Newly revised and updated, this time-tested and reader-friendly book is packed with all the information you’ll need for hassle-free travel.
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Editorial Reviews
From the Back Cover
For nearly thirty years, Britain by BritRail has been the best-selling and most respected guide to the British train system. Newly revised and updated, this time-tested and reader-friendly book is packed with all the information you’ll need for hassle-free travel. Learn how to use London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Cardiff as base cities for more than forty rail trips and day excursions to outlying areas and points of interest in England, Scotland, and Wales—from the medieval city of York, to Dover and its famous cliffs.
SUPERIOR TO OTHER TRAIN GUIDES!
Britain by BritRail is your best source for:
The latest information on fares, schedules, and pass options
Personally researched trips that take you throughout the United Kingdom
Practical travel tips on keeping costs down, traveling light, conquering jet lag, exchanging currency, and understanding British terminology
Current information on the Chunnel and other Channel crossings
Web addresses and other contact information for reservations and tickets
About the Author
LaVerne Ferguson-Kosinski and her late husband, George Ferguson, first coauthored this unique and comprehensive how-to guide in 1980. A resident of Fort Myers Beach, Florida, she has more than twenty-five years of experience traveling the rails in Europe.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
The 2009 edition: the latest news from the 20th Century,
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Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Britain by BritRail 2009: Touring Britain by Train (Paperback)
I bought this book when planning a 2009 trip to the UK because I wanted to learn about the rail system, and I've always wanted (still want) to travel around the UK sightseeing, mainly by train.
I was disappointed. Since buying the book I've been to the UK twice, based in London each time and each time taking from one to four day trips by rail. And on one trip, I had a BritRail pass, no less. The other day, to test my perception that this book had added darn little to my knowledge of, and ability to use, the UK passenger rail system, I picked it up again. This time, I'm drafting out an itinerary for that future "explore the UK by rail" holiday. But honestly, the useful information I'm finding isn't from this book. It's from other guidebooks and online resources. The first hint that this book has a huge fluff quotient, and is nothing but a rather lame marketing tool for the BritRail pass, is the amount of irrelevant material. Which includes meaningless pages of non-information about applying for a US passport, booking your air travel to the UK, stopping the newspapers at your house while you're gone, etc. The whole book reads like a "Chamber of Commerce" puff piece aimed at people who've never traveled much beyond their own state line. Worse yet, it was written in the days before the Internet, the rise of online travel arrangements, and the demise (sad to say) of the travel agent business. Worst of all, it's been sketchily updated in the days since. The "About the Author" page says the book was first written in 1980, and I believe it. Some of the information about the London Plus pass, for instance, is wrong, and was wrong in 2009 (about whether the HEX passes count against the days of use and whether Bath is included in the pass area). And in the appendix, on page 251, the reader is advised to "see the 2008 Bank and Public Holidays Section," clearly sloppy editing as just below it is the "2009 Bank and Public Holidays" list. And do we really need two paragraphs about "cameras and film" with literally a few words thrown in about digital photography, in the second decade of the 21st Century? Likewise, I don't recall a single reference to mobile (cell) phones in the book which supposedly tries to go beyond the basics of rail travel with "useful" travel information. It's the work of a moment and less than twenty bucks to outfit yourself with a PAYG (prepaid) no-contract cell phone after you land in London, which you can use all over the UK. But the readers of this book aren't given that basic and not-very-secret information, although the author seems to assume they need to know such basics as how to get a passport. Based on the content of this book, I think that the author and editor of this book just haven't been paying attention to the world around them for a decade or more. I think they've just done very sloppy "find and replace" word processing to replace "2008" with "2009" throughout the book. And of course they missed that at least once (see above about holidays). If you are looking to understand the confusing landscape* of private rail companies which operate the UK's passenger rail system, this book provides nothing but a list of names and contact information (Appendix, pages 245-247). Of course, if one purchases the BritRail pass, which this book exists to market, one might not need to know much about those companies. I learned more about the UK rail system, and the BritRail Pass options, in a few minutes on the Rick Steves website (and yes, he also sells the BritRail pass, and that's where I bought my London Plus pass), and from reading other general travel books about the UK and London, than from wading through this outdated book. I see that a "2010/11" edition of this book has been published. We can live in hope that it has been edited into something appropriate and useful in the 21st Century. But I'm not volunteering to buy it in order to find out. EDITED to add this: I have just used amazon's "Look Inside" feature to see the Table of Contents for the "new" edition of this book, Britain by Britrail 2010/11: Touring Britain by Train. It's absolutely appalling. The table of contents for the "new revised edition" is IDENTICAL to the Table of Contents of this 2009 dinosaur. Right down to the formatting inconsistencies/errors! Seriously. Some sections of the Table of Contents display page numbers right-justified with dotted leaders, and others display the page numbers just a space after the section. There seems to be little rhyme or reason for the differences, and they are duplicated exactly, as are all the chapters, sections, and respective page numbers. I suspect the "2010/11" edition was another find-and-replace word processing job, and also suspect that the "updated" explanation of "British Telephones" (page 28 in both editions) still doesn't mention the existence of mobile (cell) phones. --------- *Just to illustrate what a fluff job this book is, look at the frank and helpful information on pages 19 - 23 of the 3rd Edition (2008) of Frommer's Best Day Trips from London: 25 Great Escapes by Train, Bus or Car [FROMMER BEST DAY TRIPS LOND-3E], which recommends train travel over all other modes inside the UK, but includes this: "we feel obligated to tell you that the train system in the UK has seriously deteriorated since it was privatized in the 1980's . . . is currently in something of a crisis and in the midst of a multibillion-pound . . . restoration plan." I've ordered the new 4th edition of the Frommer Day Trip book, and I look forward to the authors' assessment of the rail system these days. Of course, there's not a word of this rather significant reality in BritRail 2009.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Same thing,only the year is different,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Britain by BritRail 2009: Touring Britain by Train (Paperback)
I have to agree with what another person wrote about this book.They are really not that helpful about train travel in the UK.I have been to the UK twice and my advice is learn to read the train schedules at the train stations and set your itenerary to the journey times.These books have good information(Historical)on the different cities in the UK,but it is the SAME information(WORD for WORD)every year.
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