On Saturday L and I headed off to Raynham Estate to explore the woods and see what we could find. UK Adventure Trails promised animals, aliens, fairies and more. A fun woodland trail that should take around 45-60 minutes to complete.
Now I will say that the website didn’t actually give a lot of information away and the Facebook and Instagram pages seemed to focus a lot on their trail at Cirencester which is very different. Most of the useful information I got about the trail came on the ticket confirmation, like the length of trail (1.2 km approx), time it would take (45-60 minutes) and whether it was suitable for pushchairs(yes as long as it’s sturdy, it was rather bumpy), by which point I’d already booked the tickets.
The walking was easy and relaxed, there weren’t many people when we visited and for a lot of our walk we were completely alone, it only got busier at the end when we had caught up with some of the earlier groups. L enjoyed having an activity booklet with things to find as he walked round and took charge of that.
We started walking through a safari which included giraffes, so already L was impressed. Then there was an area filled with fairy doors and we had to see how many we could find. We also met a very fine unicorn. Next there were pirates and then an alien invasion! The next area was filled with bears, all different types and then finally we got to meet some dinosaurs.
We took our time wandering round and took photos with nearly every single model, I made sure to look at the time when we started and finished and it took us 50 minutes to go round. It would have been nice if we could have maybe had the option of going round again, but I understand that would really affect the planning of the day and keeping people nicely distanced which was an element I enjoyed. It would have also been nice if there was a bit more of the woodland we could have accessed just to enjoy a stroll but the Raynham Estate is private and there were no public footpaths in the area the trail was set. I guess just a little something extra so we could have spent more time there would have been appreciated, though I can understand why there wasn’t.
Tickets are £8 each and under 2’s are free. For an hour or so of entertainment this isn’t cheap, nor is it too expensive, the price is reasonable I felt. There are plenty of very clean portaloos on site, parking was free and easy, really close to the entrance and there was a lovely little coffee hut selling hot and cold drinks, cakey treats and snacks that was very welcome after we finished our walk. The hot chocolate was divine and it also made our day last a little longer.
It was a lovely and easy way to spend a day of the summer holidays and L had a thoroughly good time, loving the giraffes and the dinosaurs.
The trail is running until 31st August, so if you fancy a visit you’ve got plenty of time to get some tickets booked.
Disclosure – we were gifted our tickets. All thoughts, opinions and images are my own.
