Help visting London 2 Adults/2 children best travel options

Miserjunkie

Hi

I hope you guys can help. I'm planning 3 day trip to London with my DH and my 2 children (both under 15) in the half term hols. We are staying in Kew and the nearest station is Kew bridge. I've tried to research Oyster and travelcards but I'm just getting my knickers in a twist. I must be thick but I just can't get my head round it all, and "what are these zones"! Confused

Does anyone know if I can use the oyster card from Kew Bridge (going to Waterloo) or should we use anytime travelcard?

If we buy anytime travelcard for train from Kew Bridge (going to Waterloo), can we use it on the buses and tubes in the centre of London?

I have to be organised before we get there as DS has High Functioning Autism, and I have to make sure he understands what we will be doing. Otherwise I could spend 3 days in a hotel room!!!!!

Many thanks
Miserjunkie

Gosia

Hi

Not sure if you can use the Oyster card to travel from Kew bridge - I know there are a few stations like Richmond etc which do not accept it.

The Oyster is a cheap travel option mainly if you do a lot of single journeys.

Otherwise if you are planning to use the tube, trains, buses etc it might just be easiest to get Day Travelcards (and yes you can use them on all these different modes of transport). Also you do not need to pre-register your details in advance as you would with an Oyster.

This might actually be your best option. Kew bridge is zone 3 so a 1-day travelcard for an adult is about 5.90. Just remember to get the 5.90 fare you need to get the off-peak travelcard which are only available after 9.30am! You don't want to hit London during the rush hour anyway as it's not fun.

Hope this helps but if you have any more questions just ask. :j

tarajayne

We are travelling to London during half term and are getting one day travelcards from our local station before we go so we can use our railcard to get discount on them, can't get the discount if we buy them from the underground station. From what I was told on the phone if we travel with travelcards the kids then go for a pound each, am gonna pick them up this week and see.

Miserjunkie

Thanks guys:j

I think I've finally worked it all out. Kew Bridge is unmanned station so we will have to use the machine. Thanks Tarajayne, you gave me the idea to phone London Transport, dah I don't know why I did'nt do that in the first place. A very kind lady ran through it all - we have to buy three adult one day off peak travelcards (£5.30) and one child one day off peak travelcard (£2.00) from the station and that should get us around on most of transport around London. I'll just make sure that we get to the station with plenty of time to fathom out how to work the machine.

thanks again
miserjunkie

BernadetteN

You can use the 2 following maps to work out which zone tickets you need and where you can use an Oyster card. The map shows Kew Bridge is not yet on Oyster but district line Gunnersbury is, so would it not be useful to walk to Gunnersbury? Buses 237 and 267 will also take you in minutes to this tube station. This route could prove more useful than using the train as the train goes to Waterloo I believe and you are likely to have to trasnfer to tube from there to get around London, whereas the district line take you by tube to many sights such as Buckingham Palace etc. Use the TFL travel planner to see how fast journey times are train V tube.

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/tickets/oyster-payg-map.pdf

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/tube-dlr-trams-and-train-travelcard-zones-map.pdf

If your children are aged 11-15 years old, it is worth buying an Oyster photocard and you can now order one online - just need a photo to upload and do it at least 3 weeks in advance of travel. The maximum they will then cost per day is £1.

We have 2 Oystercards which we use once or twice a year when travelling around London and we often lend them out (probably against rules) to friends who pay us back in cash. We find them really useful and you always save money, whether it is a single journey or if you are doing multiple journeys in one day and you don't need to work out in advance if a travelcard is cheaper or if several single tickets are cheaper as Oystercard does the maths for you - for example an off-peak travelcard for Kew to London costs £5.90 as a paper ticket but if you load your Oystercard with credit, the maximum you will be charged for a day will be £5.40. It's not a huge saving but it adds up over several days and you don't need to keep buying tickets, just keep your Oyster card loaded up with enough credit.

PS if you are opting for an off-peak travelcard, you will need to buy a zones 1-4 at £5.90, not a zones 1-2 at £5.30 as Kew is zone 3.

PPS here is a map showing all bus, train and tube services around Kew. You need to expand the map at least to 100% to be able to see Kew itself.
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/south-west-london-bus-map.pdf

redvanman

I have just returned from Borehamwood which i think is zone 6, we bought a travelcard every day £7 for adults, £1 for under 15s, could use it on buses and the tube, also because we bought the tickets from the train station we were able to get loads of 2 for1 offers for the zoo, aquarium and city cruises, and many others.

BernadetteN

An excellent tip redvanman. Go to the following link to see what you can get money off. You can print off as many forms in advance as you want of things you think you might do and just carry them around with you and don't forget your train tickets (which we did once after standing in a long queue and realising we didn't have them with us).
http://www.daysoutguide.co.uk/

unhealthyman

If you are buying daily travel cards, you just need to know the furthest zone you want to go to (i.e. for as far out as Kew, but a travel card for zones 1-3).

If you use oyster cards this is all worked out automatically for you. Oyster cards really work great - you get them from the booth and top them up with enough money for the three days and don't need to think about it again.

It's up to you - both will work well. In my experience I've found the London transport network to be very painless. Once you understand the different tube lines it (usually) works very smoothly. One thing to watch out for though, is that they do repairs over the weekend. You can see exactly what is happening where about a month in advance online and in the stations, but they often close a few sections of the tube network.

The buses take a little bit longer to understand, but many of them call out the stops as they go which makes it easier.

envelopes

Hello, We went to London last wednesday - myself and two young children - i got a fabby deal on travelzoo - anyway i bought a travel card from an online company called Hello paris Ltd. Now I paid more online that i needed to but didn't realise that until i changed the voucher in Euston train station. Looking at the voucher now, i paid for peak times for the kids which is why i paid more - it should have cost £2 each child off peak and about £4 for me i think.

i did have to phone up for some instruction BUT it was great and the ticket allowed us to go on a thames boat with a 1/3 price reduction - he let me on for one child and one adult so it was £7 ish for all day on and off of the thames boat - so most travel was done by boat.

Oh and we ate at the Giraffe on the south bank - well worth a visit because there are street performers all along the bank - that was near Waterloo bridge. Oh and Westminster Abbey was awesome - again very generous people - under 11's free but they charged me as a student and not as an adult.

Have a fantastic time - i wish that we'[d had three days there.

poorandindenial

Hi there

I would recommend the paper ticket if the station is unmanned as it is unlikely to take Oyster out there (although TFL can confirm)

Oyster isn't more expensive than other tickets as the fare stops accumulating at the same price as the appropriate travelcard BUT if you do go to any station with no oyster reader you pay something called a 'full cash fare' or 'maximum cash fare' or something like that because you can't touch in and touch out which works out very expensive. (you don't need to touch out on buses, just in). Singles on Oyster are much cheaper.

ALL underground stations have oyster readers but overgrounds don't always

Hope that is slightly clearer than mud - lol