Duinrell. Any tips?

[Rhinofeet]

Thinking of booking Duinrell for May half term. Travelling with an 8 year old and 15month old.

Anyone been? What's it like? I imagine it's like centre parcs. Hoping there's enough to do for younger DS as there seems plenty to amuse the older one.

Anyone any tips? TIA

It's a fab place.. theme park has rides for all ages. Plus large playground. Indoor Water park is huge.. some rides have height restrictions. A new area in the water park designed for younger children.

The town of Wassenaar is lovely to stroll around with great restaurants.. it's just over the road from the main entrance of Duinrell.

We go back for 4th time in October half term.

Enjoy

Me and DH have been there 3 times (we don't have children). We love it there and we hated Centre Parcs!

Wassenaar is lovely (the Dutch King has his house there) so very expensive neighbourhood with some gorgeous houses. The restaurants are very affordable. There is a good supermarket there too. The one on site is not that big and can be expensive.

It's in a great location to visit other places too. We love Leiden, Delft, The Hague, Utrecht. I guess though with young children you will be in the amusement park every day

Been a while now but ours loved it and we went several times. We booked a top range caravan with (I think) Eurocamp. Wouldn't recommend the camping area as it looked quite run down and the tents are pitched very close together. When we first went they chucked in free access to the adjacent water park but it was eventually downgraded/limited in some way. Can't quite remember the details so check what's on offer.

Wassenaar is v. nice. We also went on a day trip to Amsterdam which was reachable.

Forgot to say, each time we have gone we have booked through the Sun newspaper holidays. We have had a lovely mobile home for much cheaper than it would have cost to book direct with the site

Eurocamp offers families travelling with babies and toddlers the option to precook lots of free baby and toddler equipment including travel cots, high chair, bedrail and booster seats. I'm not sure how it works with other providers.
We booked our ferry travel through Eurocamp, and it was considerably cheaper than booking it direct with the ferry operator. Booking it via Eurocamp also meant the cost of the ferry was added to the holiday price so we only had to pay the balance 8 weeks before departure.
Eurocamp check in is 3pm but we arrived at Duinrell at 10am. You can use the facilities of the park until your holiday home is ready.
The Dutch are pancake mad, and one of the best places to get pancakes near Duinrell is at the Pannenkoeken Huis just outside the park entrance. This pancake house serves a mixture of sweet and savoury pancakes and was the place we headed to for brunch just after we arrived at Duinrell. Kids pancakes cost about 4 Euros and adults pancakes range from 8 – 11 Euros depending on which toppings you have.
The best ice creams can be found at Luciano's in Waasenaar. This ice cream parlour serves some of the best ice creams in The Netherlands, and is just a 5 minute walk from Duinrell.
When you arrive at Duinrell, you will be given a Duinrell Information sheet telling you what is going on at the park during your stay. Look for the special days when the Tikibad is open at 9am for children smaller then 120cm and make sure you go. We went on one of these days and the pool was so quiet – we nearly had it to ourselves.

RiceKrispie, How did I forget about the ice cream parlour? When we were at Duinrell in 2016 it was really hot and we went to the parlour every evening after our meal for ice cream. The queue every evening went down the street!

Don’t stay with Eurocamp! We stayed there last May and the so called top of the range cabins were in poor condition. Everything was a shambles, they even gave us the keg for the wrong cabin - we found another family staying in it! Book direct with duirnells instead.

Meesh, we went last year. Booked through Sun holidays which is, of course, with Eurocamp.

We had no problems at all. Our mobile home was lovely and whereas other years we have had a 2 bedroom one (there is only me and DH) last year we had a 3 bedroom one.

Yes, book direct with Duinrell. Our cabins looked much nicer than the Eurocamp or Canvas ones. You can look at the plan and pick your duingalow. I think we were up at the 6/700s, nice and quiet and close to the back entrance to the park.
Booking direct also gives you three free hours in the Tiki Bad each day.

We went a couple of years ago at the end of summer. It's a HUGE site so I would pay the extra to choose your location. We were in the 'deluxe' cabin - it was not deluxe - and about a 20min walk from the entrance which was a bit of a pain with a toddler and young child. It's expensive to hire the go kart thingy for a whole week - we did it for a day and it was fun though. We stuck to the special younger children slots at the pool and it was still crazily busy with queues at those times.

Wassenaar is lovely and walkable from the site; the beach is also lovely but a long walk and parking is quite expensive and highly sought after. We concluded that our two were a little bit young to get the most out of it (5 and 3) especially as they didn't like swimming or rides!

Might go back though as it was so easy to get to. We booked direct.

I love Duinrell. We stayed in September with Canvas, and it was great - our of school hols though so v cheap. Whenever I’ve compared prices, regardless of the use of year, it’s always seemed considerably more expensive to book direct with Duinrell than via a third-party Eurocamp-type company, but then we’re not fussy about which company we use of what type of mobile home we rent, so I guess we can pick and choose a bit.

It’s a bit like Center Paris but less twee, and obviously CP doesn’t have the amusement park, which is brilliant. I’d say it’s best for kids of about 6 and upwards, but there’s loads to do for smaller kids too. My 18-mth old was allowed to go on a lot more rides than I expected! He was pretty impressed with the caterpillar rollercoaster :) our 7 and 9-yr old niece and nephew seemed to be able to go on the vast majority of rides.

The supermarket onsite is fairly pricey but there’s a Jumbo in town, which is sort of Sainsbury’s level. We took an Aldi shop with us from home bit next time I probably wouldn’t bother.

I liked the food in the Mediterranean buffet place - we went on a Friday night and I think had to book - but didn’t really eat anywhere else onsite.

Could I ask what is the best way to travel please? Do you get the ferry then drive? Or fly and hire a car? Thanks.

LyraBelaqua

We've always got the ferry from Harwich to The Hook of Holland and then drive to Duinrell. We always camp so need to drive but also it means that we can take our own bikes.

We drove to Hull and got the overnight ferry to Europoort (Rotterdam). It’s obly about 45 mins from the port to Duinrell and you go past the most hilariously hipster/modernist service station en route.

We’re thinking of camping next time (Aug school hols) Weetabix - what’re the crowds and queues likely to be like? (It was great in September!!) Do you have any preferred camping areas? There seem to be loads!

Watching, as we're thinking of going spring bank holiday next year.

If we were to fly, can we manage without a car? Is it easy enough to get to from the airport?

Laquila

We've always been during the school holidays and it was fine. No problems with queues. We always booked an extra large pitch with electric hookup.

Really like it there and if you get nice weather it's perfect.

We have always gone Dover to Dunkirk. We like to spend a few days on the way there and the way back on the Belgian coast.

Peabody25

We've never flown. What airport would you go to - Schipol? We've got the bus from Den Haag right into Duinrell so if you can see how to get from the airport to Den Haag it's quite easy to travel from there. Amsterdam is about an hour's drive away by car.

weetabixandshreddies yep it would be Schipol.

I don't think any of us would feel comfortable driving abroad and we can fly from our local airport. Will look into transfer options.

You could always contact Duinrell either by phone or email and ask. We've done that before and they were really helpful. Of course, as everywhere in Holland, they speak perfect English and ate very friendly.

Public transport is pretty easy, but you can also book taxi transfer direct from Schiphol to Duinrell with sun transfers (and possibly others).

Brilliant thank you, we'll look into that.

Just been looking at this site for a possible few days stop with our caravan on way back up to the ferry to Hull. Ditto to Weetabix’s question, has anyone camped and can recommend which campsite to use?

I can't remember the name of the bit where we were but it was alongside a stream. We did explore the site though and everywhere seemed really nice. Pitches are a good size and toilet blocks are a good standard