We are ending a Rick Steves tour in Belfast and want to go to Scotland (Edinburgh and Glencoe areas) and then take a car south to Wales and England, ending in Bath and then London.
First, what is the best way to get from Belfast to Scotland? Air or Ferry?
And where in Scotland is the best place to rent a car if we will be dropping it off in Bath?
I would greatly appreciate any advice from travelers who have done this.
How many weeks are you allowing to do all that?
Fly and hire a car at the airport. There could be quite a hefty one way hire charge though.
I'd also like to know how long you are allowing for this?
We are planning 2 weeks. Scotland for 5 nights; then England.
Have you considered flying from Belfast to Edinburgh and hiring a car to drive out to Glencoe for your visit? Then return the car to whichever company you hire from at the airport (avoid Green Motion at all costs!) and take public transport or a taxi to your lodging in Edinburgh itself. A car will be a liability in the city and public transport links are good.
You can then either take a train to London or fly down and hire a car to visit all the other places you want to go to. I'm sure you can drop off a car in Bath if you hire it in Edinburgh, but you will be charged for the privilege of doing so.
I can't say that driving from Edinburgh to Wales is something I would wish to undertake. It would be 7/8 hours of driving to Cardiff/Swansea without comfort stops or delays due to roadworks, accidents or heavy traffic. Each to their own of course.
Fly to Edinburgh and spend some time exploring the city. You won’t need a car here as public transport is so good (parking difficult and expensive). Hire a car when you are ready to leave Edinburgh. You have a choice here. Either then drive to Glencoe OR think about doing a day tour to Glencoe - Rabbies do one from Edinburgh and get consistently good reviews.
I reckon you have 8-9 nights to play with?
Hire a car from Edinburgh Airport. Then head south via Carlisle to North Wales. This will take a full day. Plan to stop in Llandudno (Victorian sea side town ) OR Conwy (Walled Medieval town with a ruined castle). They are only a few miles apart and make a good base to explore North Wales. Plan on 3 nights.
Then drive down through Wales to Cardiff for 3 nights. Either travel the coastal route or else down through the centre of Wales. Again Allow a full day for the journey.
Head to Bath (couple of hours drive) for 2 nights.
Then hand in the car and travel by train to London for the rest of the stay. Again you won’t want a car in London.
We rented in England (Bournemouth on the south coast) and returned in Scotland (Glasgow Airport) with no extra one-way charge as far as I recall. This was with Hertz. We put about 1,000 miles on the car in about 10 days, had a wonderful trip pretty much the length of Great Britain. I highly recommend it!
