London to Edinburgh

You would spend most of your time traveling between London and Edinburgh and would not have time to see much of Edinburgh. 6 days is barely enough time for London if you want to take any day trips. You could choose a day trip that's a 2 hour train ride from London and not have to invest energy in changing hotels. Dover has a great castle and could be done as a daytrip from London. Look at London Walks trips-they meet at a train station and they have day trips to Cotswolds and other places. I haven't been on the Secret Cottage Cotswold tour(not a London Walks tour), but it seems to get great reviews on TripAdvisor-the first review that came up said it is an easy trip from Paddington Station. South Wales has castles-Cardiff castle or Caerphilly.

I agree that a one night stay in Edinburgh is not a good use of time. It's about five hours each way. There area many day trips you could do from London that will allow you to see more of the country but not live on a train.

Bath, York, Salisbury/Stonehenge, Canterbury, Oxford, Cambridge...and more.

Not only that, but you would not see much scenery from the train. If you feel that 6 days is too much time to devote to London itself, choose one of the day trips as suggested by previous comments to get out and see a bit of the countryside.

From what you've written I assume your northbound journey is on Saturday 7 October. There are planned engineering works on that date which account for diversions and longer journey times (details below).

http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/service_disruptions/currentAndFuture.aspx?TravelDate=07%2F10%2F2017&TOC=gr

Thank you very much for the replies so far, especially rail maintenance, as I was baffled why north bound would be nearly 2 hours longer than south bound. I will skip the Edinburgh side trip. I'll definitely explore that walking tour instead. York appeals to me as well.
My follow up dilemma is that my lodging reservation at Cherry Court does not include Sat the 7th, sort of forcing me to do an overnight somewhere else, or use an alternate lodging probably in Bayswater. I really like the Cherry Court location due to Gatwick arrival, it seems really well situated for touring and is economical but still includes ensuite bath.
I'm going to pore over the boards and my RS book today and probably post again. A little info about my trip- There will be two of us, me and my 23 yo dtr, we can travel lightly and handle a lot of walking and stairs. It's our first trip to Europe : ). Our first interest is the British Museum (and Library). History, castles and nature come next. Shopping, food and nightlife are at the bottom of the priority list other than a Tea and a Pub.
Thank you again for the responses. This board is a great resource and I appreciate the time it takes for you to help. Jody

I'm glad you asked this question. I really want to see Edinburgh too and have considered a two day excursion from London, but it sounds like making a separate trip to Scotland for quality time there might be a better option.

Right now we are sticking with London and easy day trips from London because it's so much more budget friendly to fly in and out of London. And booking through Travelocity the hotel is is essentially free, but they don't allow open jaw travel with the vacation packages. There seems to be a lot of good day trips from London with good variety though.

On our London trip (5 days, last September) we took two day trips. One was a day trip to Hampton Court Palace (though I hardly consider a day trip out of London since it's so close) and the other was a day trip to Eastbourne to walk along the cliffs at Beachy Head.

Could we have spent all of our time In London? Sure. I loved London and there is plenty more of it to see, but I also enjoyed getting out of London. I don't regret taking two day trips on our 5 day London trip.

Hampton Court Palace (home of both Henry VIII and William III and Mary II) was an excellent value. It's located just outside of London right on the Thames, so the area is beautiful and you get to tour two palaces with extensive grounds. I highly recommend it if you are into history.

The Eastbourne trip was my favorite day trip (and one of my favorite experiences on our whole trip). It was an easy 2 hour train ride that leaves from Victoria Station. On the ride we caught glimpses of the country side and we also saw a famous hill carving. Eastbourne is a smaller coastal city (but not a small town or village). Parts of the city were really cute though and we did some trinket shopping in some of the stores near the beach. On our walk we saw a beach on the English Channel with pier and bandstand, rolling hills dotted with sheep, two old light houses and a little WWII memorial on the cliff. We topped it off with a leisurely late lunch at an Inn on the top of the cliffs and took an inexpensive taxi ride back to the station. It was quite a lot of scenery for a one day trip.

I hear that York is a good day trip from London and I plan to include that in our next London trip or maybe Hay-on-Wye (Wales) (we're book lovers), or both. I also want to see Dover Castle and Bath. It's so hard to choose!

If you wanted to go to another castle in addition to the Tower of London, Windsor Castle is an easy day trip. And since you are interested in the British Museum(one of my most favorite museums), you might also be interested in the FitzWilliam Museum in Cambridge. I haven't been to the museum(we went to the Eagle Pub and Evensong at King's Chapel) but it sounds interesting and Cambridge is an easy day trip.

I didn't travel by train there but I can recommend bus. It takes around 9 hours and I am using this site: http://www.europebus.co.uk/london-to-edinburgh-with-national-express-and-megabus-coach/
You can check it or other bus companies. I personally prefer bus cause it is more comfortable but it depends what to you need ;) Good luck!

9 hours in an uncomfortable bus versus 4 hours in a comfortable train - no contest, unless I was totally broke.

I ended up choosing a side trip to York via train over weekend- Oct 6th and 7th, rather than Edinburgh. I still don't fully understand the nuances of the rail system. The link posted up thread was helpful re scheduled maintenance making NoBo significantly longer than SoBo. This forum has been super helpful. Jody

Jane, thank you for sharing about your side quests from London. Hampton Court would be great, very tempting.

Cala, I considered Cambridge, too. London Walks has tour there that Sat. Also Blenheim Palace and Oxford, Bath.... In the end it was probably the Vikings that got us heading to York. I know we could have a great time in London through out all 7 days.