England - Travel Deals

Travel Tips for London for the 2011 Champions League Final

The UEFA Champions League final is always in a cool European city, since they need to hold it in a place with a large-enough stadium, but some years are decidedly cooler than others. In 2011, we’re going to be treated to a Champions League final match in the legendary Wembley Stadium in London, England.

The old Wembley Stadium hosted five European Cup finals, but this will be the first held at the new Wembley. Of course, a city like London invites all kinds of interest from travelers, whether they’re die-hard soccer/footy fans or not. Unfortunately, it has a reputation for being an expensive city to reach and to visit – so here are some tips to help you travel to London for the 2011 Champions League final without breaking the bank.

>> The 2011 Champions League final is on May 28.

Glastonbury Festival Travel Deals

glastonbury2The summer music festival scene hasn’t been the same since 1970 when the Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts – usually just the Glastonbury Festival for short – first entered into the world. It’s the biggest outdoor music festival in the world, and attracts more than 175,000 people to a farm in southwestern England each June. And when we say “farm,” we’re not using the term lightly – the festival site is Worthy Farm, which, for 362 days out of the year, is a working dairy farm.

The Glastonbury Festival spans three days at the end of June every year, and takes its name from the nearby town of Glastonbury six miles away. The town and the region have long been thought of as a spiritual center (especially for “New Age” spirituality), making it an ideal location for a festival of music and other performing arts. The festival began in 1970, but it didn’t really become an institution or a regular annual event until 1981 – and still, there have been years when the festival takes its own little break to give the grounds a chance to recover a bit.

Music festival lovers will no doubt have the Glastonbury Festival on their lifetime to-do list, as it attracts top-notch entertainment from many different musical genres and is an excellent opportunity to experience the communal fun of such a huge music festival. In this article, we’ve got links to help you travel to the Glastonbury Festival without spending your life savings. You’ll find information here about finding cheap airfare to the festival, which airports to look at for flights, and how to get there.

>> There is no festival in 2012. The Glastonbury Festival opens June 26, 2013

Airports Close to the Glastonbury Festival

glastonbury3Super-planners will note that the official Glastonbury Festival website gives you the name of the airport that’s closest to the festival grounds – but what the official site doesn’t tell you is what other airports are in the area that you might consider flying into as well.

There are several ways to save money when you’re booking airfare, and one of the best tips is to look at all area airports rather than limiting yourself to just one – so it’s important to know which airports are reasonably close to the Glastonbury Festival site. In this article we’ll look at which airports are nearby, and which other airports might be options to consider even if they’re not as close to the festival grounds.

>> There is no festival in 2012. The Glastonbury Festival opens June 26, 2013
>> Don’t miss the details on how to get to the Glastonbury Festival

How to Find Cheap Airfare to the Glastonbury Festival

glastonbury4Unless you’re already within driving distance of the Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts, you’ll need to fly to England first. And since airfare is always the biggest expense of a trip, it makes sense to hunt for the best deals on airfare to the Glastonbury Festival. After all, you still need to buy a ticket to the festival, right?

People who are traveling to the Glastonbury Festival from within Europe have a better chance of getting a spectacular price on airfare, since there are so many low-cost airlines serving England’s airports from cities all over Europe. Flying from outside of Europe offers fewer options, as the majority of visitors who fly to England from overseas come through the country’s biggest international gateway – London’s Heathrow Airport.

There are other airports you can look at however, and other money-saving tips you can use to find cheap airfare to the Glastonbury Festival. In this article, we’ll go over some of the best ways to get cheap fares to the festival. Some of these tips will be handy to you whenever you travel – wherever you’re going, and whenever you fly. But when you’re talking about traveling for a big event like the Glastonbury Festival – like tens of thousands of other people are – it’s especially important to pay attention to tips like these that help you save money.

>> There is no festival in 2012. The Glastonbury Festival opens June 26, 2013

How to Get to the Glastonbury Festival

glastonbury1The Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts has been around since 1970, so it has established an excellent reputation in the world of summer music festivals. Tens of thousands of people from all over the world make their way to southwest England each year for the festival, and thankfully this one isn’t as difficult to reach as some of the music festivals that are located in more remote areas.

Although it’s called the Glastonbury Festival, the festival site is about six miles from the town of Glastonbury. It takes place at Worthy Farm – which is an actual a dairy farm for the rest of the year, when there isn’t a huge music festival going on – located between two other villages (Pilton and Pylle).

As mentioned, the Glastonbury Festival farm is reasonably easy to get to, especially as compared to some other summer music festival, but there are a few options to get to the festival itself. So in this article, we’ll go over the different ways you can get from where you are to the Glastonbury Festival farm.

>> There is no festival in 2012. The Glastonbury Festival opens June 26, 2013

New York to London flights for the price of an expensive burger

expensive-burger.jpgPeople who in London and New York City have it pretty darned good. Not only do they get to experience two of the world’s great cities on a daily basis, but they also seem to get the best deals on airline flights. I guess we can begrudge them the savings because they have to pay 20 dollars for a hamburger or 20 pounds for a martini.

Even if you don’t live in New York or London, you can still benefit from their cheap ass flights that depart from and arrive in those cities. For example, British Airways has a deal until September 27, 2007 where flights from the Big Apple to London are a mere $179 one way. As a general rule of thumb, if you can get a ticket to London for less than $400 round trip you are getting a very good deal.

Another rule of thumb. If you are paying $20 for a hamburger or 20 pounds for a martini, your stomach better send you a thank you note.

For more cheap flights to England or cheap flights to New York, cross your fingers, click on the links and be prepared to jump for joy.

Somewhat Affordable Business Class Flights to London

business-class.jpgWhen you are flying across the Atlantic, the difference between business class and economy class is about as wide as the ocean itself. In business class you have ample leg room to stretch out your legs and to recline your seat while you sleep. In economy class you have little room and after a few hours will realize what it must be like to sleep in a coffin. In business class you get decent food and beverages. In economy class the beverages are free and you have to drink plenty of them just to be able to swallow the god awful food. In business class you likely will be seated next to other adults who appreciate the value of being silent on a long flight. In economy class you will be seated next to a screaming baby, a senile person with the intent to tell you her life story and a teenager playing his iPod at decibel levels unsafe for ears around him.

Indeed, there is a big gulf between flying in business class and flying in economy. There is also a big gulf between the price of tickets for each class. Unless you are a business traveler with an expense account or someone with frequent flyer miles stored up, it usually will cost you a pretty penny to fly in business class.

Maxjet is bucking the trend, a bit. They have flights in business class to London for around $1,000, which is about double what you would pay for economy class during the off season. The good news is their rates apply for the busy summer period too so if you are already planning on spending a bit more on airfare to London you might want to think about that extra legroom, better food and more pleasant business class experience.

London Travel Deals

Los Angeles to London Flights for under $350

brolly.jpgLeave it to an airline from New Zealand to come through with the best deal on flights from Los Angeles to London to hit the World Wide Web in a long, long time. Air New Zealand is offering up the goodies for $348 round-trip plus taxes and all that other jazz that will probably make it closer to $400, which is still a very, very reasonable prize for a flight from the west coast of the U.S. to London.

The only hitch is that you have to travel before May 31, 2007, which isn’t really a hitch at all because now is the off-season for London tourists. Sure you’ll likely have to deal with a bit of rain and you’ll have to pack an extra layer or three of clothing for the trip, but the payoff will come when you go to tour the Tate Museum and you and a few slacker member of the royal family are the only ones there.

What else is there to do in London this time of year besides shivering in the dampness? The London Travel guide offers up all sorts of suggestions, while also keeping you abreast of the current happenings in one of the greatest cities on this or any other planet.