Itinerary recommendations

My wife and I have rented cars in Great Britain and love driving around the amazing countryside.

1. You have 14-16 days, don't try to do all four countries. I suggest sticking with England and South or North Wales. If you don't want to do that, England and Scotland.
   We did four weeks in 2017 and only did England (nothing in London) and S. Wales. I had originally planned to do Scotland as well, but the more that I planned, the more I could see that I needed more time to do it right.

2. Driving a rental car on the left when you are used to driving on the right is manageable, but you have to be constantly diligent. Further, driving through scenic areas will take more time than on carriageways. I tried to limit my driving to no more than 2.5 hours between cities/towns per day. Only three days of the 28 did I exceed that number. Also, rent an automatic and a vehicle where you can put all your luggage in the trunk (boot) of the vehicle.

3. The South of England has heavy traffic, it gets better the farther north you go.
   
   Here are some great places to visit--
   Bath, minimum of two nights- recommend the Brooks Guesthouse
   Oxford, one day
   Winchester, two nights-
   The Cotswolds- we stayed at Chipping Camden at the Volunteer Inn and used it as a base to visit Oxford, Blenheim Palace, the Cotswolds and Stratford Upon Avon (this is a must see).

York is a sure must see, we did three nights there and loved it. Don't miss walking the ancient walls, its museums, especially the National Railway Museum.

Your have now used up 13 nights of your visit. If you don't see all these places, Canterbury (on the other side of London is great, but don't try driving through London or the ring orbital that goes around the city, I think it is the M 25. It is one giant parking lot.

South Wales is great, but you probably don't have time for it. Scotland by itself would take 10 days, since you would need 2-3 days in Edinburg. St. Andrews (first golf course in World) and the area just north of Edinburgh is good for 2-3 days. North, Inverness is special and Loch Ness. The Scottish Highlands is another good area to visit.

GeovaGriffith,
Thank you for taking the time reply! I do sincerely appreciate it! Unfortunately, I anticipate this trip will be our one and only. I [think] we may end up being able to extend it to 20 days, but not positive. We really want to hit the highlights of England, Scotland, and Ireland. We are not found of cities and have only a few things we really want to see in London. We love the historical sites, castles, and landscapes. With this in mind, do you have any further recommendations? If not, thanks again and Happy New Year!!

You need to be very careful that you don't design an itinerary that has you sightseeing through the windows of trains, buses and cars. With no more than 20 days available, the first thing I'd do is drop Ireland. It requires either a flight (irritating) or ferry (slow--and probably between towns you'd otherwise have no interest in visiting) to reach England/Scotland/Wales. Then I'd think about dropping one of the other three--but that's just me. I spent 26 nights in Scotland in 2019 and I need to return. A friend joined me for 19 nights, of which about 12 were outside Edinburgh and Glasgow. She is still really, really unhappy about the inadequate time she had in Scotland.

The western side of Scotland is particularly wet, so it's easy for your only day or only two days at a destination in that part of the country to be significantly marred by rain. I suspect the situation in Ireland is the same but don't know for sure.

The fact that you aren't so much into cities isn't going to help as much as you think, because transportation between small towns and through scenic areas can be very slow via public transportation and not fast in some areas even if you have a car. You can use the nationalrail.co.uk website to check on travel times by rail in Great Britain. TravelineScotland.com is what I used for Scottish bus schedules. It purports to cover trains as well, but that info differed somewhat from what I found on the NationalRail website.

Use ViaMichelin.com to estimate driving times, but recognize that those times do not include stopping, navigational errors, traffic tie-ups, looking for parking or walking from your parking place to whatever you want to see.

I haven't been to Ireland, so I can't comment on travel there.

I can't help with the England and Wales portion, but here was our rough itinerary for our whirlwind Ireland and Scotland trip:

Overnight flight from the US to Dublin
- 2 nights in Dublin
- 1 night in Kilkenny (w/stops at Glendalough, Jerpoint Abbey, and Kells Priory on the way)
- 2 nights in Kenmare (Rock of Cashel, Hore Abbey, Cahir Castle, and Blarney Castle on the way, did the Ring of Kerry and was fortunate enough to do the trip to Skellig Michael as well)
- 3 nights in Dingle (we had a rest day in this area, which was perfect)
- 1 night in Bunratty (w/stop at Cliffs of Moher)

Flight from Shannon to Edinburgh
- 1 night in Oban (w/stops at Doune Castle and Lake Lomond)
- 2 nights in Isle of Skye (stayed in Portree, in addition to driving around we did a boat trip to Loch Coruisk)
- 1 night in Inverness (w/stops at Eilean Donan Castle, Culloden Battlefield & Museum, and Clava Cairns)
- 2 nights in Edinburgh
Flight from Edinburgh to US

This would be considered by most to be a very rushed trip, but we enjoyed our time and while we would have loved to have been able to stay longer in some places, I can't think of any part of the trip that we would have wanted to get rid of in order to do that.

We drove everywhere ourselves (minus the cities of Dublin and Edinburgh, and the flight from Ireland to Scotland), took advantage of the long days (we traveled in June), and had a wonderful 15-night trip. I can't imagine trying to add another destination on to this trip though, especially something with as much to see as England - haven't been yet, but it's on my list ;)

Trust me, I can relate to the idea of "we'll never be back, we must see everything", but at some point you won't be seeing much of anything if you try to cram too much into one trip. Since you are first-time travelers, why don't you focus on 1-2 areas that really interest you and then, if you get the travel bug like many of us do, you can work to make having time/money for travel a priority for the future and visit the places you didn't get to on this trip!

I tried to do these four countries in 21 days as a young man with a rail pass. I was exhausted and saw not enough of any one place. You spend all your time in transit. A car to me would be worse, because then you spend even more time looking for parking, fuel, and driving white-knuckled in unfamiliar terrain.

Maps are deceiving. It takes longer to get around than you might think. I tried to do these four countries in 21 days as a young man with a rail pass. I was exhausted and saw not enough of any one place. You spend all your time in transit. A car to me would be worse, because then you spend even more time looking for parking, fuel, and driving white-knuckled in unfamiliar terrain. Think of each time you move to a different location, you are using up 1/2 to one whole day in transit.

Our last trip was London > York > Stratford upon Avon> Bath (incl tour of Stonehenge & Cotswolds) and even that was too much for 14 days.

You need to be very careful that you don't design an itinerary that has you sightseeing through the windows of trains, buses and cars.

THIS. Be very selective and/or narrow down stops so you’re able to really be present.

I have never taken a Rick Steves Tour, but I find them very useful to plan my own itinerary. His tours provide a very good list of "must-sees" and a minimum nights stay in each city. However, I would have to cut out some cities from the RS tour or add in extra days to have a more comfortable and pleasurable pace for me.

If you were to copy the itineraries of RS's Best of England, Best of Scotland and Heart of Ireland tours, you would need 35 nights. Therefore, you are going to to have to do a lot of cutting to fit in a 14 to 20 night trip. Good luck.

Thank you all so much for your time and responses! They are very helpful!

Sounds amazing.

I would cut out Wales. Then, explore Rick's pages and recommended itinerary for Great Britain and Ireland as well as the specific itinerary for England and Scotland to see what attracts your interest the most. You will definitely need to cut out some of the highlights in order to fit all of England, Scotland, and Ireland...and that's only if you really can get 3 weeks. If you only have the 14-16 days, you need to whittle it down to only two of England, Scotland, and Ireland....unless you're OK with just seeing Edinburgh as your Scotland experience or just Dublin as your Ireland experience.

With 20 days, I would probably do something like this for a very active and thrilling schedule:

Land at Heathrow Airport-->Train/Bus to Bath
Bath - 2 nights
--> Rental Car
Cotswolds - 2 nights
-->Return rental car in Oxford, train to London
London - 2 nights
-->Train
York - 2 nights
-->Train
Edinburgh - 2 nights
--> Rental Car, Stirling en route
Oban (drive through Glencoe and Scottish Highlands) - 2 nights
-->return car at Glasgow airport; fly to Shannon (Glasgow closer to Oban than Edinburgh)
Galway (Aran Islands) - 2 nights
--> Rental Car
Dingle - 2 nights
-->Drive
Dublin - 2 nights
Return car and fly home from Dublin

You would just get a taste of each stop, and especially London, Edinburgh, and Dublin...I can't imagine visiting London for just 2 nights...but you state that you don't prefer the bigger cities. Whirlwind trip for sure - you'll probably hit the wall in York or Edinburgh...