The absence of culture shock doesn't mean it's not a holiday though. That may be your preferred holiday but that currently isn't an option.
Absolutely not, and that was my whole point in my previous posts, especially to the person who said they don't consider staying in the UK a proper holiday. We are in agreement on that.
As I said, they are both valid choices, it's just that at the moment people who usually always go abroad are feeling a bit hard done by at having to holiday in the UK. And they shouldn't. There is loads to see and do here too and I think we sometimes forget just how beautiful the UK is when we are busy flying off everywhere else. Just choose a place and an itinerary that isn't completely weather dependent.
I think there is just as much to study anthropologically in the UK as in the… Philippines. How high-handed and culturally blinkered to believe that gawping at people in far off lands makes you more open minded. Does it hell. One of the most irritating things is when people drawl they like to “travel”. Yep. You like a holiday, just like any other schmuck. Stop dressing it up as something superior.
Goodness me, I have touched a nerve haven't I? Don't you get out of Swindon much?
No-one said anything (or indeed 'drawled' anything) about 'gawping at people in far off lands' - you make it sound like visiting a human zoo. 
I've not tried to belittle domestic holidays - far from it, so I don't know why you want to take such a tone. Someone here is being high handed but I don't think it's me.
But 'travel broadens the mind' isn't just an empty phrase. It really does, but you can only understand how once you've done it. It doesn't have to be proper 'travel' either/ Just having a couple of holidays somewhere very, very different to what you are used to can be a really enriching experience that makes you feel more connected to the rest of the world and what happens in it.
It's not a question of one thing being 'superior' to the other. They are just very different. Horses for courses.
“A few Celtic Crosses” - You’ve rather brilliantly proven the previous poster’s point that travel overseas doesn’t necessarily broaden the mind - Celtic Crosses and Catholic Crosses are not the same thing.
Pardon me. I'd find neither sort fascinating as you can probably tell. Not my bag. And I have been to Scotland once. Edinburgh for the fringe festival. I may see the rest some day, or maybe I won't. It's not massively high on my list but i am sure it's lovely.
My point was, and still is, that there is very little I could see/eat/experience in the UK as an English person that I would find culturally mind blowing and unlike anything I've experienced before, because even the stuff that's new to me would still feel somewhat safe and familiar.
That does not mean I am not interested in it - I am. One of the things DH and I want to do when we retire is buy a motorhome and tour around all the parts of the UK we've not seen yet. Just go for six months, see it all, then sell the motorhome. But for me it's a substitute for seeing other parts of the world. To a very large extent I would know roughly what to expect in terms of food, culture, religion, language, markets, shops, local customs and etiquette, buildings and historic sites etc. in the UK. That's not a criticism though - just a fact.
There are no doubt thousands of subtle cultural nuances that would go straight over my head in Scotland, Wales and even Yorkshire or Cornwall, (like where I could expect to see Catholic cross versus a celtic cross) but that doesn't make me a narrow minded person. I can't know everything about everywhere and I don't pretend to. But I certainly know more about lots of places and cultures than if I'd spend every holiday returning to the same cottage on the Isle of Wight for 30 years.