European center parcs

[madamefraser]

I know this topic has been done to death , but am more confused the more I read..we are looking for a CP holiday 4-5 hours ( at a push ) from Calais in August , we are planning a two centre holiday..a week or 4 days in CP with a few days or more in another holiday park somewhere ( not CP) .
For those who have been , would you recommend one of the ones in Belgium / Netherlands or possibly drive a bit further to the ones in Northern France ..?
What accommodation would you recommend booking ?
They all seem very big, is it worth looking at the smaller ones, if there are any ?
I think Germany would probably be too far .

BrownTurkey - did you know that you can spend the day in any of the other local Centre Parcs while you are there and use their facilities. While we were in Erperheide we spent a whole day at De Vossemeren, which is around a 30 min drive away.

OP - I believe Canvas holidays are offering 40%off summer holidays at Duinrell this week.

Thanks all, now I'm all a fluster ..haven't booked Landal, but now looking at Het Meerdal and Erperhide , the latter coming out as fave..we still have De Vossermeren for a weekend. Bruffin you mentioned you had been to Het Meerdal..what did you think of it ?
Duinrell loos amazing but you have to pay extra for the pool apparently which has put DH right off. Am very excited for someone who was moaning about not going for a hot hot summer holiday this year...

You dont have to pay extra for pool at Duinrell but you only can use it for 2 hours a day.
Het meerdal is a quieter and doesnt have extras like ski dome or tropical dome, but still plenty to do .

The €22 entry for pool is for outside visitors.

"When you stay at Duinrell during winter from November till March, unlimited entry to the tropical Tiki Pool is included. When you stay at Duinrell in the summer from April till October, unlimited entry to the amusement park and two hours free entry to the tropical Tiki Pool daily between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. for the complete duration of your stay, is included."
From the website. It is really good value for money. End of August is cheapest as the Dutch have gone back to school.
We did 5 days at Erperheide then 7 days at Duinrell

Hof van Saksen in NL is a Landal park and is pretty amazing. Water flumes are awesome. Booked for a second year there this summer and before then we never went to the same place twice.

If Amsterdam is still part of the plan, take a look at my blog www.amsterdamwonderland.com

I'm the family blogger for the City of Amsterdam site and have loads of family friendly ideas on my own blog (both in Amsterdam and the rest of the Netherlands)

Let me know if I can help with anything and have an amazing time x

I believe you have to pay extra for the pool at Duinrell if you book through Canvas or Eurocamp but if you book through Duinrell directly you get 2 hours a day thrown in. Looks like there is pretty limited availability for Duinrell in August now though.
Erperheide is great. Smaller than De Vossemeren but has some extras like a bungee jump activity, a huge soft play area for children and more of an outside area at the swimming pool. We very much enjoyed both De Vossemeren and Erperheide.

Oh and I have now found out there is a ski dome just outside Erperheide if you fancy trying a bit of skiing during your stay!

We are at Erperheide now if you want to know anything specific!

Poorbuthappy any tips for eating out or any nice places that don't require a small mortgage as at the uk parks ? Have you eaten off site at all ?

Tracelab thank you ! We are looking for places to stay but trying to do it on a budget is really hard..we are looking at other areas, eg Utrecht and Haarlem..are they good places to stay near Amsterdam , or would you say, try to stay in the city if you can. It will be my 5th trip, but only my first with two teenage DDs . We are very excited !!

I dont know if the still do it. You used to be able to buy vouchers in advance for food to eat at the various restaurants. Also children under 12 ate free, but that was a few years back

When we stayed at Erperheide we went to a really lovely restaurant in Peer (a very short drive away) called De Potter. Our meal was gorgeous and the ice creams looked amazing but unfortunately we were too full to try one!

The restaurants in Erperheide itself are pretty limited but there is a buffet place, the Grand Cafe (bar food) and a grill restaurant. We weren't impressed with the grill as it was very expensive and service was terrible. Grand Cafe did nice pizzas and I believe they offer a takeaway service. We didn't try the buffet place.

De Vossemeren has the same selection but with the addition of a nice Italian called Nonnas. There is a restaurant nearby in Lommel called Diana's which gets very good trip advisor reviews. We meant to try it but ran out of time.

We are on site on Monday night due to an horrendous journey after which we couldn’t be bothered to cook!
Chicken nuggets for the kids( 3 of them), salad for me and calamari for husband. That plus drinks was 58 Euro. Bearing in mind my drink was a carafe of rose which was 13.5 euros!!!!

The restaurants seem fine to be honest. Not massively expensive but we tend not to eat on site. Even at Disneyland Paris we jump in the car and go to the shopping centre to eat in the food court because it’s better value for money!

We also bring tons of food with us!!!

If you you can visit efteling for the day even better. Amsterdam lovely city with dc, mine loved it, I do too.

poorbuthappy, did you get stuck in traffic at Antwerp on the way? We had this on the way to De Vossemeren so drove back via Brussels instead. Traffic was still quite slow but at least it was moving!

We are going to De Jempervennen on Friday. We take the kids scooters to reduce the walking for them. We have also been to Eroerheide, which was lovely, but a bit tired when we were there, 3 years ago

pinkchampagne1 yes on the ring road but because of an accident!
I’ve read that its 6 of 1 and half a dozen of the other as to whether Antwerp or Brussels is quicker!!

Just to update we came home via Brussels and decided we would do Antwerp again everytime!!!

Oh dear, I take it Brussels was no better! Hope your journey wasn't too horrendous

Has anyone stayed at le Bois francs? Just booked a cheap week in the summer holidays and the reviews aren't looking too good.

Stayed at

Holland Het Hejderbos, De Emhof, Port Zealande, De Kempervennen - twice
France Les Bois Aux Daims - twice, le lac d'ailette, les trois forets in August this year, Villages Nature in May this year
Belgium
De Vossermeren

I like them so much more than the UK parks - so many interesting things to do. The holiday clubs are amazing - my children have ridden in speedboats being pirates, taken part in plays, made pizzas, been Indians roasting marshmallows - so many things

We use our clubcard vouchers to pay for the chunnel. Stock the car with food, and grandma, and just go.

As the kids have got older we now use them as a base for exploring the region. For example we went to De Emhof but drove to Amsterdam first, had a few days there and then went to Centreparcs. We went to Disneyland and then drove to Les Bois Aux Daims. This year we are doing Villages Natures but spending time in Paris. In August it is Les Trois Forests and we will go to Strasbourg and even Luxembourg if we can be bothered to drive it.

Oh and as someone mentioned previously I think you can go to different parks - Vossermen and Kempervennan are about 20 mins away from each other.

Thanks everyone..so interesting to find out about this , being a first timer..we have now booked a weekend in De Vossermeren, one week at Eperhide and two nights in an Airbnb near Amsterdam, where we can easily get on the park and ride into the city...am excited !
Only thing is now concerned about the whole Antwerp / Brussels road..and how long we should leave for the journey back to Calais from Amsterdam ..are the roads always madly busy with delays ? Does anyone know ?