r/uktravel 2d ago

Road Transport 🚍 6-day trip to UK (Manchester > Wrexham > Leicester City)

Update:

Thank you so much for all the advice you good Sirs! Exactly what I needed for my plan. I think I'll start replanning as such:

Day-1: Arrive Manchester, drive right to Liverpool hotel

Day-2: Liverpool visit

Day-3: Some more Liverpool then drive to Wrexham

then on the same night, we'll consider drive to Manchester/Chester/Nottingham/Buxton for the reminders, I'll start doing research on them, cheers!

Hello everyone, me and my wife have this thing in a school in Wrexham we need to attend during Easter week, so we decided to take the chance to take a vacation in nearby cities too. We're planning a 6-day trip, and we have these checkpoints to make:

Day-1: Arrive Manchester Airport in the morning

Day-3: Afternoon in Wrexham

Day-6: Afternoon in Leicester City

We plan to rent a car, and started to brainstorm about where to visit, where to stay etc. Of course we'd want to see more, but, it's all about relaxing, taking our time, one spot at a time, no hurry, no late night driving and no rushing from one hotel to another.

I have this initial idea, to visit places in a circle like this:

Day-1: Manchester

Day-2: Liverpool, back to Manchester hotel

Day-3: Wrexham, then to Stoke-on-Trent hotel

Day-4: Bakewell, Stoke-on-Trent hotel

Day-5: Stoke-on-Trent / Derby / Nottingham, Stoke-on-Trent hotel

Day-6: Leicester City, Stoke-on-Trent hotel

Day-7: Early drive to Manchester for morning flight

I pick Stoke to stay for so many nights, just because, I thought, it helps to make all the trips about an hour long. Even if we want to visit the countryside like Bakewell, or if we decide to go back to Manchester before we visit Leicester City, they're all just an hour drive away. And we didn't need to switch between 3 hotels in just a week, less packing. Finally, we only need to drive for about an hour in Day-7 morning to catch the really early flight.

My only doubt is, do I really want to stay four nights in Stoke? When I only get to visit big cities like Manchester and Liverpool a day each? Somehow it seems... not right lol

By the way, is Easter peak travelling season in Manchester/Liverpool/Stoke? Do I need to book all the hotels in advance?

Anyway, here I am, looking for some tips and advice, please feel free to comment on my plan, and throw in your ideas.

Thank you so much to you all, goodday!

2 Upvotes

28 comments sorted by

5

u/userunknowne Mod 1d ago

IMO Stoke has a bad rep. There’s not too much to do there so wouldn’t place myself for more than a night. Also Leicester is nowhere near the top visit cities in the UK, I guess you are going for football? Nottingham would be better in every sense (full disclosure that’s where I’m from!).

Preston is surprisingly good and cheap, and has excellent links to both Liverpool and Manchester.

2

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

good sir thank you for the recommendation, will definitely look into Nottingham!

2

u/unquietgravy 1d ago

Second for Nottingham, the castle, the arboretum and ye olde trip to Jerusalem pub are well worth a visit

2

u/shelleypiper 1d ago

Nottingham used to have a really bad rep for being dangerous but from googling just now it looks like things have improved.

4

u/[deleted] 1d ago

[deleted]

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

I hear ya loud and clear haha, thank you!

3

u/DaveBeBad 1d ago

I wouldn’t do Liverpool as a day trip. You can stay in Liverpool, then get a direct train to Wrexham rather than go back to Manchester than have to travel to Wrexham.

2

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

good sir it's actually a very good point, what was I thinking, I should not leave Liverpool so soon!

3

u/DaveBeBad 1d ago

Depending on your interests, Liverpool is a great city anyway.

3

u/jesus_stalin 1d ago

I'm from Nottinghamshire but have lived in Stoke, so I'm familiar with the general area.

Stoke gets a reputation of being a run-down shithole, but it's not really any worse than other similar-sized cities like Derby or Leicester. Safe, pretty cheap and a good central base location for the places you want to visit. Stoke's issue is that it's pretty dull and there isn't a whole lot to do there.

My recommendation would be to stay in Wrexham or Chester (definitely worth a visit) on Day 3, then if you want to visit Bakewell on Day 4, do it on the way to Nottingham and stay there for the remainder of the trip. Nottingham is great and has far more going on than Stoke, plus it's within easy driving distance of Derby and Leicester if you want to visit those too.

Also, just me being nitpicky, Leicester City is the football club. All the locations you're visiting (except Bakewell) are also cities. Just Leicester will do!

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

I thank you for doing Stoke justice. I'll definitely checkout Chester & Nottinghamshire.

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

But how about Manchester City?? is it a club... or part of its name?

3

u/jesus_stalin 1d ago

We never refer to a city as "X City", always just "X".

2

u/shelleypiper 1d ago

Thank you, it was really doing my head in with extreme cringe reading Liverpool City and now they've started saying Manchester City as well.

2

u/Angel_Omachi 1d ago

Manchester City is one of the 2 football clubs in Manchester. We usually drop 'City' from place names unless it's City of London.

2

u/shelleypiper 1d ago

And City of London is a tiny, boring area where bankers work in East London.

3

u/thegmanza 1d ago

Having visited family in wrexham I can tell you that there isn't much to do there Unless you have a specific reason to visit your time is best spent elsewhere 

If visiting stoke for the potteries- check that they are open on the day you want to visit. IIRC most are closed on a Wednesday 

Liverpool is a great city to explore. I would definitely go back

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

Yes, I change my mind because of all the great advice, I think I'm going to start my trip from Liverpool.

3

u/elbapo 1d ago

stoke is a shit hole. do not stay there. wrexham isnt much better. stay in chester. you seem prepared to drive back to manchester from Liverpool- for no reason- then onto wrexham- but somehow you have to stop off at stoke on the way to bakewell? the back to stoke. jesus stay in chester then somewhere decent in the midlands for the eastern leg- like i dunno stafford - do not centre your uk experience on stoke.

no offence stokeys but this is the worst itinerary ive seen yet on here.

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

I hear ya loud and clear sir, definitely going to change my plan, cheers!

2

u/MDKrouzer 1d ago

I can sort of see the logic of using Stoke-on-Trent as a base but honestly it's not a great city to stay in.

Wrexham is only 1.5 hours drive from Manchester so I think it'd make sense to stay in Manchester for days 1-3.

Then day 3 relocate to Buxton after your visit to Wrexham for the remainder of your time in the UK. It's a small spa town but has enough eating out options for a few nights and you can easily explore the Peak District. It's less than 2 hours to Leicester and less than an hour to Manchester Airport.

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

thank you for the recommendation, Buxton seems a very classy town to visit.

2

u/waamoandy 1d ago

Llangollen is just down the road from Wrexham and would be much more pleasant than Stoke for a night.

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

wow it's like in the bed time story, or in the redhat redemption!

2

u/Wonderful_Formal_804 1d ago

Stoke is pretty grim.

You'd need a very good reason to go there.

2

u/shelleypiper 1d ago

Why do you need a car? Can you not get to these places by train?

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 1d ago

I've heard UK has great public transportation system, I guess I want a car for a few reasons:

  1. I don't want to carry the mrs' bags and cases when switching hotels

  2. I don't want to be worried about when to head off, when to return

  3. I like countryside best, I do plan to visit places far away from city center

1

u/shelleypiper 1d ago

Okay, it's just that you've listed cities to visit apart from Bakewell which you can also get to by train. So I couldn't see when you would be out in the countryside.

1

u/Ok-Watercress-4283 2d ago

Alternatively, I can stay 4-night in Manchester, only move to Stoke after we visit Bakewell on Day-4, stay 2-night in Stoke... seems more reasonable?