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Sample Prices for Groceries, Gas, etc.

Pauline Kenny

I am keeping track of prices of things on this page and will update it during our current trip (May 2005).

Gas Prices

£0.89 - £0.91 ($7.00) per liter for diesel
£0.84 - £0.85 per liter for unleaded

May 2005: We got just under 3/4 tank of gas. Diesel is £0.899/liter; Unleaded is £0.849/liter. It cost £41.00 to fill our tank (about $80). It probably costs about £55.00 ($110) to fill the tank and the car gets 540 miles on a tank (VW Passat Diesel). £0.899/liter is about $7.00/gallon. It works out to $0.20 per mile. Think about that when you are lost on the backroads!

Grocery Prices

Here are some sample grocery prices from Waitrose, May 2005.

£3.14 six 1.5 liter bottles of mineral water (Highland Spring from Scotland)
£0.89 San Pellegrino sparkling
£0.95 500g organic whole wheat fusilli pasta from Italy
£1.09 loaf of organic wheat bread (brown bread)
£3.79/kg organic broccoli
£1.99 bag of seven organic apples
£1.59 four rolls toilet paper
£2.25 prepared meal - vegetable curry (for two)
£1.29 prepared meal - pilau rice (for two)
£2.69 prepared meal - organic vegetable soup (for two)

Meals

£15.00 plus 10% tip for a pub lunch for two (sandwich, half pint beer, fish and vegetables, tea)
£1.15 half pint of local beer
£60.00 for two for a good meal out (3 courses, wine, sherry before dinner)
£30.00 for two for a cheaper meal out (Thai or Indian food)
£1.59 ($3.00) at Starbucks for a Tall Americano
£1.25 for a good cup of coffee at the Waitrose cafe

Miscellaneous

£0.60 Guardian newspaper
£1.20 Saturday Guardian newspaper (weekend edition)
£1.50 Sunday Times newspaper (weekend edition)
£4.00 to have a key cut
£3.99 plug adapter (bought in electronics store to adapt US plug to UK format)
£0.35 postcard
£6.80 movie ticket

Long Distance Phone Card

£0.035 (3.5p) per minute to call North America. Purchase these phone cards at the Post Office.

Entrance Fees - museums, houses, cathedrals, historic sites, etc.

£38.00 National Trust Individual member (£25.50 additional member) 12 months, for access to all National Trust sites.
£36.00 English Heritage member (or £62.00 for two adults). Two week tourist memberships available.
£4.00 per person donation for Salisbury Cathedral
£4.50 Jane Austen museum, Chawton
£5.50 Stonehenge (English Heritage)

Shipping Things Back to North America

You can find Mail Boxes Etc. and other shipping companies in the UK. In September 2004 we shipped a 10kg suitcase from Cheltenham to a London hotel for just over 17. We did this because we were flying EasyJet to France, but then returning to London. We sent our England guidebooks and hiking books and a few other things we would not need to keep our luggage light (EasyJet is strict on luggage weight).

We asked them what it would cost to ship this same bag to the US, and the price was £95! They told us that shipping prices are 30% more when shipping in the direction from England to the US.

At the post office, I got these prices (September 2004):
Packages with gifts, under 2kg, go by a cheaper rate.
Printed material, under 5kg, goes by a cheaper rate. For example £45.35 for air mail or £21.25 by surface (6 - 8 weeks). (This still seems pretty expensive.)