Derby to Edinburgh

[BigBadWolf]

I am a uni student (i.e lacking in money) and I want to visit my friend in Edinburgh. The journey would be from Derby [DBY] to Edinburgh Waverley [EDB].

I have checked the CrossCountry website (as they give me an NUS discount on top of my 16-25 RailCard) but can't find tickets under £81

I want a return for a weekend (Leaving on a Friday, returning on a Monday) but, since we are both free on all weekends, it's all dependant on which weekend is the cheapest.

I've tried split ticketing but it comes out at the same price. Have I already found the cheapest solution or is there a trick I am missing?

 

[mikeg]

Roughly which weekend are you looking at, it may be you are either:

• Booking too far in the future, before advances have been released
• Booking too late, when all of the good value advances have sold out

Remember that advances are sold as singles. The off peak return is indeed the cheapest return ticket* and there is no financial advantage to booking the off peak return in advance (or indeed having an NUS card.)

Edit: There don't seem to be many advances that are significantly cheaper. Looking on the EC website (so not including the 10% discount you'd get on the XC website, the latter of which I recommend you look through) you can buy advances from £31.20 each way. So that should be £28.10 each way if you book through the XC website. I'm looking at early May though, you may wish to travel earlier. Too much earlier and the advances get more expensive. Unfortunately that's the nature of CrossCountry. There's not much spare room on most of their trains so they have little incentive to sell advances, and the good value ones they do sell sell out quickly.

* I haven't looked into splits yet... it may be that it is a good value return fare and that money can't be saved or it may be that splitting could save some money.

Are you willing to change trains? It may be worth grabbing an off peak return to York and booking advances from York to Edinburgh on East Coast. To get the cheapest advances from York to Edinburgh on East Coast, book through eastcoast.co.uk

Edit yet again: If you are willing to lengthen your journey a little it may be worth going across to Crewe (an off peak return costs £12.85 with your rail card) and then advances are available from as little as £8.60 each way from Crewe to Edinburgh with Virgin Trains with your railcard... and that's only looking a few weeks in advance...

 

[alex17595]

The XC flows are expensive, you may be better booking with them up Doncaster and their site for the 10% discount. And geta Doncaster-Edinburgh on the East Coast site with East Coast online discount.

 

[ashworth]

Try travelling via Crewe.
There seem to be a reasonable number of advance tickets available at £18.50 with Railcard each way with just one change at Crewe. There are also a very small number of journeys available via Crewe for only £13.85.

 

[BigBadWolf]

Thank you! I looked at going via Crewe and it's reduced the journey price to about £26 each way!

 

[Gathursty]

I think a Blythe Bridge - Chapeltown (S Yorks) could be useful here considering a recent thread about it on here.