As I mentioned on the previous step – we decided to plan the route so that we could drive around the UK ourselves. This way we could see as much of the UK as we could, in the timeframe we had. We could stop at places longer if need be, and we could incorporate other places that weren’t on the tours, or that related to meeting family or where our family originated from.
To start this process, I used an Excel Spreadsheet – this was so that I could add a raft of different information, costs etc to it and use the bonus of its function formulas to help me work out times etc.
My first step was to work out where we would go. Starting in London it made sense to go South, then West, then up the Isles to the top and then back down again. Using the places that the tours frequented, I started plotting – using a spread sheet and a map. Then I started adding in places where we specifically wanted to go, and where we would meet family. I also had to work out timing of all the places, ensuring we would fit it all in the timeframe we had. We also wanted to make sure we had time to actually stop at some places and rest a bit from the travelling so there are a few 2 day stops to help with that. Of course London was a little longer at the start due to the potential jet lag!
Below is a screenshot of the route as it is today – it has had a few changes since I first started this, but the concept is the same and the only changes have been the odd place changes or the number of nights at a particular place.
The list also has some of the major attractions or travel events that I wanted to capture with regards to timing etc.
Next to each of these places was a start date, a number of days and an end date. That end date became the starting date of the next one and so forth.
This gave me the flexibility to change dates and days and have the spreadsheet update the following entries automatically for me.
You can see that we start in London, go South down to Plymouth, across to Brighton and so forth until we go up to Wales, across to Ireland, around Ireland, then across to England, up to Scotland and around back down through England back to London. Lastly we take the train to Paris for our trip to the monuments (and of course to see the Eiffel Tower!).
This is a lot of places to visit in the 6 weeks, but we have tried to keep it so that we see most of the “big” attractions and places. I think the most 1 nighters in a row is 4 days. I didn’t want to do too many 1 nighters in a row as that would get extremely tiring. Generally it is a couple of 1 day stops followed by 2 day stops etc. Most of the capitals and bigger cities have 2 days and any with family have 2 days as well.
Once the basic route was set out, the next step was to work out how long it took to get to each of the different places (as this would ultimately effect how long we had at each place). We also had to take into account catching the Ferry to Ireland and back. Doing this would also keep a track of the number of miles/kilometers we were going to cover which would determine costs for both petrol and the cost of the rental car.
So using my trusty friend Google Maps – I starting inputting each of the places, using a starting place and then adding each destination. Google is fairly good at this – you can add stops into your planned trip – however there is a maximum you can enter in one go, so you have to do this in stages. I know there might be apps and other websites that can do this, but lets face it most of us have access to Google Maps and it works fine.
Above is a screenshot of how I entered the Ireland part of the trip. As you can see there are 10 entries (which seems to be the limit) and it tells me the drive is a total of approximately 15 hours and 7 minutes. Of course that is going to change depending on times of the day and when I loaded this into Google Maps, but it gives me an idea.
However the total time isn’t helpful when planning the route as we are breaking it up into days, and Google can give you a breakdown for each of the destinations. Where it says Details, you can click on this and it will give you a breakdown of the time it takes from each destination to the next, as well as the kilometers/miles to each destination as well.
This is shown below – Starting in Waterford with the destination as Blarney Castle – the time is 1 hr 57 mins and 130 kms. From Blarney Castle to Killarney is 1 hr 13 mins and 82.4 kms and so on. So this enabled me to start adding starting and finishing times to the spreedsheet as well. I could also record the KMs/Miles from and to each.
So now my spreadsheet has expanded to include places, Start/Arrival Dates, Start/Arrival Times, KMs/Miles and approx petrol costs. See below a screenshot of it now:
You will note that I have state KMs and Miles – that is because in Google Maps, the UK uses Miles and Ireland uses KM’s. You will need to take this into account and convert them into either all Miles or all KMs to get an accurate amount (or use a calculation to get to the same result). I also used a fixed amount to calculate the petrol costs. At the time of writing it was averaging £1.36/L but I have allowed for £1.50/L. Then it is just a case or working out the Miles/KMs (Note – I added an extra allowance on as well in my calculations for many of the places to ensure I captured things like extra trips to supermarkets etc) and them multiplying by the cost of petrol you have recorded.
There is however, one last thing you need to do before you get a final figure. The above example is calculating the cost of petrol by multiplying the number of KMs/Miles by the price per Litre. However, as you know cars do not consume one litre of petrol for every KM/Mile. In fact each car will have a different range likely in the vicinity of between 6-12L per KM/Mile. This depends on the type of car, the weight of the vehicle, how heavy footed you are on the gas pedal etc. So you will need to use an average for the vehicle you are using, or if you are like me, err on the side of caution and pick a low rate such as 6KM/L. This will give you some leway and I would rather overstate the cost of petrol then understate it. Once you have done this, it should give you some petrol costs to take into account in your overall costs.
So that was how I planned our route, worked out timelines and started to calculate some of the costs. It is an ever changing process and I am always updating things. There were several things I missed like ensuring I had changed the petrol price per litre into Australia Dollars (which is where I live). Also, if I changed a place you have to make sure you change any related milage etc. However this spreadsheet is a guide, not something that can be relied on to be totally accurate. So remember, there will always be things to change, update and things you will miss. Especially when the spreadsheet gets larger and more complicated as we add more things.
The next part of my planning list was accommodation. Check that out in my next step.