St Nicholas Park adventures in Warwick

As proven with numerous posts in the past, we love a good park.  N would be happy just going on the farm and cycling or scooting in parks for the rest of the year if given the chance.  But it’s often hard to persuade him to leave the good old (fairly limited) regulars in town.  So when I suggested trying out St Nicholas Park in Warwick, he wasn’t buying it.  He wanted to go back to Ryton Pools Country Park.

Thankfully, just telling him we were going to the park less than 30 minutes away did the job.  He was happy enough thinking he was going to the old one.  It’s not lying, it’s just omitting full disclosure of my over-riding his opinion on this occasion.

The day we went to St Nicholas Park the weather was beautiful. Good enough for just a thin jacket or just a jumper if you’re a warm sort. As usual we arrived early, the only pain was the parking machines only take change. I had a panic and thought we’d have to go off and buy something then come back so I had change, but luckily the prices are reasonable so I just scraped enough change to pay.

The signs at the park are confusing as well.  We obviously wanted to get N’s bike out but the signs say the bylaws of the park are no cycling or vehicles.  So we started off minus bike, until we noticed that everyone else was cycling and scooting around, and there were bike racks.  Grr, I hate it when signs are confusing. Maybe I should just stop reading them.

Miniature golf

First of all we decided we’d play some crazy golf.  N is still a bit wild with his golf – mostly due to not concentrating and trying to move while swinging for the ball.  But we had a good laugh, and of course he thought he won.  He didn’t if we were counting correctly.  The golf cost us £4.50 for the 2 of us, and we could stay as long as we wanted.

Playground

Afterwards, we got the bike back out, and headed off to the playground area.  There’s plenty of equipment to enjoy, including some interesting things for older children which N quite enjoyed. He wasn’t too keen on the other children coming and joining him on some pieces – I don’t know why they wouldn’t just wait rather than just pile on and then put another child off who doesn’t want to be pushed the same speed. It meant N missed out even though he was there first.

Playground done we cycled and walked through the flower areas over to see what was at the boating area.  Cue me explaining why I wasn’t going to take N out on a boat on my own, and then distracting him with ducklings.

It’s a nice enough walk along the river and considering the beautiful day it hadn’t really got busy yet.

Fairground rides

Then it was time to head to the fairground ride area.  It’s not often you see a park complete with fairground rides, so we had to have a go. All of the rides were suitable for N’s height, although he stuck with the 1 token rides. For £1 card (which you can return to get the deposit back), your £1 tokens are then loaded on for use. We paid for the equivalent of 3 rides which was plenty for N – he wanted me to go on one with him, so he only had 2 rides choice.  The ride was fun and perfect for him, and then the train was calling.  He was happy enough to go on that himself, although I didn’t have my big camera with me so my photos weren’t that great for the light under cover.

He’d also spotted the hover vehicles so had a go zooming round on one of those too.  Great fun and nice to have a bit of a treat rather than just walking and playground.

Unfortunately the paddling pool area wasn’t open – we’ll have to go back from the end of May for that. But it’s a great park for lots of different activities, and it certainly had filled up by lunch time with lots of families sitting around picnicking on the grass.

We decided to eat in the café which is fairly simple fare.  N had a standard sandwich rather than a kids lunchbox (minimal amount of food for the price), crisps and drink, and I had a Panini.  I’d had my eye on an ice cream, because they had delicious looking gelato but the single queue for food was just too long to stand in – they needed a second person serving ice cream really, for when the ice cream kiosk outside wasn’t open.

By that time we were ready to head back home.  We’d had a lovely day in St Nicholas Park, and it’s definitely somewhere I’ll be suggesting we go with friends as an alternative to Stratford.

Have you ever been?  Where are your favourite parks?

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