Today we had a wonderful day at West Lodge farm park, near Desborough Northants. It was breezy and post storm; but that didn’t put us off, in fact it had made some wonderful muddy puddles. 
As it’s lambing season the main focus of our visit was to see some new borns and feed the babies with bottles. Dorothea loved this. We didn’t managed to see any lambs actually be born, but we certainly got to view some very fresh ones. They do the bottle feeding of lambs x4 a day during this season, with plenty of opportunity for your little ones to have this wonderful experience.
Although it was pretty cool and blustery Dorothea enjoyed some fresh air playtime; her and her friends loved the abundance of tractors, exploring the castle on the hill, playing on the roundabout and swings and even in the sand pit!!!! (Unsurprisingly hands in cold sand meant they wanted to return inside.)
Each and every day there’s plenty of activities for the kids; these obviously change with the season. Today’s were:
- Lambing talks
- Bottle feeding the lambs
- Small animal petting
- Piglet racing
- Pony grooming
- Pony rides
- Barrel rides
- Den building
Most of my photos of Dorothea are blurry or of her laughing! This says a lot about the farm park; she really loved it and was absolutely exhausted following 4 hours there!
The old grain adventure barn is pretty epic, with a multitude of slides, (for difference levels of thrill seeker), plenty of climbing opportunities and many places to hide and jump out at your friends! There’s a separate play area for the little ones; which Dorothea loved; with a smaller ‘hen house’, slide, toadstool seating and a mesmerising sensory ‘fish pond’.
And the best thing of all??? At the side of this play area there’s a cafe with does great coffee and cakes.
There’s also a more formal ‘Rickyard restaurant’ and ‘the udder place’ ice cream/snack/hot drink bar. On a nice sunny day there’s plenty of spots and benches for a family picnic.
There’s a lovely little shop at West lodge with some great quality toys and great wellies. Our favourites were the Lanka Kade farm animals/ characters and the hobby horses (now in Dorotheas possession).
Costs:
Varies per season but around £7-9 per person.
Under twos are free
They also have a reduced price late entrance fee (ideal for post school energy burn off)
Annual membership is also available from £42 per person (family of 4 £150)
Parking is free and plentiful
There’s plenty more of the farm to explore than we did in a few hours; and we can’t wait to go again. What we didn’t know until recently is that they allow dogs
So we can’t wait to go back with Woody and explore their many nature trails and walks. The only places you can’t take dogs are the indoor place area and the fenced off outside play park.We did go in half term, on our arrival at 9.30 the park was quiet but by the time we left at 13.00 it was packed, and the indoor play barn had no tables left- so I certainly can’t wait to go back in term time.
Motherhood after IVF 