A Cunning Plan

(Fans of the 1980s British sitcom "Blackadder" may recognize the author's rather obscure reference in the title of this section to the character Baldrick's catch phrase "I have a cunning plan.")

So, how often in life is the anticipation better than the resulting experience?  I'm really enjoying the anticipation and a cunning plan will hopefully result in the actual experience being great too.  We've found that vacation rentals are the best lodging option, so I combed through hundreds of rentals looking for the ideal places that should make memorable homes for a week.  I've lined-up the following two for a week each:

London, Southwark, just 100 yard from the Thames River and midway between the London Eye and the Tate Modern.  After much searching for vacation rentals on the north bank of the Thames it finally dawned on me that the south bank can be centrally located too.  Its just that you'd have to first cross one of the five bridges, but a bend in the river means that those bridges fan-out so you can quickly get to most of the north bank attractions.  Back in the `80s there wouldn't have been much to see except warehouses on this stretch of the south bank, but there's since been a renaissance and the Queen's Walk along the river bank provides a scenic pedestrian link to many new attractions.

Bradford-on-Avon, near Bath.  Take a picturesque town on the southernmost edge of the Cotswolds, a location next to the historic canal with a path stretching along it for miles in either direction, a nearby supermarket and bike rental business and what else could we want?

(Feel free to skip the next paragraph where the author grouses about high-season airfares.)

Okay, now for finding the best deal for getting there.  Supposedly the sweet spot for international airfares is 89 days prior to travel.  I'm embarrassed to admit (so I won't) how many hours I wasted checking airfares for weeks on end only to discover that the sweet spot apparently doesn't apply to the months of June, July and August.  In mid-April I started to see airfares begin to creep upwards so I reluctantly pulled the trigger on our ticket purchase without ever seeing anything around my target of $1,000.  I also reluctantly decided on United (yech!) because it offered the best choices of itineraries from Sacramento.  From the standpoint of airfare cost, May and September are the ideal times for warm weather Britain trips.  In fact, had we gone in September each ticket would have run $400 less, which coincidentally was the entire cost of my flight in '94 when I last went to Britain (granted, that was on a really miserable Suntrips charter flight where passengers were shoe-horned into seats that had no leg room whatsoever).  

So the hunt for great vacation rentals was a success, the search for good deals on flights not so much.  At least our flight itineraries in both directions are very good -- no rushing, only one connection with a reasonable layover, and we will arrive at our London vacation rental at about the hour when it is suppose to be available to us.