Our Summer Adventures part 1

The summer holidays are upon us, and I'm determined not to let the computers win. So I have been looking at things that we can do as a family that are different and hopefully memorable. My favourite motto of the roaring 20s is definitely "Making Memories" and as somone who loves to print out all her photos (and we do spend time sitting down looking through our albums on a regular basis, even if my reasoning is frequently to compare the size of my thighs), I want to have an array of pictures to print and not the same old same old each time.

Now that lockdown is easing, we've upped our game and taken the plunge on a few things. Today I'm going to share with you our Drive In Theatre experience, Kew Little Pigs and a good old favourite, Chiltern Open Air Museum.

Henley Festival, Car Park Party- Horrible Histories

Well this was a gamble, booking tickets for a) a show we have already seen, in b) our car from which we've never sat to enjoy a show in c) still partial lockdown and early days of easing.  But the tickets were a good price, and we paid for the car and not the people in it. I think it was £32 for our car.

Armed with snacks and not too many drinks (we didn't want to risk the toilets there) we drove to Henley and simply parked up in a field next to the river.  We were told what radio station to tune the car to and were asked to provide all passenger details before travelling in case of contact following an outbreak.

I must say this was really well managed and we arrived to see lots of children climbing onto the rooves of their parents cars. Having not preempted that, we only had a pretty grubby dog towel in the boot for the kids to lie on, and it took Lucy a while to build up the courage to climb up. Molly on the other hand loved her new sunbathing post and happily got settled to watch the show.

It was brilliant.  As all HH shows are, and also different from the last time we saw it, as it's adapted to include current news and most definitely keep parents entertained too.

There was a huge screen to watch the show on, although if I moved my head a bit I could see the live stage and we had the volume cranked up on the radio so that the kids could still hear it loud and clear too.  Instead of clapping, we hooted, which in itself was a lot of fun, and everyone was respectful of the noise so the actors were not drowned out.

The kids loved it and so did we.   Although we were asked to bring the kids down from the roof after a while (apparently someone at the back complained) it was still an awesome and new experience and a great price for a few hours of solid entertainment.

 The following day (yes how spoiled are the children) we hopped in the car and drove to Amersham to visit

KEW LITTLE PIGS

Kew Little Pigs, believe it or not, is a pig farm. It doesn't advertise as anything else, there are no rides or dinosaurs or hot dog stands there. It's simply a pig farm, but an awesome one.

You have to book in advance for your piggy experience, and we bought 4 tickets for a one hour pig play package at £24 a ticket. Not the cheapest, but again this was an experience and one that we absolutely loved.  The farm is lovely and the welcoming was great, full on health and safety and covid aware.  We were greeted along with about 7 other groups of 2-4 people and given a tour of the pens, introduced to the pigs and explained some of their history. This was really good and informative.  There are about 10 pens there in total, but we were allowed to go into 4 of them, although allowed to stroke the piggies through the fence in the others.  There is of course a reason for this. Some pigs were pregnant and not wanting people all over them, some were in quarantine ready to go to their forever homes and other reasons.  If you remember that this is a live working farm and not a pure tourist attraction, that makes total sense.

The pigs we could go in and play with were of varying sizes from really miniature to medium dog size (which is still classed as miniature in pig terms).  We were given free reign to go in and sit with the pigs, stroke them and brush them. They are very sociable animals and love to have their tummys brushed.  It was just a really lovely experience and quite therapeutic too. An hour is a great amount of time to spend with them too. Remember, they are just piggies in a pen but really cute and friendly and cuddly. Number one rule though, do not lick the pigs! Yes that's a real thing. We abided by the rules.

Chiltern Open Air Museum

Ok, so this one isn't a new experience for us, and the girls have been on multiple occasions with school, guides and brownies but this is one of our new favourite chill out picnic places.  For a £5 donation (and they really need donations right now), we booked our tickets online in line with social distancing and turned up with the dog, children and picnic to this beautiful chiltern setting.  The nice thing about COAM as it's abbreviated to is that you can do as little or as much as you want.  The history lessons are immense and give a great understanding of how things were over hundreds of years.  From the Iron age house, which despite not being in use all lockdown, still smells of the firepit last lit probably in February, to the prefab 1950s houses that were put up in an emergency after the war to provide quick accommodation.  There are orchards and veg patches and all of this is so nicely laid out with clear descriptions of what you are looking at.  There are sheep and goats here too for the animal lovers, and previously we've seen horses, but they weren't out this time.

Becuase of Covid, some of the buildings were closed off, but we could still see through the windows are there were still some lovely volunteers to chat to about the history of these amazing buildings.

The picnic area is spaced out, there are tables or grass area for blankets and the little drinks fridge is open for purchases too, as is the shop too.

Don't forget we have this amazing place right on our doorstep (if you live near me).