. Book in advance for lower fares vs buying on day of travel
   
3. For the lowest fare check out: Megatrain
   

 

'Megatrain' use standard SouthWest Trains - its simply a carriage (often not labled, so in practice any carriage) on a SouthWest train. Fares from £1 + 50p booking fee.

[Steeplechaser]

Hi,

 

And I think the Southampton bus U1A, or something, runs frequently from the central train station to the dock. I've not tried it yet but plan use it my next solo trip. It might not be worth it with luggage and more than 1 person, but I'll experiment.

 

George

[twoatsea]

Well, thank you so much for all of your posts. So much good info. Rob, I am on the roll call. And, Q-step, I think the info about the Stonehenge tour is good to know. Not, wanting to give you an assignment, but I hope you posted that info on the ports of call board.

 

Right now, we are waiting for responses from 4 car service companies, plus we have received a response from Smiths - thanks KarenR_UK for that link! We didn't think the quotes were unreasonable & definitely much more convenient - pick up at hotel, take directly to pier, & so on for the other trips. No lugging bags, no stairs, no several means of transport. But we are still undecided. Also, regarding price, we have to consider when taking the train we have to get from our hotel to the train station - private car or taxi because otherwise we are lugging bags up & down stairs in the tube stations, and transport to the pier from the train station which will incur additional costs & more inconvenience that a car. Makes the car sound very comfortable! We love taking trains & definitely would be much more enjoyable than taking a car. Right now it is the thought of using 3 modes of transport to get to one place than using 1 mode - comfort vs cost. Strange - spending all of this money & dickering over a comparatively small sum for the convenience of a car!

 

Anyway, thanks so much for your help.

[southwestie]

You folks have already helped me with so much & I thank you. Sorry to impose, but now I am working on getting to S.Hampton from London.

 

Am I correct to assume that our options are a private car (about $110 total for the 2 of us) with Smiths (take us to the dock), or the train from London to the S.H. train station. Is that correct?

 

What link do I use to book the train?

 

Where in London would we board the train?

 

How do we get from the S.H. train station to the dock? Taxi?

 

Do the trains run regularly?

 

For those of you who take the train, do you do so on the day of sailing, or do you feel more secure taking it the day before & staying overnight in S.H.?

 

Thanks

p.s. the private car sounds so much easier, doesn't it!?

 

 

I am confused here, If you are on the TA from NYC on the 5th, surley you want to GO TO london and FROM London.

 

or am I reading this all wrong

[pepperrn]

Passengers in London wishing to travel to New York on QM2 on 11th November would be advised to travel TO Southampton to join the ship.

 

I think the advice "you want to GO TO London and FROM London" is wasteful of a passenger's time on the day of departure (unless you're an "in-transit" passenger looking for a few hours sightseeing in the capital). I would make only one journey from London, once in Southampton I'd stay there, no matter how much I enjoyed train travel. And of course, return journeys can be more expensive than single trips.

[southwestie]

Passengers in London wishing to travel to New York on QM2 on 11th November would be advised to travel TO Southampton to join the ship.

 

I think the advice "you want to GO TO London and FROM London" is wasteful of a passenger's time on the day of departure (unless you're an "in-transit" passenger looking for a few hours sightseeing in the capital). I would make only one journey from London, once in Southampton I'd stay there, no matter how much I enjoyed train travel. And of course, return journeys can be more expensive than single trips.

 

 

Martyn, you really need to read all of twoatsea posts, what we are trying to find out is does she wish to travel from southampton to London, or vice versa, we all know which way the train travels, what we need to know is are they now sailing to NYC on the 11th, or as we now think they are sailing on the 5th from NYC and wish to take train to London.

 

We can all work out the fact that they dont wish to travel BOTH ways on sailing day:eek: duh

[southwestie]

Well, thank you so much for all of your posts. So much good info. Rob, I am on the roll call. And, Q-step, I think the info about the Stonehenge tour is good to know. Not, wanting to give you an assignment, but I hope you posted that info on the ports of call board.

 

Right now, we are waiting for responses from 4 car service companies, plus we have received a response from Smiths - thanks KarenR_UK for that link! We didn't think the quotes were unreasonable & definitely much more convenient - pick up at hotel, take directly to pier, & so on for the other trips. No lugging bags, no stairs, no several means of transport. But we are still undecided. Also, regarding price, we have to consider when taking the train we have to get from our hotel to the train station - private car or taxi because otherwise we are lugging bags up & down stairs in the tube stations, and transport to the pier from the train station which will incur additional costs & more inconvenience that a car. Makes the car sound very comfortable! We love taking trains & definitely would be much more enjoyable than taking a car. Right now it is the thought of using 3 modes of transport to get to one place than using 1 mode - comfort vs cost. Strange - spending all of this money & dickering over a comparatively small sum for the convenience of a car!

 

Anyway, thanks so much for your help.

 

 

I see now that you are on the 5th roll call along with our very good friends Terry and Loreatta, you are in very good hands on that voyage, shame your not our 11th voyage, , so you will leaving the ship in southampton and going into london-you are right though a private car is the way to do it, which ever way your going.

 

now if you altered the crossing and your on the 11th TO nyc, I look forward to meeting you the ship

 

rob

[southwestie]

Well, thank you so much for all of your posts. So much good info. Rob, I am on the roll call. And, Q-step, I think the info about the Stonehenge tour is good to know. Not, wanting to give you an assignment, but I hope you posted that info on the ports of call board.

 

Right now, we are waiting for responses from 4 car service companies, plus we have received a response from Smiths - thanks KarenR_UK for that link! We didn't think the quotes were unreasonable & definitely much more convenient - pick up at hotel, take directly to pier, & so on for the other trips. No lugging bags, no stairs, no several means of transport. But we are still undecided. Also, regarding price, we have to consider when taking the train we have to get from our hotel to the train station - private car or taxi because otherwise we are lugging bags up & down stairs in the tube stations, and transport to the pier from the train station which will incur additional costs & more inconvenience that a car. Makes the car sound very comfortable! We love taking trains & definitely would be much more enjoyable than taking a car. Right now it is the thought of using 3 modes of transport to get to one place than using 1 mode - comfort vs cost. Strange - spending all of this money & dickering over a comparatively small sum for the convenience of a car!

 

Anyway, thanks so much for your help.

 

If its any help, we are going from the west country to the docks by car, on the 11th and returning from London home by private car as well.

[pepperrn]

twoatsea 18th Sept 09

 

"This will be our first time on the QM2. When I booked, I waitlisted us for the premium balconies & ocean views. We paid for & were assigned cabin #6232, an inside. Our sail date is 11/11/2009. Today I got a choice of #5250, oceanview."

 

"I am working on getting to S.Hampton from London"

 

"Where in London would we board the train? How do we get from the S.H. train station to the dock?"

[twoatsea]

This is soooo funny - to my little mind anyway. :p Let me explain!

 

On Nov 5, 2009 we sail on the QM2 from NY to Soton (just was told about that life saving abbreviation today).

 

Sooooo for 11/11, I needed to know how to get from Soton to Gatwick.

 

On Nov 11 we fly from Gatwick to Rome for 7 nights

 

On Nov 18 we fly from Rome to London for 5 nights

 

On Nov 23 we transfer from our London hotel to Soton - so needed to know how to get back to Soton from London - such as, the questions in my original post.

 

On Nov 23 we sail on RCCL Independence for a 13 night TA, ending in Ft. Lauderdale.

 

In my planning I knew that I needed to work FAST in order to grab the prices of my 2 cruises (we usually book much earlier; this was a whim!), but I didn't want to pay nonrefundable money if the rest of the trip was not going to work out to our satisfaction. So, for 2 days I frantically worked to research & coordinate all of the hotel, transfers, cruises, & flights connections.

 

Therefore, some of my many posts for various parts of the journey were confusing - this one is probably one of the best - because I entered wrong info or just didn't explain myself properly!

 

Anyway, in my original post on this thread, I apologized for imposing, but didn't explain why. I came back to the Cunard board for info pertaining to my transfer to the RCCL ship, because folks on this board had been so helpful. :cool: What's wrong with you guys - can't you read my mind via computer??????? Hmmmm, good thing I don't date via computer; I could end up on the news!:eek:

 

Lastly, thank you Cunard folks for being so helpful - seriously. I look forward to my first cruise on Cunard & the QM2 - all of my friends are so jealous. I didn't realize how many people dream of cruising on the Cunard ships!

 

Happy cruising.

[twoatsea]

Here's what I should have done. Hopefully my signature will show the 2 countdown clocks I just added!

[cruisegal101]

This is soooo funny - to my little mind anyway. :p Let me explain!

 

On Nov 5, 2009 we sail on the QM2 from NY to Soton (just was told about that life saving abbreviation today).

 

Sooooo for 11/11, I needed to know how to get from Soton to Gatwick.

 

On Nov 11 we fly from Gatwick to Rome for 7 nights

 

On Nov 18 we fly from Rome to London for 5 nights

 

On Nov 23 we transfer from our London hotel to Soton - so needed to know how to get back to Soton from London - such as, the questions in my original post.

 

On Nov 23 we sail on RCCL Independence for a 13 night TA, ending in Ft. Lauderdale.

 

 

 

Lastly, thank you Cunard folks for being so helpful - seriously. I look forward to my first cruise on Cunard & the QM2 - all of my friends are so jealous. I didn't realize how many people dream of cruising on the Cunard ships!

 

Happy cruising.

 

Thank you for clarifying--I was going to reply to you but had no real idea what you were doing (see quote in my signature). ;) Your trip sounds wonderful and I'm guessing that you've booked a car to get you from Southampton to London on the 11th and then from London to Southampton on the 23rd. It really is much nicer and easier hiring a private car--great experiences for me with Smiths!:)

[pepperrn]

On Nov 5, 2009 we sail on the QM2 from NY to Soton... for 11/11, I needed to know how to get from Soton to Gatwick. On Nov 11 we fly from Gatwick to Rome for 7 night. Therefore, some of my many posts for various parts of the journey were confusing - because I entered wrong info or just didn't explain myself properly!

 

Well, we tried to help...

 

I'd be interested in your views, once you return, if you can remember, between a liner going out and a cruise ship coming back. QM2 and IoftS are like chalk and cheese despite being of similar size (QM2 is a bit longer, taller and wider. IoftS has a slightly larger grt). I hope you like both, but I think it will be for different reasons.

 

"Bon Voyage!" on Queen Mary 2, the greatest liner in the world, and, indeed, for your whole vacation.

[cruisegal101]

Well, we tried to help...

 

.

 

Yep, and you posed the question that I was wondering about--thanks for doing that since it led to clarification!:)

[pepperrn]

Yep, and you posed the question that I was wondering about--thanks for doing that since it led to clarification!:)

 

My pleasure Bettie, thank you.

 

Very best wishes

[southwestie]

This is soooo funny - to my little mind anyway. :p Let me explain!

 

On Nov 5, 2009 we sail on the QM2 from NY to Soton (just was told about that life saving abbreviation today).

 

Sooooo for 11/11, I needed to know how to get from Soton to Gatwick.

 

On Nov 11 we fly from Gatwick to Rome for 7 nights

 

On Nov 18 we fly from Rome to London for 5 nights

 

On Nov 23 we transfer from our London hotel to Soton - so needed to know how to get back to Soton from London - such as, the questions in my original post.

 

On Nov 23 we sail on RCCL Independence for a 13 night TA, ending in Ft. Lauderdale.

 

In my planning I knew that I needed to work FAST in order to grab the prices of my 2 cruises (we usually book much earlier; this was a whim!), but I didn't want to pay nonrefundable money if the rest of the trip was not going to work out to our satisfaction. So, for 2 days I frantically worked to research & coordinate all of the hotel, transfers, cruises, & flights connections.

 

Therefore, some of my many posts for various parts of the journey were confusing - this one is probably one of the best - because I entered wrong info or just didn't explain myself properly!

 

Anyway, in my original post on this thread, I apologized for imposing, but didn't explain why. I came back to the Cunard board for info pertaining to my transfer to the RCCL ship, because folks on this board had been so helpful. :cool: What's wrong with you guys - can't you read my mind via computer??????? Hmmmm, good thing I don't date via computer; I could end up on the news!:eek:

 

Lastly, thank you Cunard folks for being so helpful - seriously. I look forward to my first cruise on Cunard & the QM2 - all of my friends are so jealous. I didn't realize how many people dream of cruising on the Cunard ships!

 

Happy cruising.

 

 

It is so funny your right, some people on here just jump in, I thought I could see what happened lol,

[southwestie]

Well, we tried to help...

 

I'd be interested in your views, once you return, if you can remember, between a liner going out and a cruise ship coming back. QM2 and IoftS are like chalk and cheese despite being of similar size (QM2 is a bit longer, taller and wider. IoftS has a slightly larger grt). I hope you like both, but I think it will be for different reasons.

 

"Bon Voyage!" on Queen Mary 2, the greatest liner in the world, and, indeed, for your whole vacation.

 

 

Thank you martyn, however if memory serves me correctly you have not been on many ships?, qe2 and qm2 i think, so i have to just put the OP right here, she will find both ships amazing, I have been on both and I love both ships,

You find that both ships are similar in size, when you stand on the top deck of the IOTS I can assure you will be above the decks of QM2, both ships are as martyn says different in a few ways, but not chalk and cheese:rolleyes:, many places are better, the shows, the theatre, the cabins, are all better than QM2, I would say the real difference is the passenger count, there are more and this is only really a problem if you ever want to sun bathe on the the top deck, every where else your fine, the ship is just as dressy as QM2, you will love them both.

 

If you wish to see my dvd of IOTS and QM2 they are on the link here. as I said before you are in good hands on the 5th , Terry will look after you, you have a good meeting there.

 

When your ready for sailaway on IOTS may I suggest that you go out to the bow, not many gather there, you stand right up on the bow tip, wonderful, like flying over the sea

 

http://rob6852.blip.tv/