To refuse to go on days out in the UK anymore ?

[Heswall]

I have spent half the day mumsnetting from my phone because we have been bored rigid on a "day out" at a local national trust event.
The egg hunt clues were crap or missing, I ended up offering lunch at Frankie and Benny's if we could get the hell out of there and warm up.
I am sick of having to buy tons of layers of warm clothing that get taken off and then lost - if anyone finds an age 11-12 Joules Aire bodywarmer can I have it back please ? - I am sick of paying £60 in petrol and entrance fees for an hours entertainment at best.
For the price of Alton Towers I can fly two people to Spain, I feel I have done every farm, theme park, old house in the half of the country I live in.
AIBU to stay shove the staycation and save up for warm sunny weather and pastures new instead ?

I am so proud. My son has never done that You have been snooping on my profile glad to entertain you Don't speak before you know the details.

Snooping on a public profile ? Contradiction in terms my dear.

Enjoy.

noddy I just had a snoop at your profile pic too. Because I'm nosey. Can I come and live in your house? It's lovely. I'd be no trouble.

Hahaha! We are not rich enough to do days out in the Uk. And apparently we are nowhere near poor. I used to do the whole let's pay loads of cash to do an easter egg hunt around a NT property thing. Now I just force friends to do it in my garden, or do in in theirs.

Why on earth buy cake and tea there though? For that price you could buy a Thermos flask, and take a whole flask of tea plush a posh cake from Waitrose or wherever.

Surely the point of going to National Trust places is that you eat a picnic with your kids perched on the tailgate of your ageing Volvo?

Too many children to fit of the tailgate these days.
I shall never again suggest tea and cakes I was desperate to inject some joy into the day.

second the Museum of Childhood because a. it is fab and b. I had a really nice surprise the first time I went there that they had some of my work in a display. (Magazine I worked on way back - not sure whether it really is a good thing that my work is so old-hat it's already in a museum but it amused my Mother, who is used to the younger generation teasing her about 'but did they have electricity in your day, Grandmother'.)

But NT places convince you that you are going to have the best cream tea ever. but be £30 poorer.

And for some reason people seem to think their children will grown up more wholesome because of the experience. Maybe they will.

But maybe a week in Malaga is more fun for all.

edam you are showing off! [bugrin]

I just sold that house! I am renting atm and looking for somewhere you certainly wouldn't want to come here although I have a fair stash of chocolate . I love a UK day out it is expensive but I love the tradition of it and the fact that we are such optimists with the weather etc

Last time we had a weekend in London we spent about a grand, although we did have a fantastic time, maybe that's the answer.
Move down sarf.

Your choice, but I think it is possible to have a decent day out if you plan it well enough.

It's the little things that add up - on the way back from a cheap day out recently we had drinks at the station, it was 15 sodding quid! We definitely need to plan against that sort of thing.

We've decided on a Staycation thing this year and we've been looking at prices and offers. Websites like southern.com save loads.

Just got back from a lovely NT day out. We're members so it feels like we're getting in free - we go to 10 or 12 places a year, more if we're on holiday and will do 2 or 3 in a week.

We had a very nice lunch, including desserts for £24 between three of us, and the Easter Egg hunt was £2, so not bad. I also got to learn a bit more about art, had a nice walk in the fresh air, dressed appropriately so not too hot or too cold.

I agree with the PP who said the best thing about membership is you can pop in for an hour. At least we know wherever we are in the country we can get a decent cream tea at a NT property.

I'd rather go for a walk on the beach with a bag of chips then drag kids round some horrendous country pile where you have to fork out ££ just yo look st their furniture and rubbish portraits of various nondescript Toffs.

I remember with great fondness the days out of my childhood. Making sandcastles on Blackpool beach while mum and dad huddled under a brolly in their deck chairs with a flask of tea. Banana and sand sandwiches and a portion of chips on the way home if we'd been good.

I LOVE this country!

What has spoiled Days Out for me is that over the years 'attractions' have tried to be everything for everyone and lost something in the process. E.g. A working farm that would cost a few pence to get in and a few pence more for a bag of food. You could spend a couple of happy hours there feeding the animals. Now that same farm has to have a fooderie, information panels, hourly demos, a play area, something to do indoors in a barn if it rains and a shop selling expensive jam. And only £20.00 for a family ticket! All the advertising it has to do to get the punters in from far and wide means the punters expect a certain standard of 'entertainment' leading to disappointment as really the only worthwhile thing to do while you are there is to feed the animals.

Not sure if I've explained my 'rant' properly but basically I don't want historic/interesting places having to turn into circuses to keep in business. Give us back our low-key farms/houses/museums please!

Tea and cake for 5 at a total of £26 (assuming £1 for the biscuit) is £5.20 each. Not cheap but not epic in it's scale.
I think your problem is that you're picking the wrong places for your interests. You obviously don't like being cold so why go to an outdoors type thing on the gloomy Easter Sunday?

YABU.

There are so many great places to go in the UK. Some are expensive, some are totally free if you take a picnic. Carry a rucksack to stuff discarded layers into (though TBH an 11-12 year old should be able to not lose their clothes).

NT membership is great value.

But if really you don't like those sort of places and events, don't do them. Lurk around the Outdoorsy Shite Great Outdoors threads and learn about doing real stuff - walking, canoeing, biking, nature watching. Todays 'day out' was - knowing there was a very high tide due - timing a walk to come excitingly close to being cut off and then watching a whole salt marsh flood while (of course) eating sarnies and drinking flasks of tea .

YANBU. We've decided to go down the emigration route.

Lee I totally agree. It's homogenising everything.

I visited Clovelly in my childhood and remember it this lovely seaside town. Fast forward to the late nineties and there is a whopping great visitor centre as gateway to the village with fecking turnstiles and stuff. Blardy hell.

Bloody visitors centres. Sodding cream teas.

To be fair it was me that dropped the body warmer off the top of the buggy

Cream teas, mmmmmmm ...

YANBU. You can't even park in the country side now without having to pay. Every walk is some sort of organised trail so you are supposed to trudge along with everyone else. Sundays here are hell on eath. Everyone (huge packs of familiy and friends, walking alone is not done) goes out for lunchtime "walk" . You have to be dressed in full Northface, special socks and a back pack. Apparently just having a stroll in whatever you like, and enjoying yourself is no longer the point. God forbid you want to go to an actual attraction.

What happened to picnic's on grass verges on country roads?