Train fares

[Ricardothesnowman]

I am looking to go to Edinburgh from the South Coast.
I thought a train would be better than driving.
I tried looking for prices for travel in the summer. The Train line won't give me any prices for then, or and time noet even for next week, it just says no tickets available.
National rail quoted minimum of £184 return.
Can that possibility be correct??
That would mean travel costs of around £800 for my family of 4 for a short 4 night break!
Am I being stupid and missing something obvious?

Fly to Gatwick and get the train from Gatwick to wherever you are going, I have done this a few times to visit family in Hampshire and it always works out the cheapest way

You have to change at London anyway if you are travelling from Southampton to Edinburgh

I've just done a quick search - 3 adults and 1 child F&F railcard
Buying tickers S'ton to Edi - £336
If you buy tickets separately - S'ton to Waterloo, Kings Cross to Edi - £247 plus the tube. Same trains
There are probably cheaper advance tickets

@Ted27

You have to change at London anyway if you are travelling from Southampton to Edinburgh

I've just done a quick search - 3 adults and 1 child F&F railcard
Buying tickers S'ton to Edi - £336
If you buy tickets separately - S'ton to Waterloo, Kings Cross to Edi - £247 plus the tube. Same trains
There are probably cheaper advance tickets

You don’t have to go via London, you can go on cross country trains via Birmingham instead.

Well you have to change somewhere - same principle re split tickets

Railcards can be purchased with Tesco club card points 🙂.

Try trainsplit.com op, you might get some good split ticket savings on that route.

Martins money tips emails used to mention about split tickets too. Perhaps there is advice on that site also.