Traveling from HeathRow to Salisbury -- advance reservations necessary?

You will be able to get onto the bus and train, but the fares may be cheaper if booked in advance. However, if you miss the train you booked on a discount fare, you may have to buy a new ticket at full price. Tickets from Woking to Salisbury aren't especially expensive at full price, so I wouldn't bother to reserve if you're getting straight off a flight.

I agree with Philip. Alternatively, there is a direct National Express coach from Heathrow to Salisbury departing at 12.20 and arrives at 2.30 which costs £17.50, but this service does not run very frequently - the next direct coach leaves at 16.55. If you are not pre-booking, you can decide on the day which is best.

Note that 4 and 25 May are Bank Holiday Mondays here, so more people will be travelling on the previous Fridays. You should be OK earlier in the morning.

The advice regarding 'advance' type rail tickets is correct in general, but there aren't any sold on Woking to Salisbury.

Hi all,

Thank you SO MUCH for all of your excellent advice!!

Jennifer, thanks for your thought about taking a direct National Express coach for the journey, but I'm concerned about the fact that this service does not run very often. I would hate to spend the first part of our trip waiting around for the next bus.

Phillip, I'm glad to hear that the full fare for the bus/train trip is not terribly expensive. I guess this is a good thing, seeing as there aren't any advance tickets sold (thank you Marco!)

I have done alot of Googling around, and it appears that there is a company, "South West Trains", that might provide a good option. It appears that with "South West Trains" you can take a Rail air link bus to Woking, and then catch a train from Woking to Salisbury.

The WEB site http://www.southwesttrains.co.uk/SWTrains/TravelInformation/Onward+transport+links/Airport+links.htm has information about this.

Have any of you used "South West Trains"?

By the way, we will not be traveling on a Bank Holiday weekend. After reading about this holiday, I scheduled our plans to avoid this very busy sounding event. It rather sounds like the Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends (CRAZY busy, crowded, etc) here in the States.

Thank you again for all of your information!!

Regards,
Virginia

South West Trains are the main railway company on that route. They're no better or worse than the average privatised rail company - when they first took over they sacked loads of workers to save money and then discovered they didn't have enough left to run a proper service, but that's par for the course.

Thanks, Phillip for letting me know that South West trains is the primary service for this area of England!

Makes me feel better about traveling with them.

Regards,
Virginia

They are one of the big ones. Owned by Stagecoach (the Scottish bus company) which also owns or has its hand in East Midlands Trains, Virgin Trains East Coast (the former East Coast), Virgin Trains West Coast (the former Virgin Trains) and a few others. They are not the underdog. I remember when they thought that decreasing the number of train drivers by a lot was a really cute idea. It didn't work and cost them a bomb.