Gatwick to Bath

The fastest train service from Gatwick to Bath Spa (one connection in Reading) takes 2hr20min. If you book well in advance at www.eastcoast.co.uk, you can get a discount fare as low as £8.50. However, that ticket will be for a specific departure date and time and is non-exchangeable and non-refundable. If you book a discount fare ticket, allow lots of connection time (at least three hours) at Gatwick in case your plane is late. Discount fare tickets go on sale about 10 weeks in advance. If you book sooner, you'll pay full fare. If you wait too long, the lowest discount fare tickets will be gone.

Weekends in the UK is when engineering works take place on the railway. You can check on the National Rail Enquiries website around 13 weeks out for any planned. They will tell you of any planned closures, any planned diversions, and any rail replacement buses to be laid on. November is way too far out to check now. Generally NRE will suggest either Gatwick => Reading, Reading => Bath; or Gatwick =>Farringdon, Tube to Paddington, Paddington => Bath. The second option is counter-intuitive, taking you all the way back into London and back out again. It would be difficult with luggage. The first option makes more sense, just be prepared to move quickly at Reading because it is a large confusing station which by November will be in the midst of a large improvement package which may mean walkways may be narrower. You will only have 10 minutes there so you need to get your head down.

Jim, Just to piggyback on what the others have already said: October 2009 my wife and I took the train from Gatwick (7am arrival) to Reading and then transferred to Bath Spa. We're both experienced travelers and regularly take trains in Europe, but we were exhausted when we arrived. It's just a long journey after an international flight. Nevertheless I still recommend this route as the best choice, but advise that you be sure not to over-schedule the remainder of your day, as you will be tired. I can also testify that Reading station was chaotic, and this presumably was before any construction. We had difficulty finding our transfer to Bath Spa in the 10 minute window we had between trains. We asked at a ticket booth and were pointed to a train that did stop at Bath Spa but wasn't the train we had planned to take. Fortunately for us we were on a rail pass and nobody complained that we were on the wrong train to Bath. I recommend that you give yourself some extra time to transfer or at least have a back up plan for the next train if you miss your connection to Bath Spa.
matt