Train travel - best price & advice

hulahoop09

Hiya

Not sure if I am posting in the right section.

There is 2 adults, 1 child (7 years old) and an 11 month old baby travelling from Wolverhampton to Rhyl on monday 17th sept and returning on friday 21st sept. Now I have looked at train fares for those dates and with a family & friends railcard and to travel at at approx 11.45am and return at approx 12.40pm we are looking at approx £54. For the week before the prices are coming in at approx £44. I was wondering will the price for the dates I want to travel be likely to get sold and so the price goes up or is it likely to drop as the time gets closer? Any advice would help!

Also we need to book our seats and would like a table with the 4 seats and as we wont need to pay for our 11 month old she wont have a seat if the spare seat is reserved. We will have quite a bit of luggage and also a puschair, I was wondering if there is a way of getting seats near pushchair space or is it best to slide it under the table? I know its a silly question but it is bugging me where the hell it will go! In the 2 hours & 30 mins we are on there it may be hell as my little girl has a short attention span, doesnt like sitting still and also likes her regular naps and if I cant put her in the pushchair to nap then she wont as she doesnt sleep in my arms anymore! Lol.

Panicking just a little!!!

wordsfan

I am from and was a wife of raf n have travelled n still travel A LOT by train. Don't pay for reservations. If train busy n someone sits in you seat conductors do nothing about it. R u on one train? If so cheap tickets ok but...advance tickets the cheapest are only for the train you are booked on. If for ANY REASON you miss it you have to pay full fare.
If more than one train If different train companies n train 1is late that's deemed to be your fault by train/company 2 n u have to pay full fare.

For seats you want get there early. Generally speaking the seats near luggage racks are for disabled/elderly.

Negative sorry but true

hulahoop09

Thanks. My dad used to work for british rail years ago so I too have travelled a lot by train but things have changed.

It is cheaper for us to book the tickets in advance otherwise we may possibly end up paying double if we buy on the day. As for reserving I dont think all allow you to reserve but as we are travelling with a child and 11 month old would it not work in our favour to book seats (no extra charge) incase the train is very busy? I am not afraid to politely ask people to move if they are sitting in the seats I have reserved believe me Never had anyone refuse so far!! Lol. Specially as we would have children with us aswell.

The trains (specially coming back) are every 2 hours and so I am generally very punctual and tend to get to the station an hour before our train is due at least I know obviously anything could happen but booking in advance in our situation could save us forking out double the money and potentially guarantee us a seat specially for the 7 year old.

I am not too fuused about sitting near the luggage rack I was just wondering re the pushchair but would happily put it under the table.

We will be travelling on the 1 train there and 1 back, no changes required on the time trains I am looking at. On the other times there are 1 or 2 changes but with an 11 month old and puschair and cases etc this would be a nightmare!

Thanks for the reply!!

FatAndy

hulahoop09 wrote: »

Hiya

Not sure if I am posting in the right section.

There is 2 adults, 1 child (7 years old) and an 11 month old baby travelling from Wolverhampton to Rhyl on monday 17th sept and returning on friday 21st sept. Now I have looked at train fares for those dates and with a family & friends railcard and to travel at at approx 11.45am and return at approx 12.40pm we are looking at approx £54. For the week before the prices are coming in at approx £44. I was wondering will the price for the dates I want to travel be likely to get sold and so the price goes up or is it likely to drop as the time gets closer? Any advice would help!

If you can be a bit flexible and travel at slightly more anti-social times you can get some cheaper prices if you book advance fares a week or so in advance. If you look for example on the National Rail website at fares next Monday a standard single from Wolverhampton to Rhyl costs £29.60 but if you travel at 5:48am (not that you're going to want to!) it costs £7.00, at 7:42 it's £13.00 and at 9:43am it's £23.00. Next Friday there's a train from Rhyl to Wolverhampton at 20:55 which again is £7.00 for a single. All these services are on the direct train so there are no changes (for some reason all the cheap prices are on the direct service).

I appreciate that with two young kids, and presumably check in and check out times to work around, these times are far from ideal but it does show that if you wait until nearer the time you should be able to make some sort of a saving. I'd also suggest booking your seats as the Birmingham to Holyhead trains more often than not only have two carriages so they can get crowded at times.

hulahoop09

Thanks! Yeah we cant check in until 4pm so were planning on getting the 11.43am train and coming back we have to check out at 10am so were planning on getting the 12.40pm train which means we dont have to be hanging around too much after checking out.

I think we will prob end up booking in the next week or so as am worried the prices for the times we need may go up. I have budgeted £48 for train fare with our family & friends railcard.

dzug1

If the fares you have found are advance singles then book now. 99.99% certain they won't get any cheaper and 100% certain they will go up, though when is a moveable feast

hardpressed

Have you tried Red Spotted Hanky or Qjump, see what their prices are then try all the different train companies web sites. Cheapest I found for a journey was from East Coast trains, the fact that the trains I shall be travelling on don't go anywhere near the East Coast line is a bit of a puzzle but that doesn't matter.

artichoke

just wanted to ask more about the pushchair - are you wanting the pushchair to be used for child to sleep in on the train? Not sure there will be space anywhere for a pushchair to be used.... unless you can stand in the corridor between the carriages...but again there will be people walking backwards and forwards to the toilet so you could be in the way...

The aisles are very narrow so no where for you to stand the pushchair in the carriage...

I used to travel by train with a double buggys and it was a nightmare...the only place to stand with the buggy inuse was by the door in the end carriage but you have to move all the time to allow people to get on and off the train...

bring back the guards van!

Art

joerugby

Advance fares at £48 are available now on the the direct trains at 11.43 and 13.43 outbound and 12.40 and 14.41 return.

Cheapest advance fare for all of you would be £21 but you would need to travel at 05.48 outbound and 20.55 return. As well as being cheap these are fast, direct trains (Virgin) with only 4/5 stops and would be less likely to be busy at that time of day. First class advance on these trains is £100

Off peak return is £65 - travel when you like

It's up to you really

hulahoop09

I got my tickets a few days ago. I used red spotted hanky as I had a £10 off loyalty voucher so only ended up paying £38 which I well chuffed with.