To think this is plenty of spending money?

[londontripspendingmoney]

Partner and I are going to London tomorrow for 3 nights with our toddler. We are driving there and mileage is around 270 miles each way. Hotel is paid for already so it's just fuel costs, food and activities / shopping etc that we need to factor in. We have a budget set aside for this and there's £600 in the pot currently. We have already booked and paid for one activity happening on Friday, so the cost of that isn't needed. The £600 is for fuel, food, travel in London (tube etc), and any other activities we might choose to do. Bearing in mind we are only there for two full days (Friday and Saturday), with tomorrow and Sunday being full days of travel (so only food and fuel costs needed on those days). Even if we chose to do a small amount of shopping on the Saturday, surely this is enough money? Partner thinks we will overspend and need more and end up using the credit card. I don't agree - I think £600 for this trip is do able for 2 adults and a 2 year old

Thoughts? Who is right?

With a toddler, Battersea Park
Children’s Zoo is 100% better value. Honestly!

@londontripspendingmoney I'm not persuaded that London Zoo won't be horribly cold at this time of year. I don't know if it's changed at all over the last 20 years but it was a terrific rip off 20 years ago. Well hidden animals, lots of information boards and extraordinary upselling of: balloons, trampolines, bouncy castle, various ride ons and anything else shiny and colourful with an inflated price tag that appealed to small children. If you want to so something spendy, the London Acquarium might be a better bet.

If you tell us whether you are staying North, South, East or West some of us can probably give you some ideas of good places within fairly easy reach.

London Zoo do 2 for 1 admission (for one of the adults, I'm assuming a 2 YO would be free anyway) with a National Rail ticket. I know the OP is going by car, but I think its possible to buy the cheapest possible local train ticket and use that to get the discount. You could probably do it legitimately by arriving at the Zoo by train, rather than tube, bus or walking.

London Zoo Offers | London Zoo

But possibly, Battersea Park sounds better. Plus one of the big parks (I think Regents or Hyde or possibly both) has squirrels that are so friendly you can almost stroke them, so you can be entertained by wildlife completely free.

Agree with this! There are also loads of play areas in battersea park zoo. Then in the park itself there are 2 more playgrounds and the main one has a big separate toddler section. The pizza from the putt in the park is surprisingly really, really good and would make a cheap lunch.

Just stick to the budget you’ve set? 🤷‍♀️ it’s plenty to have a lovely weekend away!

It’s fine, but I’d roughly plan out what you want to do, so you’ll see how much you have to play with.

See I'm a Yorkshire lass and it would be enough. I would be checking trains too as it could be cheaper than the car and some places have clean air zones, parking charges, toll charges etc. Are you planning to eat out at restaurants all the time because that's going to be your biggest expense and 600 wouldn't do it not with fuel and activities.

Don't take your credit cards.

I was about to suggest the 139 which you can get from outside Selfridges. Great views of the lights from upstairs and warmer than an open topped bus, which would have been around £20-30 each.

Impossible to predict! It all depends on where you go and what you do. You could easily come back with money to spare or you could go mad and rack up a credit card bill. Only you and your husband can influence what you spend! Is it do-able? Certainly. Will you be able to do it 🤷

I think it’s doable depending on what you want to do and your tastes. You could go to any of the city farms which are free.

You can eat cheaply, it depends on what you like. I don’t agree with having to eat in a fast food place like pizza express or Wagamama just because you have a toddler though. We live in London with a toddler and often go out for a three course meal at lunch (not for dinner as the toddler goes to bed at 1930).

Next time an airB&B might be better. You can go out at lunchtime and then eat in the apartment in the evening. You can also have more of an evening to yourself when the toddler is in bed.

As you are travelling by car you can take lots with you; bottles of water for your room ( may be provided but possibly glass bottles in room) and for taking out and about, biscuits/pastries, evening snacks, toddler snacks and drinks will doubtless be cheaper bought at home than out and about in central London.
one thing I would say, we were in London last Weekend and the crowds were beyond anything we had experienced before. Theatreland and the main lights areas were rammed and I wouldn’t want to be there with a pushchair!

Spend what you want. Lots to do for free, such as science museum, natural history museum, British museum, V and A. And lots can be done really cheaply such as bus tour or boat trip. I wouldn’t bother with shopping at all tbh. Just stuff to carry. Maybe something like Borough market is fun but that won’t be expensive.

Evening meal depends where you eat. Pizza express will be cheaper than a posh restaurant. Just plan out what you plan to spend.

It it was important to still to £300 that’s possible also just need to be careful on choosing were to eat.

£40 per day on breakfast? Seiously

London is one of those places (after travel and hotel costs) where you can easily adjust to any budget. Tons of free museums and expensive attractions. Millions of cheap restaurants or the most expensive restaurants in the world.

You spend less in a cafe for three people? Where do you live? Not in London, I assume.

Petrol £80
Service station drinks and snacks x 4 £60 ( really? Take lunch from home or get a tesco meal deal at £3.95 each)
Sandwich lunches x 2 £50 (London Zoo jelly - ouch) Again no need. Eat lunch before or after Zoo elsewhere. Can get much better deals
Chinese in Soho £75
Burgers or Pizza Express £75. (3 burger meals at £25. Cheaper with a kids meal)
Travel cards for two days £60 (depends on zone) (daily cap zones 1-4 on payg is under £12 per adult. Kids free)
Wine for your hotel whilst toddler sleeps £15

One of them is a toddler, so would be able to eat from the parents' plates if they have full cafe meal breakfasts.

Certainly they'll be able to spend £40 a day on breakfast if they wanted to, but it would be a bit daft to do so if they were trying to stick to a budget a little bit.

They could do it for under a tenner if they went to Greggs.

But of course this is Mumsnet so you have to pick the most expensive option you can find and then complain that money doesn't go very far.

I also think it's do-able but I always end up spending more than I had thought/planned in London as you forget how much just a couple of coffees cost.

Easting out also adds up really quickly but when a friend of mine takes her dc to London for the day, they go to Boots in Covent Garden, buy a meal deal and sit and watch the world go by & the entertainment while they eat. I appreciate December might not be so practical to do that though, hence costing more to eat in somewhere.

I'm not sure how much shopping you'll be doing on your budget but to be honest, I'd rather avoid shops in central London in December and just enjoy the atmosphere and lights, which is free.

It really depends... is breakfast included with your hotel? Otherwise a full English at a cafe for 2+1 with hot drinks could come up to £30. We have 2 small children and lunch out easily costs us £80 to £100, dinners £150 to 200.

Essex 25 miles from London in a commuter town. Can easily get a huge breakfast in a cafe for a tenner. Toddler doesn't need one of their own.

If you also going things on budget could eat mcdonalds brekkies , buy pastries and coffee from supermarket bakery or get bacon rolls and tea from greggs at £3.50 a person

I think it’s plenty! There’s so much you can do in London for free or cheaply.

You can have a pretty good tour on an ordinary bus rather than a tour bus. Walk along the South Bank and go into the Tate Modern (lots of space for children in the turbine hall). Or take the clipper boat between the two Tates. Go to Greenwich park and see the meridian. Go on the cable car thing in Woolwich which is part in the transport network.

Go to Hyde Park and the play park there for a West London trip

Battersea Park is lovely too- or Richmond Park

Avoid all those awful awful Leicester Square and Oxford Circus bits. That’s not London - I don’t know what it is but it’s not London!

(Also you might want to ignore The Hyde Park suggestion as I forgot Winter Wonderland - awful money pit)

It's a fine budget

London Zoo is great, but I think expensive and if it's cold a lot of the animals hide! Depends on your toddler tbh. Might be better to do when they are older?

There are lots of food halls doing street food - great of you want to sample different things and quite atmospheric (seven dial - covent garden or spital fields for example)

Lots of free stuff - Natural History Museum, the toddler Garden in the Science Museum - but go first thing as they get crazy busy! It's nice to go to the basement of Science Museum and then pop over the road to the very beautiful V &A cafe.

Also the art galleries are very toddler friendly - the Tate Britain has a fab kids room. And most kids just like running up and down the ramp at the Tate Modern

Southbank Centre usually has something going on for little kids

So many Christmas lights! Carnaby Street most fun ones. And Christmas windows. Covent garden is just beautiful at this time of year.

And also free light/visual displays at the Outer Net by Tottenham court Road.

Southbank is full of lights this time of year - and you can take the Uber (Clipper) boat on the Thames (wrap up warm though!) - nice at sunset as the banksides and bridges are lit up. There is also the cable car from the O2 centre.

Have fun!

I think that’s more than enough but it does really depend on what activities you do.