Manchester England for 1st stop on "open jaw"

This sounds like a perfect opportunity for a true Back Door experience. by that I mean, you're driving, you come into a small village, what better way to soak up the local flavor by just being in a small English or Scottish village. you could very well be the only Americans there that day, visit the local pub, stay in a small family run B&B. Sorry I don't have anything specific but this was my first thought when I saw your post.

Edinburgh's about a 4 hour drive (traffic permitted) but you'll hit the Scottish border in about 2.5-3. The quickest route is motorway all the way but you go through the Lake District so you could easily make a stop along the way if you wanted.

Depending if you really need a car you can also get a train from the airport up north which will be quicker (about 2.5 hours.)

One caveat I would make about flying to outlying airports to save money is don't forget to factor in the time and cost of getting to where you really want to go. A day's car hire and tank of petrol will cost at least £100, plus I wouldn't fancy that drive after getting of a transatlantic flight so you'll probably need to get a hotel along the way and the whole trip will take a day or two out of the time you have... I'm not saying don't go this way but just make sure you've done all the sums.

Plenty to see.Depends what you mean by scotland, if its just edinburgh, then a a slow drive up through the Yorkshire Dales, and southern uplands would be good.If you want to tour the Highlands, grit your teeth and get to scotland first day, a week is barely enough!.You would be able to prebook cheap train tickets manchester-edinburgh.Maybe even pickup a scotish rail rover ticket there, 4 days unlimited travel over 8 day period for £100 each. Should be lots of flights from the scotish cities to Belfast/Dublin.

Drove Edinburgh to Manchester AIrport in just under 4 hours in September - early hours of teh morning in relatively good weather. May take longer at busy times. As others have said, depends what you want to do. We drove motorways, you could cut across to teh east coast and come up through good scenery or come up through the borders. All depends on your intersts and other plans.

Dan,

Just a thought.....

Would your flights options be any better (cheaper?) by flying out of Vancouver, BC??

Both Air Transat and Canadian Affair fly Vancouver to Manchester or Glasgow (among others).

If you do decide to fly into Manchester, I'd suggest taking the train as someone else mentioned. Unless you have plans to explore area between Manchester and Scotland, a car is probably not the best choice.

Happy travels!

From Manchester, you could possibly drive to Wales and then cross the Irish Sea to Ireland, then head back to Scotland. It is just amazing to see all the signs in Wales in English and Welsh. It would really enrich your trip to see some of Wales, as well. Then, you would have been to 4 countries, England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland.

Hi, Dan. You might think of going round trip Seattle to Ireland, and then just catching a Ryanair flight to Scotland - it's generally cheaper than ferry, etc. Either arrive, and head right to Scotland, or maybe 2-3 days seeing Dublin, 1 week Scotland, back for the rest of Ireland. Just an idea!

If you decide to head manchester-ireland, check out the "sail-rail" fare, I think its £26 from manchester to Dublin including the ferry.Try the Stenna sealink site ,From what I can remember taking a car across is very expensive, you'd be better hiring one for a once in Dublin.

Actually the ferry fare isn't too bad about £120 car plus driver and £20 for extra passenger.s