Britain's best attractions – that most people have never heard of

Telegraph

30-03-2025

The British Museum was recently revealed as the nation's most visited attraction, with 5.8 million people passing through its doors in 2023, according to the latest figures from the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions (ALVA). The Natural History Museum and The Crown Estate in Windsor both also saw visitor numbers surpass 5 million (5.7 million and 5.4 million respectively) as day trips to the Britain's top sites skyrocketed.
But you don't need to shuffle shoulder-to-should with the masses for a grand day out. From a Victorian mansion in the Cotswolds and heading under ground in Suffolk to modern art on the outskirts of Edinburgh and celebrity pubs on the Thames, these attractions all come recommended by The Telegraph's destination experts and span the entire nation.
They promise not only a queue-free experience, but the chance to explore like a local and discover corners of Britain the crowds often forget – what's more, some are entirely free to visit. For further inspiration find more of the best things to do across Britain in our dedicated guides, and share your favourite underrated attractions in the comments.
Southern Cemetery
Chorlton, Manchester
Free to visit; tours cost £15, plus booking fee
Wander among the graves of some of Manchester's most famous former residents four-and-a-half miles south of the city centre, in the suburb of Chorlton. Southern Cemetery is the largest municipal cemetery in the UK and here you can see the final resting places of the city's first multi-millionaire, textile entrepreneur, John Rylands; Mr Manchester, Anthony Wilson, who founded Factory Records and the Hacienda nightclub; artist LS Lowry; and Manchester United manager Sir Matt Busby.
Its grand avenues of beech and plane trees, plus wildflower areas also make it a lovely place to stroll – in fact, in March 2025, a 28-hectare section of it was named as Manchester's latest local nature reserve. Its size can make it tricky to navigate, so consider booking a tour with local guide Emma Fox who runs both private and public tours. What more? A 32-mile cycle trail, which passes through Manchester and Salford's cemeteries, has recently been launched, too.
Cathy Toogood
Kerdroya, Colliford Lake
Bodmin Moor, Cornwall
Free; parking £2.90 for two hours
Most visitors flock to Cornwall's coastal villages and beaches, but inland the county is just as beautiful, and a lot quieter. Cornwall's largest inland water, Colliford Lake and nearby Dozmary Pool (where it is said the Lady of the Lake handed King Arthur the sword Excalibur) are on Bodmin Moor, one of the area's most dramatic National Landscapes (previously AONB), just minutes from the A30.
Next to Colliford Lake is a new installation, Kerdroya, a living labyrinth of Cornish hedges stretching 56m in diameter. Follow the path between walls and among wildflowers to the steel Thrussells installation at the centre. Nearby, waymarked trails take in lake views and Cornwall's vast moorland landscape which many visitors often overlook.
Rachel Buchanan
Woodchester Mansion
The Cotswolds
£11 (adult); £2 (child 5-16); free (under 5)
Hidden among the trees in the secluded Woodchester Valley near Nailsworth, and a mile from any road, is a secret house: the Victorian Gothic Woodchester Mansion. It's also one of the most memorable houses in the Cotswolds, for it has not been – and will never be – completed.
There's no glass in the windows, limited staircases and barely any floors. The listed building, completed externally but not internally, is an extraordinary architectural exhibit, the craftsmanship exceptional, yet your imagination is required to finish the house.
Intricately carved corbels stand ready to receive vaulted ceilings that never materialised, Gothic arches part-finished, and the marks of the carpenter's pencil poised for a non-existent completion. The residents are a large colony of endangered greater and lesser horseshoe bats – the subject of the world's longest (since 1959) continuous scientific study of the species.
Caroline Mills
Jupiter Artland
Edinburgh
£11.80 (adult); £10.80 (concession); £7.50 (children)
You'll find an entirely new perspective on modern art in this extraordinary sculpture park set in a wooded estate on the outskirts of Edinburgh (take Bus X23 to the gates).
Moving around, on and through works of world-class artists like Anish Kapoor, Antony Gormley and Ian Hamilton Finlay is uniquely absorbing, with children (and adults) welcome to get up close, touch, even swim in a work of art in the Joana Vasconcelos Gateway Pool.
Book tickets online, treat yourself to lunch, a snack or afternoon tea in the café and immerse yourself (literally) in the experience.
Linda Macdonald
The historic Thames Path
London
The 40-mile-long Thames Path offers plenty of hidden London gems along its quieter stretches. A particularly lovely East-London section takes in two legendary pubs that are the oldest in London: The Prospect of Whitby, once a favourite haunt of Charles Dickens; and The Grapes, a centuries-old riverside pub where Sir Ian McKellen is the leaseholder – from the terrace you can admire Anthony Gormley's Another Time sculpture that stands in the water.
Alison Taylor
St Peter and St Paul's church
Pickering, North Yorkshire
Free
Most visitors to Pickering, a market town on the southern edge of the North York Moors, are here for the ruined medieval castle, the jolly market and, especially, for a steam-train ride on the North Yorkshire Moors Railway. But they really should take time to pop into St Peter and St Paul's church just behind the Market Square.
The 12th-century church surprises with its set of rare medieval wall-paintings (similar in appearance to frescoes), believed to be one of only five such examples in England. Rich, colourful and large – they stretch along both sides of the nave. Depicting biblical and saintly scenes, such as St Christopher rescuing the child Jesus, the beheading of St John the Baptist, St George slaying a dragon, and the fiery 'Harrowing of Hell', they are a treasured example of how brightly coloured medieval church interiors often were. They have a history of being painted over and 'rescued' several times, the last in the 1880s.
Helen Pickles
The Regency Town House
Brighton
£15 for a pre-booked 90-minute curator-led House Tour or Town Walk (April to October). Children and dogs welcome
Ever fancied poking your nose into one of the towering, butter-block town houses that flank Brighton and Hove's Regency squares? The grade-one-listed Regency Town House, part of architect Charles Busby's Brunswick Town estate, is a work-in-progress heritage and cultural hub. Between April and October it opens its doors for exhibitions, installations, period architecture and food-led workshops, readings, recitals and more. The handsome garden square in front is open to all.
During festivals, national heritage events and the annual Artist Open Houses, you may be lucky enough to find the 1820s basement kitchen open for tea and cake. Pack a bonnet.
Teresa Machan
Johnny Wood and Borrowdale Yews
Borrowdale, Cumbria
Free
Think of the Lake District, and lakes, waterfalls and fells come to mind. Woodland, not so much – although the area was once largely covered by trees. Borrowdale has one of the area's largest remnants of temperate rainforest (and now a National Nature Reserve) with the indigenous oaks of Johnny Wood, roughly between the villages of Rosthwaite and Seatoller, a delight to walk through.
Almost primaeval in feel, with their lush green mosses, lichens, liverworts and ferns carpeting the floor and boulders, you're a world away from the bustling honey-pots. A mile further south, along the narrow road from Seatoller towards Seathwaite, a footpath skirts the lower slopes of Seatoller Fell. From here, look up carefully to spot three magnificent yew trees on the fellside above. At least 1,500 years old, William Wordsworth captured them (when there were four) in his poem Yew-Trees.
Helen Pickles
Castle Acre
Norfolk
£7.70 (adult); £4 (child 5-17 years)
Hiding in plain sight, this extraordinary spot near Swaffham is visible from the A1065, the main through route to North Norfolk from the south, yet ignored by the stream of holidaymakers and day-trippers intent on the coast.
Take time to pause, however, and you'll not only discover one of the UK's largest and best-preserved monastic sites, dating to 1090, but also the spectacular remains of a Norman castle built by an ally of William the Conqueror and a well-preserved bailey gate from the 1200s. Explore Castle Acre 's Priory exhibition, absorb the audio tour and enjoy a leisurely picnic in the grounds.
Sophie Butler
Kilmartin Glen
Argyll and Bute
Kilmartin Glen, free; Kilmartin Museum £9.50, March to October
It's hard to find ruins quite as evocative as those of Kilmartin Glen on the west coast of Argyll. Begin by overlooking successive burial cairns from the roadside, then pass through fields of black-face sheep to a prehistoric collection of stone circles, cist chambers and henge monuments that are older than Stonehenge, older even than the Great Pyramid of Giza.
Perhaps, though, the wooded glen's most wonderful feature isn't its extra layer of Neolithic or Bronze Age remains, or the rock art sites that are denser than anywhere else in Britain (there are more than 800 at the last count). The most magnificent attraction is its stories are still being unearthed from the soil by archaeologists — and so much of this history is still waiting to be discovered.
Mike MacEacheran
Salmesbury Hall
Salmesbury, Lancashire
Admission by voluntary donation; parking is free
Salmesbury Hall is reputedly one of the most haunted houses in Britain. The 14th-century manor is, apparently, home to at least 13 ghosts, who wander its creaking floorboards and spook staff after hours. Visitors can join these ghostly goings-on on nighttime torchlight tours of the manor.
If spectral investigations aren't your thing, Salmesbury Hall is also a charming place to visit in the daytime. The popular 'audiences with Henry VIII' will delight the young history buff in the family, while their regular rotation of fairs, markets and lectures make it engaging for the grown-up visitor, too.
Grime's Graves
Suffolk/Norfolk
£9 (adult); £23 (family); English Heritage members free
Despite being an English Heritage attraction, Grime's Graves remains under-the-radar for most visitors to East Anglia because it's, well, underground. Situated on the edge of Thetford Forest on the Norfolk- Suffolk border (it's technically in Norfolk), Grime's Graves is Britain's only accessible neolithic flint mine, and as such a glimpse into its industrial past.
Sitting amid a weird lunar landscape of green mounds and craters, the site is just one of many flint mines that would have been here – basically a circular pit, nine metres deep and accessed by a steel ladder. It's become a bit more accessible – and comprehensible – following a major Lottery-funded upgrade in 2024, which added an above-ground visitor centre and a below-ground immersive film and audio installation showing the lives of the folk who lived and worked here.