For Christmas I got a National Trust membership. It’s being a few years since I was last a member, but now looking forward to visiting new places and going back to places we have been to before.
Back in 2016 I did start to keep a note of how much we saved with the membership, but looking back over the blog, I never kept up to date with that, but with this membership I am intending to blog about the visits we do this year and the savings we made.
I actually went to Hanbury Hall, for two reasons, in the main to get a drink from the cafe as I was heading up the M5, and the other was to see what it was like, for a potential future visit.
Hanbury Hall
A country retreat in the heart of Worcestershire. The William and Mary-style country house and garden, originally a stage-set for summer parties, offer a glimpse into life at the turn of the 18th century.
Current saving -£21.80
One adult £14.00
Parking free
Total saving £14.00
Cumulative saving £126.00
Membership cost £133.80
Cumulative saving -£7.80
Obviously we will need to visit some more places to make the membership cost effective and increase that cumulative saving. However for this visit, which was more of a journey break, for this kind of quick trip, a National Trust membership is really useful and makes sense.
It’s a nice drive up the driveway to the hall, and after parking and scanning your membership card (or paying money) you walk towards the house. The grounds look magnificent, and I suspect on a nice sunny (dry) day there are some nice walks.
As I approached the house I found myself at the imposing gateway into the grounds and gardens.
Through the gate is the house. Nice thing about going out of season and during the week, it is a lot quieter. So much easier to get a photograph without lots of people in the shot.
According to the information inside the house, this National Trust property is one of the most popular in the country, mainly due to the ease of access from large centres of population close by.
Upon the entering the house you find yourself in a huge entrance hall. There was an impressive staircase with some amazing paintings up the walls and across the ceiling.
I did like how the rooms were not roped off enabling you to walk around the room freely. You could quite easily imagine yourself as staying or living at the house as you walked around the room.
Having looked at one of the downstairs rooms, I had a chat with a couple of the volunteers.
I then headed up the fantastic staircase to see the murals and the rooms upstairs.
Having had a quick look around upstairs I went back down to the ground floor.
It was then back upstairs to go out via the rear staircase I then went for a coffee in the Stables tea room. There is some building work behind the house on a new larger cafe. This property is one of the most popular National Trust properties.
I would really like to have seen the second floor and the rooms there. They may not be special, but it would be nice to have a whole house experience. However I suspect this would require more vounteers to enable this.
As I approached the gardens, the fog came in.
It was a short, but lovely visit to beautiful house.
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