Would you go to a birthday party 30 minutes drive away?

[Sprogonthetyne]

There's a small zoo type animal centre about 30 minutes drive away that we visit quite often and DS (going to be 9) loves. They do party packages (look round zoo, animal handling and picnic), which look good, but I'm not sure if the distance will put off some of the school friends parent. Would you take your kid that far or make an excuse not to go?

(Not sure if this is relevant, but to avoid a potential drip feed, DS and majority of the potential guests have SEND)

It's absolutely fine...

for a 'good' party I would. But we do live rurally, so everything is at least 15 min drive, but its really common round our ay to go that far for a party. We had DS1's party 35 min from out house, and the last 2 parties we were invited to were 35 min and 25 min drive away too

It's fine. We've had a party invite to a venue 30 minutes away. It was a sports party and only about 1/6th of the class actually turned up but I think that was the combination of distance and type of party. I'd travel 30 minutes for a zoo party. Kids are 5 and 8 and 8 year old is autistic

I would have at that age yes.

Hope you all have a lovely time. Sounds like a great party.

Yes, and have done so many times. We are rural and don't live near any soft play centres oe zoos.

We would travel 30 minutes for an interesting and different party or for a closer friend. Tbh I wouldn’t do it for the standard bouncy castle village hall class type party.

Yes that’s be fine for something a bit different like that. There’s a good chance some of them will have been before and will be excited to go to a party there.

A lot of our parties are this distance now as DC have gotten older and grown out of soft play. There's not much locally for age 9+ so most parties involve some travel. A lot of the parents share lifts to them.

This would be fine for us for a ‘good’ party like a zoo.

Wouldn’t be impressed if it was something we could do in the same town, like soft play.

Offer to coordinate lift shares if possible.

Yes, that’s the joy of a car. 30 minutes isn’t really much of distance.

Yes- we drove nearly an hr to a farm- it was a full day outing party and we loved it

Will other parents be staying?
Is there a coffee shop?

Absolutely. My DCs are all older now but I’ve done this for each of them multiple times. At 9 you’ll find parents lift share within friendship groups more than likely.

Due to the kids SEN parents tend to stay with them, at least they did last year at a local party, and it's more or less the same kids. There is a coffee shop on site, though was planning on catering for the adults too. (You rent the party space and bring your own food/drinks)

For a best friend party yes I would.
You could also offer lifts (if you’re able to of course) if anyone is struggling. For DDs last birthday we got people to drop off at our house then took 2 cars to an attraction with all the kids- 7 including DD

If parents staying then fine imo.

30-40 mins I think is fine for a party. Most decent places are around that distance from us so wouldn’t think to was unusual to travel that far.

Frequently do, but it is a bit of a given in our fairly rural area.

Yes I would and I live in a big city with plenty of potential party venues nearby.

A party is a party and a good one at a zoo would be well worth the relatively small journey time.

When any of my kids are invited to a party in a soft play or venue somewhere I always try and coordinate lift sharing with another parent.