It is with HUGE excitement and a little intrepidation that I’ve booked us our first family holiday. We shall be spending 3 nights this June at the Bedruthan Steps hotel, Mawgan Porth in Cornwall. Gulp.
The trip will not be into wholly unchartered waters as this shall be my third return to this little corner of North Cornwall. My first trip was to review the newly opened Scarlet Hotel back in 2009. The sister hotel to the Bedruthan Steps, it is alas a civilised adult-only affair so a no-go this year, but so blissful was our stay there the OH and I are determined to break free from parental duties for the weekend and return.
My next visit was to Bedruthan Steps itself last year, acclaimed as Cornwall’s Hotel of the Year 2010/11, I was part of a press trip to sample their ‘knitting weekend’ with knitwear guru, Erica Knight.
Now, it could be argued this is my second trip to BS with child, as I was secretly 2-months pregnant during that trip. With babies firmly on the brain I clocked how clued up and set up BS was for les enfants. Not simply a perfunctory offering of a knackered travel cot in the room and a high chair plastered in baby food. This place *gets* parents.
It’s not only the extensive facilities the beach-side hotel has up it’s sleeve: soft play areas, adventure playground, craft room, baby pool, OFSTED-inspected children’s clubs… but crucially, the little extras that show someone in the management team is a mother: complimentary sterilizers in your room, changing facilities throughout the hotel, HIPP Organic baby food at breakfast and built-in baby monitors in every room so you can eat dinner in peace. It’s fab. You could literally pick up your baby and go without a week of lists, packing and stress beforehand (which, lets be honest, keep most of us parents at home).
So, that’s exactly what we’re doing. They even rent you an all-terrain buggy for your stay so we’re not even taking that. The plan is to arrive on Friday, Country Bebe is booked into the creche that afternoon while we take a couples massage in the spa (I can’t actually think about that at the moment, the idea of 2 hours alone being pampered with my OH makes me quite teary). Then drinks and dinner at one of their two newly opened restaurants, followed by a weekend of (weather permitting): sand castle building, pool splashing and cream-tea scoffing at the National Trust tea rooms at Carnewas. A good old-fashioned British seaside holiday. Perfect.
[…] Today is the OH’s 30th birthday. He was thoroughly chuffed with all his presents (especially the MASSIVE chocolate cake above) and we’re all looking forward to heading down to Bedruthan Steps tomorrow. […]