When the recession first hit I panicked. It was the last thing I needed when I was trying to gather the dollars for the trip. Hubby being self employed didn't help as the trade dropped right off. However, I soon discovered that the recession being global was working in my favour. Suddenly the dollar went from being worth 45 British pence to 58, then 59, and even went over 61 pence at one stage. So I decided I would pay for as much as I could in advance. Much of the accommodation I booked, being B&B's didn't have card or Paypal facilities and preferred payment on arrival. So I researched the cost of admission into the myriad castles, stately homes and museums only to find their prices exorbitant. So I turned back to my fellow forum members at Simple Savings (see banner at top of page) and asked for their suggestions. It turned out I could purchase a card for each of us that would get us into almost every British Heritage site, and another advantage was that with the card you don't have to queue for tickets. Yay! When I went over the attractions that we would definitely be visiting I found the cost for the two of us was approaching $1,200! The GB Heritage pass was only $700 for two. So naturally I ordered them online. Then another Simple Savings member told me about the London Pass and London Transport card. These were purchased for around $240 all up, making another estimated saving of around $200 on the London attractions. This includes Thames river cruises to Windsor Castle plus entry; places like St Paul's Cathedral, Tower of London, all the museums, etc were included. Plus I was able to buy tickets for a tour of Buckingham Palace for only $12 each.
We were intending to stay in London for four days but accommodation in the city was prohibitive. That is until a Simple Savings member told me about the London Universities taking in visitors. I found accommodation at Imperial College for $100 a night for the two of us. This was half the cost of everywhere else I had tried. Plus it has its own cafes and restaurant, gym etc, which we can access. The gym is free.
The best saving due to the recession was car hire. Booking online directly with Hertz saved us a fortune. We were quoted less than 1000 pounds for 56 days hire, all inclusive. That is around $1,800. Booking a Brit Rail pass would be $1,300 each for 2 months access, and you still need to be able to get to the stations. Even a Navman GPS unit was only $120 bought from a UK website, complete with UK maps. (This was the $350 model, if bought here in Australia.) Hertz wanted $400 to hire one from them for 56 days! We will pay the $80 to download the Aussie maps when we return.
Everything I checked out was much cheaper than it would have been prior to the recession. So I was more than happy. The next thing to do was check out the currency exchange rate and we found we could get around 120 pounds more per $1000 than the same time a year earlier. This was going to make our holiday so much more affordable. It was even better when the Euro fell, too. Italy was looking really good!
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