Where we've been

The best holiday ever!

3 months ago

in Family, Reviews, Where we've been

A look back at our holiday to Groupotel Mar de Menorca in May 2011 – from the point of view of a 4 year old!

When I woke up I remembered – no more sleeps to go! I went to wake up Mummy and Daddy and tell them it’s time to go on our first holiday!

We went to the airport (it’s just near school) and my best friend Woof Woof had to go through a big machine – I didn’t like that bit. We got on a big plane and it made a really loud noise but then it zoomed off faster than superman into the sky. I loved it! We even had lunch on the plane but I couldn’t see the little TV screens as I was too small.

Mummy said that when we got to our holiday it would be nice and warm, Menorca is a sunny place to go. But when we got out of the plane it was raining, everybody was a bit cross.

Where we were going to live was really big and the swimming pool was right outside our door! It was still raining and nearly dark so we went to have some tea. There were not many people there but there was lots of food and I could have anything I wanted – that was so cool! Somebody else’s Daddy said the food was a bit rubbish, but there was chips and meat and pasta and rice and some vegetables and I like all those things! There were lots of different ice creams too and the best bit was that it was the same food everyday so I always loved it. I wish it was like that when we are not on holiday!

Every day we went swimming in the pool (which was a bit cold) and I played with my new best friend Amelie, she lived next door to us and we played with each other’s toys. We played games with the grown-ups at the holiday too – there was a funny man called Chocolate who got us to do sports and we danced with him at the disco at night, and there were some grown up girls who played games with us and painted fire engines and butterflies on our arms after tea.

Mummy and Daddy did some sports too and Mummy read lots of books – she likes sitting in the sun reading but I like to run around and hide and talk to people with funny voices. I thought everyone would speak like Dora but they didn’t.

Each day more and more people came to our holiday, so sometimes we couldn’t sit right outside our room, but there was more and more food too. One day we walked down to the sea and it was really nice but there was a really big hill to go back up. Another day we went on a bus and looked around some shops then played on a big park.

Daddy won some money playing bingo 3 nights in a row and sometimes after tea there were shows to watch too. When it was time to come home I was really sad, I was going to miss the holiday and Amelie.

It’s really fun to look at the pictures from my holiday and I still sing the song from the disco…Chu chu ua, chu chu ua, chu chu ua ua ua…

As far as first family holidays go it was brilliant! The place gets some really bad reviews but some awesome ones too. It was perfect for what we needed – a cheap break away, all inclusive and from a local airport. Friendly staff and safe for kids. We’d definitely go back.

This was our entry to the Tots100/ Al Fresco Holidays competition. Their sites look amazing and we would totally love to visit one someday, for now it’s a muddy camp site in Norfolk for us! There’s still time to enter the competition – take a look here

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Boggles, Twiggles & Thorny Crocklebogs!

8 months ago

in Family, Keep it local, Reviews, Where we've been

A few weeks ago we started to read the Tom Blofield story ‘A Boggle at BeWILDerwood’, that tells of Swampy, a marsh boggle and the adventures he has in the world of Bewilderwood. Along the way he joins up with his cousin Moss and a twiggle named Leaflette and they journey accross the broken bridge, down slippery slopes, meet a thornyclod spider and a vegetarian crocklebog with a lisp called Mildred.

The language in the book is quite advanced (even for me!), but at the end of each nightly chapter a few questions ensured that J understood what was happening and where the story was going!

With some careful planning we finished the story on Friday night. On Saturday we set off, with our friends Charlie, Daz, Toby & Evan, on our very own boggle adventure, in Norfolk’s very own magical world of BeWILDerwood!

And it really is magical! We started off on a boat ride through the Dismal Dyke where you can see the Boggle Village, and onto the Sccaaaaary Lake, home of the star of the show – Mildred the Crocklebog! True to the book, Mildred has some rather unsavoury habits and snorted a load of water all over the boat, making us all jump!

The boat ride only really takes a few minutes, and then the real fun begins. Once you have decided which way to turn you are met with all sorts of things to do. We started off with some den building – an area dedicated to constructing your very own shelter, or in our case we claimed squatters rights on an already built den with J & Toby adding a few final finishing touches!

We then spent some time in Toddlewood Valley, one of 2 dedicated areas for the younger members of the family. There are tall towers, small zip wires and stepping stones to negotiate. This area was great but the eye’s of the boys (big & small) were fixed on the bigger stuff!

Huge treehouses, slides, zip wires, tunnels, the broken bridge and a very muddy mudlde maze kept us entertained for hours. in my quest to get a good picture of the boys coming down the slippery slope they came off the end and landed face first in the mud – and I didn’t even get a picture!

There are plenty of places to stop and get a drink or bite to eat and the prices are reasonable. Whilst we had a drink, J was drawn to the music coming from the Big Hat tent and went to join in with a dance all about the characters. Also in the tent were various craft tables where you could make your own handbag or tiara just like Mildred’s or have your face painted (for a small fee).

All the time we were on the look out for large coloured butterflies around the woods so we could claim a special reward at the end, if we spotted them all! The weather was not fantastic but due to all the trees we really didn’t get very wet! Because of the weather though we didn’t go along to any of the story telling times (I’m not sure if they went ahead in the rain) and we didn’t take part in the Crocklebog Challenge situated near the entrance and not particularly sheltered.

If you were wondering about last week’s Silent Sunday post, it was taken here at the FarTree where lost shoes end up!

At 4 and nearly 3 the boys were able to do most things, but equally the adults found plenty to amuse themselves too. The most surprising thing is how accessible everywhere was for a buggy – at only a few months old Evan couldn’t really do much, but he was able to see everything and go almost everywhere.

BeWILDerwood is a fantastic family day out, even the weather couldn’t spoil it. Even without reading the books you can’t fail to be taken in by the story surrounding it. A trip to the Bizarre Bazaar before leaving saw us bringing home our very own Mildred, who is now part of the family!

Whilst we were there they were hosting Mildred’s Crocklebog Capers, other events take place around the year – the next is at Halloween - Snagglefang’s Spooky Spectacular, see the website for details. Entrance starts at £8.50 and varies depending on height (those under 3 feet go free) and annual passes start at £30 – great value for such a fantastic adventure playground. It is open from February until October half term although not every day during term time.

We had a brilliant day out at BeWILDerwood, for the purpose of writing this review we were granted free entry which we were very grateful for!

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My first holiday

1 year ago

in Family, Where we've been

Mummy, there are no more sleeps to go! It’s time to go on our family holiday – get up!!

Let’s just say the excitement had been building for J’s first holiday abroad (our first for 5 years). We booked it just after Christmas and stupidly told him straight away, so then had a 5 month countdown – Doh!

Here’s J’s holiday in pictures (the rare occasions when he didn’t have the camera!)

I packed my suitcase & Woof-Woof is ready to go