The train
LNER trains from London King's Cross to York typically take about one hour and fifty minutes to two hours and ten, depending on stops. It is the same east-coast line that continues to Newcastle and Edinburgh, so a York break is also the natural pause if you are building a longer northern trip. Sit on the right-hand side going north if you want the Minster towers as the train slows — you will still walk to them afterwards.
The station and the walls
York station is a grand curved train shed just outside the city walls. The walk to the Minster is about fifteen to twenty minutes if you are not rushing, through the walls at Micklegate or along Lendal. That walk is the reason to travel light. A hotel inside the walls, or just outside them on Bootham, means you are not doing the walk twice a day with shopping.
There is no commercial airport in York. Leeds Bradford is the airport people mean, and it still needs a bus or a train-and-taxi to finish the job. For a city break from London, that combination rarely beats King's Cross.
Coach and car
Coaches take most of four to five hours and deposit you in the centre, which is fine if the fare is the point and the day is not. Driving via the A1(M) is about three and a half to four hours before roadworks and the ring road. A car is useless inside the walls and useful only if York is the start of a Yorkshire Dales loop. Park at the hotel or a park-and-ride and walk.
Once you are there
The Minster, the walls and the Shambles are the day. The National Railway Museum is the family morning, and it sits beside the station, which is convenient on the day you leave. Christmas markets fill the same lanes that feel spacious in March. If those are your dates, the hotel goes first.
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