In reply to Climbing Pieman:
I went into In Focus (@Brockholes - Preston) to do some very initial research on upgrades for my bins and small scope - this is what I found out...
Bins - currently Hawke Frontier HD-X 8x42 (£280 last year), and my questions were should I have bought the ED-X (exactly the same but with ED glass), should I upgrade? Answer, yes you should have (would have cost £120 more at the time) but no, not worth upgrading to. If you're going to upgrade then to make a significant visual difference you'll need to be looking at £600-700+.
Chatting with the guy in the shop, he was saying that although more expensive bins will give a nicer view, he wouldn't be able to id something with £2000 bins that he couldn't id with £300 bins (a Mini gets you there as effectively as a Rolls, just not as nicely).
Scope - currently Hawke Endurance 12-36x50 (£210 in 2020), and my question was, would a £500-600 scope with ED glass be significantly better? Answer, yes especially if it's got a bigger objective lens (more light) which allows more useful magnification.
This would allow you to id something at distance that you couldn't id with the cheaper scope.
So when I do make the next optical "investment", it'll be a scope upgrade.
My advice to you would be to invest as much as you can when buying a scope, to get as good optical quality as you can.
Oh, and decent tripods (which you'll need for a full size scope) aren't cheap either ☹