St Margarets (Herts) to Edinburgh Waverly

[jjbb]

Afternoon afternoon,

I'm looking to get tickets for me and my partner (both on 26-30 railcards) from SMT to EDB on the 12th Aug (one way, already booked the sleeper back ). Slight fly in the proverbial, in that we will be held up in St Margarets for an indeterminate period of time, and would want to catch a train earliest 10am to latest 5pm.

I've checked out on the forum's ticketing site and from my reckoning it'd be a fairly painful £279 for an anytime ticket, or roughly £100 for the 16:48, which means we could end up sitting at St Margarets for a good 7hrs... Neither's ideal, so wondering if there's a cheaper/better way of doing it? Maybe by not going into London but taking a more circuitous route? Buying it on the day is potentially risky as it's the fringe, and I recall last year the trains being fully sold out to head up north a few days in advance.

Cheers in advance,
Jacob

 

[Benjwri]

As a starting point 2 Super Off Peak singles are £135.80, you can travel on anything up to the 13:17 departure and be within the restrictions, if you can reduce the period of time you might have to wait?

 

[Watershed]

Welcome to the forum!

It's between £63.50 and £67.90 per person (with Railcard) for a Super Off-Peak Single from SMT to EDB. The former is the cheaper 'not via London' fare, which would require you to change at Cambridge and Stevenage (plus possibly Peterborough/Doncaster/York etc.), or Cambridge (plus possibly Ely) and Peterborough. The latter is the slightly dearer 'Any Permitted' fare which also allows you to travel via London (e.g. changing at Tottenham Hale for the Victoria line to Kings Cross).

Those tickets are valid to depart Kings Cross between 09:06 and 14:59, or from 18:59 onwards. From Stevenage it would be valid to depart between 09:19 and 15:07, or from 19:01 onwards. If you choose to go via Cambridge and Peterborough then the only applicable restriction is that you couldn't board a CrossCountry service (e.g. from Cambridge to Peterborough) before 09:30.

There are also cheaper options if you take a look at TrainSplit - though these involve Advance tickets, so you'd be tied to the exact journey you select when booking. For example this journey via Hertford East/North, Stevenage and Leeds costs just £65.80 for both of you. It's worthwhile having a look at the results as it comes up with plenty of options.

Also worth noting that although Advance tickets tie you to your booked journey, you can change an Advance ticket to another date/time (or even the above Super Off-Peak Single) on payment of the difference in fare plus an admin fee of £5. Such a change has to be made before the departure of your first train though.

 

[Benjwri]

The Any Permitted Super Off Peak single I mention above is also unrestricted on Euston departures in the evening, so if you’re willing to travel the longer way with Avanti instead of LNER, this could also be an option.

 

[JBuchananGB]

By selecting "Flexible" on the Forum's web site I found Super Off Peak Singles for £127 (covering 2 people). I did this by forcing "Change at Stevenage" and "Walk-up tickets". It is valid at a lot of different times. I had to keep resetting the Filter for walk ups, and resetting the search parameters for depart at 12.00.
Try this link: and the change the Filter to "Flexible"

 

[jjbb]

Ideal, thanks for all the quick replies - looks like Watershed's suggestion, going super off peak via Cambridge, gives us the most flexibility at the best cost. Who would've thought a quick forum post would save £100+

 

[Haywain]

It's between £63.50 and £67.90 per person (with Railcard) for a Super Off-Peak Single from SMT to EDB. The former is the cheaper 'not via London' fare, which would require you to change at Cambridge and Stevenage (plus possibly Peterborough/Doncaster/York etc.), or Cambridge (plus possibly Ely) and Peterborough. The latter is the slightly dearer 'Any Permitted' fare which also allows you to travel via London (e.g. changing at Tottenham Hale for the Victoria line to Kings Cross).

Surely the ‘not via London’ fare allows travel via Cambridge/March/Peterborough?

 

[Hadders]

Rather than travel via Cambridge, I'd go to Hertford East and walk to Hertford North then take a train to Stevenage.

You could pick up the 12:41 Lumo which does Stevenage to Edinburgh in 4 hours on the nose.

 

[Watershed]

Surely the ‘not via London’ fare allows travel via Cambridge/March/Peterborough?

Yes, as alluded to:

which would require you to change at ... Cambridge (plus possibly Ely) and Peterborough