Adventures in the deep dark wood

As I am sure is the case in many homes The Gruffalo is a popular choice at bedtime. When I saw that the Forestry Commission were helping to celebrate the Gruffalo's 15th anniversary with a number of activities I was intrigued.

After a quick search I found our closest Gruffalo sculpture and activity trail was at Sherwood Pines in Nottingham and although an hours drive away we decided to add it to our Summer to do list.

We had never been to Sherwood Pines but were pleasantly impressed. Despite the rain and being quite ill prepared (I keep forgetting you have to remember so many extra things with a baby!) we ventured out of the car to track down the cafe to purchase the activity leaflet. I wouldn't bother with that again although we did all get a sticker!

Attention quickly turned to trying to find the trail. The first thing we spotted was the Gruffalo. At first we weren't sure whether this was the sculpture we thought we would be looking for in the deep dark woods. Turned out it was. Luckily E wasn't bothered and still wanted to explore. It did however seem a bit strange to put the 'treasure' of the hunt at the beginning?

We carried on to find the trail which included all the characters you would recognise, the mouse, owl, snake. There were other activities along the way which would probably help keep older children's attention but E was a little too young.

At Sherwood Pines the trail is amongst the other play areas for children which were all excellent. We eventually teared E away with the lure of cake in the cafe. Towards the end of the day there wasn't much choice left but Baby R needed feeding and there were a couple of chocolate options :)

We will definitely be going back to Sherwood Pines in the future and there is another chance to meet the Gruffalo in August, a little closer to home in Leicestershire for the Gruffalo tour. We may just have to convince E that that Gruffalo is still just a 'pretend' one!

I am also linking up with Country Kids!