8 days - London and surrounding areas - advice needed.

You have two choices regarding visiting the Cotswolds.

1) Stay in London and take day trips to Bath, the Cotswolds or other places.
2) Rent a car for your visit to Bath and other places outside of London.

We had been to London and we just did a 28 day driving tour of Wales and England last October. We visited Bath as well as the Cotswolds.
We stayed at the Brooks Guesthouse in Bath, it was great.
We stayed at the Volunteer Inn in Chipping Campden in the Cotswolds for six nights, taking trips to Stratford Upon Avon, Oxford, Blenheim Palace and of course the other towns and cities of the Cotswolds.

If you rent a car, be sure to rent an automatic if you aren't used to driving on the left. Also, a navigation system is a must unless you have your own GPS or cellphone with google maps of the UK.

Driving in Southern England you will encounter heavy traffic, especially anywhere close to London. Plan on it taking you three hours to drive from Heathrow to Bath, finding your hotel etc.

You need a full day in Bath to see the city and the Roman Bath Museum. Not sure what you want to see in the Cotswolds, but you won't see it all in a full day.

Rick Steves Great Britain is helpful.

Here is my story in detail of our drive tour as well as cruise back to the US.
28 days in Britain and Celebrity Eclipse home
https://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=599139

I see a third possibility:

• Travel by bus or train to Bath and enjoy the town to the extent that you can on your arrival day. (I would definitely not be driving then; I'm hit far too hard by sleep-deprivation and jetlag to be safe behind the wheel, even aside from needing to drive on the left.) Sign up (in advance) for a one-day van tour of the Cotswolds. That doesn't allow you to sit behind the wheel, but it saves you the time you'd otherwise spend at the rental car office(s). MadMax is one company that runs tours from Bath; it was recommended in the RS guidebook I used last year. I can't provide a personal recommendation because of an ill-timed illness that caused me to miss my MadMax tour, but I did enjoy the GoCotswolds tour I took a couple of weeks later from Moreton-in-Marsh.

You could do something similar by instead heading to Oxford on your arrival day. There is good train service from Oxford to the aforementioned Moreton-in-Marsh, so you could spend both nights in Oxford. I think you'll be unproductive enough on Saturday that--if you want to spend a day in the Cotswolds--it doesn't matter a great deal where you spend Saturday and Sunday night as long as it is an attractive introduction to England. Both Bath and Oxford have pretty historic areas and enough to keep even a non-jetlagged traveler busy for about a day.

My initial thought is to transfer to Bath on Friday (bus? rental car?).

Neither. Train is the obvious choice. Departures every 30 minutes from London Paddington station and it takes 1½ hours. Lookup times and buy tickets on the National Rail site: http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/
Buy early (up to 3 months in advance) to get the cheapest tickets. Prices start at £15.

This will be a lot quicker than driving, and you can pick up your car in Bath. You seriously DO NOT want to be driving in London.
A good place to drop the car is Oxford, as you can then spend some time looking round Oxford, and possibly stay overnight, before catching a train back to London.

Thank you all for the suggestions. I think we've narrowed down our flights, though nothing is booked yet. We'll probably arrive to Heathrow at 9:05 AM Friday and depart the following Saturday at 8:40 AM. With that in mind, here's another idea:

• Spend Friday - Sunday in London, thus minimizing additional travel after our flight from the US.
• Spend Monday AM - Wednesday PM outside London for a change of scenery. Maybe take the train up to the Cotswolds and rent a car to explore for a couple days? Or spend a few days in York? Any suggestions on a good two-night getaway within an easy train ride of London? We're not 100% set on the Cotswolds.
• Return to London Wednesday night, spend Thursday and Friday in London, depart LHR on Saturday.

Of course the other option is to transfer to either Bath or Oxford on Friday, spend a Friday - Monday exploring the area, then on to London Monday night, giving us four full days in London.

Any thoughts on doing a mid-week, two-night getaway from London to see another part of the area? If so, where would you suggest we visit?

Personally, I'd try to avoid the time-consuming hassle of checking into London hotels twice within about a week, preferring to head straight to my non-London destination. However, figuring out the timing to allow you to buy an "Advance" rail ticket for your arrival day is tricky. You don't want to spend hours twiddling your thumbs in London because you over-compensated for potential delays when you selected your departure time. You also don't want to miss your train and have to buy a new ticket.

Walk-up tickets can be very, very expensive in England: I see London-York fares up to 127 GPB per person, and that's one way. That would be a major "ouch" for a visit of about 1-1/2 days. Even Bath can be almost 100 GBP. Inexplicably (to me), Oxford is under 33 GBP. You could stay in Oxford and side-trip to the Cotswolds easily by van-tour or rental car. If you planned to go by car and you woke up to really dreadful weather, you'd have plenty to do in Oxford.

A bus to Oxford would be viable, too, and might save a fair amount of money if the only alternative was a full-fare train ticket. I believe Oxford Bus Company has buses straight from the airport to Oxford. For much of the day, bus frequency is every 20 or 30 minutes, and the trip is supposed to take no more than 1-1/2 hours.

Edited to add: Here's the Oxford Bus schedule.

York is an amazing city. We loved it.
For details, check out the link that I provided earlier.

I agree with acraven. It takes time checking into and out of a hotel. You get in early in the day - just head to your destination outside of London (using public transportation) where ever that may be Bath? and finish in London. There are many places you can easily explore from Bath - Salisbury, Wells, Glastonbury, the Cotswolds..... then head to London to finish your trip.

Another way to do this is to start in London, then pick up a car at Heathrow and see your other destinations. The night before your flight home, return the car and check into a Heathrow hotel. Or, you can see destinations after London without a car, and still use a Heathrow hotel the night before your flight.

This has two advantages: You don't have to take any chances on buying Advance train tickets you can't use, and you are closer to Heathrow for your (early) departure.

I stayed at the relatively new Premier Inn near Heathrow Terminal 4 last September. As of that time, the rates were fabulous for an airport hotel--under 60 GBP per night for a single occupant.

Thank you all. What about the following itinerary? Or, again, if you have suggestions on somewhere else to visit in the first 3-4 days besides Bath/Cotswolds, please let me know. Maybe York instead, though it's a longer trip from/to London?

Friday - 9:05 AM arrival to Heathrow, bus to Bath. Push through the jetlag, leisurely explore Bath.
Saturday - Bath in the morning and through lunch, then pick up car to drive to the Cotswolds.
Sunday - Drive/explore Cotswolds.
Monday - Drop off car late morning, train into London.

Then we have Monday afternoon - Friday in London, leaving Saturday morning, with maybe a day trip to Windsor included mid-week.

We rented a car and drove from Heathrow to Glastonbury and stayed at a amazing B&B called Number 27- it was beautiful! Amazing hosts, lovely decorated, can walk to town and The Tor, as well as The Chalice Well and gardens. From there we drove to Stratford On Avon, stayed at another great B&B called Shakespears View- another amazing host, clean, comfortable, beautiful!
http://www.shakespearesview.co.uk/
From there we went to Wells to see the Cathedral(a must) and had lunch- and from there drove to Windsor and stayed at the lovely Rainworth House! Another great host (Doreen) another great English town! Wonderful trip!
http://www.rainworthhouse.com/
(This was after 3 days in London) took public transport from Heathrow to hotel with a Oyster Card- stayed in London- took a Uber back to Heathrow and picked up rental car- returned rental on flight back to US- worked out great

Your new itinerary looks good.

We're now looking at a slightly different itinerary to allow more time in London and trying to avoid too much travel immediately after arrival. Based on recommendations here and from friends, we'd like to work in a visit to York. Then we're going to maybe add one or two other day trips, probably to Windsor, but maybe Cambridge, Greenwich, or the Cotswolds Secret Cottage tour. Any thoughts on those spots or the itinerary below?

Friday morning - arrive to LHR at 9:50 AM.
Saturday - London
Sunday - London
Monday - early fast train to York, spend the night in York.
Tuesday - morning fast train back to London. London that afternoon.
Wednesday - London
Thursday - Probably a day trip day.
Friday - Free - London if we feel we want more time, otherwise maybe a shorter distance day trip.
Saturday - 8:40 AM flight back to the US.

That would give us at least four days in London proper, a day/overnight in York, and allow for at least one more day trip.

I wonder if you might be short changing York. We loved it and there are lots of things to do and see there. Why not swap the Thursday "...day trip day" for another day in York? Just a thought to consider.

I agree with TC. Stay longer in York. Vikings, Romans, chocolate: there is so much to see and enjoy there! For good budget accommodation, Two Premier Inns (almost side-by-side--story we heard is they wanted to expand but could not due to a small property in between so constructed a second one) are just outside the Micklegate walls on Blossom Street, a 5 minute walk from the train station and about a 15 minute walk to the historic areas.

The Cotswolds or York? York wins hands down every time. There is so much more to York, the Cotswolds is simply a handful of nice looking villages in some pleasant countryside but York has all that and much more.

Sure, the Cotswolds is a nice area but it would be far down on my list if I was visiting the UK for the first time, there are so many more interesting areas that I would want to visit above the Cotswolds.

Yes, after doing more research, York won out over the Cotswolds.

We have discussed how long to stay in York. Our main concern with two nights is eliminating some of our potential "flex time" in London should we decide we want more time there or to explore it at a more leisurely pace. We're not sold on doing a third day trip; York and Windsor (most likely) are probably the only two we'll visit.

If we were to spend a second night in York, how should we incorporate it into our existing itinerary? The current plan is to spend our first 2.5 days (Friday - Sunday) in London, travel to York Monday morning, and return to London Tuesday morning. That would give us Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday in London, Thursday in Windsor, and Friday in London (or another day trip).

If we did two nights, should we do Monday morning - Wednesday morning? We'd have Wednesday afternoon in London, with a day trip to Windsor either Thursday or Friday, probably Friday to avoid to travel days in a row. Or we could do Sunday afternoon - Tuesday morning in York, though that would potentially rush our first couple days in London.

If we did Monday morning - Wednesday morning in York, what would you suggest we visit? We would arrive late morning on Monday, then have all day Tuesday. Should we spend all the time in town? Or would it be possible to do a quick visit to the nearby countryside? Any thoughts/suggestions/favorites/recommendations are welcome! Thanks!

What to do in York? Not sure what things you like to do but in a city that oozes history and charm you’ll find more than enough to occupy you!
Churches...The Minster has to be a must see but also don’t miss Holy Trinity Church off Goodramgate. This is a lovely little church with original Georgian box pews, one of my favourites. A bit difficult to find as it’s down a little alleyway but well worth it.
Walks...The city walls are worth walking either in their entirety (about 2 miles) or you can exit the walkway at any of the bars (the fortified gateway type!). The daffs may even still be out along the walls if this cold weather continues! Another nice walk is along the river Ouse. Or take a boat trip. Lots of guided walks around the city as well.
Museums....The Railway museum is also great and free as it’s a national museum. Worth a visit even if not a train buff! Then there’s the Castle museum, the Yorkshire museum (Roman exhibits) and the Yorvik Viking museum. There’s also the Yorkshire Chocolate story charting the history of chocolate making in York. If you like Georgian architecture Fairfax house is a treat and Barley Hall and Merchant Adventurer’s Hall are medieval (although Barley Hall is a reconstruction).
You could have tea at Betty’s if you haven’t already done that in London or just wander the cobbled streets and snickleways particularly the Shambles and Stonegate. There are lots of little independent shops to browse in and good restaurants and pubs.
Plenty of day trips possible from York as well.

Cancel the last few days in London there’s so much more up North!

Also easy day trips to Whitby, Harrogate, Beverley. Steam train over north york moors from Pickering. Tour de Yorkshire cycle Race starts from Beverley on 3rd May. Tulip festival on in Pocklington. Could do a bus trip out to Pocklington and then on to Beverley.

Thank you all for the input - we've decided to stay two days/nights in York! We'll try to arrive mid-morning on Monday, giving us most of Monday and all of Tuesday to explore the town.