Generally recognised as the best way of introducing our country to a visitor, Sterling Travel's Heritage tours go a step further by ensuring a level of expertise and quality of service which together guarantee that your clients experience the most memorable tour - the best way to keep them coming back for more!

ENGLAND

England is a country of immense beauty with a national identity as diverse as its heritage - from peaceful rural attractions and grand stately homes to festivals, historic sites, arts, culture, and shopping.

This 10-night English Heritage tour encompasses a great variety of themes. By train from London to historic York where Roman Eboracum and Viking Jorvik live side-by-side with recreated Victorian and Edwardian streets, then into the surrounding wild countryside with waterfalls and deep valleys where medieval monks built secluded monastries. From the Lake District where poet Wordsworth wandered and Beatrix Potter was inspired, to Chester with its tiers of shops known as Rows. From the villages and churches dotting Cheshire's countryside to the Heart of England and Shakespeare Country where the willow-lined River Avon meanders slowly through the valley, hinting at the ravages laid upon the area by the Wars of the Roses and WWII bombs. From the first-time visitor to true Anglophiles, this itinerary will please the most discerning of visitors.

Overnights:

London (1) York (2) Lake District (3) Chester (2) Stratford-upon Avon (2)

Features include:

Ride on North Yorks Moors steam railway
A unique Lake District minicoach trip to see remote areas
Private readings of Wordsworth's work at Rydal Mount
Royal Shakespeare theatre play and tour backstage

SCOTLAND

Scotland will always surprise and delight with its contrast of bustling cities, architecture and history, and the tranquility of its glorious coastal and mountain land-scapes. Renowned also for the warmth and quality of the welcome extended by the Scots, a tour to this part of the British Isles will provide a memorable experience.

Here is an extensive 17-night tour covering the whole of Scotland, including the Orkney Islands, and yet excepting the first night, enables leisurely two-night stops everywhere. It can be shortened or modified for a number of themes including ornithology and ancient history.

Overnights:

Glasgow (1) Oban (2) Isle of Skye (2) Ullapool (2) Kirkwall (2) Inverness (2) Aberdeen (2) Edinburgh (2) Ayr (2)

Features include:

Isle of Iona, Isle of Skye, Dee Valley, Burns Country, Dunvegan Castle, Inverary, Inverewe Gardens, Dunrobin Castle, Bonnie Prince Charlie's Battlefield at Culloden, Macbeth's Cawdor Castle, Glenfiddich Distillery, Glamis Castle, Royal Yacht Britannia
· Visits to early Viking sites in Orkney
· Cruise on Loch Ness and time for Nessie-spotting (!)

Highland Games and Cultural Festivals, like the famous Edinburgh Festival, can be built into your programme at almost any time of the year.

WALES

Wales, a country of constantly changing scenery, is so often only briefly included on a tour itinerary but is worthy of a more in-depth visit. Its fabulous scenery includes mighty mountains and hills, mystic valleys, and remote bays with miles of golden sands. Its rich and varied history can be experienced in Castles and Abbeys, and the culture and traditions appreciated through music and song and in the people, proud to speak in their own native language.

This 11-night tour travels throughout Wales beginning in the North, exploring, Snowdonia National Park, and then travelling through mid-Wales and the beautiful Cardigan Bay area to St David's. and continuing along the scenic coastline to the Gower Peninsula to the capital, Cardiff, visiting many fascinating parts of this charming country on the way. The itinerary may be easily modified to follow a special interest theme, for example, ornithology.

Features:

Narrow guage railway, Caernarfon Castle, Portmeirion, Whistler collection, Powis Castle, Arthurian Carmarthen, St David's Cathedral and Palace, Cardiff Castle, Rhondda Heritage Park, Llancaiach Fawr Manor.
· Caldey Island where Cistercian monks live in silence
· Welsh Banquet
· Dylan Thomas boathouse