Trip Report - Exploring the UK from Land's End to John O'Groats with Mandy Watson

In episode 103 of the UK Travel Planning Podcast, host Tracy Collins welcomes travel enthusiast and blogger Mandy, who shares her extensive seven-week adventure across the UK. Mandy, an experienced traveller from the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia, provides a detailed account of her journey, including her goal to travel from Land’s End to John O'Groats, visiting friends, and exploring historical sites along the way.

From Cornwall's picturesque landscapes to the Scottish Highlands' rugged beauty, Mandy enthusiastically recounts her experiences and provides invaluable travel tips. Highlights include a magical visit to St. Michael’s Mount, a memorable performance at the Minack Theatre, and a thrilling ride on the Snowdonia Mountain Railway. Mandy also shares her unique accommodations, from staying in a longboat in London to a converted jail cell in Fort William.

Join us as Mandy's vibrant storytelling inspires you to explore the UK with a sense of adventure and curiosity. Whether you're planning a short visit or an extended stay, this episode is packed with insights and tips to help you make the most of your UK travel experience.

⭐️ Guest - Mandy Watson from SpendingKidsInheritance.com
📝 Show Notes - Episode 103

Listen to these episodes next:
Episode #3 - Visiting York
Episode #30 - Scotland road trip itinerary
Episode #38 - British Bites (an intro to British food)

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Visit our website to learn more and book your consultation today:
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Global Travel Planning Podcast is filled with travel inspiration, itinerary ideas, real life adventures, practical tips and insights to fuel your wanderlust and help you make your travel dreams a reality.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Welcome to the UK Travel Planning Podcast. Your host is the founder of the UK Travel Planning website, tracey Collins. In this podcast, tracey shares destination guides, travel tips and itinerary ideas, as well as interviews with a variety of guests who share their knowledge and experience of UK travel to help you plan your perfect UK vacation. Join us as we explore the UK from cosmopolitan cities to quaint villages, from historic castles to beautiful islands, and from the picturesque countryside to seaside towns.

Speaker 2: 0:41

Hi and welcome to episode 103 of the UK Travel planning podcast. This week I am joined by guest Mandy, travel lover and blogger, who is here to share her trip report from the UK. For those of you who listen to our other podcast, the global travel planning podcast, you will recognise Mandy's voice because she was in episode 19 last month sharing about her global travels. Mandy loves inspiring others to have a go and step outside the comfort zone and just say yes. She's a very experienced traveller and has been all over the world I think every single continent and 66 countries and she's really inspiring to talk to. So in this episode I started off by asking Mandy to introduce herself and give us a little bit of information about her background before we started talking about her trip to the UK. Okay, so, mandy, would you like to introduce yourself, tell us where you live and how you heard all about UK travel planning, please?

Speaker 3: 1:35

Well, hello, thank you for having me on. My name is Mandy, my husband's Trevor. We've been together for 36 years now and we've just really cracked on with our traveling now. So we're from the Gold Coast, queensland, australia, and very recently retired, and we've just ramped up our travels.

Speaker 3: 1:55

And I stumbled across your podcast whilst walking my dog and I got sick of listening to music and I wanted to learn stuff. So all my young grandkids and kids all say learn stuff, mum. So I did. I just turned something on, thought, listen to something about the UK, want to learn about where we're going. And I got onto this one lot and I didn't like them at all. They swore all the time and they were just nasty. So at the end of theirs, your podcast popped up and I just continued on listening to it. I went well, hello, hello, hello. I think I will listen to these guys and I just. I listened to everything, and some of them twice, and I took notes. And this is all just every hour, walking my dog in the morning, and I just came back completely empowered for our trip.

Speaker 2: 2:41

Oh, that's so lovely to hear as well. We just love it, and I love talking to Australians as well, and all Americans out there as well. I love talking to you guys as well. But Mandy's from very close to where I live in Australia, so I think we were kind of destined to meet as well because we're very alike, aren't we? We've managed to have a few conversations and I'm like, yeah, we're kind of like soul travel mates, reckon I agree. So let's talk about because you're actually going to be coming on to my global travel plan and podcast. I'm going to put a shout out to that in this one as well um, to talk all about your travels all around the world, because by the end of this year you'll be on every continent, that's correct.

Speaker 3: 3:21

Actually, it was at the end of 2019. We'd finished doing all the continents and then COVID shut us down completely and that gave us a chance to actually do some work around the house, because we were spending all our time and energy travelling, which was great. This is what we like to do. Then we came home and went oh wow, that pool needs water in it now let's put some money into the house. But, yes, all seven continents. And then, by the time this year's finished, we would have done 66 countries together.

Speaker 2: 3:55

Oh, that's amazing. That's amazing. Well, this episode we're going to concentrate on your trip to the UK. So how long were you in the UK for Mandy and give us a brief overview? I know you were there for quite a while, but give us a brief overview of your itinerary.

Speaker 3: 4:09

Okay, so we had a seven week holiday from during September through to early November last year, 23. And my first goal I like getting to the top or the bottom or the east or the west of places, like the most westerly point or the most southerly point. So I thought let's do the end to end thing, cause I heard about that's a thing, the end to end. So land's end is a common place to go, obviously, but I'm a real lighthouse fiend and I wanted to. I found that it wasn't just John O'Groats, it was Dunnet Head Lighthouse, which is the tip of Scotland. So I thought, okay, and we're Aussies, so I thought it's only I don't know 700 and something miles. That's just like a day's work for Aussies driving. But you throw everything else in between, we'll turn it into seven weeks and as well. We also had three sets of friends that we had met on previous holidays that we wanted to go up and stay with them, and particularly we spent a week in Wales with our Welshie friends who we met on a cruise to Russia a few years ago. So we've kept in contact with all our little travel family, which I love, and Facebook's really good for that. So we keep in touch and then hopefully they come over to see us and then we go over to see them. So we threw in an end-to-end goal three lots of friends and turned it into a seven-week adventure.

Speaker 3: 5:32

I had a friend of mine who did a two-week bus tour so I printed out the photo of her map that she went on and it had a really good guide of general stops to go to. You know your Yorks and your Edinburghs and Inverness and Chester and Southampton and all that. So I just added what I wanted to do and from then I then got onto your podcast or your website and downloaded all those wonderful documents which made me realise that I can't do it all. And we laughed the other day about I was driving or coming down from Gretna Green down towards York and I said to my husband I think we can just swing by the Lake District on our way. And I looked at the map and it's kind of like I don't think we can. So Tracy and I we laughed about one does not swing by the Lake District, to add to the day. So I use your podcast advice to say we can't always fit everything in.

Speaker 3: 6:31

So I had everything written down of what the main things I wanted to see and the things I'd like to fit in if possible, and that's a really good way of organising it. So the things that I wanted to see, we didn't miss out on, and we got to add lots of cool things to it as well, as well as our friends adding stuff that we never even knew about. Wales was just on a whim. We were there for seven days and they just took us to castles and horse-drawn boat rides and got Snowdonia Mountain Railway and Brecon Beacon train trips. It was just magical. Wales is awesome.

Speaker 2: 7:08

It's brilliant. Yes, doug spent a bit of time in Wales last year, I think. He went and did some stuff in North Wales and then we were doing it. We were house sat in Wales in January this year, which was really, really lovely, so okay, so you planned your trip. You had your idea of where you wanted to go. You're doing the end-to-end thing, so you're going from Land's End to the northernmost point of mainland Britain and Scotland. Obviously, there's islands further north than that the Orkneys and Sheltons, if you want to go even that bit further north, but the end-to-enders are basically Land's End to John O'Groats. So we've done that as well, and it's it's a nice thing to do, isn't it? So how did you decide how you're going to get around the UK?

Speaker 3: 7:48

Right. So we flew into London and spent a few days in London and what was really cool, we stayed up. We'll get to the accommodation part next, I think, where we stayed there. That was really really quaint, but uh, we basically, just after a few days there, jumped on a train. Well, first of all, london we pay passed our way around London very, very easily. I didn't buy any train cards because I didn't think we were going to use them that much. We were going to hire a car for most of the trip. So we just pay passed with my Visa card. It was just on off and the station guards and everyone by every station was super, super helpful. They told us what the Elizabeth line or the Northern line and you just follow the arrows. It was really really easy and really quick. Taxis, too much traffic, too expensive. The trains were great. So we just did that for a few days.

Speaker 3: 8:36

And then we headed South, just to Surrey, which is a little bit out, a bit South, and then from then we were with friends and then we hired a car from their place, actually, no, no, from Southampton. From Southampton we then went to um, we did Stonehenge and then made our way through Devon down to Land's End, from Land's End all still by hire cars we went up through Bath and then the Cotswolds and then we got to Cardiff where we had seven days with friends. So we ditched the hire car and then from after there we went a train from Chester to York. And that's when all our trouble hit, because do you remember when all those storms were hitting Scotland? I suppose it happens all the time, but there were really big storms. And we got on a train in York to head to Edinburgh uh, no, to Inverness, we're going all the way. But there were really big storms and we got on a train in york to head to edinburgh uh, not, to infinis, we're going all the way to infinis. And we got on the train and they just said go home, turn around, abandon all hope, you're not going any further than edinburgh and was like oh no, I had tickets the following day on the jacobite train and I was gutted. So we got stranded in edinburgh for a few days and we just had to change plans. So we then picked up another hire car. From there we went Fort William, isle of Skye, picked up the North Coast 500, which is the I've never heard of that until your podcasts.

Speaker 3: 9:56

And we love driving. My husband's a really good driver, so the narrow roads, dodging sheep and the stone walls didn't perturb him at all. He loved it. It was a challenge, he thought, especially when it said you're supposed to do maybe 60 miles an hour. He goes, I'm doing 16 miles an hour. So we got all the way up, we did Skye, we went all the way up to Orkney almost to Orkney Couldn't get across, the waves were too big. Then we made it all the way back down to Edinburgh and further south and we only caught a train back to London when we were in York. So most of it was done by car. And we found Enterprise Car Rental, a really fabulous car company. They gave us upgrades, we got an automatic every time and they changed when we had to change our destinations because of the weather. So that was very, very good and they were really affordable. So that's a big plug for them. They were terrific. So we drove lots.

Speaker 2: 11:27

That's good, and I know you took some train journeys, so you did the journey from York down to London on the train and then from I'm trying to think what you said now to York, from Chester to York. Was that what you said?

Speaker 3: 11:40

Yes, Chester to York, york to Edinburgh, then pretty much York back to London. Those were the three main ones, and the rest was all by car.

Speaker 2: 11:51

Okay, that's good to know. So you enjoyed that, enjoyed being on the trains? Oh, I was gonna ask me if you have asked you that, so I have to ask you love trains.

Speaker 3: 11:58

My husband is a train fiend so anytime we could get on a steam train we were uh boots and all for that one, and it gave him a chance to look out the window or stare out the window with his eyes closed because he's a good sleeper. But it was a nice rest to get on the trains. And here's a tip you buy a first-class ticket. Don't have lunch in Starbucks before you get on the train, because they feed you on the train. Didn't know that one.

Speaker 2: 12:30

Yeah, that's so true, that's so true, that's so true. So you obviously you traveled all all the way around. You went england, wales, scotland, back down. So what are the stand-up places that you stayed in? Because I know we've chatted about that you like kind of quirky, different places to stay?

Speaker 3: 12:45

yeah well, when I was 18 I did a contiki tour of britain. It was called a concept tour and every two days we stayed in something different. We even stayed in a youth hostel, then we stayed in canal boats or a castle. So I've always had that in mind, that I like to have something different, and I believe sometimes the overnight journey or when you get to a place can be part of your vacation, not just a hotel night and then you go somewhere the next day. So standouts were I booked everything on bookingscom or Airbnb. I try to have everything with a free cancellation up to a point in case you need to change plans and it worked a treat. We stayed in a castle in Devon. We stayed in a long boat in London, which was probably our favorite. It was the most uncomfortable, but it was gorgeous and it was so uniquely different to our life here in Australia. So finding it in the dark all the way from an Emirates flight was quite hilarious, but it was tranquil and beautiful and you just had the ducks on swans going past you in the morning and then you just walked to the train station. It was five minutes. It was really good going past you in the morning and then you just walk to the train station. It was five minutes. It was really good.

Speaker 3: 13:58

We stayed in a converted jail cell in Fort William. My husband was really impressed with that. It was bunk beds and bars, but it was a classic and I thought this is a memory. Those things are fun. You immerse yourself physically into something and it's much more memorable, I believe. From there we went to a log cabin on Sky, yourself physically into something, and it's much more memorable, I believe.

Speaker 3: 14:11

And from there we went to a log cabin on Skye. So that was two little log cabins in a guy's backyard, virtually in Dunvegan, overlooking the lake, and we had seals outside. It was amazing. And yeah, just Salmon Landing, right at the top near John O'Groats, was beautiful. They don't even allow kids there because it's right on the cliff and it was just terrific to do quirky places. But I do recommend ground floor units, if you can possibly think ahead, because you're lugging all your suitcases up and down three or four or five flights of stairs and at the end of seven weeks I think luggage was probably just my least favorite thing in the world. I just so sick of living out a suitcase we packed too much. That's always a tip of mine pack less, pack less. But um cute places, lots of steps, so pack less and um think outside the square. Sometimes it's pretty much a similar sort of price half the time if you look around.

Speaker 2: 15:13

Okay, that's great. Well, and also I'll get the names of those places that you stayed at as well, mandy, because I can put those in the show notes. So if you're thinking, oh, I like the sound of that prison, we'll put that in the show notes. So let's go back to the places that you visited and what were your favorite places and your favourite experiences, because I'm kind of all sent to kind of the experiential travel. What is it that you experienced that you're always going to remember?

Speaker 3: 15:41

I think we loved St Michael's Mount down there down the bottom near Penzance. That was probably even one of our first castles, but also the best. It was such a beautiful display, like how it's just been restored and everything, and just getting across there, either walking one day and then boating the next because the tide was in or out, and then from that day that afternoon we went to the Minak Theatre. Honestly, I think I booked it over breakfast and we got in. It was the last show of this particular play. My husband has never seen a live play before. He think he'd rather, you know, not do a play, and he loved it. But the funny thing was the drive to the Minack Theatre. I thought the Minack Theatre I heard that was just on the sides of the cliffs near Cornwall and I thought, okay, well, it's just Cornwall's, just Cornwall, cornwall's massive. And this drive up to Minack Theatre took ages and it was just donkey tracks and we thought we were in the middle of nowhere. And then you see a little tiny sign saying Minack Theatre, car Park, and you were there there at the top of the cliffs and nowhere anything else for miles around and halfway down the cliff is this theatre and sort of the amphitheatre seats carved into the side, and it was just a highlight. We had gorgeous weather. We were really blessed for the first half of our trip with really really good weather, so it was amazing. That was a highlight.

Speaker 3: 17:13

Another highlight would have been, most definitely in wales, the snowdonia mountain railway going up. Um, they, it's, it's steep and they just they, they have either a steam train or a diesel. Push your uh carriage up the the mountain and then you see all the mountain bike guys pushing their bikes up and you think, oh, sucks to be you when I'm looking out the window because we were really comfortable. That was hard. They would have been pushing it up for three or four hours to ride all the way back down. However, when we did Ben Nevis, you can catch a cable car about two-thirds of the way up and they get to put the mountain bikers, get to put their bikes on the back of the cable car about two-thirds of the way up and they get to put the mountain bikers get to put their bikes on the back of the cable car and just ride down there. Even I could have done that that was, but I probably wouldn't because I'd kill myself. But there's so many fun things there.

Speaker 3: 18:02

And then on the same day that we did the Snowdonia Mountain Railway, of course, obviously in Wales, we then drove and did a horse-drawn longboat ride along the canals in Langollen or something like that. It's very hard to pronounce Welsh names, you need to buy a vowel, and that was beautiful. I love horses, I own horses, so doing a heavy horse Tracy's laughing at this and along the canal was just brilliant. And then from then we drove further and we did a um, uh aqueduct, uh canal boat across a really tall aqueduct, which is something I really wanted to do. And then also in canarfon we went to and stayed in the really close to the canarfon castle.

Speaker 3: 18:42

We had two nights in a hotel that was built in 1522 and we had a ghost, um appearance not appearance, but a ghost experience one night in one of the rooms we were staying in and Trevor and I both woke up and thought did that really happen? Twice during the night we thought we heard something. I heard footsteps and a click of a door and we felt a presence. And then, when we walked downstairs the next morning, I said to the lady at the desk I said is this place haunted? And she said which room are you in? And I thought okay, well, that's a yes to me. And we still had one more night. I thought oh no, what are we going to do? But nothing happened the following night we were safe. But if you're ever going to have a ghost story, why not have it in a four or 500 year old castle inn? Hey, what do you reckon?

Speaker 2: 20:08

oh, absolutely. I probably wouldn't have stayed the next night. I will just have to tell you that, oh funny, I'm a chicken. I'm a chicken. I've told you that. No, that would be. That'd be enough for me. The first night I wouldn't have slept, the lights would have been on, I would have been sitting up in bed. I would have woken up, dog. I would have been like, right, something's going on here. Next night I would have checked out. We've been running miles away going. No, we're not staying there. In fact, that's one of the reasons I actually don't stay in a castle. I would love to, but I kind of go, and every time I think about booking it I go.

Speaker 3: 20:39

No, tracy, you won't sleep, so not a good idea I think it's funny because, uh, you know our the house that we live in now and the house that we lived in before. We built both houses, so there, so, unless there's a sacred site under our ground, we're pretty cool. No one's lived in our house, so this was very new to live in very old places for us, very, very new. We're brave.

Speaker 2: 21:04

Yeah, all that spooky and creaky floorboards and no, no, not for me. So did you do any? I know didn't plan a lot of this yourself and used a lot of our resources to help you do that, but did you take any tours when you were there?

Speaker 3: 21:19

yeah, we did, we did. Yeah, as you say, we did a lot of touring ourselves and I did a lot of research at home. Even booking things and looking um into opening times is really essential too, because we were there in late autumn, at the end of it, and a lot of these castles close, so we made sure like even Castle Howard in York that was going to be closed on our way back, so we made sure we saw it on the way up. But tour-wise, listening to your podcast, I heard about the Walking Pub Tour in London, so we were down for that. That was really great and we actually had tickets to the Lion King that night, so it actually delivered us around Lyceum Theatre at the end of it. So that was really great, perfect timing. And then, uh, we did on. Our last night was Guy Fawkes night, was our last night in London, and we did a Jack the Ripper tour.

Speaker 3: 22:09

I wanted to do a keys ceremony and we have a friend, one of the guys that we stayed with. He's a former Scots guard and he was trying. He got us into Windsor Castle for nothing and he was trying to get us into the keys ceremony as well, but because it was Guy Fawkes night. There was a private function and he couldn't get us in, but he had so many great stories taking us around Windsor Castle. He actually had the honour of standing vigil for the Queen when she was lying in state at Westminster Abbey. He was one of the guards. He had two shifts of standing there and he said he was so nervous and just like little stories wow, he wouldn't have gotten that from a book or a guide. And then we also.

Speaker 3: 22:50

What else did we do? Oh, we did the London London bake, the big bake, or something. I heard that on one of my uh listings in your podcast. I heard one of your readers, uh, talk about that, and we're great British bake-off junkies. I can tell you we have seen every episode, maybe twice and um, so we were down for that.

Speaker 3: 23:09

That was our second night in London. So after the first night we did the Lion King and the second night in the evening we did the Bake Off Tent, which was so much fun. We even came third and it was one of those cases that if you had a look at the cake online and then you had a look at the actual cake that we made, it was one of those nailed it moments as in no, it was a hoot. That was a really fun thing to do and we did an Outlander tour as well, out of Inverness, which was great because we were kind of Outlander fans and I'm not ashamed to say I was an Outlander fan and that's what really got us to learn so much about Scotland and about Culloden and I've never heard of Culloden and I'm a Crawford and one of the things that we did was seek out our Crawford Castle, so our clan castle, which is in ruins near Moffat and sort of like the lowlands of Scotland, and that was very emotional to find the Crawford graveyard and to go through the old castle that William Wallace even conquered at one stage because his mother was a Crawford.

Speaker 3: 24:13

So I did a lot of research and when I got back home from walking the dog, I just go straight to your website and everything was there that I needed to know. All the links that I needed to know were right there, so I booked it and then read more about it. It's fantastic. So you get to look forward to it and it's all sorted.

Speaker 2: 24:30

That's brilliant. And also I'll just let you know at the moment as well, Mandy, because I know you're a big Outlander fan is that I'm actually talking to Charlotte from Edinburgh Black Cab Tours, who actually knows Sam Heughan, and she's going to be coming on to talk about all things Outlander.

Speaker 3: 24:44

I'm down for that, that's so good, you know, we went to Lallybrook and we went to Dooncastle and everything that was good, you know we did. We went to, uh, lally brock and we went to dune castle and everything that was, uh, you know, it was just terrific and everybody else. There was one guy on our tour that he said I don't even watch outlander, but I thought this could be fun because you guys are crazy, oh that's brilliant.

Speaker 2: 25:10

That's good, right, I'm going to change the topic from tours. I'm going to go food, because you kind of mentioned it when you did the pub food tour. So what were your favorite foods? Were there any standout foods that you went? Oh wow. Standout places that you ate that you went? Oh my goodness. I can't wait to go back. You know what? What did you enjoy?

Speaker 3: 25:27

well, my husband loves a roast dinner, so he was always looking forward to a Sunday lunch and from learning on your podcast that you have to book Sunday lunches, sunday roasts. You're not going to just walk in because you're not going to get it at night time, not that much, it's a lunchtime thing. So we were staying with friends and they took us to Winchester, which is Winchester was really interesting because that was a former capital of England at one stage and it's got the big cathedral or church there, that's got the Knights of the Round Table on the wall. That was great. I digress. There was a Wickham Arms pub right nearby and that had the best roast dinner on the planet. It was our first, but we've had them during and that was had the best roast dinner on the planet. It was our first, but we've had them during and that was still the best. It was just everyone had something different, but it was really good.

Speaker 3: 26:19

Then there was Trevor loves a Cornish pasty. He wanted to try a Cornish pasty and we were within a couple of probably five minutes of leaving the vicinity of Cornwall on our way out and was like we haven't had a pasty in Cornwall yet and so we pulled over to a service station and there was Warren's Pastry Shop, or Warren's Pies, and Trevor had the biggest, most beautiful golden Cornish pasty there and it still was the best that he had. So if there was ever a Warren's and especially if you're driving, it's fantastic, you're going to get a great Cornish pasty Scones. Okay, you've got to have your jam on the bottom, cream on the top, but we came across two different people that had the opposite. But we found lemon curd and the clotted cream is just next level.

Speaker 3: 27:09

That was so good and as far as not liking something in Scotland, I had a deep-fried Mars bar and a deep-fried fruit mince pie and it was, oh sorry. I had one bite just to know that I'd never, ever, ever, eat that again. Why destroy a perfectly good chocolate bar? It was gross, but it was fun. And the guys, when we ordered it, I said this is the first time I've ever had this and this is going to go home to Australia on what I write about, because this is, uh, gross, not yours, just the idea. So that's. But each their own. It's unique, it's unique.

Speaker 2: 27:51

Yeah, you've done more. You've done more than me, because I've never tried one before. I mean I don't like the fruit mince pies anyway, yuck, but I definitely wouldn't want to deep fry a mars bar. I I mean no, no, thanks. So I mean you took a step further than me, that I've looked and went. No, you've tried one.

Speaker 3: 28:06

So I'm game. I have a tattoo on my inner arm that just says just say yes. And so maybe when it comes to a deep fried ice cream, I'm just. I have a tattoo on my inner arm that just says just say yes. And so maybe, when it comes to a deep fried ice cream, I'm just going to put a piece of masking tape over there and I just say no.

Speaker 2: 28:21

I just cover it up. So I'm going to ask you about tips, and I know you're going to talk about packing and I think that's a key tip that you've already said actually is, when you're travelling, really think about how much you take with you. So I'm going to ask you to save your number one tip to the last question, if you can do that, mandy Okay, because I love to end my podcast with that particular question. But let's talk a little bit about your packing and what tips you would give to anybody who is going to the UK. I mean, you went for a long time so you had to think carefully about what you were taking.

Speaker 3: 28:57

Yeah, yeah, and we were going through a late, late coming into autumn so it was going to be cold and layers and you know, we Aussies, we just Trevor just when he goes out he just brings out his best pair of thongs to wear on his feet. So we had to really think about shoes and walking hiking boots. So just like one pair of runners and one pair of flip-flops and one pair of hiking boots and a long jacket that can roll up. But I always say too that if you don't want to look the same like I, I've, the last couple of weeks in in in scotland, I look the same. I just had jeans and layers, thermals and and my rib jumper and a jacket. I look the same in every photo.

Speaker 3: 29:40

So I started, I started to buy a couple of scarves. I bought a london scarf which I really love and just have. What I say to ladies is just put five silk or nylon scarves in your bag. They pack, pack down to nothing, way nothing, and they can make you look different in every photo. That was. I mean. It's kind of like after seven weeks. You know, if you want to look, we've got photos on our wall we're on from different holidays and Trevor's wearing the same thing. They could be years apart.

Speaker 2: 30:15

All right, another tip.

Speaker 3: 30:17

Youy. So another one, which I said before, is just check opening times for places, um, even restaurants on the isle of sky. We were there on a sunday and monday and I read that a lot of the restaurants aren't open on sundays and mondays. So I booked something six weeks in advance, which for a little tiny place seemed silly, but it was packed because everyone around there knew that they were going to be. Everything else was closed and you can always cancel. So look at those things. And same with castles or attractions is to look at their opening times and whether or not they're closed for the season, because they do. Especially further north you go, they do tend to shut down.

Speaker 3: 30:59

And another thing that I did I actually bought an Australian national heritage card to get into places cheaply. So it worked around England a treat. There's a lot of places with this Australian one that actually works with many countries around the world, not just Great Britain. So I think even by using it the first two times, it already paid for itself and it means that when I get home I can still use it in Australia instead of just on the one holiday, because sometimes the localised heritage cards are only good for two weeks and we were there for two months. So that was a good tip that saved us money. And it was not very useful in Scotland because Scotland likes their own things and they had their own heritage thing. So I don't mind.

Speaker 3: 31:42

I don't mind paying entry into these places because it's not expensive and it keeps the upkeep. It all goes to a good cause. That's cool. And to be flexible. I think that's another tip is to be flexible. Don't lose your nana if something gets cancelled or if the weather gets in the way. You just need to have that's when I say book refundable accommodation. As long as you're outside of the 24-hour period, you can cancel. So be flexible and go with the flow. Sometimes it's travelling, smile.

Speaker 2: 32:17

Oh, I totally agree with all of those. I mean I always say that to people you never know. We always book free cancellation with accommodation. So many times it's just saved us when we've got sick or we've changed plans or we just want to have some flexibility to do that. So that's a really great tips, mandy. But I'm going to ask you what would be your number one tip for somebody visiting the UK for the first time. Well, the number one thing that you should say you've learned from your trip that you would say this is what you need to keep in your mind.

Speaker 3: 32:48

Well, I actually forgot a couple of things, so I will end with the number one, which I've kind of mentioned before, but also the speeding fines. You make sure that if you're driving don't go over the limit. There's cameras everywhere. And to pay your parking, we got given like a $70 Australian dollar fine. It lands end when there wasn't a car in sight and it was about five minutes to five. We thought, oh, we didn't even see the car parking sign, so we forgot. So pay for parking everywhere. That's a big one, otherwise that's going to really add up.

Speaker 3: 33:21

But my biggest tip, which I did mention, I think, is pack less. It's a motto that I need to put on our suitcases and I've always said lay it all out on your bed and then have it and figure out just a couple of nice things. But for two months we still pack too much. So we get ourselves down to a medium-sized suitcase and a carry-on for a trip that long and if you go into cold weather there's nothing much else you can do because you need jackets and you need a pair of boots and stuff. I can't ever think of doing a whole holiday on check-in luggage on like one bag, especially out of Australia. They're very, very strict with a seven-kilo bag and I see some people they they got backpacks and carry and they come on with three bags went not in Australia, you know. So we're used to that. We're used to the the uh, the luggage guards being very, very tough.

Speaker 3: 34:11

So, um, but at the end of the day, you don't want to be lugging all those up the stairs. You don't want to be lugging them in and out of your boot of your car and on and off trains really quickly, or having to put them high up on a luggage rack on trains. So be mindful of that. Just do yourself a favor and pack less. If, at the end of the day, buy another jacket and tie it around, you know, just buy a jacket over there if you're missing something. Which better than taking stuff that you don't need. Buy it if you do need it. It's not the end of the world. If you've paid all that money to get there, you can afford another jacket. You do need it. It's not the end of the world if you paid all that money to get there.

Speaker 2: 34:42

You can afford another jacket. 100, no, 100, that's so true. And there are great shops even if you you know for toiletries, for medical stuff and boots, chemists there's, just so you don't have to take everything, because you can go buy loads pound land for glasses.

Speaker 3: 34:56

I found pound land it's like a dollar shop and we got glasses. You know those reading glasses that used to be a dollar shop and we got glasses. You know those reading glasses that used to be $1.99 in Australia. Now they're $25, kind of like the ones I'm wearing at the moment. They're $1.99, poundland it was fantastic. And you get Panadol and Nurofen. My husband just had a new knee put in 10 weeks before this holiday so we needed to get some pain relief and things like that. Those places are just great to stock up on those things. Don't bother bringing that from home. Find a pound land.

Speaker 2: 35:29

Perfect, that's perfect. So, mandy, thank you so much for agreeing to come on the podcast. I'm just going to also give a shout out for the fact that you have your own blog, so just want to give us a quick chat about your blog and where people can find it, so just want to give us a quick chat about your blog and where people can find it Excellent, thank you.

Speaker 3: 35:45

I started a blog back in about 2018 and it's called Spending Kids Inheritance. My son came up with the name because he said well, mom, what do you think you're doing? Oh, okay, spendingkidsinheritancecom is my domain name, so if you Google that, you will find my blog, and it's all about bucket list estimations and you know, we've I've climbed mount kilimanjaro and I've swum with sharks and we've done machu pichu and galapagos and um petra and all those fun things, and and we've got mozambique at the end of this year and we've got iceland greenland coming up in a month's time. So I love writing, writing, I love talking, as you can hear. So come on and have a look. There's lots of great photos, because I really have a lot of good time just taking photos and I'm just an iPhone girl, so I'm no pro, but I'm a chatterbox and I like to write about living life the best you can. Actually, I've got a tattoo on my other arm that says adventure before dementia. That's me.

Speaker 2: 36:45

Oh, that's perfect, Mandy, and, as I say, we're just about after this, we're going to record an episode of the Global Travel Planning Podcast, so I'm going to I will put a link in the show notes to this episode as well. So if you want to hear more from Mandy about her amazing travels all around the world, pop over and take a listen to that episode, because we're going to be talking about some of the fantastic places that she's been, and I've had a good look around her website and yesterday watching the videos of the migration. The Masai Mara was just fabulous, absolutely fabulous, so that's now on my to visit list next year Excellent, Excellent.

Speaker 3: 37:22

Thank you, tracy, for having me on and it's a blast I love. I'll continue listening to all your podcasts and anytime I can help and have a chat I'm happy to, and thank you for everything you do for all of us, for nothing. Thank you, you're a blessing.

Speaker 2: 37:36

Oh, thanks, mandy. It's been so lovely to chat to you. Brilliant. Thank you for tuning in to this week's episode of the UK travel planning podcast. As always, show notes can be found at uktravelplanningcom. If you've enjoyed the show, why not leave us feedback via text or a review on your favorite podcast app? We love to hear from you, and you never know. You may receive a shout out in a future episode. But, as always, that just leaves me to say until next week. Happy UK travel planning.