Departing Southampton on Bank Holiday

[TMLAalum]

Our 2025 Apex cruise departs on August 25 which is a Monday U.K. bank holiday.

Will transportation from London be affected that day?

Would it be better to plan time in London after the cruise which ends September 6? Initially I was thinking of arriving August 21 or 22 and spending those nights in London but am having 2nd thoughts about the timing because of the bank holiday. I recall being in the Lakes District over a May bank holiday and encountering great difficulty finding lodging and restaurants that didn't require reservations.

Thanks for any insights, advice!

 

 

[Globaliser]

39 minutes ago, TMLAalum said:

Our 2025 Apex cruise departs on August 25 which is a Monday U.K. bank holiday.

Will transportation from London be affected that day?

Would it be better to plan time in London after the cruise which ends September 6? Initially I was thinking of arriving August 21 or 22 and spending those nights in London but am having 2nd thoughts about the timing because of the bank holiday. I recall being in the Lakes District over a May bank holiday and encountering great difficulty finding lodging and restaurants that didn't require reservations.

 

In general, all that a Bank Holiday means is that public transport will run on a special Bank Holiday timetable (but all that usually entails is that it's likely to be more like a Saturday or Sunday service than a Monday service).

 

Whether there will be any specific disruption that day (for example, engineering work closing the line) probably won't be known until a couple of months beforehand. Engineering work does tend to take place at weekends and on Bank Holidays, but whether any specific line has any engineering work on any specific day, and what that means for the level of service that day, can't be predicted this far in advance.

 

You won't have the same problem in London as you did in the Lake District about getting bookings over a Bank Holiday weekend. Many places in London (particularly restaurants) will be quieter over that Bank Holiday weekend than they will be two weeks later.

[John Bull]

The roads out of London (and Heathrow) to Southampton will be quiet 🙂.

Depending on the weather & time of day you may have schadenfreude from seeing the lemmings on the opposite carriageway slowly heading back to the big bad city after their weekend on the coast or in the countryside. 

 

Trains will also be lightly-loaded, even though they'll be on a sunday timetable.

The risk as per @Globaliser's post is that long weekends are favoured for carrying out track maintenance. (commuters are a big big customer base)

These will be planned works so there'll be up to 3 months notice on https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/status-and-disruptions/?date=20240527&operatorCode=SW

 

In the main only a relatively short length of line is closed, and "rail replacement" buses close the gap between the stations either side of the closure. So your journey will still be available, but passengers have to leave the train at the station ahead of the closure, join a fleet of buses (they always grossly over-book buses so no line) to the station beyond the closure, and continue by train. 

 

JB 🙂

[gumshoe958]

@TMLAalum It’s worth noting that the Notting Hill Carnival always takes place on that Sunday & Monday, which typically attracts one to two million people (it’s billed as Europe’s biggest street party). 

 

Much of central London is unaffected but it does have an impact on travel around the Paddington, Notting Hill, Bayswater and Hyde Park areas where there are many popular hotels.

 

Edited April 3 by gumshoe958