Totally dissapionted with haven holiday!

SHEILA54

Hi

I have been to 2 of the sites in Weymouth, Wild Duck in Norfolk and to Riviere Sands in Cornwall. We have never been disappointed and the caravans have always been clean. I do prefer to pay for a silver upwards as you get extra space and heating, which is great if the weather is dodgy.

Riviere Sands is next to 3 miles of sandy beach and is never packed. I love Cornwall and have seen bad reviews of many of the other sites down there.
The clubhouse was a bit tired but I think that they renovated it last year.

Louiseuk25

*onlyme* wrote: »

And why did I read this thread? We booked our 1st ever holiday to go to Haven near Chichester...during October half term. I am hoping and praying it is not as bad as some of you have described. I will go with very low expectations so it can only get better....(one hopes!!)

I'm thinking exactly the same....only we're off to Haven Lakeside at the begining of June. Here's hoping this one is an exception!

liam8282

We just went to Cala Gran near Fleetwood/Blackpool over the bank holiday weekend, using the £99 offer found on here.

Me, my partner, 8 week old daughter, 5 year old son, and my parents all went.

The caravan was just a standard caravan but was ok. Suppose that added to the "camping out" sort of feel to the holiday. It had everything that we needed and we were only really in it to sleep, we were out most of the day.

The park wasn't very big, but there was enough to keep my son entertained with the arcade machines, crazy golf, football pitch, pool and park.

The park was very clean and tidy.

Everything was mainly aimed towards it being a kids holiday, which is what we wanted and our son really enjoyed it.

The things I didn't like about the place were the food was awful and very overpriced, think it was about £8 for fish and chips and they were absolutely disgusting. The drinks weren't much better either.

I also agree that there was a lot of selling going on, every night they had something different to sell that had something to do with the show and the kids had to buy it to take part.

Plus every time they had a part of the show where one of the entertainers came out in a costume, and everyone was reminded not to take pictures as the park photographers had bought the rights (park photographer being one of the guys who worked behind the bar).

Overall I think the holiday was worth the £99 I paid and I would go again, but only if I could get it at the same price. It was a good little break.

Looking on my confirmation sheet the holiday should have cost £299, if I had of paid that I would have been very disappointed!!

SUESMITH_2

kjmtidea wrote: »

I went to Butlins (Bognor) for the first time last year and it was fantastic, our accomodation was spotless and I could not fault the holiday one bit. It wasn't even full of chavs like I was expecting!

Unlike Haven a few years back, never ever again. It was absolutely filthy and you couldn't pay me to go back.

same here, we had very low expectations of butlins but we all loved it and would happily go back - the pool was very good

tryingtobegood

Louiseuk25 wrote: »

I'm thinking exactly the same....only we're off to Haven Lakeside at the begining of June. Here's hoping this one is an exception!

I'm also wishing I had never opened this thread.
To be fair I've been to Haven at Berwick 4 times now and I can honestly say that I have never had any real moans (apart from the weather!:p)

I hated Seton Sands with a passion. I'll never go back there. Heehaw to do. I live in the central belt of Scotland so going Edinburgh just wasn't an option (felt like I was going home!). The sands at Gullane were lovely though.
Haggerston Castle was ok.
I generally use the caravan as a base and don't spend much time in the holiday park itself.
I'm off to Prestatyn in July so I'm hoping it's not as bad as I'm imagining.....
I'm just about to google Prestatyn and its surrounds for things to do now!

sickparrot

My Haven experiences in list form:

Hafan-Y-Mor - Arrived to find budget accomodation a horror filled stinky hell hole. Upgraded and was OK after that. One of the best tribute bands I'd ever seen was on for entertainment and that made the weekend.

Weymouth Bay - Week in a caravan, fine, but too many of them seem to be privately owned and they stare at you like some kind of freak 'not from these parts are you ooo-arrr' outsider.

Tenby (wall park?) - Camped here, no problems

Lake district (forgot name) - Camped also, no problems, great place to explore from.

We've stayed at quite a few Pontins sites, and these seem to be more consistently 'mildly grimy but not terrible' to stay at. Butlins Minehead was by far the best camp We've been to.

Rachel85

Curlywurli wrote: »

I've been to Caister a few times and it's the worst park I've ever been to. The last time we went there was on a Sun deal and it was a nightmare. The holiday camp had flooded- obviously not their fault. We were supposed to get in at three, didn't give us our keys until 5:30, told us we could go and wait in the cafe. Dumped our things in the caravan, went to the "supermarket" and it had closed at 6- even though they were hours late getting us in everything had still closed early. Our little girl was six months old at the time- it was awful. I've been to many haven camps and this is one I would never go back to- even if it was free!

So why keep going back?!?!?!?!

remembered_nights

Woh, we've been on like 15 different caravan holidays and never had problems, didn't realise how lucky we were :eek: Also never felt any desire whatsoever to go to the 'entertainment' or eat onsite... the caravan is just a base camp

November2

I think it definately depends which park you go to and more importantly where it is in the Country! I've been to Isle Of Wight several times and they are lovely parks. One thing to remember is they have different parks to cater to different people - the quieter country parks and the activity parks. If you want lots to do then go for the activity parks but expect it to be much noiser as it will have lots more children and the accommodation etc will be more 'used' there's also lots of extra charges for activities at these parks. The quieter parks are by far the nicest as they don't attract the 'rowdy families'!

vikingaero

November2 wrote: »

I think it definately depends which park you go to and more importantly where it is in the Country! I've been to Isle Of Wight several times and they are lovely parks. One thing to remember is they have different parks to cater to different people - the quieter country parks and the activity parks. If you want lots to do then go for the activity parks but expect it to be much noiser as it will have lots more children and the accommodation etc will be more 'used' there's also lots of extra charges for activities at these parks. The quieter parks are by far the nicest as they don't attract the 'rowdy families'!

Agree with November here.

The less accessible the parks are by public transport the nicer they are likely to be. The larger parks (and generally speaking where they include half board) are likely to be busier and grottier.

Any park a few hours from the major conurbations get overrun by the masses who always holiday with 500 other members of their family.