October 2016
Firstly no rating for children as ours have flown, but play areas on site. That said I had to tick!
We arrived in the middle of October hoping to witness autumnal colour, sadly lacking, but leaves just beginning to turn and I would imagine the lake reflecting them in their full glory would be stunning, but it wasn't to be for us this time. We had one VERY wet day, forecast, so we chilled out in our motorhome with the rain and acorns dancing on the roof. However our other days were glorious. Neither of these observations are reflections on the club! The site is VAST, much bigger than I'd expected despite reading the size. Divided into two areas. The facilities were immaculate at all times, with the fallen leaves being cleared from the entrances, with a leaf blower (rather noisy) daily. The facilities are locked and we were given two keys, enough for us, but I forgot once to take it and had a long walk in each direction! I cannot understand why the facilities are locked - but mine is not to reason why! When exploring the block, towards the end of our few days, I discovered a drying room - no reference is made to it/them anywhere on the site plan AND they were locked but required a code to operate not your key. Again why? When I asked I was told 'if you enquired we would have informed you and given you the code'. A bit of a Donald Rumsfold - an unknown unknown!! It turned out we need not have been confined to barracks on the wet day, we did that because of drying wet clothes. HoHum. There is a site shop, which could be well stocked as it has a freezer and local produce but we were told they'd be stocking up for half term, we'd be gone by then, so only basic fresh goods for our visit, plenty of dry goods, but that included milk etc and papers which needn't be ordered. Opening hours on the door say closed for 2 hours lunchtime, caught me out, but not an issue called later - to be told if the blind not down and door locked, or even if they are call into the office.......... All that said a very large very clean site, as one expects from The Club, however, it is a very shady site, clue in the name, and when the sun is low in the sky mostly shaded. Also because the pitches are under the trees it can get noisy with acorns and twigs when the wind blows, but generally a sheltered site. It is possible to walk to the village by going to the bottom of the site and going through fields, tarmac path(s) most of the way adjacent but not on the lakeside. You can choose to go to the lake with Bluebird Cafe and boat trips or into the village. The village is small and pretty lots of places to eat and drink, Ruskin Musuem and grave as well as Donald Campbell's grave -in the cemetery not the churchyard. Lots of walks from the site and access to the opposite bank via the launches by Bluebird Cafe. Bus stop on the road at the site entrance with limited service at the time of our visit, out of season, but in both directions enabling a day out where e
