WWT Castle Espie
We love this place!!! Near Comber, a 30 minute drive east of Belfast city centre, this place ticks every possible box for a family day out! You drive into a large car park, unpack all the paraphernalia to lovely birdsong (if you can hear it over a screaming child!) and walk on the lovely flat surface through the automatic doors to be greeted by the lovely ladies at reception. Then armed with a bag of bird food you start by feeding the duckies. If you’re into waterfowl this is actually an eclectic mix of international and endangered species of ducks and geese. For a 2 year old (and uninformed Mummy) they are all duckies! The only slightly risky aspect of this trip is the open water – but, hey, it’s not deep! Personally, I attach reigns for this part just in case.
There’s plenty of scope for a toddle out to the bird hides on great buggy friendly paths. The Strangford Lough scenery is lovely even if you don’t know your Brent geese from your Whooper swans!! There’s a great woodland adventure playground that’s recently been extended. A proper nature experience which kids so often miss out on these days. I think it would be an awesome site for a Forest pre-school if anyone is so inclined!
If all that natural play wasn’t enough and you’re missing “Funky Monkeys” (seems unlikely!) there’s a little soft play area which was refurbished in 2015. Best suited to toddlers.
Last but not least there’s a great coffee shop which as of February 2016 also seems to have been refurbished as well. You see, this place really does tick all the boxes!!
Cost wise kids under 4 are free…yay! Adults are about £8 each so a little pricey but the money does help support wetlands conservation work worldwide so I don’t mind too much. We love this place so much that we’d highly recommend membership if you live locally and plan to visit a few times a year. Of course if you live on mainland UK you can use your membership to visit some of the other WWT sites. I bet they are all this good:-)
That sounds like a lovely place, under 4’s bonus!
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We love that you love Castle Espie, thanks for this review. Very soon the Kingfisher Kitchen will have a baby station with microwave and cutlery etc to add to all the boosters and high chairs. See you again soon.
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What a lovely afternoon! I love the idea of a forest preschool too! @WhatevertheWeather
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What a beautiful place to explore. Castle Espie sounds so good! I love that it’s so friendly for little ones. We’d love a place like this near us. Thank you so much for sharing your adventures with #whatevertheweather x
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It sounds like a great place to explore, nice to know that there are places that are so friendly toward little ones and love it when the littlies are free! Thanks so much for linking up your fun to #whatevertheweather 🙂 x
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