Cruise to London and Mildenhall visit

Author Message   Darrell F. Snook New member Username: Dfsnook Post Number: 3 Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 99.74.218.241 Posted on Monday, May 10, 2010 - 03:08 pm:    DBM UK & Tommy: Thank you both for the rental car information. This is last critical piece for our trip. Planning 3 week driving tour of Northern England, Scotland & Wales. Plan to end trip with few days in Cotswolds before returning to MHZ. Thanks again for all your help...Darrell   Tommy Towery Intermediate Member Username: Ttowery Post Number: 75 Registered: 10-2007 Posted From: 75.64.18.5 Posted on Monday, May 10, 2010 - 12:41 am:    Darrell, Enterprise is in Barton Mills - about 5 miles from the base, BUT - they sent a cab to pick me up at the Bird in Hand and drove me back there after I turned in the rental car. All at no charge to me. I got a small (Cat A) automatic Vauxhall for 59 GBP for a five day rental. That is hard to beat. I booked it on the enterprise.com web site - just make sure you pull down the UK area when searching for vehicles. I would use them again in a heartbeat. They were truely professional.   D.B.M UK Senior Member Username: Overlandrover Post Number: 5953 Registered: 04-2005 Posted From: 81.145.102.64 Posted on Sunday, May 09, 2010 - 05:12 pm:    Darrell, Enterprise is the closest Main Rental company. It is in Barton Mills, just outside Mildenhall village. About 4-5 miles from the base. There is a car rental just off the base at Mildenhall at the Bird In Hand pub area as well.I know some people rent from them too.   Darrell F. Snook New member Username: Dfsnook Post Number: 2 Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 99.74.218.241 Posted on Sunday, May 09, 2010 - 03:52 pm:    Tommy - Was Enterprise the closest off base car rental to Mildenhall? In what town was it located? Hertz is listed in Space A guide, do you know if it is closer to MHZ than Enterprise? Thanks, Darrell   Tommy Towery Intermediate Member Username: Ttowery Post Number: 73 Registered: 10-2007 Posted From: 91.204.172.59 Posted on Thursday, May 06, 2010 - 03:51 pm:    Senan...we just returned from eating at the dinning hall. We found that you need to go early, which we did today. The food was good and reasonable. We ate dinner there twice before and found out that at 1830 we were the last ones in the line and the food had been out since 1630. So the secret is to go early while it is fresh.   Senan Halpin Member Username: Irish02 Post Number: 11 Registered: 09-2009 Posted From: 141.152.169.46 Posted on Thursday, May 06, 2010 - 02:13 pm:    Tommy..you can also eat morning and evening meals at the dining hall at Mildenhall..at least we did Last Oct 2009 but the staff said we could not eat mid day meal there..also, Bird 'n Hand was reasonable   David Advanced Member Username: Reverie4401 Post Number: 187 Registered: 02-2008 Posted From: 74.230.239.5 Posted on Wednesday, May 05, 2010 - 04:10 pm:    Tommy, sorry to hear you are having trouble getting out of Mildenhall to the States. I would look at alternatives such as Ramstein. Sounds like we made the right decision jumping in Vigo. Great seeing you on board the Indy. David   Tommy Towery Intermediate Member Username: Ttowery Post Number: 71 Registered: 10-2007 Posted From: 91.204.172.59 Posted on Wednesday, May 05, 2010 - 03:13 pm:    I booked two tickets on the National Express Coach online before I left on the cruise. It is a 5 GBP taxi ride from the cruise port to the Coach Station. By booking early I got the two e-tickets for 7 GBP - much cheaper than buying the ticket at the station. The coach has free wifi as a bonus.   Roger Johnson Advanced Member Username: Rwjohn6 Post Number: 326 Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 205.188.116.208 Posted on Wednesday, May 05, 2010 - 02:19 pm:    How did you get from Southampton to London.   Tommy Towery Intermediate Member Username: Ttowery Post Number: 70 Registered: 10-2007 Posted From: 91.204.172.59 Posted on Wednesday, May 05, 2010 - 12:51 pm:    My wife Sue and I took the 14-day Independence of the Seas repositioning cruise from Ft. Lauderdale to South Hampton, arriving there on Sunday, April 28th. It was a great cruise but not Space-A so I will not go into details on the cruise part of our adventure. That said, I will say that at least four other cruisers on the ship were planning to space-a home from Mildenhall, but two got off in Lisbon, Portugal, and two more in Vigo, Spain, to make their way to Rota instead, because of the Icelandic volcano mess. We spend three days in London and then took the National Express coach from the Victoria Coach Station to Heathrow. We bought our tickets one day in advance and paid 5.80 GBP total for the two senior tickets. Taking the coach instead of the tube meant not having to worry with getting our luggage up and down the tube stairs/escalators and it was a very good ride in a nice soft seat. Once we got to Heathrow it was an easy walk to Terminal Three and comfortable wait for the Mildenhall shuttle. We got there early and were a little concerned that the bus wasn’t waiting, but it showed up about 15 minutes before schedule departure. Another SPAT couple was there with their friends who had flown in commercial. It turned out their traveling-friends were not retirees but thought they could just pay to ride the shuttle with their retired friends – not so. No luggage and no seats for ineligible passengers. It was a nice, easy ride to Mildenhall. We checked in at the Mildenhall Gateway Inn upon arrival and our three day reservations were confirmed. We were put up in the TLF facilities, Bldg. 105, which was about a quarter-mile walk from the lodge office. For $41.50 per night we had a two bedroom unit with living room, with washer/dryer, full kitchen, three TVs and three DVD players. They now have wifi in the rooms as well. (There's also free computer access in the Bob Hope Rec Center, the Lodge Office, the Pax Terminal, and the library.) The next day I called Enterprise and they sent a cab to pick me up at the Bird In Hand. Since the cab could not come on base I had to walk there to meet it. I picked up an economy car that I had reserved online – five days for change less than 60 GBP. Did the normal tourist things in the area – which I will not cover. Gas was 1.22 GBP per litre (about $6.61 per gallon). For the record, retirees have no base exchange or commissary privledges at either Mildenhall or Lakenheath. You can eat in the food court, but cannot buy anything else in the BX. There are some gift shop type vendors where you can buy gifts, but you have to go to a local store to buy any food or other items. You also cannot buy gas on base. After three nights at Mildenhall we drove over to Lakenheath and checked into their lodge for another pre-booked three nights at $39 a night. This was a standard BOQ type room with a shared kitchen, double bed and TV and DVD player. The laundry room was down the hall. They also had free wifi, but it was acting up. When I checked out of Mildenhall, I was allowed to make another three-day reservation to start the day I checked out of Lakenheath, just in case our planned flight didn’t work out. We checked out early Tuesday morning from Lakenheath, and I dropped Sue and the luggage off at the Mildenhall Passenger Terminal and took the rental car back at 8am. They brought me back to the Bird in Hand and after a short walk I was back at the terminal before the planned 9:10am roll call for a KC-135 to Rickenbacker. Another family was there and had sat through two other early morning roll calls only to be told that no seats had been released. That turned true as well for our planned flight, so we went back over to the Gateway Inn and checked into our reserved rooms. A large group got off of a McConnell KC-135 about the same time and another couple got the last room available – they did not have reservations so they were very lucky. We were told there were no scheduled flights out for the next 72 hours, so we went to the room and enjoyed the rest. We went to the library and I was issued a library card and allowed to check out some DVD movies for no charge. Went back to the room and watched the movies and relaxed. Having already been in the area for six days, we felt no requirement to play tourist every day. We’re now in the TLF room and awaiting a couple of space-a opportunities to get out on Friday. Will update as that happens.