Adventures // Bluestone, Wales (Part One)

I can’t believe it’s already been over two weeks since we stayed at Bluestone in Wales! The past few weeks have gone so quickly with H-Bear’s birthday, family staying and then our gender scan…

We had the most wonderful time at Bluestone and I’m looking forward to sharing our experience with you in these posts. Nick used to holiday in Pembrokeshire when he was little, so he loved returning – and reminiscing with our own children in tow.

We’re a family who likes to create their own adventures; our holidays usually consist of self-catering accommodation in the middle of nowhere. So I wasn’t sure whether we’d feel too ‘penned in’ at Bluestone, but I was pleasantly surprised.

Sunday 17th June 2018

We decided to head down to Wales on the Sunday to get the long journey out of the way. We stopped for the night at the amazing Apple Camping and stayed in the Witches Hat, which was great fun (although no one got much sleep as we were all sharing together!).

The site had brilliant facilities and it’s somewhere we’re already talking about revisiting.

Monday 18th June 2018

We were awake (far too) bright and early on Monday morning, so we decided to head into Tenby in search of coffee and then lunch. We definitely recommend the Pembrokeshire Pasty & Pie shop for a lunch on the go (not allergy-friendly, but the kids had sandwiches from Sainbury’s, so they were happy).

We arrived at Bluestone about 3pm. Check-in was impressive and very quick; the staff were incredibly friendly and made us feel very welcome.

Unfortunately, we couldn’t get into our lodge until 4.30pm, so we parked up in the car park and had a wander around the Bluestone village (which has everything you need including a pub, a café, a little shop and even a spa) and a quick play in the playground until it was time for us to be able to drive in and unload the car.

Bluestone is mostly car-free, except for lodge unpacking and check out. You can rent golf buggies, but we didn’t feel that this was necessary for us as everything is within walking distance.

We were staying in Preseli View 13 which was within easy reach of the village. The lodge was ‘upside down’, which the children found to be such a novelty! It was a three bed lodge, which slept 6. It was very spacious with good size rooms – the blackout curtains were excellent. Our ensuite had a bath (although the main family bathroom didn’t have a bath). We found the lodge to be quite dark, but then this might have more to do with the weather than the lodge itself as the weather at the start of our adventure wasn’t ideal.

The kitchen was well-equipped, with children’s plates and cutlery too. There was a starter pack for cleaning, which included dishwasher tablets.

We all had an early night on Monday ahead of the Bluestone adventures really starting on Tuesday!

Tuesday 19th June 2018

The weather was a bit pants on Tuesday morning, but we decided to embrace it and don our raincoats and wellies. We headed to the forest and the steep ravine walkway down into the woods. We passed through Camp Smokey, had a look at the fire pit and then continued on into the trees – spotting baby frogs, robins and butterflies. There were lots of bug hotels, which Busby had many questions about.

After a wonderful walk, where we barely encountered anyone, we decided to walk back towards Camp Smokey for lunch. I’d heard brilliant things about the restaurant and we weren’t disappointed.

Camp Smokey is an open wooden restaurant in the middle of the forest. Birds come and visit your table, and it has a very relaxed atmosphere.

They were fantastic catering for H-Bear’s milk allergy and double checked the ingredients on everything. The food was yummy and reasonably priced.

The highlight of our Camp Smokey experience was definitely toasting marshmallows (and in Busby’s case, making s’mores) by the fire pit. We spent ages there!

Eventually, with our bellies full and the children sufficiently sugared-up on marshmallows, we headed back through the woods to our lodge.

By the time we got back it was almost 4pm, so we decided to amend our plans to go to the Blue Lagoon in favour of some downtime, dinner and an early bedtime. H-Bear could barely hold his head up by this point!

Part Two coming on Tuesday, including our Blue Lagoon adventures and a trip to Saundersfoot.

Hannah