Public Transportation to Avebury & Beyond from London

Emma, thanks for the response, sorry I wasn't clear. We would like to see Avebury, Glastonbury & Wells all as day trips from London. It would be wonderful if we could see all three as one day trip. We could see Glastonbury & Well via bus from Bath (after our train trip there), but if we could a way to only see all three it would be even better.

You say you prefer not to take tours, but how many days do you have to visit these destinations?

If you need to fit them all into one day, I believe there's a bus (coach) tour company that runs a day trip from London that includes Stonehenge, Glastonbury, and Avebury. It would be a long day, though, without very much time in each of the locations, and I don't think Wells is on their itinerary.

Public buses do run between/among the various towns in southwestern England. This site has info on how to get to Wells by train & bus:
http://www.wellssomerset.com/search/entry1014_by_train.html

Stonehenge, Glastonbury and Avebury from London in one day is a waste of time, as you will spend so long in transit, that you will not have sufficient time anywhere.

Rail has already been mentioned. Book 12 weeks out for the best prices and travel after 9.30 if possible.

There are also coaches http://www.nationalexpress.com/home.aspx. Again, cheaper if booked in advance.

To get from Avebury to Wells on public transportation, you'd need to take the bus back to Swindon, take the train to Bristol or Bath, and then take the bus to Wells. The total trip takes close to 3 hours. (There are some other combinations of buses and trains that work at some times of the day, but none of them are any faster.) That's a big chunk out of your day. I don't think it's feasible to do Avebury, Wells, and Glastonbury all in a single day trip from London.

When you say your train trip to Bath, is this another day trip from London, or will you be staying in Bath for a while? I wouldn't recommend trying to see Bath, Wells, and Glastonbury in a single day trip from London either - the transportation logistics make more sense than they do with Avebury, but Bath takes more time to see on its own. However, if you have one or two overnights in Bath, Wells and Glastonbury would make a good day trip from there.

Thanks for all of the responses. We are spending 9 nights in London w/plans to day trips for the majority of our time as we have already been to London. We can spend a day just going to Bath, another for Wells & Glastonbury, another for Avebury. It's not a problem. I just wanted to find a simple way to see more then Avebury on that day trip. Are there other sights easier to get to view near Avebury?

I can’t understand why you base in London - one of the most expensive cities for accommodation. I think you would have been better off moving out to the areas you are interested in.

We are staying in London so that we can go to places within a 2-2.5 hour train ride in various directions & still enjoy London.

If you haven't locked down your accommodations yet you could do half your stay in Bath to more easily see places like Glastonbury, Wells, Avebury, Salisbury, Stonehenge, Old Sarum, Cirencester, Cotswold villages as day trips, etc... Then from London maybe Oxford, Windsor, etc... as well as more of London.

Mad Max Tours out of Bath does fabulous tours of Stonehenge, Avebury, Castle Combe, Lacock and also one that goes to Wells, Glastonbury. You would likely need to stay overnight in Bath as the tours leave in early morning.

Once again, thank you for the suggestions. We have already booked & paid for our hotel near Victoria Station in London with the intent of using our London Plus Railpass for day trips. We are used to 2+ hour drives (each way) going from one side of The Big Island to the other at least 2-3 times per month, so the train trips will not be an issue. The list of other villages in the areas we want to visit is helpful.