Dublin & flight to Liverpool

That sounds like too much for one day. We are planning a trip to England for 2020, and will spend several days in Liverpool before the RS tour.

Depending on where you will be in Scotland or if you will be starting or ending in Scotland, it would probably be better to tag on a day in Liverpool, getting to and from your Scotland destination by train.

You probably can benefit from a multi-city flight itinerary trans-Atlantic, into one city and home from another. It must be done with a multi-destination search function.

www.skyscanner.com shows bargain flights within Europe; for instance, cheap fares from Liverpool to Dublin on RyanAir. I'd put Liverpool at the start or end of your vacation, to get a good look at the city.

"would that be stressful to fly over and back the same day, airport transfers, taxis/ buses to see the sights?"

It sure would be for me. I spent four nights in Liverpool and didn't run out of things to do. But even if you just want to do Beatles sights, there are three big ones:

1) The Beatles Story museum - takes several hours, and has a lot of information on their early years, so unless you've studied these extensively, you're bound to learn something new.

2) A bus or taxi tour of sights associated with their lives and songs - this is what you seem to be referring to. Again, these sights are spread out, and take a while to see. There's a cluster in the center (such as the Cavern) and a cluster near the airport (where John and Paul grew up, such as Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields, etc).

3) The National Trust tour of John's and Paul's childhood homes - this is wonderful. However, it requires advance booking and is only offered to small groups a few times a day. The bus and taxi tours pass by the outside, but this is the only way to get inside. More details here: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/beatles-childhood-homes

I agree with the idea of seeing Liverpool either before or after your tour. If you can't snag a flight into Liverpool, look into flying into Manchester, which is a much larger airport with many more flight options; there are direct trains right from Manchester airport to Liverpool. From Edinburgh or Glasgow, a train to Liverpool takes about 3 hours, and can be very cheap if booked as a nonrefundable Advance ticket (these become available about 11 weeks out).

If you want to see what I did in Liverpool, here's my trip report from a few years ago - just skip down to the Liverpool sections: https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/uk-trip-report-glasgow-manchester-liverpool-in-september-2016

Thank you all for the advice. I am trying to change my inbound flight to Glasgow to add a few days to the trip. Changing the flight to London is going to cost $291 each. I am hoping flying in to Glasgow early (the start of the tour) will only be a $50 change fee.

Harold - I have been studying train prices, 11 weeks out for discount tickets is very useful info.

I had wanted to see an Elvis impersonator show in London, looks like that won't happen. My husband is a huge Beatles fan, I hope we can get to Liverpool.

Again thanks for the advice. This RS forum is awesome.