Going on holiday to weymouth

kezzygirl

Thanks for your suggestions!

Re.the sea life centre, we have two 2 for 1 tickets, so hubby is going to take dd in and I will take ds, about £45 doing it that way.

We will definately visit durdle door, and bowleaze bay is right next to our haven camp! Nothe fort looks good, on the saturday they have a re-enactment day where they do all victorian things, so looks good!

Thanks for you suggestions, I just really want to make the most of it! weather forecast doesn't look too cracky, but I'll be damned if I let it ruin things!! I just hope its not too windy as we will be blown about in the trailer tent :rotfl:

kezzygirl

Shelldean wrote: »

It's called the sealife tower.
http://www.sealifeweymouth.com/explore/weymouth-tower.aspx


Edited to say buying tickets in advance online is cheaper it seems

I think that entry to the sealife tower is free when you show your sealife ticket. I will force myself to do it, I HATE heights....

Elsewhere

If you head inland, Dorchester is a lovely town - market day is Wednesday, so it's pretty busy then. Right on its outskirts is Maiden Castle, which is a huge hill fort (free to get in, so it's worth a quick look even if you're not usually interested in that sort of thing)

http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/content/properties/maiden-castle/gallery-for-maiden-castle/gallerymaidencastleaerialviewironagehillfortskyballoonphotographym981888.jpg

and also on the outskirts is Poundbury, a new suburb of Dorchester, built by Prince Charles. I find it a very creepy place - too perfect and too empty. It's like a deserted film set.

http://duchyofcornwall.org/poundbury.html

If you belong to the National Trust there are several places good to visit with small children - Corfe Castle, just down the road from where I live, Brownsea Island (catch the little boat near the Sandbanks side of the Sandbanks Ferry) and of course Shell Bay, which is the beach on the Studland side of the Sandbanks ferry. All the car parks for Shell Bay belong to the National Trust and cost silly money unless you are a member, when they're free. The car park on the edge of Corfe is NT too.

Ebe_Scrooge

Durdle Door, and Stair Hole just round the corner in Lulworth Cove are both well worth a visit. If the weather is nice, you can have great fun swimming through the arches and climbing up the rocks and jumping off ( just watch the depth of water below, best to do this at high tide ). Chesil Beach is interesting - lots of pebbles to break open and find "jewels" inside ( quartz and suchlike ) - very popular with the kids.

And fossil hunting at Lyme Regis is great fun, as others have said. If you like exploring caves and rocks, Portland Bill is a good day out. A little further afield is Swanage and Hedbury Quarry - a disused quarry that's very popular with climbers, and loads of man-made caves to explore. Also Tilly Whim caves. If you like walking, head over to Durlston Country Park, miles of spectacular clifftop walks.

Bovington Tank Museum is another interesting day out - I thought my kids may find it a bit boring, but they loved it.

You'll not be short of things to do in that area - I lived there for 10 years and still found new "secret places" every time I went out

kezzygirl

Wow, thanks for all of your suggestions! chesil beach jewel hunting sounds good, I love jewels! is that near weymouth?(i will google it)

Not long until we go now, getting very excited!4.5 hour drive, but we like a challenge

Ebe_Scrooge

kezzygirl wrote: »

Wow, thanks for all of your suggestions! chesil beach jewel hunting sounds good, I love jewels! is that near weymouth?(i will google it)

Not long until we go now, getting very excited!4.5 hour drive, but we like a challenge

Yes, Chesil is right next to Weymouth, between Weymouth and Portland.

When I say "jewels" I don't mean real valuable ones ! But a lot of the stones have shiny quartz type stuff inside them ( sorry, I'm no geologist ! ), which my kids always loved finding, cleaning up and keeping in their little "treasure boxes"

Interesting fact : The stones on Chesil graduate from large boulders at one end through to tiny, almost sand-like at the other. They do say that in the olden days, sailors who came ashore in darkness knew where abouts they were by the size of the pebbles.

kezzygirl

haha, I know what you meant. I love quartz etc, so sounds like this could be good.

gamston

charmouth is best for fossiling, go on a tour from the fossil shop on the beach, take your own hammer for breaking the rocks
Weymouth is great beach for kids
lots of places to see & do locally
if you are going via M5 it takes ages to get anywhere that side of the M5 when you exit the motorway

kezzygirl

Well, we are back and had an absolutely fantastic time!! It is very beautiful, and all I hoped it would be.

We went to weymouth beach a few times, to the carnival, took a boat ride to Portland, visited the sealife centre, went to durdle door and man o war beach-gorgeous! visited bowleaze cove, whihc was pretty much next to our haven sight. we visited lulworth castle too!

we were going to visit portland lighthouse and chesil beach but we were exhausted from our excursions lol we also spent some time on site swimming etc and doing the activities.

The weather was lovely, apart from the last day (Monday) in which it rained all night and all day as we drove home. It took us 8.5 hours to get back to norfolk because traffic was chocka block on m27 onwards!!

BUT...we are coming again next year, we loved it so much

Shelldean

The traffic was awful on Monday wasn't it? We camped in signage over bank holiday and also came home Monday our journey time back to London was two hours longer due to traffic and weather