Center Parcs - I thought it was to be kept within my marriage

[BathshebaKnickerStickers]

My family are currently at Center Parcs because we are Scottish, on holiday and we come every year.

Dd ages 15 and add age 13 and I went to the pool at Center Parcs at the busiest time of the week and we are somewhat regretting this choice. It was like people soup, and I have seen every body shape imaginable today ( and honestly no-one cares I know, I cart this awful body around). Anyway, the rapids are our favourite, however it’s possible to get stuck at various points ( we give them names - The pool of unbearable sadness, Dumpy Mermaid gulch, the eddy of despair etc) and at those points it’s possible to get split up from your own friends and family and end up engulfed in the arms and legs of other parties....suffice to say, what happens at Center Parcs stays at Center Parcs, and I suspect some lovely young mid twenties boys who go to the gym may have been turned off women for life.....

I knew that a certain amount of specific intimacy is expected at Center Parcs, however I thought it was supposed to be with my husband and not some student boys from Stafford in the rapids....

Found my lovely drawing. I look fab in this rendition :)

That
Is
Beautiful

I lost my bikini top in there once. My poor cousin had to scour the people infested rapids for quite some time before finding it for me (I was clinging to the side) and we could eventually get out. I think that was the last time I ever wore a bikini

To be fair I wear a very sturdy boy leg suit that no-one could ever accidentally remove

I'm guessing your are at the very turbulent Whinfell rapids! I was flung down the very last drop, churned inside out like I was in a washing machine then spat out, desperately trying to grab hold of the wall or something to keep me still whilst waiting for dd to pop out (usually bum floating first). I had been there maybe 5 mins and the lifeguard whistled very loudly with three short blasts pointing towards me, obviously as a grown up I knew he couldn't mean me as I wasn't doing anything wrong. He whistled again so I turned around to see a very yummy man who said, erm you might want to cover up. One tit had come out of the side of my swimming costume

We go to Woburn now

These are fab.

I'm going to Whinfell in couple of weeks with DS who is 3. Can't wait. Last time we went I took him down a slide and he was catapulted out of my arms 😂

I should also clarify- there were traditional old El Paso hard taco shells on the table. The squirrel specifically chose the soft, stand and serve version.

If I was a squirrel researcher rather than a school support assistant that could be amazing squirrel information

'Specific intimacy'. What a lovely phrase!

@nespressowoo - dd2 went to whinfell at 9 weeks old. We controlled how many stranger gussets she was in contact with. That’s my top tip as a mum. Leave it until they are around 3 to let them loose on intimacy with strangers

Squirrel knows the soft ones are twice the price!

@ForalltheSaints - 7 showers isn’t enough to forget. 6 glasses of wine makes you forget but you always also remember

@Stabbitha that is true. We bought them in an Asda on the way down so we feel like we have beat the system....yes squirrel you think you have robbed us but the soft stand and serve taco came from Asda in Cambridge rather than the Parcs market

I am laughing out loud at this thread! I was at Center Parcs last week and sadly didn't get to go down the rapids as it was just me and DH with our two very smalls. I've been down enough as a child (and an adult) though to relate to every single post. The hairy backs. Oh god, the hairy backs.

This is the most poetic review of the rapids ever. Thank you OP

Thank you.

To be fair... if I could support my family by writing reviews of the dads and grandads of other families, interspersed with the odd teenager who has tried hard, rather than working in a school office..... I spend 4 days a year at Center Parcs and180+ days in a Scottish Primary School...so I understand how exciting it is for me to meet random strangers

hahaha, the eddy of despair - I remember it well, and having to pull my niece by her ankle through it on several occasions.

Oh, and don't the rapids if you have a dodgy back, I was in agony for 5 days after (and that was because I was trying to find a ...ladylike...way to go down then)

I’m impressed that you are Scottish and have gone further south than Whinfell..... that’s dedication to the cause!
I went last week and for some reason thought 10am on Friday was a quiet time to swim. NOPE. It was terrifying.
Our rapids time was spent trying to keep hold of a slippery, buoyancy-aid refusing 4 year old (who hasn’t mastered breathing and swimming) who wanted to playing the game of ‘you lose me mummy!’ 🤦🏼‍♀️

BUM SEX.

Riding the rapids with my sister, her son and daughter, my Dh and two sons, we always end up competing as to who can get down first because no matter who starts first it is no guarantee of a win.

She is also known to cry out "strangers, strangers" in an overly dramatic voice which is hysterically funny when we are inevitably tangled with randoms.

Going down in a group is good as you can share horrified looks and wide eyes as you see yourself or them hurtling towards some unsuspecting octogenarian who is still a lively woman riding the rapids with her grandchildren.

Good times. Elevden rapids are the best ones.

Of course we have come further south than Whinfell.

Shhhhhh

It’s a great big secret

Ssshhhhhh

I work in a school in Aberdeen and my children go to school in Aberdeen.

The first week of our 2 week October holiday is the week that children in England are still in school (we were back in school in the 2nd week in August),.”

So. Our schools in Aberdeen city finished on Friday for 2 weeks. I work in these amazing schools so we have 10 school days and weekend days and we are exhausted

I have had rapids issues in a foreign not-centre Parcs. I went down the rapids with my then 5 year old DD amd nephews aged 5 and 3. I lost the youngest, found him clinging to a man, then I kept getting stuck on the man, and ended up submitting to the water whilst holding onto as many of the children's hands and ankles that I could. Then nearly drowned all of us in the splash pool at the end.

It wasn't fun.

I decided to rest by joining DH and our 1 yr old in the baby pool only to find him leaping out of it (baby in hand) looking traumatised as he revealed another child had just poo'd in the pool and her mother had picked it up with a bare hand to dump in a bin.

Loss of control all round.

I have to add this, my friend ended up with a man's toes in her lady bits!
I have never laughed/cried so much in my life

I vividly remember resurfacing gasping from the washing machine that is the rapids at Woburn to find my bikini top was missing.

I have never been to centre parks and now i don't want to