A month in the UK

I would have thought moving around rather than basing yourself in one place would be better....For me if I was to base myself in one place in Scotland for sure it would be Edinburgh not Glasgow.....If you move around you might try youth hostels for some of your accommodation. Some of the places are very good and have private rooms. Also having use of the kitchen might be very useful for you, I am certainly not suggesting dorms though !...... With a one year old spending time with other people and potentially a nice outdoor space might be more interesting than a lonely apartment / air bnb.....Official YHA are generally more reliable and i would have thought better suited for than private hostels.

A very rough idea of where you can go given what you want and places easy to get to on the train could be Durham, York, Chester, Llandudno for a nice seaside town, (near to ferry for Dublin), Bath, London and back to Glasgow by plane.

IOM perhaps would be a wasted journey for you unlesss you have a specific reason to visit.

I’m definetly open to suggestions, but I figured with a baby, it would be easiest to leave all the “stuff” in one home base rather than having to pack up every few days. And I agree, I would love to stay for the monthin Edinburgh but it’s crazy trying to find a place there in August, and the train between Glasgow and E is easy and fast, so I figured it was a good compromise. I’ve never stayed in youth hostels.. I’m not sure it’s suited to travel with a baby though...

Some youth hostels would be really good for you with a baby, some would not. Most official YHA would give you good information on suitability for this. As mentioned the kitchen, potential outdoor space and other families staying might be good for you. In August you would need to book well ahead of the time though for pretty much everywhere.

The ferry to Dublin near to Llandudno goes from Holyhead by the way...not a great place to stay though.

You are right about Edinburgh the festival will be on in August and it will be expensive and packed out. I still would move around rather than book a month in Glasgow though.

Cool. I’ll look into what it would look like to bounce around a bit. Thanks for the suggestions!

We are an older couple, and have stayed in YHA (HI) Hostels in quite a few countries. They often have quite a mature crowd (as well as young), and quite frequently there are families with young children staying there. Booking a private room as a solo adult will not necessarily cheaper than finding an Airbnb place, however they do offer several advantages:

• they are friendly, social, and nice places
• they're usually located on public transport (few guests are car drivers, normally)
• the kitchens are often good, and the social spaces generous too
• they often have lawns, or outdoor eating places with tables, etc
• most have very friendly booking websites

They're not for everyone, but we have enjoyed many of them a great deal. BTW hostels in the US can be a little different - with a slightly grungier aspect to them - but not always.

As to your itinerary, it needs to be a balance between having a long-term base, and making it an efficient "road-trip" - a month is a long time to be based anywhere, even in the relatively compact UK.

And backtracking from day-trips would quickly become fairly depressing, I think, and outweigh the overheads in moving all your "stuff" a bit more frequently.

With a month I would look at a minimum of say four places, roughly of a week each. Or if you can stand it, six places with 4-5 nights each. You could look at:

• Scotland (Edinburgh or Glasgow)
• York
• Welsh coast somewhere
• Dublin
• Cambridge or Oxford, or even nearer to London

Probably what I would do, even with the additional overheads of tending to a very young child. Whatever you decide (YHA, Airbnb, or B&B), you'll need to book it all very soon indeed. Good luck with it.

The problem with basing yourself in Glasgow is that it's rather a long way to anywhere in the midlands or south of England for day/weekend trips. I agree that multiple bases would be better. Even if you just do half the time in Glasgow and half somewhere further south.

i agree with above...a month in Glasgow doesn't make a lot of sense to me.Its not a great base for most of the UK.Fine if you just want to stay in the city and see a few places around it...

In your situation (of not wanting to travel too much) I'd follow Ian's advice above and maybe do 4 weeks,one in each base..one could be Glasgow and then three more (eg one in Ireland,one in north of England and one in the south?).That is a decent compromise between having to move around too much with a small baby,but still having the opportunity to see and do new and interesting things.

I wouldn't bother with the Isle of Man personally but if there is something you want to see there,why not?

Just to add make up your mind fairly quickly if you are to use four places for one week each to base yourself. Perhaps Glasgow, York, Dublin, Cambridge would suit and book your accomodation early......Also book your trains for the main part of the journeys early and definitely your flight / train back to Glasgow. The train could run into hundreds of pounds close to the date..........helpful article to get you started here on train fares

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/advice/cheap-uk-rail-fares-how-to-save-money/

Manchester has cheap flights to Dublin and the train runs right into the airport from lots of places in the north.

Thank you all for the advice! I’m working out a rough schedule that looks like this:

Fly into Glasgow, spend the night.
3 nights in Edinburgh.
5 nights in Glasgow
TRAIN TO YORK
5 nights in York
TRAIN TO CAMBRIDGE
7 nights in Cambridge
TRAIN TO LONDON
3 nights in London
FLY TO DUBLIN
5 nights in Dublin
FLY TO GLASGOW, overnight there, fly home.

Roughly speaking. I already have my hotel booked in Edinburgh so that’s set in stone. Does the route make sense? Are the amount of days appropriate in each spot, or would you add more/take away for some spots?