To blanch at the cost of UK attractions

Membership of historic royal palaces gives you access to the Tower of London, Kensington palace and Hampton court.
Museum of childhood is free and tube and bus free for children. Try the DLR where they can “drive “ the train.

Merlin passes are bloody brilliant! We pay £15 per month per person for the platinum passes (we also had no sign up fee - got an offer) and you're tied in for a year then it's a monthly rolling contract you can cancel at any time. We often do London dungeon/sealife/shrek experience as they're all next to each other. We also do madame tussauds and regularly go to legoland and chessington. (Our kids aren't old enough really for Thorpe park) we have also planned a trip to alton towers and have often visited the sea life in Brighton. We'll also use them on the way up to alton towers to do warwick castle and Cadbury world.
We take a packed lunch every time we go anywhere merlin and if we do buy the odd coffee etc it's 20% off. We also get discount for staying at the alton towers hotels for example but we are local enough to do legoland and chessington as day trips. They are brilliant- never any hassle booking tickets and we have more than got our moneys worth. Our 2 year old goes free anyway so we don't need a pass for him but also don't have to buy him a ticket. Re think your views is all I'm saying!

Aren't museums free well suggested donations ? You could do a few museums and maybe the aquarium, attractions everywhere are expensive but I don't think you need to .spend loads all summer holidays pick a couple of things to do and then free stuff other days.

London has heaps of free/cheap stuff to do. You’re lucky. Think of those living in the back end of nowhere.

Yeah you can't expect if you live in London to be able to afford to go places tourists do.
Life is crazy now in Britain.

Surely the London Eye is just a tourist trap I wouldn't have expected Lodoners to take their small children on it,

Adult at 13 in some places I was shocked to see 13 considered an adult 😂

There's so much free stuff in London I would save your money. If you think attractions are expensive now wait til they're teens and sometimes deemed an adult at 15 (ie they're not an adult but you have to pay adult prices!!!)

So it’s London attractions you are talking about, not UK ones?

It is incredibly expensive.

The wetlands centre is lovely

If you get annual membership it’s £78 for 1 adult and up to 6 children.
The playground has water play area, so you could go weekly in summer with swim stuff and picnic and pass hours. Also has various events on. And indoor area

https://support.wwt.org.uk/membership?_gl=11qr09dd_gaNDQxNDk2MDAzLjE3MTE1NDUxMTE._ga_3NTBT76G2J*MTcxMTU0NTExMS4xLjEuMTcxMTU0NTE4NC4wLjAuMA..

Kew Gardens is also worth membership. Can use for walks and picnics, indoor and outdoor playgrounds, cafes, Christmas events, others. It’s less busy in summer than other London parks due to not being free.
https://www.kew.org/membership/become-a-member-kew#kla-membership-options

We love the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust.Slimbridge is our local but they have a reserve in London. They always have loads on for the kids and if you have membership you can visit all their sites in the country

If you get UC you can get into some london attractions for less than £5 each.
tower of london
london zoo
transport museum and a few others.

Otherwise- look up free museums- there are so many.
we got a coach from Birmingham to Leicester and visited 3 places. All it cost was £10 in Mcdonalds 😂

London has so many free places to visit, unlike most countries. Honestly, limit paid for attractions to one and go to museums, more educational too

It's always been expensive. I went on holiday to dorset many times and have only ever seen Brownsea island from afar as it was too £££

Vauxhall farm/Deen city farm is very cheap, we go a lot to the london parks which are excellent. Depends which side you are but jn SW there's lots to do. You can look at when the steam day trip trains come into victoria and then get up close without getting on.

My kids love the changing of the guard/seeing the touristy stuff like parade horses in central.

https://www.hrp.org.uk/tower-of-london/whats-on/ceremony-of-the-keys/?gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAjwh4-wBhB3EiwAeJsppKKJKuDP7rr2wlkYAXQ0iVvUhqSGXSClmFvqp8to0ekF5Su1eLiBMRoCSq0QAvD_BwE#gs.70q4s8

more for older ones but this was fabulous at Tower of London and only £5.

I think at 4 and 6 some of these places won't be worth it. There's not a lot for that age group at the Tower of London for example and Chessington etc have a dedicated area for the small ones but you're paying a lot then for a few rides.

My dc never tired of the natural history museum, maritime museum and the science museum - all free and with lots to do for kids. They enjoyed Parks visits too - Greenwich Park, Kensington Gardens and there are loads of parks with water play fountains. The Horniman Museum in Forest Hill is great and has a mini aquarium, loads of kids stuff and is in nice grounds. You could go on from there to see the dinosaurs at Crystal Palace park.

Dc loved riding on the DLR to City Farm, again loads to do and free. We used to pack a picnic or for a treat, get a Nando's.

Colchester Zoo is very good and cheaper than London Zoo but you'd obviously have to factor in transport costs.

Going back 25+ years before you could look up prices in an instant, it drove me mad, not being able to take the kids anywhere affordable. Often, not able get through on phone to ask, then having disappointed kids if we couldn't afford entry and could only walk through free gardens etc. Particularly educational places, the very kids that need access are denied because of cost.

Tower of London does £1 tickers if you are on UC or other provable low income.

Tesco's club card vouchers!

Just read your update about having done loads of museums! If you haven’t heard of them, both Museum of London Docklands and the Maritime Museum both have indoor bookable activity areas for this age range. Very cheap I think around £3 a ticket (museum is free!) and they are so fab. Really jazz up the museum experience for my DS!

I’d second the cereal wrappers for 241, this is great! Especially if you combine with an attraction where the 4yo goes free.

Last summer we found a London Playgrounds book and made a HUGE deal of heading out any sunny day we were free to find a new playground. DS adored opening the book on a random page and the whole transport journey there. Great for learning about new areas of London too 😂 Know that’s not what you’re asking for, but I’ll be wholeheartedly sharing this with every London parent I come across because it was just such a nice, cheap summer 😉

Most NT places do allow dogs in most places. Not normally in the houses themselves, but in the surrounding parkland etc they are. We normally take the dog, and as my OH isn't bothered about seeing the houses, he has a wander with the dog while me and kids go inside if we want to (depends on mood and weather!). If he does want to go in, we just split up - him and one kid and then me and the other zoom round.

NT membership does work really well for us. We save the membership fee on parking alone where we live - appreciate not the same for all locations. And if we holiday in UK, always look at NT properties / land nearby for some free days out!

We went to the RAF museum at Hendon last year. It was free and really good. There were loads of families there with young children. Loads of really old planes there.

You could get your older one to apply for a blue Peter badge, that gets them in for free at some place, so reduces the cost.

Memberships/passes can work out quite cost effective, especially if they cover a few places (eg. NT or English heritage).

Look out for anywhere that offers free entry to under 5's, and make the most of them before 4yo's birthday.

Look out for discounts or vouchers