How much to visit London?

[Onthelastdayofseptember]

Looking at last minute trip to London. For few days in half term (family of 4). Doesn't seem so bad when I look at individual prices, but adds up to over £1.1k for 3 nights...

Train £200
Accommodation zone 6 £500
Travel cards 4 days approx £120
Spends maybe £300 (we'd be self catering but would have to buy lunches x4, entrance fees to some things)

We can afford it but just seems a lot to justify. I'm keen as I want to take dc to London and don't think it'll be a lot cheaper if we book in advance next year. Dp thinks it's stupid to spend that much on 3 nights.

Any ways to do it cheaper? If we drive it'd be cheaper but more expensive to get parking.

When you say drive, do you mean drive down from your city? That means you are saving £200 (minus petrol)

you should be able to get free parking in zone 6, add up travel cards and see what an Uber might cost, sometimes it works out the Same.

£500 on accommodation seems a tad high, are you going through air bnb type place

I planned a break in London very recently and nearly fucking died at the cost of hotels/air bnb! Even the total shit holes were extortionate. Im still going though because I really want a Korean cheese dog and humble crumble from Camden Market 😂

There loads of pages on Instagram with free activities! Type in London break and loads appear x

Flew into and stayed in Luton recently (due to DPs work) train was 30mins from central.

Have you got a family and friends railcard? How old are DC - the travel cards for four days sounds a lot?

Yes air bnb. Hotels were crazy prices and then we'd have to eat out so thought it would be cheaper to self cater. There are some cheaper places but they look really ropey (and not that much cheaper!).

Yes driving would be probably £60 petrol? But accommodation with parking is more expensive, and thought dc might like the train. Dc are primary age - I was thinking adult daily travel cards x2 for 4 days (£30 x 4) - is there a cheaper way to travel from zone 6 and then between sights?

Any other tips to make it cheaper, or is this just what london costs??

Meant to add, don't currently have a ff railcard but this includes buying one and the discount

What are you planning to do when you get there? Natural history and science museums are free so Definitely do those things!

£300 for 'a few days' for four people seems very very little depends on what you'll be spending on. That's the important bit

Unfortunately London IS expensive. We visit every 6 weeks and just suck it up.
Just the 2 of us....2 nights in Premier Inn hub and travel is about £300. We usually spend about £500 on food/ drink...plus galleries/ exhibitions. But we love it!!! There's lots of free stuff...we seek out weird and off the beaten track stuff and avoid the obvious tourist stuff which is ridiculously expensive

A day travelcard/Oyster cap fare for adults in zone 1/2 is £8.10 and u11s are free on tube, DLR, bus, tram, Overground and some other rail routes. The zones 1 - 6 cap is £21.50 anytime and £14.90 off peak. I don't think you'll be able to prune much off your transport costs, I'm afraid

£500 for three nights in Z6 sounds steep. You should be able to park for free there though. Where in Zone 6 are you staying? Depending on where you are can take an age to commute in. You’d be better getting something in Z3, or a little further out on a quick train link.

PAYG cap on contactless payment from zone 6 to zone 1 is £14.90 OP so yes, your travel costs in London are about right for 2 adults x 4 days.

TBH this is just what it costs to stay and do stuff in London. We are going to Paris next year (admittedly for the Olympics) and it is £££££££ (if that makes you feel any better )

Surely a premier inn would be cheaper

Premier inn in East Croydon is £250 for 3 nights.
Its Zone 5 and has fast trains to Victoria and London Bridge taking about 20 mins each.

Well you are a family of 4 so to be honest this price seems about right.

You could probably save a couple hundred quid doing things on the cheap, but it wouldn't be as fun.

For example getting things like Greggs sandwiches/ Mcdonalds for lunch rather than sitting down somewhere nice, and only doing the free attractions like museums/ galleries. You could probably save £200 or so by doing this, but do you really want to?

If you can afford it then I think the experience would be worth it. London is expensive.

Also there’s lists of places kids eat for £1 or free in the holidays- do that for dinners

It's a family of four so £165-ish a night for 4 people. That sounds about right to me if you want something reasonable.

You could probably get it down to £120 or so if you were happy with something much more basic but it's not going to be a massive saving for a big dip in quality.

If you can get more central accommodation your travel costs will be far lower. I paid £700 for a 3 bedroom right by British museum and we mostly walked. I'm sure there's smaller (so cheaper) options

Personally living in zone 6/7, I'd try to get something more central and offset the difference in travel.

But... keeping to the original brief, the Premier Inn in Rickmansworth is nice enough. Three nights for a family of four next week is £303. You can get the Chiltern line to Marylebone in 25 minutes or Met Line to Baker Street in 30 minutes (and station easily walkable from the hotel). Single adult fare is £4.70 off peak.

Another option for the future is the travelodge near King's Cross, I've got a family room for only £99 recently and kids eat free for breakfast, eat substantially em then grab supermarket sandwiches for lunch. Despite being expensive for most things, eating out in London can be very reasonable, look on the back streets and eat early evening (theatre set menus) for excellent value and it's possible to ask for 2 kids to share one adult meal, my dc did this until they could manage a full adult meal, they hated "kids food"

We paid £600 for a 2 bed for 4 nights last august. That was zone 2 so we spent very little on travel. We also ate in a few nights and made sandwiches etc. It wasn’t the best place I’ve stayed but functional and clean.
Id look more central if possible especially for the amount of time travelling takes.

I do it totally on the cheap but it is just me.
I stay in zone 1, Victoria in really cheap hovels hotels, eat in food courts or even just grab a sandwich from Tesco or whatever, I pay for expensive things, such as gig and theatre tickets, in advance, then do all the free museums, or parks, markets, a lot of people watching and generally mooching around the different areas.
I also get there and back on Megabus.
Currently waiting for BST Hyde Park shows to be announced to build my summer trip around, but I'll be down for an overnight in November, February and April before then.

Can you park it until Feb half term. It looks like if you book now you could get a central premier inn for £300-£350 that cuts out your travel costs and is cheaper. Kids will be free for breakfast.

Other Cheap options for food are too good to go. Loads of places in London and we treat it like a surprise!

How old are your dc? You can get quadruple rooms / family rooms at various hotels through booking.com that would work out cheaper. If the dc are under 16 you can get family rooms at premier inn or Travelodge. There used to be a Travelodge at Caterham that had parking included and train into central London within walking distance.

The Travelodge on York Road Wandsworth has availability next week and is currently at £382.97 for 2x adult 2x children for 3 nights.

It's in zone 2, so your maximum daily travel cost is £8.10 per adult.

It's not the most popular hotel and its surroundings aren't great, plus it's not well connected on public transport. (I'm really selling it well, here, aren't I?). But, if you're only using it to sleep, it's not bad; and it is pretty much right on the Thames Path which makes for a good stroll. And its only a short bus ride to either Clapham Junction, Vauxhall or Victoria all of which connect well to the rest of London public transport.

You'd also be v close to Plantation Wharf Pier, so you could take a boat in to central London (but that's not included in Oyster cap, so an extra 4 fares as I think DC have to pay for that too)