A Spooky Day at Manydown Farm

Dear mummy, it’s nearly Halloween! Our favourite *cough* ….Mummy’s favourite time of year!

Our local farm, Manydown Farm just outside Basingstoke, Hampshire have a great range of children’s activities this Halloween Half Term.

It’s £8.50 per adult and luckily we have a discount voucher from the newspaper mailers. As I’m under 2yrs I go free 🙂 Its a good thing to check out Manydown Family Fun Facebook page for offers too! We visit the week before half term to explore before the mad rush, the festivities go on until the 2nd November which is good.

Manydown Farm has been open all year…so far…and has a maze, animal petting, bouncy castles, outdoor adventure area, go carting and tractor rides all included in the price.

They also have a little cafe called Farmers Retreat on the site along with toilet facilities and picnic areas. As the farm is on a hill it can get a little exposed and windy, so wrap up warm and take a brolly. During the Halloween period they have set up a pumpkin carving tent and an additional indoor seating area for families incase the weather turns bad. We enter and pay for our tickets at the door and are warmly greeted by staff and a great Halloween scene. I’m fascinated by the pumpkins and tombstones.

I’m intrigued to find out what these big orange globes are and go to investigate, I tap them with my fist to see if they are soft, I can’t lift them as they are sooo heavy. Their skin feels smooth and I like stroking the pumpkins. We pick one to carve and put it on the table to return to it later.

My tummy is rumbling so we head to the cafe to enjoy a jacket potato, a mug of tomato soup and some cake and crisps. As we are in a tent, it can get cold so we keep jackets on and I can see steam coming off our food.

The cafe layout is a bit of a headache for my mummy as the baskets of crisps are out on display on the lower shelves, so I spend time going back and forth picking bags up, much to the weary despair of my mummy telling me to put them back! (It might be worth Manydown putting them up another run of the shelves so little fingers can’t get to them ) maybe replace them with fruits and other healthy snacks which I’m sure I wouldn’t go for. Plus the tent door was wide open and very exposed, the wind came through and chilled us to the bone.

Talking about being chilled to the bone….we head into the farm at see the 1.30pm showing of the Witches Storytelling Time in the barn and its a great sight! The witch sits in her rocking chair and greets us with a cheery hello she asks me to pick a book of the mantlepiece and I pick Room on the Broom for her to read for me by the fire, it’s like being in a witches cottage. I’m not too sure of her before she starts reading the book, as I think she’s going to eat me! But once I get comfy with my packet of crisps and on Grandma’s lap, we all huddle together and enjoy the story.

Afterwards Mummy sits in the creaky rocking chair and puts on the witches hat and I look on…..silly mummy! I think. More children arrive into the barn and we sit quietly and listen to the witch read some more stories.

The heavens open and we can hear the rain beat down on the tin roof, so we dash back into the cafe for a hot beverage and I get treated to a green cupcake with a scary pumpkin on.

Eventually the sun comes out and we go and explore the mini tractors and trampolines. We feed the goats and the sheep and spend over an hour in the field, mummy grabs our pumpkin and we head inside to carve it. It’s very late in the day and nearly 4pm and the staff kindly let us finish carving the pumpkins even though it’s the end of the day at the farm and they are getting ready to close.We have great fun carving and I help my mummy with the pumpkin shavings collecting and putting them into the bucket provided. My mummy uses the utensils provided by the farm staff and cuts out a creepy face. The nice thing is that we get to keep the pumpkin and take it home with us! What I lovely reminder of our day.

A great day out and it’s nice to do something different.

Love Bella x