Warwick Castle

A tourist trap.

As a commercial entity, it is neither English Heritage nor National Trust, so you will have to pay full price for your entry, plus £6 for parking (which (1) you only find out after you park there, and (2) the parking lot is a 15-to-20-minute walk from the castle). Depending on your level of entry and the age of your children, expect to pay around £100 for a family of 4.

No audio tour. This castle is not intended to educate you on the castle and its history, but rather to entertain you. Unfortunately, they come up short on the entertainment side. What you won’t learn on your visit to Warwick Castle is how it was built by William the Conqueror and was held by the powerful Earls of Warwick for several hundred years. The history is quite fascinating, so you should watch the documentary Secrets of Great British Castles on Netflix instead.

The hedge maze. Probably the worst one in the British Isles. The hedges are so low and sparse that it would be impossible to get lost in it. Not to mention that all paths converge anyway on some cheesy “educational” play areas. As with many touristy spots in June, the place is overrun with school groups, but even the kids in school were noticeably bored with the maze. Our ten year-old son was not entertained by it, though he was more diplomatic than I: “Enh, not the best.”

The dungeons. Cost an extra £9 per person, and totally not worth it. Really cheesy, not scary at all. Pretty much just caricatures of medieval stereotypes.  And, by the way, your £9 did not cover the pictures they try to sell you at the end for £20. Skip it. Your time is better spent walking back to the parking lot.

It wasn't all negative, however. Several rooms have been decorated or furnished, and the arms and armor collection is quite good.

Arms and armor display at Warwick Castle. The Tower of London's is better, though.

The best part of our visit was the longbow demonstration. England was famed for its longbowmen in the Middle Ages. A war bow could shoot up to a quarter of a mile, but the bow that was used for our demonstration was a 6'7" hunting longbow with about half the draw weight of a war bow. Still, the bowman reckoned he could shoot an arrow clear over Warwick Castle with a full draw. Due to its difficulty to master, English law required children of all classes to train on the bow at least once a week from the age of 6. This constant training was required to build up the strength to draw a full-size battle longbow and also to gain an instinct as to how the arrow will fly. The bowman never aimed his bow, he just pointed and shot. And hit. I have a video of him shooting 4 arrows in pretty quick succession at a man-sized target about 200 feet distant, and hitting all 4 in the chest.

Nock! Draw! Loose!

I also wanted to catch the trebuchet demonstration, since I have never seen a trebuchet fire in real life. However, our dungeon passes were timed for 3 o’clock, which meant we stood in line for half an hour before we were admitted to the cheesy dungeon tour around 3:30. And by the time we emerged from the dungeons, it was 4:10. We hustled down to the demo, hoping we would not have missed it — it started at 4 — but by 4:15 it was all over. I’m a bit annoyed at that.

All told, I cannot recommend Warwick Castle. Their website makes it seem like a wonderfully entertaining experience, but it wasn’t, and it was expensive. Save the money for something else. You will get a lot more out of visiting other, better castles, which I have already written about.