Dover to London

[flobo]

Hi all,

i live in Calais and was planning a day trip to London, sometime next month. My first idea was eurostar from Calais to London but return ticket is 90€, almost the same as from Paris :roll:

I'm now thinking about taking a ferry to dover and then the train to London, but the whole thing confuse me a bit.
From what i can understand from southeastern site, i can either buy a regular line ticket, a high speed one, or a high speed supplement.

First of all, it always seem to be cheaper on saturdays, so looking at Saturday's fare, i can find a non high speed return ticket at 20 £, and a high speed one at 35£.
I have not found yet how to add the high speed supplement manually, but wouldn't it be cheaper to buy the 20 £ one + high speed ?

Also i read in another post (not sure which one, i read a lot of them) that it may be cheaper to take a ticket farther than london. How can this even work ?

Finally, is is easily possible to walk from the ferry terminal to Dover Priory, or is bus necessary to get there. (on google earth, it doesnt seem to be that far).

Thanks in advance and sorry if the answers are already on the southestern site, i did not find them.

 

[Oracle]

Bonjour! We go to Calais quite a lot via the (cough) Chunnel (Tunnel sous La Manche) and have stayed there once. The train services have changed over the years since I first went to the town in the early 1970s! I can advise that the ferry terminal to Priory should, from experience is a long walk...1 1/2 miles apparently.

P & O advise:

Foot passengers:
Passenger who are travelling by foot can only travel between the hours of 08:25 - 19:35 Dover to Calais and 06:30 - 22:00 Calais to Dover.

By train:
The nearest main line train is Dover Priory - about 1.5 miles from the port and approximately 2 hours from both London Victoria and Charing Cross. A regular foot passenger shuttle bus operates from the station and the ferry terminal between 7am and 8:40pm and costs just £2 per person each way.

I know that this is the opposite direction but this may help:
http://www.seat61.com/London-Paris-ferry.htm

I would purchase a Travelcard add-on to get the free bus and rail transport.

 

[flobo]

Thanks for you answer, I didn't know they were specific times for foot passengers, that's good to know (since it's P&O, i assume UK time).

About the Travelcard, i'm not sure it's worth it, the plan is to stay in Westminster/Oxford Street/British Museum area, which is doable by foot.

The only thing is that using the high speed line, you get off at St Pancras which may be a little too far north. The morning, it might be OK, but in the evening, i may have to use one tube ride (never taken it before, actually) to get back to the station in time for the last train, and get in Dover in time for the last Ferry.

I could also use the regular line, but 1h30 for ferry each way 2 * 2h train = 7h is way too much time in transit for a one day trip. 5h is already pushing it, but with getting up early and taking the first Ferry, you can get in London by 9-10 AM which is acceptable.

There is also the possibility of adding the Dover bus to the train ticket, i have seen at the same time, but i don't see the point either since i won't get the ticket until i get to the station.

 

[yorkie]

Also i read in another post (not sure which one, i read a lot of them) that it may be cheaper to take a ticket farther than london. How can this even work ?

Basically you can buy a ticket from anywhere to anywhere on the National Rail Network (with a few impractical exceptions for journeys that you couldn't realistically do by rail e.g. Yeovil Junction to Yeovil Town), and in general tickets are valid via any "permitted route", which in some cases is a very wide range of routes.

However some tickets are restricted and only allow (a) certain route(s) or prohibit a certain route.

In the case of the HS1 line, what would have made sense if the cheaper tickets that are not valid for that line were routed "Not HS1" but all other tickets remained Any Permitted.

However they didn't do that.

Instead we have the daft situation that causes confusion, where tickets to London are routed "Not HS1" or "Plus HS1". But if you go beyond London, they become "Not HS1" or "Any Permitted", go even further out (e.g. to Peterborough, Rugby, Ipswich, etc) and you only have "Any Permitted", ie. it is no cheaper to avoid HS1.

As for the "supplements", for normal tickets we have excess fares. For a change of route, the price is HALF the DIFFERENCE in fare, per direction, payable on board the train. However excess fares are time consuming to issue, and so they effectively replaced excesses with supplements, where applicable for travel on HS1 when holding a ticket routed Not HS1. Is it cheaper to get a Not HS1 plus a supplement? It shouldn't be, but maybe there is an anomaly somewhere! It should be the same price however in many cases it is more expensive. Which is wrong and goes against the spirit of excessing.

In summary, I feel the HS1 fares structure is a mess, it causes confusion, it can penalise some passengers, and it should be brought into line with the rest of the National Rail system. If HS2 is to be done in a similar way in terms of ticketing, and if the existing services are slowed down too, I would prefer the line to never be built!

Sorry our fares structure is so confusing! Many guards don't understand it, let alone passengers. But if you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask

 

[flobo]

I think i understood most of it, thanks, even if i had to reread the part about fare 3 times.

About the ticket I think i got what the problem is. The 20£ ticket is to Victoria, while the 30£ ones are to London Terminals or Zone 1-6.

So my bet is that the supplement won't work with the Victoria ticket since Victoria is not reachable via HS1 without backtracking.

That leave the Terminals tickets which probably include Saint Pancras.

I figure Zone1-6 are probably related to the Travelcard add-on ?

About the farther than london thing, if i understand correctly, i can not get a better price to london since i would have to take a ticket way too far from london to get back on the "any permitted" system.

 

[Birdbrain]

If you stay for a little longer you could always try a Brit Rail Pass!

 

[flobo]

I really can't, in the middle of the college year, plus the hotel would probably be expensive.

 

[yorkie]

About the ticket I think i got what the problem is. The 20£ ticket is to Victoria, while the 30£ ones are to London Terminals or Zone 1-6.

So my bet is that the supplement won't work with the Victoria ticket since Victoria is not reachable via HS1 without backtracking.

Yes, there is a £20 "Super Off Peak Day" return fare to Victoria specifically, routed "Not HS1".

That leave the Terminals tickets which probably include Saint Pancras.

Yes, a London Terminals ticket allows you into various London Terminals, including St Pancras, providing the routeing allows it.

I figure Zone1-6 are probably related to the Travelcard add-on ?

Yes, a ticket to "London Zones 1-6" includes unlimited travel within the London Travelcard area.

About the farther than london thing, if i understand correctly, i can not get a better price to london since i would have to take a ticket way too far from london to get back on the "any permitted" system.

An Off Peak Day Return to London Terminals Route "Plus High Speed" is priced at £34.30. A ticket to somewhere just beyond London costs a little more.

However if travelling at peak time both ways, an Anytime Return to London is so incredibly expensive that it is cheaper to buy an Off Peak ticket to somewhere like Ipswich, which is valid on any train between Dover and Ipswich and only time restricted between London & Ipswich.

 

[flobo]

Thanks for all the explanation i get it now.

I guess i'm way too used to the similar french regionnal high speed service Calais-Lille where the price is ALWAYS the same, from monday to sunday, each hour, each day.
But even if it's complicated, one advantage is the return ticket, it's almost given if it's the same day in this case.
Here, in my exemple, to Lille, it's always 14 € going, 14 € back.
And SNCF does have strange tarification, too. once, i had to go two days in a row to Lille for an exam, so that would be around 60 €. I almost bought it, then, i thought to ask if there wasn't an alternative. In the end,i found out the week long ticket (any travel and return you want for a week) is 50 € , 10 € less than 2 tickets :roll:

Anyway, back to London, i have just seen the tube single ticket price and am amazed, at those price, it's almost cheaper to buy a Travelcard anyway.

Or maybe since i don't know how much i'll move (not too much, but you never know), i should buy and recharge a Oyster card with a few pounds, enough to reach the Travelcard if needed, and if i don't, i'll still have some money on it for the next time i'll be in London.

 

[island]

Or maybe since i don't know how much i'll move (not too much, but you never know), i should buy and recharge a Oyster card with a few pounds, enough to reach the Travelcard if needed, and if i don't, i'll still have some money on it for the next time i'll be in London.

You definitely should get an Oyster card if you are not getting a Travelcard, as paper singles are ridiculously expensive. You can cash in the card at any London Underground ticket office if you want to.

 

[LexyBoy]

If you're travelling in London you should definitely get an Oyster card (single fares are very high to force people to use Oyster - however you can buy a Travelcard on a paper ticket for about the same price as the Oyster Travelcard cap). On Oyster your credit will be there for next time you need it, and you can get it back by taking the card to a station.

Also I'd recommend getting the bus rather than tube, it's much more fun (and cheaper) (London buses have a display to tell you the next stop, so you won't get lost!)

The walk from the ferry terminal to the station at Dover isn't too far as long as the weather is OK - better than Calais anyway where you have to walk for ages to get to the far end of the ferry terminal! Since you won't have luggage it should be fine.

From Dover I guess you'll need to see what time you get to the station - if there's no fast train for a while it would be better to get one to Victoria or Charing Cross rather than waiting. You would be better on a train to Charing Cross rather than Victoria (the £20 Cheap Day Return ticket is valid on either) if there's a choice, since Charing Cross is better placed for sightseeing (though Victoria is only ~15 mins walk from Westminster, but it's not especially nice). As pointed out by other posters you can get the fast train to St Pancreas and pay the supplement on board if you change your mind.

Oh, by the way - these cheaper tickets are available in the week as well as weekends - but only later in the day (after 9.00-9.30 usually, but depends on the route).

 

[At_traction]

As for the Oyster Travelcard vs. Pay-as-you-go: although only in the latter scheme is it possible to get refund for any loaded but unused value (in Travelcard only the Oyster card itself is refundable), I'd think very carefully whether the price difference is worth the extra care and possible hassle related to the PAYG procedure vs. the more care-free Travelcard.

Should you fail to, for example, "touch out" with the Oyster as you leave a station, a day's price cap will be immediately charged and you'll have to waste time at the ticket counter to sort this out, possibly even reloading more funds to the card because the barrier refuses to let you into a station due to insufficient funds. Been there + badly burned. It's a horribly byzantine scheme and I've even had to walk all the way up from platforms at an NR station just to touch myself out in order to not activate the cap charge and then use the NR ticket to go through the barrier and back to the platforms. *%&##,X!!!

 

[flobo]

I see, that must be problematic, but i don't think there is this kind of problems using only bus and metro, you must have to pass near a station to get out, right ?

 

[island]

Should you fail to, for example, "touch out" with the Oyster as you leave a station, a day's price cap will be immediately charged and you'll have to waste time at the ticket counter to sort this out

And a lot of the time the ticket counter will tell you to wait two days and phone up the number on the back of your Oyster card, who after some humming and hawing will ask you to nominate a station where you're going to be making a journey to or from in the next eight days and they'll send a refund there. Not good if you're foreign.

I've even had to walk all the way up from platforms at an NR station just to touch myself out in order to not activate the cap charge and then use the NR ticket to go through the barrier and back to the platforms. *%&##,X!!!

Some (but by no means all) stations with both NR and LU, or substantial interchange from paper tickets to PAYG, have standalone Oyster readers inside the barriers to reduce this problem. But this can cause its own confusion, with people using the standalone reader at the end of a PAYG journey which ends their journey, and then touching out again at the barriers which promptly charge them for an unstarted journey! The standalone readers at LBG appear to have been permanently shut off for this reason.