England, Scotland & Wales
Loved, loved loved Rachel. Best tour director we ever had. Tour began September 2nd with a heat wave. Everyone dressed for much cooler weather but we really enjoyed all the blue skies and lack of rain during our trip. My husband had to buy short sleeve t-shirts and others purchased shorts. Was a great trip with a great group of folks and I really can’t complain about much of anything, although we could have used air conditioning at one of our hotels in Wales. Tauck is always the best at putting us in the middle of towns so we can explore on our own after hours. The Savoy was wonderful our last three days and loved the Beef Wellington the night we went to see “Tina” in London. The food was actually much better than I expected on this trip. We really covered a lot of ground seeing the usual UK highlights but Rachel had some really nice hidden gems for us as well. Loved the time we spent in Oxford at the inside the walls tour and dinner at Balliol College. We really loved the architecture of Bath and what a fun little town to explore. I definitely recommend this trip but you must have an appreciation of history and art. Lots of castles and palaces. Rachel was able to articulate the regional history in a concise and humorous way that never bored us.
Comments
Great to know. We’re planning this trip in 2025 with the Week in Scotland just before.
Going fall of 2024. Question - did you go a day before/after? Thinking Tower of London after. Any other suggestions?
We received a Tauck brochure this week which featured a new tour of the West country in England for 2025, while it only mentioned places visited and no other details, it is a beautiful area of the country and less visited by foreign tourists. Keep an eye out for details.
British -- What's the name of that tour? I just went to the Tauck website and searched for "England" in 2025 and the new tour didn't show up. I've been to Salisbury and Bath, but nowhere else in the west of England, and would love to see more of the country. (And it would give me an excuse to spend some more time in London on my own...not that I need an excuse!)
I looked for it online but it is not there yet. I just took a photo
Thanks, British. I've been to the Cotswolds, too (though I don't consider them "west") so maybe this isn't the tour for me. I'll definitely take a look at it when I get the brochure, though.
I wonder if the new tour gets all the way down to Port Wen (Port Isaac) in Cornwall? Too bad he "retired" or you might have been able to drop into the 'surgery' for a check-up and blood draw by 'Doc Martin.'
The description, "Explore romantic English landscapes that reveal timeless stories; they are settings for some of the world's famous novels, locations for film and television, and locales for some of history's most memorable events," "Cornwall- rugged coastlines, sandy beaches, coves, forests, and picturesque fishing villages . . ." sounds like Port Wen, to me, or maybe the area where they filmed Poldark. Between Stonehenge and Ascot/London could there be a stop at 'Downton Abbey'? Well, maybe it could happen????
Is this (a younger?) Rachel on the left? This was taken during the farewell dinner in the Tower of London. Our Rachel was doing a cross-training for the E,S,W tour and we were on our very first Tauck tour in June 2013. That is Ron Wesner our TD on the right!
I’m sure it’s the same Rachel. We have taken two AFRICA tours with her, way back starting in 2007 when Ashe lived there.
Cornwall and Devon have fishing villages all over. A very charming area of England, popular for vacations. Roads are narrow with high hedges unless it has changed as I haven’t been there for a long time. I might even be tempted to take the tour someday down the road.
I’m doing this trip this May. Does the tour in Oxford include entering some of the Colleges like Christ Church or Magdalen? In London, on the West End night, around what time is dinner?
We did that tour in 2018 and then did Ireland back-to-back. We had a great tour director for the England, Scotland and Wales portion, Bret Buskrud.
https://www.mikeandjudytravel.com/2018EnglandScotlandWales-01.htm
Finishing at the Savoy was really memorable. We probably would not have stayed at the Savoy on our own. We still have the little Savoy bathtub rubber duck.
We went on this trip in 2019. The tour did not go into any of the major colleges in Oxford. We had dinner one evening at a smaller college - Pembroke - where we learned about the college system. In your free time you could go into some of the more well-known colleges. You also may want to go to Evensong to see the interior of the chapel at Christ Church.
The dinner on the theater night is early. I think around 5PM. You need to be able to be finished in time to walk to the theater which I think starts at 7:30 or 8:00. (There was also no air-conditioning in the theater we went to, so if it's hot you will want to dress appropriately.) We found the dinner that evening to be fairly nondescript. It's an early bird special which has limited offerings.
We also had a very good tour director - Suzy Gray. She is from the UK but lives in Italy with her Italian husband and also does some of the Italy tours - Tuscany and Sicily.
As Kathy M said our tour in Oxford didn't include entering any colleges and they have porters station at the door. None would let tourists just walk in but you might check with the college itself to sed about a tour.
For the theater night the TD gives you a list of performances and restaurants to pick 1st, 2nd, 3rd choices of which you'd like. This happened at the tour start then we heard later which we'd gotten. The restaurant had special theater menus with 2-3 main choices and a couple of dessert choices you selected from that night. Be aware that street traffic can be crowded in London so if you plan on a theater more than walking distance from the hotel plan on using the subway or allowing time for a cab.
And yes the theater was a bit warm and dress was fairly casual.