Where to stop btwn Lake District and Legoland for 4 nights?

[av3nturin3]

Hi, we're planning a 5 week holiday in England this summer with 3 kids (ds1 9yrs, ds2 7yrs, ds3 2yrs) and will rent a car.
London: 3 nights
Bath: 4 nights
Center Parcs Longleat: 1 week
Birmingham/Stratford upon Avon: 1 week
Lake District: 1 week
???: 4 nights
Legoland Windsor: 3 nights

We have a gap btwn Lake District and Legoland Windsor and I'm struggling for ideas. I had a look at the map and Corme in Norfolk looks like it could be "different" enough from the other destinations we've already booked, but have never been, any thoughts?

We'll be traveling end of this July/ early August

I'd say so- maybe slighter warmer or at least brighter in the Peak District.

Abersoch and Nefyn are beautiful places on the Llyn peninsula.
Liverpool is fab (photo).

Another vote here for Liverpool /Chester / Llyn Peninsula. If you based yourself in either Llandudno or Conwy then all are in easy reach within an hour's drive with plenty of choices for activities to suit all interests.

Yorkshire is beautiful. If you stay in the Ripon/ Masham area you have lightwater valley theme park and the very excellent Forbidden Corner. You can also call into to Hawes on the way to the Wensleydale Cheese Factory. The countryside is stunning.

Warwick castle is really great for a day out :)

I was about to suggest a canal boat trip - www.canaljunction.com/canal/llangollen.htm is really beautiful, would be on your way south from the lake district and you could combine it with a bit of history at Chester.

UnaOfStormhold, thanks for the link! This looks really good. I've been trying to book accommodation using Airbnb for either Peak District or Shropshire area, with no luck due to random glitch on site, so a canal holiday looks like a great alternative right now

Looking at your itinerary, Birmingham/Stratford is sort of midway between Lake District and Legoland. Don't know if that helps.

Grange over Sands in the south lakes.

I live in Bath so shout if you need suggestions for that section.

I need to figure out interim overnight places at the start and end of our summer "up north for a week or so" trip, but we are doing:

• York (2 nights)

• near Whitby (2 nights)
• Ambleside (Lake District)

England is quite narrow as you head further north. Now I have started to think of places to go I realise we'll have to go back!

Northumberland is lovely BTW. Longleat safari park is probably worth a visit too. DD(9) enjoyed Mary Arden's farm in Stratford.

With 5 in the party it might be worth investing in National Trust family membership. Admission charges do mount up. A great many of their houses have great playgrounds/wilderness areas for children to play in (as well as a cafe and clean loos)!

Where are the decent beaches near Chester whatslove?

We like to drive up from Bath using the A49, rather than the M5, so maybe that would be a nice place to break our journey and overnight.

I would go to Blackpool for the day. Its a shit tip so don't stay over. Then down to Liverpool. You could go and see the Antony Gormley figures at Crosby. Maybe a few days in North Wales too.

OR

Drive over to the east coast from the Lakes and spend some time in Whitby. You could visit Scarborough, slightly less of a shit tip than Blackpool. Robin Hoods Bay and Staithes are lovely too.

I would add a few days at the sea side to make the trip complete I think.
Looks great.

Hi Madcats, thanks for the offer for Bath ideas. I'm there for a week with 3 boys to entertain while DH enjoys uni life (ahem, "attends tutorials related to his studies").

After a lengthy and unsolvable glitch with Airbnb, we ended up renting a self-catering cottage on the Gloucestershire/ Cotswolds border using a rival cottage bookings site. Google maps gives an estimated driving time of 4 hrs from our Lake District accomodation to the Gloustershire cottage, so it should be ok.

Thanks everyone for your ideas!

That was lucky; I was just checking out older posts. If you are staying somewhere central in Bath make your husband take the bus up to the University (even in the summer I would be very surprised if he had to wait more than about 10 minutes - we are over-run with Uni buses). Saying that. Rainbow Woods is not too far from the Uni and is very popular with budding den-builders. A Ranger is usually up there on Wednesday mornings running activity sessions. www.nationaltrust.org.uk/bath-skyline.
The Uni also runs lots of sports camps for kids over the summer for not too much money. Lots of people just send their children for a day or 2. www.teambath.com/tribe-schools/holiday-activities/ That might be an idea for the older 2.

There should be quite a few things going on for kids over the summer holidays. Look at the www.visitbath.co.uk and www.familiesinbath.co.uk/ websites closer to the time.

Otherwise the biggest playground is at Royal Victoria Park. Alice Park is a bit smaller and quieter on the way out of Bath, or maybe try Sydney Gardens (the canal and railway run through the middle).

It sounds as if you are going to have a lovely holiday (I hope the weather behaves for you).

We recently returned from our trip, thanks everyone for your suggestions, they really helped!

Hey Madcats, a huge thanks for the suggestion about getting a National Trust family membership! Our first trip to a NT property was Corfe castle in Dorset, while staying at Center parcs Longleat, and we opted to spring for the membership (hubby was impressed with the welcome ctr, parking and clean loos prior to the castle ticket office!). We ended up stopping at 1 or 2 NT houses/parks during each long car journey, which was very helpful. It was very helpful during our 2 week stay in Lake District, as many of the places we wanted to visit anyways happened to be part of NT, and we discovered a few new places too.

We ended up going to Blackpool from the Lake District! Took the kids to Blackpool Zoo, then Blackpool beach for fish n chips, Mr Whippy ice cream and hot mini donuts. Hubby and kids had never experienced a British seaside so I was determined we do it all (minus the rock candy) ..I wanted to take the kids on donkey rides along the shore, but we hadn't brought spare shoes and cringed at the idea of wet sand in the car on the return journey.

The weather was completely bonkers. It went from cold, overcast (sometimes rainy) and windy each day to bright and sunny at 6pm, when most shops were closed and we had just dragged the kids back home out of exasperation with the cold and wet , and were doing mundane things like cooking dinner, doing laundry, giving the kids dinner and baths. While in Bath, we managed to buy rain boots for the 2 older kids, and really put those to good use when faced with several days of wet weather later on. There were a few really bright and clear days during our trip, and we mostly got to do fun things then. The whole canal boats idea got me thinking about canoeing, so in Bath I tried canoeing with the 2 older kids, and it was very memorable, esp as I had no clue about boating/rowing apart from watching "Swallows and Amazons". We then went canoeing as a family in Center parcs Longleat and it was a lot of fun.

This sounds fabulous! Did you do Airbnb? Any recommendations for nice accommodation you found?

Blackpool would have been my suggestion too, been there a few times and liked it and everywhere else you were going was inland. It's unashamedly downmarket though.

@Madcats is know this is old but have a look at staithes in North Yorkshire- close to Whitby. It's amazing. Lots of crab fishing and fresh air :)

@wannabestressfree thank-you for thinking of us. We had a great holiday up in Yorkshire and the Lake District, even though it was rather chilly and wet every day. We did indeed go to Staithes (and demolished a seafood platter at the quayside pub).

We definitely want to go back (but maybe later in the summer or Autumn). I think we would probably spend 3 nights at each place, rather than 2. We did tend to cram things in.

We also maxed out our English Heritage and National Trust cards. Saying that, DD did get "heritage fatigue" by the time we made it to Whitby Abbey so I made sure I asked to go to places with a decent wilderness area/playground after that.

I'm glad @av3nturin3 had fun too. Bath has been distinctly damp and dark for most of the school hols but, yes, early morning and evenings do seem to be the brightest and driest.