[Days Out] Our Gruffalo Hunt

21st July 2014
Last Saturday, after seeing a few blog posts, we decided to head over to the Wyre Forest near Bewdley to partake in the Forestry Commission’s Gruffalo Trail

To celebrate the Gruffalo’s 15th (15 years??!! How old do I feel) anniversary, there are 15 wooden Gruffalo statues in forests around the UK. We are all huge Gruffalo fans (especially me…yes, I know!) so this sounded too good to pass up.

We arrived around 10.30am on a Saturday morning and parked really easily which I was shocked about. Parking is £3 and you can stay all day and lots of shady places to park away from the sun so you don’t go back to an oven of a car!

As you walk to the trail, there is a large play area for older children. It’s all enclosed so they can’t run off. Charlie LOVED it and we spent around 10 minutes playing on there before we went off to the trail – with some grumbles from Charlie as he wanted to carry on playing on the playground.

Having so much fun!

 

Next to the play area there are lots of picnic benches and also a small shop and cafe which sells both hot and cold food and drinks – and of course, the obligatory hot day treat – ice creams! 
In the shop you can purchase a Gruffalo trail guide which is £2. We chose not to and have to say we did the trail easy enough without it so don’t think it’s a necessity.
The trail itself it totally free. You follow the signs dotted around the wood. The signs are arrows and also on some there are little mini quizzes which give the kids extra things to do. Charlie loved running trying to find the next sign and seeing what we needed to do. 
 

 

A very rare photo of us all!
 
Also dotted around were some of the Gruffalo’s friends which we enjoyed seeing. The trail itself took us around 15 minutes to complete. We took the girls in the pushchair and easily got it around the wood. We were lucky that despite it being a hot day, we were sheltered by the trees so it was a lovely walk
 

 

Mouse
 
We found the Gruffalo in the end (although confusingly the statue wasn’t actually at the end of the trail!) and here he is in all his glory. I presume he is sleeping…or at least I hope so!
 
 

 

 
After finishing the trail we sat and had a picnic under a lovely tree near the play area and cafe. By this time it was starting to get more busy so we definitely did the right thing going early. I think if we had been following big groups of people the “hunting” element may somewhat have been removed and it just would have been listening and following everyone else!
 

 

She was more interested in the rice cake. Yes, I know, but we are somehow related…
 
It was a lovely super cheap outing. However we were only there for 2 hours so I don’t think you could stretch it out to a full day. Saying that I’m sure if Charlie had some of his friends with him they could have spent more time on the play area. But we really enjoyed our Gruffalo trail. You can visit the Forestry Commissions website to see if there’s any trails local to you. “A gruffalo? What’s a gruffalo?” you ask? Well across the summer holidays the Gruffalo himself will be there so you can find out all about the beast himself!
B x
  • Judith Luscombe 6th April 2015 at 10:16 am

    It looks a beautiful place, with gorgeous surroundings ideal for a family outing.

  • Sharon Mclauchlan 12th July 2015 at 10:49 pm

    look like so much fun

  • Maya Russell 16th July 2015 at 5:10 am

    £3 parking is really good. Would love to go on this hunt as it’s one of our favourite books.

  • Barbara Handley 23rd August 2015 at 10:03 am

    This sounds so much fun. Not too bad a journey down the M42 from where my grandchildren live. I will have to put it on my list of places to take the children in the future.

  • Maria Hackett 19th October 2015 at 3:40 pm

    looks like a fab day out. same as you I like leaving early for things like this too x

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