Holidays by train from London with tween.

[Lemonaided]

My youngest has had a tough time recently so I’d like to take him away 1 on 1 in May half term. He doesn’t like flying so I was wondering about places we could go via train?

We in London and happy with UK or Europe. I think he’d be fine with a city break as long as we have somewhere nice to retreat to when we want. But would be really keen for somewhere warm and/or close to water. Any good ideas?

Yes we did this last May half term, then took a local train from Penzance to Falmouth Harbour, then stayed in Pendennis Castle, where English Heritage have a couple of holiday properties - it was amazing!

I’m so grateful for all the recommendations. Thanks so much everyone 😊

I travelled back from St Austell, Cornwall to the Midlands recently. Had to change in Plymouth but the service was great and the scenery lovely. Lots of stops along the way with a few branch lines. My late DSis lived in Looe which still has a branch line pretty much into the centre and has plenty to do and see.

There’s a decent bus service between the fishing villages and there is a train to Newquay.

If the weather is good you can take a boat to Polperro or Fowey.

Looe has a couple of caravan parks and loads of holiday rentals. You need a good pair of walking shoes because it’s a bit hilly.

The TV series Beyond Paradise is filmed there if you want to get a feel for it. They often film outside my BILs parents place on the quay. We often spot my BIL boat moored in front of the buildings. It’s a lovely spot with a beach in the town but easy access to quieter shoreline for hours of beach combing. A favourite pass time of my DS when he was preteen.

Like most Cornish coastal towns it’s full of tourists but there are some quieter spots if you want to get away from the crowds.

In addition we always see seals and occasionally dolphins when we go out fishing on BILs boat.

Paris, Lille, Brussels, Amsterdam all by Eurostar. You could also change at Brussels for Cologne.

Edinburgh, sleeper to other parts of Scotland.

We just had a trip to St Ives and it was pretty busy, even though a) it's not yet high season and b) the weather wasn't great. I can't see how a half term visit is going to be 'healing'! (Unless you like crowds of course)

However, the Night Riviera train from Paddington is worth a go - then local trains from Penzance to explore.

That’s the problem with AI - it can only spout what it’s scraped, clearly here from marketing materials, not reflect actual human experience. And that’s also why posters should JUST STOP DOING IT. If the OP can post here for advice she could ask AI herself if that’s what she wanted. @LittleEmily has added nothing to the discussion apart from some dubious info which will no doubt itself get scraped and added to a future search on the same subject. Infuriating!

Yep. AS seems to show more than one such post from that poster.

I wouldn't mind the use of AI/Chat GPT so much if it was acknowledged; why not start a post with 'I put your question into Chat GPT and it came up with this ... '

It's presenting the post as if it were genuine/from a human poster that I object to.