Mini break to London

All you can do is compare prices between a company and DIY.

No need to go to an agent, A company such as Superbreaks will offer the whole package - travel, hotel and theatre tickets and you can book online.

We have used them as they have been cheaper, or the marginal extra cost was worth it to be able to click and book everything at once.

We're not long back from a weekend in London, traveling on Virgin's West Coast line from the Scottish Borders. Or English Borders, depending on who you think won and who you vote for.

First thing: Saturday travel (on Virgin) is waaaaaay cheaper than the price component of any 'holiday' devised by a third party. We paid a mere £30 each for 1st Class travel. Including a, uh, picnic breakfast. Virgin don't offer that kind of ticketing every weekend, but they do offer a mere £10 surcharge over Standard Class. (Our distance from London, incidentally, is 315 miles.)

If you have a railcard, which is always worth having, then bagging what is, in effect, a free one courtesy of Tesco Clubcard, is essential. We've had railcards for years. Mr Tesco has paid for all of 'em. If you shop at Morrison's, then tough. And Sainsbury's Nectar is useless in comparison to Tesco Clubcard.

Accommodation? We always book into university hall accomm. There's absolutely no point in having a weekend in London and staying further than walking distance from the centre. Kensington hath its charms, but Tube travel and/or expensive cabs ain't amongst them.

However: when you're going, students are all in residence, so you need to think about London. . . properly. As ex-Londoners by virtue of provenance if not of birth, Northumberland Avenue is always our preferred destination of choice when enjoying a weekend in The Smoke (aaah, yesteryear) and there's at least one hotel there which doesn't charge the earth.

You're less than a 5-minute stroll from Trafalgar Square, 10 minutes from Piccadilly Circus; 12 minutes from Leicester Square; a quarter hour from Covent Garden's piazza restaurants. It's also less than 5 minutes' walk to ye pedestrian bridge over the Thames to the South Bank.

London's Tube is brilliant. Make sure you have your contactless debit cards with you. You don't need Oyster cards. Likewise, London's buses are fabulous. Just hit the yellow button when boarding.

Theatres? Your choice. Prices vary wildly according to popularity. Last-minute bargains are to be had at ticketing agencies (there's one in Leicester Square we've used from time to time) but you're not guaranteed the best seats. Just make sure you look at a seating plan for sight lines. We tend to go to the pictures instead: the British Film Institute's iMAX on the South Bank. Outstanding. (But advance booking is essential.)

Best value in London? City Cruises lunch. Seriously. There's no pretence (as there is with certain other, unnamed, dining-cruise operators) at cordon bleu, but equally, no pretence at their prices, either. Instead: there's a floating restaurant -- a proper one, not a boat-with-a-caff -- and lunch from a set menu (two choices: eat it; don't eat it) and fabulous staff as the restaurant boat cruises up and down the Thames.

Next best value in London? Something called 'the classic' bus tour, starting off from, of all places, Northumberland Avenue. It is not a hip on / hop off affair, so no, you don't spend half your time in London, having hopped off the bus, waiting desperately to hop-on again when it next trundles into view. If it ever trundles into view.

Good luck, and don't believe that DIY London is out of the question. It isn't. But yes, you will need to pre-plan. And remember those train fares: we usually go out Saturday morning 1st Class (most often at a £10 premium on Standard but hey, breakfast is free) come back on Standard. Using railcard each way (one-third off) unless, of course, Virgin is running a £30 1st Class rail offer, in which case it doesn't matter if you have a railcard or not.

We're both very familiar with London by virtue of careers and residence, though it's been a few decades since last we knew it on a daily basis. Nowadays it's where we head for good times re-visited. And always but always . . . we do it ourselves.