To be shocked at the cost of family days out?

[holidaaay]

My sister was talking to me earlier and she said she’d seen that tickets for x4 to our local zoo are £25 each. As soon as a child turns 3 you pay full price for them. £100, just to get there. I couldn’t believe it!

It got me thinking how everything is just this way now and almost feeling a bit sad about it.

Take a weekend to London. £300 return for everyone’s train tickets (that would be a very good deal, too!) easily £200 per night for the cheapest of hotel rooms a walk out of the centre. If you’re there for two nights that’s already £700, not to mention shows, food, attractions whilst there… I reckon you’re then on at least £1500. I don’t know who’s affording it.

Of course, you could limit or go without those types of activities and spend a lot of time in parks and having fun at home or finding local free things to do at the museum and library. Nothing wrong with those things at all. But nor do I think it’s far fetched to hope some of the more ‘exciting’ activities and trips would be just that little bit cheaper so families can make some memories alongside doing the everyday things. It would be nice to think the zoo and a weekend to a big city weren’t activities reserved for the rich.

We have a few years before we will be paying full price for DD. We are likely going to be one and done, finances hugely influencing this and we don’t earn badly. I just don’t know how families with 2+ children do it- school holidays must cost parents so much money especially if the weather is crap. Never mind then factoring in other costs in the year like holidays and Christmas, any childcare bills you have to pay for monthly.

Has it really always been like this or prices just steadily getting more stupid?

There is a Council park in the next town to us. It has a lovely cafe and a little nature area which used to be free to visit - deer, pigs etc nothing exotic. They added meerkats and it is now 24 pounds for a family ticket. I think this is a shocking price for families to pay ( doesn't affect us as kids are grown). They told me they had to charge to feed and care for the meerkats 🙄

It's definitely so much more expensive than it used to be. It's (admittedly a small) part of the reason we're not having a second child, as these kind of things would be totally out of our reach paying for the extra ticket. It's the same story with holidays.

In my childhood, we regularly did days out. My parents are the tightest people on the planet, so no way were they paying the equivalent to what today's prices are.

Everything is expensive right now but there's a few things I do to try and keep costs down for days out:

1. We have memberships for English Heritage and National Trust (one through work and another is around £13 per month).
2. We take a picnic when we go out somewhere, or at the very least, snacks and a drink. We got hot drinks as a treat at a recent visit to a NT site and it was nearly £20 for 2 x coffees, 2 x cake slices and 2 x cookies(!)
3. I buy a soft play pass for the summer holidays for our local soft play (it was £11 per child last summer) and that's an easy, cheap activity that we do at least once a week when they're off school.
4. The park, playgrounds, local woods, etc are all free to go and explore.
5. Make use of free days out or activities - local museums are usually free if run by the council and do very cheap activities/events, Heritage Open Days, free farm Sunday, etc.
6. Put ice lollies in a Thermos flask and they will last without melting so saves you having to buy an ice cream from the extortionate ice cream van!
7. Give your child a couple of £s and see what they can find for themselves in the charity shop to bring home and play with.

Some places we don't even bother going to unless we've got a discount code/offer - Legoland, Sea Life Centre, etc are all so expensive!

We only go when I can find offers to bring the cost down.

If you're travelling by train to London, book attractions via the National Rail website to get 2-for-1 or 1/3 off lots and lots of attractions https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/days-out-guide/2for1-london/?gad_source=1&gclsrc=ds

Cadbury and Kellogg's often have 2-for-1 tokens on their wrappers.

Some local attraction annual memberships are also valid in city centre attractions. Eg Annual Membership to IWM because we live near Duxford also gets us in to the IWM HMS Belfast and the IWM War Rooms (and somewhere else I think).

Stay in a family room at a Travel Lodge/Premier Inn on the outskirts of the city and use public transport. Or camp (that might only be possible in London, don't know about other cities). Youth Hostels are also sometimes an option.

I have never found a way around the expense of show tickets when you need more than 1 or 2 seats together. We're a family of 6 and so we very very very rarely go to the theatre and tend to limit it to one parent plus interested child/ren rather than the whole family going when some may not be interested.

We limit eating "out". I hate making sandwiches, but a meal deal plus extras from the supermarket on the way to the zoo is a hell of a lot cheaper than the zoo cafe. Take snacks. The only food item I'll buy at the zoo/theme park etc is ice cream (and that's only because I can't take it in there myself!).

Shops etc at attractions are for pocket money in my family. If I was paying then they'd all want several things from the shop and I'd be £50+ down. I give nominal pocket money each week and they spend it on the days out. They buy less tat when they're paying themselves! Sometimes I'll buy a t shirt or something for one of them, but that would count as clothing budget rather than day out budget.

Tesco vouchers for dinner out at Pizze Express/Bella Italia etc. I save them all year and we eat out during the summer!

It's not easy or cheap. But you can make each and every bit of it cheaper, and the kids and you soon get used to the changes and don't resent not having the "expensive" experience.

To be fair £24 for a family (2 adults 2 dc?) isn't extortionate. Of course it would be much better if it was free, but animals do cost money to maintain. I have a relative who is a vet and frequents zoos, and says it is so expensive to maintain animals with high standards of welfare. The electricity bill alone for some zoo enclosures can be be tens of thousands per annum.

The central London stuff is because rich tourists don't care what it costs.

Normal people just have to work around it, Tesco or national rail discounts. We always bring picnics and water bottles, and a visit to London eye for example will be part of someone's birthday present. We even walk to save on tube fare sometimes.

I was accused of being a "cruel" mother by my SIL as during the recent two week half term, we only did one day out. The rest of the time we did things at home or with family/friends to their houses which the kids were very happy with! But according to my SIL I am "ruining their development" whatever that means.

I took my daughter and her friend to a play centre over Easter and it cost me nearly £50! Entry, plus a very very basic lunch for them and a couple of coffees came to £47. It wasn't even an hours entertainment and the stuff they had is exactly the same as what's in my garden. Completely extortionate but the place was packed.

If your children are still pre-school age, you might be better with a term time Monday to Friday Butlins or Haven holiday.

You can get some really cheap deals. It gives you a pool, often soft play, bits of entertainment etc. You can take your own food or some of the meal deals are excellent but you are not then buying three meals a day.

Plus it's easier getting small children to sleep in a static caravan with their own room than standing in the en suite in a hotel.

You could have a decent break for the cost of a day out.