Information & FAQs

Gardens & attractions

Britain is a gardening nation, and our gardeners are keen to welcome visitors.

It is estimated that some 3,000–4,000 gardens open to the public each year. Some for charity, for just an afternoon, and some every day of the year, and we take you to a selection of the finest gardens in each tour area.

At some gardens, we arrange private guided tours or introductory talks – often by the owner or the head gardener – but otherwise we leave you to explore the garden at your own pace.

Wherever we are, we will rarely be far from other attractions, especially Britain’s history and heritage, and we use these nearby attractions as a backdrop to our day-to-day itinerary, stopping as our pleasure takes us.

Your group

We limit group sizes to a maximum of twelve and encourage a multi-national mix of garden lovers.

A few customers are as young as their early twenties, and a few are in their late eighties, but it’s more likely that the mean age of your group is mid-sixties to mid-seventies.

To date, we have been joined by customers from Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Britain, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and most of the states of the United States of America.

English is spoken in a range of styles, and with great humour!

Suitability

All our tours involve getting into and out of the minibus, and for safety reasons alone, you must be able to do this independently.

On our garden tours, you can do as little or as much as you like, largely at your own pace – you can sit and read a book or explore every path in the garden.

On our other tours – particularly on our walking tours – a suitable level of fitness is required, and this may vary from tour to tour.

If you are concerned about the suitability of a tour or whether your fitness and mobility may impair either you or the group, please discuss this with us before you reserve your place.

Our tours have no upper age limit, although there is a lower age limit of 16.

Single female travellers

We welcome single travellers and want to particularly assure single female travellers that women make up some 70-80% of our customers, and it is more likely than not that there will be other single female travellers on the same tour. Otherwise, women travel with us accompanied by sisters, friends, mothers, daughters, colleagues and, occasionally, by their husbands.

Sleeping

Your comfort is a chief concern, and we go to great lengths in choosing where to stay. We seek out comfortable, family-owned and independent establishments with character, friendly service and a good kitchen. When considering a new hotel, we visit it first. The majority of our hotels are establishments we use repeatedly, some for a dozen years or more and many of the hotels we use are listed in the Good Hotel Guide.

Eating

We enjoy good food. Not only do we choose hotels with reputable kitchens, but when we dine out, we do so at some of the very best local restaurants and pubs, often award-winning establishments, preparing locally sourced fresh produce and cooking it superbly.

Meals

Breakfast is a cooked breakfast complemented by a lighter 'continental' breakfast, which varies from hotel to hotel. Lunch is taken at one of the day’s attractions, and is your responsibility, although occasionally, we provide a picnic lunch.

Dinner is taken à la carte, occasionally from a limited-choice menu, and increasingly we are asked to order beforehand.

Dietary requirements

Britain has a sophisticated and knowledgeable restaurant trade, and we have, to date, successfully accommodated all our customers' dietary requirements. From vegan to gluten-free, and much else besides, we do not imagine that anyone’s dietary requirements will be a problem.

Accommodation

Bedrooms vary in size, sometimes considerably so – not only from establishment to establishment, but within the same establishment – and what may be considered 'large' in one place may be considered 'small' in another.

Also, in some of our older hotels, some dating to the 16th century, not all rooms are perfectly square or level.

Double and twin rooms

In British English, we say 'double room' to mean one room with one bed for two people and 'twin room' to mean one room with two single beds – please bear this in mind when booking!

And we don’t generally refer to rooms by the size of the bed.

Rooms, bathrooms & stairs

We confirm room reservations to our hoteliers as bookings arrive, and they allocate rooms in the order they receive them, with the better rooms allocated first.

Your room will be en suite, typically a bathroom with a bath and a shower over it, though occasionally there may be just a shower or, exceptionally, just a bath.

We also ask to be accommodated on the ground or first floor, unless there is a decent working lift, but this is not always possible.

Let us know

If the nature of your room, your bathroom or the number of stairs to your room is material to your booking, then please tell us.

What to bring

We strongly recommend that you pack a good waterproof and windproof jacket and a pair of sturdy boots or shoes. Even at the height of a British summer, it can be wet and windy, and, in any case, there will doubtless be gardens where it will be wet and uneven underfoot.

You may like to consider a hat, scarf and gloves, for tours in April, early May and September – and for all tours in Scotland, whatever time of year!

Otherwise, comfortable clothes, layers that you can put on and strip off, seem to work best for walking around the gardens, exploring villages and getting into and out of the minibus.

Dress at dinner

On those days when we dine out, without first returning to our hotel, our casual day dress will be fine, though a spare pair of shoes (left on the bus for the day) won't go amiss.

When we dine in, at our hotel, it is fair to say that you will feel comfortable dressed 'smart casual' to 'as smart as you like!’

Walking tours

There are specific requirements for walking tours, and these requirements will be set out in the tour itinerary.

Luggage allowance

Unless we say otherwise, please restrict your luggage to one main suitcase and one smaller bag, a day pack or similar, per person, with no piece of luggage being taller than 80cm (32in) (including wheels and handles etc) or wider than 50cm (20in), and not exceeding a maximum weight of 23kg (50lb).

Maximum height 80cm/32in
Maximum width 50cm/20in
Maximum weight 23kg/50lb

NB. We will always ask that hotel to assist you with your luggage, but we cannot guarantee it, and you must be comfortable taking your luggage up one flight of stairs.

Britain

VisitBritain, our national tourism agency, has an excellent website with pages devoted to practical information and health and personal security.

Pounds Sterling

Remember that we use Pounds Sterling, and not Euros or Dollars, and that, whilst most of the places we visit do take credit cards and bank debit cards, we recommend that you have a small amount of cash for those smaller places that do not take cards.

There will be opportunities to withdraw cash from ATMs or banks during the tour.

Imperial & metric

We still drive in miles per hour, and drink pints of beer, but we shop for kilos of cheese, metres of fabric and litres of fuel – we remain a metrically challenged nation!

Weather forecasts

We recommend both the BBC Weather and the Met Office websites for forecasts.

Most of us talk about our temperatures in degrees Centigrade (ºC) and not degrees Fahrenheit (ºF), but if you are a Fahrenheit kind of person, then remember that 61°F is approximately 16°C (just transpose the numbers) and, likewise, 82°F is approx. 28°C, and conveniently, this is broadly the range of temperatures of the average British summer.

Communications

Please check that your mobile/cell phone will work in the United Kingdom.

Joining the tour

The joining instructions for each tour are outlined in the first day's itinerary, with any specific information in the ‘Additional tour information’ section at the bottom of the tour page. The precise arrangements – i.e. the exact time and confirmation of the location – will be confirmed by email, some 13 weeks before the tour.

Insurance

Please ensure that you have adequate holiday/trip insurance, including Personal Liability Insurance, Medical Insurance (including repatriation insurance), and Holiday/Trip Cancellation Insurance.

Presumption

We do not sell insurance, nor do we insist on proof of your insurance, but we will presume that you will have it.

European Health Insurance Card (EHIC)

If you have an EHIC, please ensure that it is in date and bring it with you.

Travel assistance

If you require assistance with your travel arrangements in Britain, either before you join the tour or after you depart it, we will endeavour to assist you.

But please remember that we are tour operators, not travel agents, and we reserve the right to charge you for our assistance.

Meeting points

We will meet you at one of our principal meeting points, namely:

• the Heathrow Sheraton Hotel, immediately north of Terminal 5, Heathrow Airport, for tours in southern England

• Ashtree House Hotel, Paisley, some 10 minutes by taxi from Glasgow Airport, for tours starting from Glasgow

• the Hampton by Hilton Edinburgh Airport hotel, for tours starting from Edinburgh

Or elsewhere by arrangement.

Airports terminals

We neither collect from nor drop off at airport terminals, save only when you are a whole-tour group arriving on the same flight.

Booking flights

Please do not book your flight before reserving your place(s) on the tour. Likewise, please ensure that your flight arrival and return flight departure times are compatible with the tour meeting and finishing times.

Please also consider the considerable benefits of arriving at least the day before the tour starts, so that you are refreshed from your flight before the tour starts.

Baggage allowances

Finally, if you are flying long-haul into Britain and then intend to fly short-haul, either domestically within Britain or elsewhere, please check your baggage allowances on your short-haul flights.