Description: Don't leave home without it! This wonderful little card is a must for first time travellers and those who plan to do lots of sightseeing on their holidays. This pass is available for Australian and American visitors to the United Kingdom in either 7 days, 15 days or one month cards. The card is validated at the first property you visit and your time starts from then. We recommend purchasing it prior to leaving home as it comes with a book outlining all the properties it will let you into so you can plan places of interest on your route. It also assists with information as to type of facilities such as tea rooms, toilets, etc., that are available at each site and opening times for many. Many of the properties listed are well known sights - for example, Blenheim Palace, Windsor Castle, the Palace of Holyrood (including entry to the Queen’s Gallery – we were lucky enough to see her Faberge collection, including three famous Russian eggs). The 600 sites are varied, from palaces to priories and Roman ruins to Stonehenge. Many properties belong to English Heritage, National Trust or Scottish Heritage, making it unnecessary to join these associations to gain cheap entry. Available from your travel agent.
This card saved us a fortune on our recent holiday. We spent one week in the south of England, one week in the Heart of England and one week at Loch Lomond in Scotland. We purchased the month pass as we needed more than the 15-day alternative. There is no children or senior rates but we found that you still saved money. The pass at A$160 was equivalent to approx 65GBP at the time we travelled (September/October 2003). In the 22 days of our trip averaging a visit to one to two properties per day, I calculated that each adult would have spent 135GBP to gain entry into all the attractions we used the pass for, my 76 year old mother at senior rates and our 17 year old daughter at student rates would have been slightly lower at around 110GBP and our 14 year old at children’s rates would have been approx. 90GBP. On our party of five, that is a saving of 265GBP or A$660 - worth having to spend on other things! If we had stayed another week it would have been worth even more to us.
As a rule of thumb, costs at the door were: smaller properties charged 3or 4 GBP per person while the major sites charged up to 13.50 GBP, with many around the 10GBP price.
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