I'm looking to buy 2 tickets (adults with senior railcards), from Exeter / Tiverton to York / Leeds. It's for 3 nights either from 31st July - 3rd August or 1st August - 4th. I'm looking for the cheapest fare, within reason, so excluding overnight / long stops and departing after say 07.00 and arriving by around 23.00. Please can someone advise?
Obviously travelling from Tiverton and to Leeds is cheapest as it makes for the shortest rail distance.
If you want to use flexible tickets, splitting at Bristol, Cheltenham, Birmingham, Derby and Sheffield would cost £93.95pp with the Railcard. Each of the tickets would Off-Peak Returns, except Bristol <-> Cheltenham which would be Off-Peak Day Singles in each direction (period returns were abolished when single leg pricing was introduced in this area), and Sheffield <-> Leeds which would be an Anytime Short Distance Return.
No time restriction for the outward journey if it's on the Sunday. If you did it on a weekday (i.e. the Monday) your tickets would be valid from 08:33 and rather conveniently, there's a direct train at 08:41
No time restriction for the Leeds-Sheffield part of the return journey (as it's an Anytime ticket), but from Sheffield onwards you can't depart before 09:00. There's an 08:11 off Leeds but this departs Sheffield at 08:56, just before the validity cutoff.
So you'd need a slightly different combination of tickets if you wanted to take that train (it would also require a change at Bristol). The 09:11 would be valid, is a direct train through to Tiverton, and is booked an HST in case that's something you're interested in!
If you are happy to take Advance tickets you can make the journey for slightly less but I can't see a material saving on offer for the XC route - the cheapest combination of Advances seem to cost around £80, which doesn't seem particularly worthwhile considering the loss of flexibility.
If price is more important than journey time and you're happy to be fixed to specific trains, it's worthwhile considering SWR services from Exeter to Waterloo. Obviously it's a notably slower route, but it can be quite a bit cheaper - using the cheapest trains on the Sunday out and Wednesday return would come to £54.30 with a few splits (out: 08:24 off Exeter, 13:33 off Kings Cross, return: 13:45 off Leeds, 17:20 off Waterloo). Out on the Monday and return on the Thursday is a little dearer but still a decent saving over taking XC.
