If I recall correctly (I may be rusty here) The Uk has a VFR mandate for being in sight of the ground. In Johnny Foreign land of EASA there is something colloquially called VFR "on top". EASA rules may have changed the UK rules that are in my Air Law book, but the weather hasn't read any books, new or old. Some examples:
-Flying this morning was particularly grotty. The cloud didn't have a base. It just got soupier and soupier as you went up. I never got 2000'. Terrain avoidance, land clear and even the 500 ft rule were all in my mind. Yes I was also lit up like a Christmas tree.
-In the later morning, the cloud lifted and threatened to have holes. There was absolutely no way I was going to go up through them, because I'd have a bigger problem: how to get back down through them.
-Consider that most beautiful of alternative days. Lovely puffy cumulus to play around. You are on a cross country. The Cu becomes strato cumulus and your 3/8 becomes 5/8 with patches of blanket across parts of the terrain. You can see the ground -frequently, but this becomes occasionally. What was that town? That becomes the new game. It's all too easy to head off 30 degrees away from your planned route.
It's better to be on the ground wishing you were in the air, than being in the air wishing you were on the ground.