Signature Experiences

across the UK and Ireland

The doors that rarely open, opened for your travellers.

After hours

Before opening, after closing, nobody else there.

Tower of London, England

The Ceremony of the Keys

At seven minutes to ten, the Chief Yeoman Warder walks out by lantern light to lock the Tower, as it has been locked every night for at least seven centuries. A small audience watches in the dark, then is escorted out through the gates.

Every night of the year

Stonehenge, Wiltshire, England

Inside the stone circle at dawn

Dawn or dusk, most of the year

Hidden London, London, England

The underground city

Seasonal dates, private groups on request

The Real Mary Kings Close, Scotland

The buried streets of Edinburgh

Year round

Trinity College Dublin, Ireland

The Long Room before it opens

Year round, early access

London, England

Westminster Abbey after the crowds

Selected evenings

Engines

Merlin engines, racing lines and working factories.

Goodwood Aerodrome, West Sussex, England

Fly in a Spitfire

Take off from a Battle of Britain airfield in a two seat Spitfire, climb over the South Downs and turn for the Channel. For many travellers, this is the reason for the whole trip.

Spring to autumn

MINI Plant Oxford, England

Where the MINI is made

Year round

Goodwood Estate, West Sussex, England

Goodwood, by invitation

July and September

Weybridge, Surrey, England

Mercedes-Benz World at Brooklands

Year round

Herefordshire, England

Off road at Eastnor Castle

Year round

Warwickshire, England

Aston Martin at Gaydon

Year round, weekdays

Great railways

Sleepers, steam and lines through impossible country.

From London Victoria, England

The Britannic Explorer

The first luxury sleeper train in England and Wales. Three nights to Cornwall, the Lake District or Wales, with dining by a chef who holds eight Michelin stars, a wellness suite on board and grand suites with a butler.

Spring to autumn

Scottish Highlands, Scotland

The Royal Scotsman

Spring to autumn

From London Victoria, England

Lunch aboard the British Pullman

Year round

Fort William to Mallaig, Scotland

The Jacobite steam train

Spring to autumn

Ireland, Ireland

The Emerald Isle Express

Selected departures

Caernarfon to Porthmadog, Wales

The Ffestiniog and Welsh Highland

Spring to autumn

The Season

The dates the country dresses for.

Berkshire, England

Royal Ascot

Five days in June of racing, millinery and morning dress. We arrange the hospitality, brief your guests on the dress code and handle the chauffeured arrival.

June

London, England

Wimbledon

Late June and July

Edinburgh Castle, Scotland

The Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo

August

Oxfordshire, England

Henley Royal Regatta

Early July

London, England

RHS Chelsea Flower Show

May

Oxfordshire, England

Henley Royal Regatta

Early July

Taste

Poured where it is made.

Speyside, Scotland

Straight from the cask

A private tasting in a bonded warehouse, the valinch drawn straight from the cask by the people who fill them. Speyside is home to more distilleries than any other whisky region.

Inner Hebrides, Scotland

Islay, an island of distilleries

Spring to autumn

Midleton, County Cork, Ireland

Irish whiskey in Cork

Year round

Sussex and Kent, England

English sparkling wine

Late spring to harvest

Hampshire, England

Gin in a Victorian mill

Year round

London, England

The American Bar at the Savoy

Year round

Screen and story

The sets and houses behind the stories.

Hampshire, England

Highclere Castle

The real Downton Abbey and home of the Earls of Carnarvon, open on selected dates each summer.

Summer

Doune, Culross and Blackness, Scotland

Outlander country

Year round

North Yorkshire, England

Castle Howard

Spring to autumn

Porthcurno, Cornwall, England

A play at the Minack

Spring to early autumn

Black Country Living Museum, Midlands, England

Peaky Blinders country

Year round

County Londonderry, Northern Ireland

The walls of Derry

Year round

Made by hand

At the loom and the bench, with the maker.

Isle of Harris, Scotland

Weave Harris Tweed at the loom

The only fabric in the world protected by its own Act of Parliament, and it is still woven at home by hand in the Outer Hebrides. Sit with a weaver in the shed, work the treadles, and take the cloth away.

Elgin, Moray, Scotland

Cashmere at Johnstons of Elgin

Year round, weekdays

Scotland, Scotland

Design a tartan of your own

Year round, allow lead time

Barlaston, Staffordshire, England

Throw a pot at Wedgwood

Year round

London, England

A morning on Savile Row

Year round

Lock and Co, London, England

Fitted for a hat in St James

Year round

Learn the dish

Hands in the bowl. Dinner is what you made.

Working sheep farm near Stirling, Scotland

Make your own haggis

Blend your own spice mix, fill and tie your own haggis with a master haggis maker, then sit down to scotch broth, your haggis with neeps and tatties, and cranachan. Vegetarian haggis as standard.

Year round

Bakewell, Derbyshire, England

Bake the original Bakewell pudding

Year round

Edinburgh and Speyside, Scotland

Blend your own whisky

Year round

London, England

Distil and bottle your own gin

Year round

Cheddar, Somerset, England

Cheddar made in the gorge

Year round

Shanagarry, County Cork, Ireland

A day at Ballymaloe

Year round

Signature gastronomy

Kitchens, vines and boats.

London, Edinburgh and Dublin, England

The chefs table

A table set inside the kitchen of a starred restaurant, the pass two feet away, courses handed over by the chef who made them and explained as they land. Six to fourteen guests, and the hardest booking on the page.

Year round, books months ahead

London and the Cotswolds, England

Cook the menu, then eat it

Year round

Sussex and Kent, England

Harvest day at an English vineyard

September and October

Cornwall and Connemara, England

Forage the shore, cook the catch

Spring to autumn

Loch Fyne and West Cork, Scotland

Shellfish straight off the boat

Spring to autumn

England and Ireland, England

Lunch from the walled garden

Late spring to autumn

Behind the gates

Factories, libraries and rooms with no public ticket.

Goodwood, West Sussex, England

Where a Rolls-Royce is built by hand

The wood shop, the leather shop and the quiet line where each car is finished by hand, including the coachline drawn down the body in a single stroke by one painter with a brush.

Year round, weekdays

Cheshire, England

Bentley at Crewe

Year round, weekdays

London, England

The Italian Job, in convoy

Year round

The Postal Museum, London, England

Ride the Mail Rail

Year round

Oxford, England

Dine at high table in Oxford

Term time, by arrangement

Bath, England

Dinner beside the Roman Baths

Year round, evenings

What money can buy

Not sold to the public. A phone call, not a ticket.

Leith, Edinburgh, Scotland

Dinner aboard the Royal Yacht Britannia

Piped aboard over the Royal Brow by the Pipe Major, champagne in the State Drawing Room, a private tour of five decks, then the mahogany doors open on the candlelit State Dining Room where Mandela, Clinton and Sinatra were entertained. Dinner is cooked in the original Royal Galley. From 8 to 196 guests, with Beat Retreat or a ceilidh on the Royal Deck after.

Year round, evenings

England, Scotland and Ireland, England

Fireworks over a great house

Year round, licence and lead time required

Natural History Museum, London, England

Dinner under the blue whale

Year round, evenings

Greenwich, London, England

Dine beneath Cutty Sark

Year round, evenings

Hampton Court Palace, England

A banquet in the Great Hall

Year round, evenings

Hebridean waters, Scotland

Cruise the islands as the Royal Family did

Spring to autumn

Stars and time

Where Britain set the clock and still watches the sky.

Royal Observatory Greenwich, England

Dinner on the Meridian

A reception standing on the Meridian Line itself, with London on both sides. Drinks among the Harrison timekeepers, dinner in the Octagon Room and the telescope opened for the evening. Sixty for dinner, a hundred and twenty for a reception.

Year round, evenings

Northumberland, England

A night at Kielder Observatory

Autumn to early spring

County Armagh, Northern Ireland

Armagh Observatory and Planetarium

Year round

Blackford Hill, Scotland

Astronomy above Edinburgh

Autumn to early spring

Boyne Valley, County Meath, Ireland

Newgrange and the solstice

Year round, solstice by lottery

Country pursuits

Tweed, whistles and seven in the morning.

Suffolk, England

Dawn on the Newmarket gallops

Stand on the heath at first light as strings of racehorses work past, then breakfast and a look inside a training yard in the town that invented the sport.

Year round, early mornings

England and Scotland, England

Clay shooting on a country estate

Year round

River Tay, Perthshire, Scotland

Salmon fishing with a ghillie

Spring to autumn

Scottish Highlands, Scotland

Throw the caber

Spring to autumn

Kerry and Snowdonia, Ireland

Sheepdogs at work

Year round

Dublin, Ireland

Hurling and Gaelic football

Year round

Wild edges

Basalt, sea cliffs and open Highland.

County Mayo, Ireland

Falconry at Ashford Castle

Walk the woods of a thirteenth century estate as a Harris hawk flies from the trees and lands on your glove.

Year round

County Clare, Ireland

The Burren by four wheel drive

Spring to autumn

Zip World Velocity, Eryri, Wales

The fastest zip line

Most of the year

Inner Hebrides, Scotland

Sea eagles off Mull

Spring to autumn

Inner Hebrides, Scotland

Peat cutting on Islay

Spring and summer

Shetland, Scotland

Northern lights in Shetland

Winter

Tell us the moment. We will find the door.

Dates, group size, the experiences you want. We come back with availability and net rates in writing. Contracted direct, operated by our own team on the day.

Or write to operations@interopa.co.uk and call +44 20 7258 0009.