Anyway, the fun part at this stage is deciding: when, after August, is the best time to go; how long to stay, given about one to one and a half weeks of paid leave; where to stay so that we can see/do the stuff in London; and how much to anticipate spending once there.
Anyone who's done international travel and/or lives in the U.K. want to offer some pointers?
Yay, I'll be useful~
I honestly wouldn't recommend being there much after early October. It was nice for a week and then England revealed its true colors (do I have to spell that with a 'u'?) and became rainy and dark and cold. The hostels and hotels are certainly far cheaper, then, but it also makes visiting some historical (re: tourist) sites a royal pain in the ass due to shortened hours, and some outright closed sites.
Did I mention it will be raining the entire time?
Sooooo I'd recommend going mid-to-late September. Prices on touristy nonsense will be lower than they are in August but higher than they are later in the year.
A few other things:
Since you're only going to be there for a short time, plan as much as you can ahead of time. Most major cities have a tourism website and you can look up the major attractions and see what you'd visit. Winging it is way more fun but you need way more time to do it and get enough in to justify the trip.
Stay in a Hostel. Hotels are stupidly expensive, and staying in a Hostel allows you to meet a lot of other people and meeting people is like 70% of the goddamn point of travelling, if you ask me. If the whole "sleeping with 6 to 14 other people in a dormitory" thing sounds too sketchy, you can spend a little more to have to room with less people while still having access to hostel common rooms (and occasionally bars) and spend way less than you would at a hotel.
You'll only be going for a week and a half(?) so this might not be an issue, but if you're looking for a cheap meal, go to a Sainsbury's, Morrison's, Tesco's, or whatever other groceries there are to get food for one or two meals. You're almost always assured to spend less money than you would have otherwise. All I can remember is that cheese is stupidly expensive and alcohol is stupidly not.
You might look into getting a railcard. I'm 90% sure it won't be worth it (or possible) but my memory's fuzzy. They're nice and get you a discount on the railways. Buuuuut I'm pretty sure they're only for students and UK citizens so I dunno.
Manchester may not be your guys' thing, but it may be. Incredible music scene and good pubs, but horrible architecture, mediocre museums (though the People's History Museum was being renovated at the time, if that matters?), and I really don't recall much except that there were several bars featuring live music and every night I was there was a fucking blast. But if concert/bar hopping isn't your thing...
Uh. Don't bother going to Cardiff unless you're dead set on seeing Wales. Norwich is a nice city to live in but I'd hate to visit it. Newcastle was OK but unremarkable. I hear Edinburgh's a lot of fun, as is Scotland in general, but I never made it. Stonehenge is nice but Salisbury is a shithole. London, of course, is the best city of the lot but you assumed that anyway, didn't you?
Now, that being said, there's absolutely no reason to restrict yourself to England if there's not enough you want to see to keep you there the whole time (especially if you're planning on flying damn near ANYWHERE. This early in advance, budget airline tickets out of England to elsewhere are bound to be cheap. If it's a language barrier thing, I'd highly recommend Dublin, and I hear Belfast is an interesting city as well. (And would strongly discourage going to Scotland. Northern dialects are barely English). I won't bother writing about stuff in other countries, but there's absolutely no reason to remove the option from the table.
If you've got any other questions, feel free to ask.
