Centerparcs in England - which one is best - sorry loads of questions!!

[Charlene1]

Hi, we won vouchers towards a holiday and we don't know which one to go to in Britain! We want to go at the end of April.
We have very little spending money for food and activities - ds is 6, dd is 3. Tend to buy a couple of drinks each when we go to clubs at Haven/Butlins etc and live on cereal for breakfast, burger and chips/sandwiches for lunch, restaurant meal of something with chips or veg at night.

What would it cost us for:
Football for ds
Hire and deposit of 2 adult bikes
Swimming lesson for 2 kids
Teddy Bear's picnic
Tot's tennis
Mammal magic
Robin Hood/Little John archery
Willow weaving
Circus workshop
Adventure golf
Evening meal for 2 adults, if kids meals cost £1 between 5-7pm??

If you don't prebook, then can you just turn up and join in things on the day you fancy doing it - we hate planning and being restricted to "having to be somewhere at a set time" etc.

How big are the villages exactly - does it take long to walk to the centre? We went to Butlins and it was 15 mins from the car to the apartment and another 15mins to the entertainment - kids and dp not impressed!!

Do they have luggage trolleys like at Butlins, as I don't fancy dragging shopping from the car park if we go out to Tesco midweek!

I have looked at other threads for Centerparcs, loads of people have been, but no one is very specific on these things!
Centerparcs won't tell you cost etc until you've actually booked, and I can't estimate distances from the website.

Sorry to write an essay, but dp will kill me if we book and it's crap, or we can't afford to do anything so the kids cry all week!

Ok - we have been to centreparcs longleat for 7 years now. Should remember exact prices but cant so this will be a guestimate! If you dont prebook the chances are you wont get a place on the activities.

Bike hire fairly expensive approx £30 per bike?

Swimming lesson unsure
Teddy bear picnic £8 per child?
Adventure golf £5
Circus workshop unsure
Eating out - this varies widely dont remember ever seeing kids eating for £1!
There is a supermarket, takeaway fish and chip shop, pizzeria, american diner - and I would say the average price woulf be £8-9 for a main course in these places. They have more upscale places like Le Sapinere and Grand Cafe.

The pool/restauraunts are in the Plaza and the Jardin Des Sports holds an Indian restaraunt sports cafe, all your sporting events. It is a fair old walk about 15 mins uphill if your villa is around Jardin Des Sports to get to the swimming pool. There is a land train but you are then restricted to their timetables.

No luggage trolleys as far as I am aware and it would be a slog to get your tesco bags from the car park to your villa unless of course your staying somewhere close to the plaza cos thats where the car park is!
Supermarket well stocked and not expensive.

Things to do for FREE

Walking, swimming (you will spend hours in the pool its lovely), some kids entertainment - ask when you arrive, lots of lovely playgrounds

HTH

Longleat very hilly. I prefer Elveden as it is flatter and much easier to navigate by foot (i don't cycle.

Here are the prices from last year

Football for ds £12.70 for 2 days, £17 for 3 days
Teddy Bear's picnic £4.60
Tot's tennis (tots sports was £3.50 per hour)
Robin Hood/Little John archery £6.50

The other things listed seem to be new, or may not be on all sites. The one thing I would say is that be careful of overbooking, otherwise the holiday just becomes manic as you're trying to get from one place to the next. If you're doing football and swimming lessons then tbh I would only book one more thing for the kids.
Evening meal for 2 adults, if kids meals cost £1 between 5-7pm?? The set meals seemed to come to between £13 and £16 pounds, but that was for a 3 course meal. We tended to cook , but my overall impression was that most of the restaurants weren't really value for money. There is a reasonably well stocked supermarket on site.

In terms of booking ahead, it depends on when you are going. If it is peak time (school holidays) then yes, you need to book within one to two days of the activity brochure arriving (2-3 weeks before the holiday), especially for popular events (football and swimming lessons). But there is plenty to do without booking in advance too, and at the age of your children I would maximise the free stuff. Some of the activities are imo a rip-off eg Teddy Bear picnic is overpriced. I think I did pumpkin carving one October and I ended up paying £4 per child to carve my own pumpkin - all that was provided was a pumpkin and knife!

If your kids like water then the swimming pool can easily entertain you for several hours a day. Your dcs will find other children, there is a separate themed area for little ones etc.

Over the years we have been to Sherwood, Longleat and Elveden.

Longleat is the prettiest, but if you are in the far end of the park as trip to the swimming pool is a day expedition.

We really liked Elveden but found that there was alot of military aircraft noise.

Sherwood is currently our favourite. Its closest! The only negative is that its 'village square' is open air so if the weather is wet there isn't as much protection as at some of the other villages. We are usually on a reasonably tight budget. We take the childrens bikes with us - borrowing a friend's bike rack. We generally eat out for elevenses and then cook our own meals. The supermarket isn't too over priced especially if you pick what you buy carefully and they have a good reduced section. Our boys would have happily spent every afternoon in the pool. Also we tend to suss out where all the play areas (from the village map) - indoor and out are and then plan cycle-rides or walks to them, stopping somewhere for a coffee and bun on the way back. We don't often book activities.

We always have a good time.

My mate goes to Longleat every year.

She's just come back, and she wasn't too happy. Centre Parc at Longleat (I can't speak for them all) has become a victim of its own success. They queued for everything in the central halls. It was totally over-subscribed and much more frenetic than the adverts will have you believe.

As your DD is 3 I would recommend a bike with a trailer - that would be £30 (and a deposit on top) but a normal mountain bike is about £19. The trailer allows 2 children to be biked around in a carriage thing behind the adult bike. It has a compartment at the back that holds a couple of bags of shopping.

The supermarket on site is reasonably priced so I would say a trip to tesco is not necessary (and this is from a tesco-aholic)

Most people bike everywhere so it is quick and easy to get around, you can request a central location for a fee of about £15? (i know we pay £15 to request a specific villa)

The activities are a little pricey but it means you get a break if the children are in there on their own. Restaurants are also a little expensive (if memory serves a burger and chips in the sports cafe costs £7 but it is a huge adult portion with colslaw, big fat chips and a big meaty burger -not a Mac D's flat thing with no meat in it.) But you can cook, the villas are spacious (I've visited my mate at Butlins Skegness and could not believe how tiny the apartment was) so you wouldn't feel you were falling over each other although the TV has just normal 5 channels and a couple of sky channels.

Accommodation wise book at least a comfort plus -dishwasher, towels and DVD player or if you can a new Woodland lodge which has just been renovated.

FYI I have been to Whinfell twice and am going again March, Sherwood 3 times and Elvedon once (it's the best but too far for a weekend for us)

If you are going during term time try using "JAN8CP" code to get a discount of around 20%

Went to Sherwood last year. Booked loads of activties before, then realised hwo much we could do without and cancelled them all - got our money back no problem. I think you can pay for a villa close teo the centre for a small extra fee. THis means you don't necessarily need the bikes, though it is lovely to cycle round. Not sure why you would need to go to Tesco mid week. The supermarket is fine and has plenty of variety. The fridge was a bit small though and there was only a fridge top freezer. We are considering CP this year but not yet sure where.

we do longleat every so often, its not the kind of holiday I'd want if I didn't have kids but...I do, so...

re the bikes-we hire bikes with child seats, dd prefers them to the trailers (she is 2.5). BUT I doubt there is any need to book really, they have vast, vast numbers of all combinations of bikes, we've never been bike-less. We take ds's bike with us.

We don't actually do any extras at all. We have the bikes, and spend all day in the pool. It is a really really fabulous pool, I have never had my kids wanting to leave even after 4 days of it...We have cereal for breakfast, make sandwiches for lunch and cook a nice supper every night. The restaurant food is really nothing special, and the only thing we eat that the shop doesn't do is fresh fish.

I remember the extras as being quite astoundingly overpriced, but if you just spend the day in the pool and cycling, you can have a very nice, chilled holiday IME. And there is loads to do anyway without booking.

Would recommend considering a comfort plus villa, we normally get one for about £10 extra and this includes a dishwasher and dvd, which can be most helpful.

take your own food to save money. you don't have to take much to be able to make the basis of a lot of meals and then you can always find a supermarket when you get there. (not the one on site they are expensive and not much in them)

we usually take cereal, bread/tortilla wraps/pitta bread/bagels/crumpets etc, eggs, milk, butter, philadelphia, yoghurt, pasta/spaghetti, rice, vegetables oh and flour cos we have pancakes as a holiday treat.