It was a rip off!

This week Louise and I visited the Hampton Court Flower Show. Never again; it was a rip off!

We decided to visit the show as a belated wedding anniversary present to ourselves, but we found it very disappointing. Perhaps our expectations were too high, but we expected a bit more for our money.

The tickets cost us £27 each and it was £9 to park our car. A quick calculation for you… that is £63 before you start talking about food and drink.

We wouldn’t have minded stumping up if the displays had been worth the visit, but they weren’t. There were dozen or so garden displays and the rest of the show consisted of trade stalls geared up to take even more of our money.

It was a little like one of the gift shows that Lou and I used to visit, but held not inside the National Exhibition Centre, but outdoors. However, the thing about the gift shows is that you go there to browse round the exhibition stands, expecting to be pounced on by salespeople, but at the NEC you don’t have to pay twenty seven quid each to get in!

No doubt the Royal Horticulture Society charged the stall holders for exhibiting there wares at the show, so I think it would have been more honest if they had offered free entry for the poor old punters. If shops and markets charged the public the retailers would never take any money!

And it isn’t as if the goods on sale were all garden related; for instance, why on earth did they have stalls selling jewellery and handbags?

Anyway, despite the disappointment of the show itself, we did have a nice relaxing day away from campaigning. A real anniversary treat!