We are planning a trip to the UK this month. Is it a good idea to get a British Heritage Pass?

Where are you going? If you're only going to be in the London area, there aren't that many sights on the GBHP. However, if you are getting out of London, it can be a great deal. We got a 15 day GBHP family pass (covers 2 adults 2 kids, IIRC) for $217 which we used on our 17 day trip to London, the Highlands, and Edinburgh and it saved us a bundle. But, had we spent the whole time in London, it probably would have saved us only a little.

Check the list of included attractions against your itinerary, look at the admissions charges for the various sights if you don't use the pass, then decide.

I am a member of English Heritage. Every year the renewal comes up and I pay for it thinking "THIS year I'll make full use of it". I never use it enough, but I do think that having it will make me visit more places (THIS year)!

One small but significant side benefit of my pass is that when driving around, if I see the "brown sign" to an English Heritage place, then I know where there is a clean loo and a decent cafe ! English Heritage places make good roadside restrooms in country areas where facilities are otherwise scarce - but without the pass you wouldn't pay the entrance fee just for a wee and a cup of tea !

I'm not familiar with the "British Heritage" pass, is it like an English Heritage pass, but including Scotland and Wales ? Or does it include National Trust properties as well ? Or is it for a completely different set of places?

I agree with the previous poster - it will depend where the properties are and where you will be. But if it "almost" seems a good deal (when you do the sums) then I would vote for getting it - it probably WILL encourage you to visit more places (especially when you are running behind time : you might not pay cash to go into somewhere for the last hour, but you probably would if you had the pass and could get in for free).

In particular, do check if the pass includes National Trust places: if a lot of NT places will be on your "must do" list, you don't want to feel cheated if your pass does not work for them.

Incidentally, English Heritage is an arm of the British (Not English, we don't have one) Government - it used to be called the "Ministry of Works". I do rather resent having to pay the government and additional fee to see places my taxes already bought !

The National Trust is a private organisation which members of the public can join (!). They are one of the biggest landowners on the country, because they protect a lot of landscape as well as buildings, they collect rent from farmers and buy even more land and buildings.

The Great British Heritage pass is <u>entirely</u> different than the English Heritage Pass Chris_England is talking about. It is understandable that chris doesn't know about the GBHP since I thnk s/he lives in the UK. The GBHP is only available to overseas visitors.

The main benefit is it covers all English Heritage sites, all National Trust sites, all Historic Scotland sites, all National Trust for Scotland sites, all CADW sites, and many, MANY privately owned sites (these are the expensive budget savers like Blenheim, Warwick, Castle Howard, Chatsworth, etc etc.)

As twk says - the GBHP is not as useful if your trip is &quot;London-centric&quot; since the Tower of London and Windsor dropped out.

But for just about anywhere else in the country - it is a HUGE money saver. Will recoup most of its cost in just a day or two.

As an example - All of the Shakespeare Properties in Stratford, Warwick and Kenilworth are w/i a few miles of each other and their entry fees are more than the cost of a 7-day GBHP.

So -- where are you going to be touring?

ditto to above - not great in London, especially since Queen removed Kensington Palace and Windsor Castle and 50% off the Tower from it last year but great anywhere else where typical admission to stately houses, castles, etc can easily be $20 per place.

I've had three GBHeritage passes and saved bundles each time and visited more places than i would of by paying separately.

Pass can be bought online in pounds but when i last bought one was actually cheaper in the U.S. thru RailEurope - seems ones in pounds may of had a Value-Added-Tax whereas foreign ones did not - or maybe because of the strengthening pound making $ purchases cheaper, whatever. Compare each - In U.S. i always recommend BETS (800-441-2387) for any RailEurope product - talk to experts and they won't charge RE's $18 mailing fee which can negate any savings over buying in pounds online.

I'm a fan of the Great British Heritage pass also. But I found it of less value in Scotland, just because there were fewer sights. So you do need to do the math to see if it's worth your while.

With the pass in England we visited more places than we planned, just because we could. And it gave a nice freedom to our touring.

We bought the 7-day in 1998 and it was a great moneysaver. They neglected to stamp it at Stonehenge so actually used it 8 days.

The clock starts ticking on the pass the first day you use it so try to time your attractions within the 7 or 15 days of the pass.

re Mimar's comment about Scotland. It is true that on the west coast/Hebrides there are very few covered properties. But on the eastern side, Orkney, the Borders, SW and NE there are just TONS of covered places. Edinburgh Castle, Holyrood, all the Border Abbeys, Glamis, all the &quot;Castle trail&quot; properties (and that is a <u>bunch</u> of castles ), Glen Coe, Culloden, Ft George, Blair Castle, Scone Palace, Falkland, Linlithgow, Stirling Castle, Traquair House, Culzean and on and on - about Scottish 150 sites in all.

Dunnottar, Drummond Castle Garden and Cawdor are not covered - but just about every other major site east of the Great Glen is.

So anywhere except Argyll/Skye - nothing at all on Skye or Mull - and much of the far west coast, the GBHP is a deal.

And with the pass you just flash it at the entrance - at Windsor - no longer covered - i got to skip the long ticket lines as there was a special entrance for Heritage Pass holders. Not sure this is true like at Warwick or not but a good perk if so.

FYI: If you want to see where I used the GBHP, just click on my name and look for my trip report. I note all properties where it was used.

The link I used to purchase the GBHP family pass is, as follows: http://tinyurl.com/2ufqne

Even if you don't want the family pass, if you live in the US, I'd buy from that site (they have the individual passes listed elsewhere).

Thank you for correcting my reply janisj. It was the west side of Scotland, both north and south where I found few places that took the GHBP.

Those the GBHeritage Pass is of use in London (St Paul's, Shakespeare's Globe Exhibition and a few lesser sites) that it is no longer good at Kensington Palace, Windsor and Tower of London for even 50% off means that just for London few will find it a good deal

But i've just read about the new, i think, British Royal Palaces pass, which comes in 2, 3 and 4 castle/palace forms - the fourth being Hampton Court. I don't have price details but will try to find out to see if it 1- saves money 2- gives quick entry.

oops - Windsor not on the Historic Royal Palace Pass

FOUR PALACE PASS
Tower of London; Hampton Court Palace; Kensington Palace, The Banqueting House in Whitehall

THREE PALACE PASS
Tower, Hampton Ct and Kensington Pal

CENTRAL LONDON PASS
Tower, Kensington, Banqueting House.

Children 5-15 special rate.

Historic Royal Palaces &gt; Home &gt; Travel trade and groups &gt; Royal passes

Four palace pass: includes admission to the Tower of London, Hampton Court ... Historic Royal Palaces Waterloo Block HM Tower of London London, England ...
www.hrp.org.uk/royalpass.aspx

Since Britrail USA, purveyors of Great British Heritage Passes in USA, sets their prices for the year and has never raised them until Jan 1 - and since the Pound is now officially at about $2.06 - or effective $2.10 rather than thue $1.90 or so when GBHP prices in dollars were pegged there could be substantial savings by buying in dollars.

except - BritrailUSA requires one to pay for express shipping which negates much of the savings.

well i know BETS only charges $5 for orders under $250 - none over but i don't know how long they require to avoid express mailing.

I bought one from them two years ago when they (or actually BritRail USA) who originates these passes here and agents then sell when there was a huge discount - a 7 day pass for the price of 4 sold only in January and could be used for a year. Otherwise i would not have bought the pass but did find it a huge bargain for what i ended up doing.

Can buy in London at BTA on Haymarket i believe.

I think that is on Regent Street, not Haymarket (also can be purchased at Heathrow - though not at Gatwick)

Can't comment on it in England, but we bought 2 week passes when we went to Scotland. It was well worth it for a few reasons...

One, from a strictly financial standpoint, it saved us money. Probably 60% in total.

Two, we didn't feel bad just 'dropping in' at a number of sites. With no extra admission to pay, we would notice a sign along the road, stop in, explore for a 1/2 hour and not feel that we didn't get our money's worth.

Three, the map and guidebook were quite worthwhile.

Four, we actually got some 'bonus' attention at a few sites. We showed up with the passes and they seemed more than willing to show us around (even at places that were self guiding.' Not sure how much of this was having the passes, but it seemed to help.

You can buy the Great British Heritage Pass online at www.visitbritain.com .

We got seven-day passes and saved a lot of money using them. In fact, we ended up using ours for nine days - the people at Blenheim Palace couldn't figure out how to activate our passes, and the people at Warwick Castle didn't notice they weren't signed (we didn't realize we were supposed to sign them), so they weren't activated until two days later at Chatsworth. This meant we were able to visit the Roman Baths and Stourhead Gardens for for free at the end of the trip.

In addition to Blenheim, Warwick Castle, Chatsworth, the Roman Baths, and Stourhead, we used our passes at Haddon Hall, Conwy Castle, Berkeley Castle, and the Fox Talbot Museum of Photography and Lacock Abbey, both in Lacock.

Go to http://www.britishheritagepass.com to decide if the pass is a good deal for you.

Lee Ann