Great get away from it all, relaxing family holiday (Center Parcs)

Member Name: greysanatomyfan

Product:	Center Parcs
Date:	31/08/09 (183 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Beautiful setting, good range of accommodation, very family-friendly

Disadvantages: Activities cost a fortune

I have visited Center Parcs Sherwood Forest in Nottingham once and Longleat Forest in Wiltshire twice and highly recommend both. My review below is mainly of Longleat as that is the one I've visited most recently. We have even booked to go back there in two months time.

WHO IS IT FOR?
I think everyone will find something of interest at Center Parcs as there's so much to do there and is set in such a beautiful, tranquil setting. We have been as a couple and again since our son was born. He was 18 months old the last time we went and we all had a great time.

WHATS THE ACCOMMODATION LIKE?
You stay in villas set around the village. Having a young child, we pay extra to stay in the central/middle area as none of us ride bikes and Longleat is quite hilly. There is a free land train that takes you from the villas on the outskirts to the centre but it does go all around the houses and can take a while. It also does not run on changeover day. We stayed in the fir area in our first visit to Longleat and found it a nightmare as it was a good hours walk into the centre and trying to get a young baby and a buggy on the land train was a struggle. The land trains do tend to get very full when the weathers bad too. We now always stay in the more central pine area and enjoy being able to walk to all the main attractions.

There are different grades of villas ranging from comfort, comfort plus, new style woodland, executive, new style woodland, new-style executive and exclusive. We have stayed in comfort, comfort plus and new style woodland. We would recommend the new style woodland as the decor is nice and modern and you get more amenities. With comfort you don't get towels, a DVD player or a dishwasher but you do with comfort plus. If you want daily maid service you need to choose one of the executive or exclusive lodges.

ACTIVITIES AVAILABLE
What isn't available is a better question. As our son was only 18 months old last time we went, the only things we participated in was swimming and tinie tots tumble time. The swimming pool is free and is fabulous. It has a separate toddler pool, wave machine, flumes, rapids and outdoor pool. The changing rooms are also fab as they have family changing rooms all with cubicles. The tinie tots tumble time was quite expensive for what it was and the session time of 30 minutes was very short. I think Center Parcs should have a free soft play area for children to use at all times.

If you have older children that want to participate in lots of activities the holiday will cost you a fortune - so please bear that in mind!

RESTAURANTS
The lodges are self-catering and there is even a reasonably priced and well-stocked supermarket on site. However I don't go on holidays to cook so we visited many of the restaurants. Each has a good children's menu but not a very varied adults menu. The prices and food we ate were pretty average. The italian restaurant Strada was our favourite.

Overall I would recommend Center Parcs for a relaxing family-friendly holiday or even for couples looking for peace and tranquility. The activities though are not great value for money so bear that in mind if you or your children want to participate in many.

Summary: Brilliant get-away for families and couples.