Wales Roadtrip in a Motorhome - With Kids!

Back at Easter we were due to fly to Florida to embark on an epic 3 week roadtrip in a motorhome. Sadly due to Covid, our plans were scuppered and our trip got cancelled. Weeks/months passed, lockdown restrictions started to ease and we decided to get away for a UK holiday. We didn't fancy flying anywhere so a UK roadtrip was the obvious choice!

We found a local company who rent motorhomes and we were really lucky to secure a last minute 10 night rental. With only a couple of weeks to wait until our holiday it was full steam ahead to plan plan plan! Being peak season, and especially busy with more people holidaying in the UK it was really important for us to get campsites booked asap.

We decided to head to Wales - there are so many lovely places to visit there and it was a tricky job narrowing down our trips to squeeze them into our 10 days!

The Motorhome

The company we hired from are located less than 6 miles from our house so we were able to collect the motorhome and drive it back home to pack. This definitely worked in our favour because it meant we didn't have to pack the car up/unpack/repack the motorhome etc. It also meant I could do a food shop in the morning and load this straight into the fridge. (Although next time I won't buy so much food, I forget that the fridge/cupboards would be smaller than home so it was a bit of a mission finding homes for everything!) . After loading on what felt like half our house, it was time to leave and head to our first destination....Stonehenge!

We weren't able to collect the motorhome until late afternoon so rather than making the long drive down to Wales and get in late, we decided to stop off in Wiltshire and visit the famous stones. We also had our first experience of "wild camping" - rather than park in a campsite, we parked up in a pub not far from Stonehenge. We found details of this on https://www.searchforsites.co.uk/ - it's important to know that you can't just pull over anywhere for the night but surprisingly, there are lots of places that let you stay in their carparks. I was a bit apprehensive but it felt very safe, and we had a fantastic meal in the pub too. The kids were excited spend the first night in the van and went off to sleep surprisingly quickly!

The next morning we made the short drive to Stonehenge and spent a brilliant few hours exploring the visitors centre and then walking down to the stones. We've never visited before and it was quite cool to see them up close and think about how they came to be there.

We were able to book tickets using our National Trust membership so it made a nice cheap start to the holiday.

From Wiltshire we headed into Wales and parked up at our first campsite of the holiday which was located around 20 miles from Cardiff. It was good to park up and get hooked up to electric for the first time and see how everything in the motorhome worked.

 The next morning we spent a few rainy hours fossil hunting at Llantwit Major Beach before driving to the Gower. South Wales is one of my favourite places and it always brings back fab memories seeing Swansea Bay and the Mumbles in the distance. We didn't stop in Mumbles this time as it was really busy and we struggled to find somewhere to park the motorhome - one of the downsides of having a large vehicle!

Instead we headed straight to our home for the next two nights, Three Cliffs Bay. This lovely campsite is perched high on a cliff looking down at one of the most beautiful beaches in Wales and is very very popular. We were extremely lucky to get a pitch right on the edge of the campsite with perfect views to the beach below and the cliffs in the distance that gives Three Cliffs Bay it's name.

This was a great campsite with a well stocked shop and the cleanest, poshest shower blocks I've ever seen. It's no wonder it's so popular! You can even hire fire pits which came in handy for marshmallow toasting...

We were able to explore the beach the next day and it was just as beautiful down on the sand. The walk down however was quite a steep one and definitely not buggy friendly! The sea is quite dangerous to swim in here with unpredictable riptides but the kids had lots of fun paddling in all the little lagoons that were left as the tide went out.

Our next campsite was located in Cardigan Bay so it was a couple hours of driving. We did plan on exploring the Gower a little more but when we left the campsite the weather was pretty rainy and we decided to just press on to our next stop.

The rain cleared a little on the way so we stretched our legs at Cenarth Falls. It was a bit soggy for any walking but we had some lunch in the cafe and admired the falls. It's a nice little stop but the carpark was £2.50 which is a little expensive if you just wanted to pull over and take some photos!

Our next campsite was located at Cardigan Island Coastal Farm Park - another family friendly site with stunning views. The camping field was located right next to the farm park and we had a lovely afternoon exploring. There were lots of animals for the children to see, plus we walked right up the headland overlooking Cardigan Island and spotted seals!

A massive plus point for this campsite was the play area in the park, probably one of the best ones we have found. The kids didn't want to leave! Even the lure of a slice of cake and a hot chocolate wasn't quite enough for them to stop playing.

The next stop on our Welsh roadtrip was Barmouth - a lovely seaside town in the southern part of Snowdonia. The drive up the coast was stunning with mountains and streams all around us, then the beautiful view of the Barmouth Bridge running over the estuary as we drove towards the town.

We stayed at Hendre Mynach Campsite and we picked this as it was walking distance to the town. As lovely as it is to have a stunning campsite high up on a cliff in the middle of no-where, sometimes it's nice to be able to walk to a pub!

Things have probably changed over the last few weeks but we did notice that it was really quiet around the town and things seemed to close quite early. We had some fish and chips near the beach and there were more seagulls than humans!

I really liked Barmouth though, the beach and harbour were so pretty and there seemed to be a good mix of quirky shops in town. I shall putting this one of the list of places I'd like to return to.

The next morning we left Barmouth and carried on up the coast to Harlech Beach. Overlooked by the impressive Harlech Castle, Harlech Beach is a 4 mile stretch of flat, golden sand that seems to go on forever. It's also one of the cleanest beaches I've ever seen.

The weather wasn't too sunny but this didn't deter the kids, they were straight in the sea despite the temperature! We had a fantastic time playing on the beach and building sandcastles, the kids also loved the surrounding sand dunes. These made good slides!!

One of the great things about traveling in a motorhome is having everything with us - when we got back to the carpark, we just showered all the sand off the kids and it was 100 time easier than getting them clean on the beach.

Venturing deeper into Snowdonia, we headed onto our next campsite Coed-Y-Llwyn where we stayed for two nights. It was a great base to explore the area and there was a brilliant pub just 5 minutes walk away!

We spent a bit of time in Porthmadog and it's a nice little harbour town to stroll around. You can also find the Ffestiniog & Welsh Highland Railway hubs here too. When we visited, the Covid rules were just starting to change and not all attractions were fully open yet so unfortunately we weren't able to experience any of the trains or castles - maybe next time.  Luckily the scenery more than made up for the closed attractions!

Betws-y-Coed is another nice place to visit if you are exploring the area. Known as the gateway to Snowdonia, it's a bustling little village with plenty of outdoor shops to kit you out for your expeditions! We loved walking over the historical Pont-y-Pair bridge and going for a paddle in the river below. Be careful though, the stones are very slippery and the water is icy cold. Very refreshing on a hot day though.

After leaving Snowdonia, it was time to start heading South again as our holiday was almost over. On our way to Brecon we stopped at the Elan Valley Reservoirs which made for some impressive scenery. The reservoirs are a chain of man-made lakes that provide drinking water for Birmingham.

If you are visiting, the Visitors Centre is a good place to start and here you can find bike hire, plenty of walks, a cafe, shop, picnic areas and a fab children's play area. The staff are all very friendly and knowledgeable too, the gentleman we spoke to gave us lots of info about driving around the area to see all the dams and reservoirs, and put our mind at ease with regards to driving down narrow roads!

From Elan Valley, we made the short drive to the town of Brecon where we were booked into a campsite for the next two nights. It was a really clean site, with great showers and within walking distance of the town centre which was handy. We were also able to order a takeaway to be delivered directly to our campsite which are one of the bonuses of being close to town!

The walk into town took us along the canal and it was a really pretty route, the kids enjoyed waving at the barge boats! Brecon is a nice little market town with lots of shops and pubs. It's also a great base for exploring the Brecon Beacons National Park.

On our last full day in Wales we decided to treat to the kids to a day out at Cantref Adventure Farm , not far from our Brecon campsite. With spectacular views over the Brecon Beacons, Cantref was a great day out to end our holiday. The kids had lots of fun in the play areas, seeing and feeding all the animals, whizzing down a giant hill on sledges, going on a tractor ride, we even met a dinosaur!

Of course Elliot was in his element with all the goats to feed too :)

Those views though! 

We had a brief stopover in the Forest of Dean and then it was time to head back to Dorset via our favourite farm shop, White Row Farm in Frome. We always seem to stop here if we are passing through - it's a great place to have some lunch (the fish and chips are lovely) and the kids love the playarea. The farm shop is brilliant too, the yummy home made cakes and pastries are just too tempting!

White Row Farm play area

Spending 10 days in a motorhome with two young children probably isn't for everyone and it was definitely a steep learning curve getting used to the small space! The best thing was to be as organised as possible and keep things tidy, although that was a challenge in itself with the kids and all the bits they had with them. Next time I think we could definitely pack less and I'd make more use of the laundry facilities at campsites rather than packing outfits for everyday.

We really enjoyed covering lots of miles and seeing lots of different places and this is a definite plus point of having the motorhome. However it is a bit restrictive if you want to drive anywhere once you have hooked up a campsite. I can see why a lot of larger motorhomes tow a car on the back now.

Wales has so much to offer and it's a fantastic place to holiday with children. It's a shame we were a bit restricted with days out due to Covid (no castles open and boat trips hard to find) but we made the best of the situation and I think the kids enjoyed themselves!

A Long Weekend At Bluestone National Park Resort, Wales - Part 2

To find out what we got up to on our first day at Bluestone, see here but read on to see what else we did over our long weekend!

Day 2

We woke up to heavy rain and strong wind....not quite the Summer break we were hoping for! Fortunately I'd packed our raincoats so after breakfast we jumped in the golf buggy and headed up to the Adventure Centre for some indoor play fun. 

The Adventure Centre is a brilliant place for kids - there is mini golf, a bouncy castle, Lego wall, wooden climbing frames, soft play and even a high ropes course for the bigger ones! There is the Wildwood Cafe upstairs and plenty of comfy sofas and picnic tables so you can relax with a drink while the children play. Elliot couldn't wait to get going and headed straight for the climbing frames!

There is also a small arcade section and Elliot was quick to spot the grabber machines! We never win on these but today was our lucky day, my husband won an Angry Bird pig on his first attempt - Elliot was SO excited!! 

Our tummies were beginning to rumble after all the playing (well, Kindle reading in my case!) so we decided to brave the weather and head down to Camp Smokey. We never got round to visiting on our last trip and I'd heard really great things from other bloggers.

You aren't able to take the golf buggy down to the camp so we parked up the top and followed the path which wound it's way down and through the steep forest. I was concerned the path would be muddy and slippery but the entire path is a boardwalk which is easily accessible for buggies and wheelchairs. You could also use the faster route and take the ziplines down!

Camp Smokey is a wooden restaurant nestled in the woods and all the food is barbequed and rustic style. The menu isn't huge but the food is cooked as you wait and the smells - wow wow wow!! My husband had a chilli dog, I had chicken fajitas and Elliot had a kids hot dog - plus all the meals come with amazing roast potatoes that I'm still dreaming about now. I loved the atmosphere at Camp Smokey, it was so relaxed and it felt really cosy sitting under cover having our lunch while it was pouring down outside.

The best part though was the open fire where you can toast marshmallows - amazing!! Elliot loved this bit and actually consumed most of our marshmallows....no surprise there ;)

Rather than head back up the zig zag path to our buggy we decided to follow the nature trail through the woods. It was a bit steep and a bit muddy at times but it was a really fun walk through the trees and it was so peaceful, we hardly saw another person. Fortunately the rain stopped too!

Our walk finished with a stroll around the beautiful lake where we saw lots of rabbits, ducks and various baby ducks - very cute!

We were itching to try out the ice creams in the village so we headed over to the cafe which has had a bit of a make over since our last visit. The ice creams didn't disappoint! (Although I did have to share mine with the husband....what's that about!)

We were going to head over the pub for a quick drink but we stumbled across a big marquee in the middle of the village which was offering free children's entertainment. Despite lots of people walking around the village, the entertainment tent was dead quiet and there were only a couple more kids in there. The children's entertainer was really sweet and really bubbly and enthusiastic with the children - they did some drawing, dancing, a treasure hunt and even pass the parcel! I had no idea that free entertainment was offered so I'd definitely recommend looking out for this if you're in the village. We were there an hour and Elliot really enjoyed it. He especially enjoyed winning pass the parcel!

We took a slow walk back up the hill to find our golf buggy and we made a quick tea back at the lodge. We were all quite tired after a busy day!

Day 3

We woke up to another rainy day but we had an exciting day planned at Folly Farm which is located just a few miles down the road from Bluestone. We first visited last year and it's somewhere Elliot always talks about! We knew we'd have a pretty busy weekend but we wanted to try and squeeze in a day at Folly Farm, it's such an amazing place and it's not like we're in the area very often to visit. And the weather scuppered our plans for a day out on the beach at Tenby so we really had no excuse but to visit Folly Farm!

We booked our tickets online the night before and were first in the queue when it opened at 10am...very keen ;) I won't write a big post about it but you can read my review from last year which contains lots of info and pics. Needless to say we had a brilliant day out and Elliot really enjoyed himself!

We got back to Bluestone around 5pm and were going to eat out in the village again but we were all tired again (must be all the fresh air!) so we tea back at the lodge. Cheese on toast - the tea of champions!


Day 4

Our last day :( Typically, the sun was shining when we woke up! Check out is 10am and so we had a bit of a mad rush getting everything packed. Why is it you always seem to go home with more than you came with?! Although you have to be out of your accommodation by 10am, you are able to use the facilities for the rest of the day so you can extend your holiday that little bit further. Elliot had a quick whizz around on his scooter but we decided to head on home as we had a 4 hour drive ahead of us. Pleased to report there were no vomiting instances on the way home - phew!

We had a such a brilliant weekend at Bluestone and really wish we were able to stay for another week. There is so much to do for families and we didn't even touch upon any of the paid activities such as messy play or archery. Hopefully we will get a chance to return next year!


*Disclaimer - We were given a 3 night break for the purpose of this honest review but all views are my own. We LOVED it!

A Long Weekend At Bluestone National Park Resort, Wales - Part 1

One of my favourite places in the world is Wales - we have family there and spent a lot of our holidays there as children. There is so much to do, plus the scenery is beautiful and you can't beat the beaches!

Recently we travelled down to Pembrokeshire for a last minute long weekend at Bluestone National Park Resort, a place we visited last year and fell in love with. Our last visit was in Winter so I was excited to experience it in Summer....although we weren't too lucky with the weather, doh! I had planned on writing just one blog post about this but I've split it into two so not to bombard you with info :)

Day 1

Bluestone is a 4 hour journey from Dorset so we set off nice and early on the Friday and couldn't wait to start our mini break. We stopped for breakfast at White Row Farm in Frome which is a brilliant farm shop and cafe, the food is lovely there. Unfortunately Elliot was in a bit of a grump and said he wanted to go home and wouldn't eat anything! After a stop in the farm shop (and buying yummy things we didn't really need), and a quick play in the playground we were on our way.

Looks can be deceiving, he was grizzling 5 minutes before this!

Sadly, my fears of Elliot not feeling well were confirmed when he decided to be sick on the M4 - ahhhhhh!!! Luckily I managed to catch most of it in a carrier bag but we had to pull over on the hard shoulder to do a quick clean up....yuck yuck yuck!

On our way again and we stopped at a supermarket in Camarthen to get a few supplies for the weekend. There is a little village store at Bluestone which stocks the basics but we decided to stop anyway, it was a good excuse to stretch our legs!

We arrived at Bluestone around 3pm and joined the queue of cars at the check in gates. Within a few minutes we had our keycard for our holiday home and a map of the resort, it was so quick and straightforward.  We weren't able to check into our lodge until 4pm so we parked the car in the long stay car park and my husband went off to sort out a golf buggy for us. Golf buggy hire was £80 for the weekend which isn't cheap but if you have little ones or don't fancy the hills then it's a great idea to hire one. It's also great fun whizzing around!

As we had some time before check in we headed straight to the Blue Lagoon pool - this was a highlight from our last visit so we couldn't wait to go for a swim! Elliot was back to his perky self now too and he couldn't wait to get in the pool. It was a really good time to go because the pool was really quiet and there were plenty of family changing rooms available. And the water was SO warm, just like getting into a lovely bath!

photo credit - Bluestone 

There is plenty to do at the pool for little ones - there are two toddler areas with mini slides, inflatable balls and a pirate's shipwreck to explore. If flumes are your thing then there are several slides plus a really nice lazy river in which you can just bob round. It takes you outside and it was certainly a lot warmer than when we went in Winter last year! My personal favourite bit is the wave machine, and even Elliot loved this. He liked to dive through the waves!

Soon it was time to drag ourselves away from the pool (it was tough, could have stayed all day!) but we were excited to check out our lodge. Cars aren't allowed on site through the weekend but you are allowed to drop your luggage off on check in day so we nipped back to the carpark and swapped the golf buggy for the car.

We were staying in one of the Caldey Lodges on Barthomelew View which was a short walk from the lake and village area. With two large bedrooms and  lovely open plan kitchen/lounge it was everything we would need for the weekend. As with our previous visit, everything was spotless and the beds looked so comfy and inviting!

Not of my photos, mine were filled with the mess that a 3 year leaves so thought you might appreciate one of the official pics from the Bluestone website!!

We quickly unpacked and headed down to the village to seek out some dinner, it had been a long day and we were all pretty tired and hungry. Especially after the swimming! We booked a table in the Farmhouse Grill for 7pm and headed over the Knights Tafarn, Bluestone's family friendly pub for a drink.  The lure of the outside play area was too much for Elliot so he ran off for a quick play whilst we enjoyed our drinks in the evening sunshine.

The food at the Farmhouse Grill was really good - it has changed slightly since our last visit and they no longer have the kids buffet but I was really impressed with the kids menu. Elliot had gammon steak with chips, egg and veg and the not only was the portion huge but it was really really tasty!! My husband and I both had a burger...no complaints from us!

We couldn't squeeze in any pudding so we headed on back to our lodge and I for one couldn't wait to go to sleep!

A Long Weekend at Bluestone - Part 2

*Disclaimer - We were given a 3 night break for the purpose of this honest review but all views are my own. We LOVED it!