Last Sunday we spent a wonderful day out with friends at Cliveden, which is near Slough.
Setting off from Croydon, the satnav said our journey should take 1 hour and 3 minutes. In the end, due to traffic on the M25, it took just over an hour and a half (and nearly two hours on the way back) and our two girls were definitely ready to get out of the car by the time we arrived. However, it was well worth the trip and next time I think we'd just set off a bit earlier in the morning, to try to avoid the congestion.
Cliveden is a really big National Trust property, so there is heaps to do and lots of different areas to explore. We were there for around five hours and there was still plenty of bits that we didn't manage to see, so we will definitely be back.
We arrived at lunchtime so we started our visit with a picnic in the field next to the overflow carpark. This was handy because we could then put all our picnic paraphernalia back in the car before heading off to visit the rest of Cliveden.
The adults were in need of a cup of tea so after a short walk through some woods, where we stopped for a while for the kids to explore some dens that had been built around the trees with sticks and branches, we arrived at the Doll's House Café which overlooks a small, shady wooden play area called the Storybook Play Den. The kids enjoyed playing on the various bits of play equipment and we enjoyed our drinks.
Next, we headed over to The Water Garden, which was fun to explore with its birds, fish, stepping stones and bridges, and then The Maze, which was actually surprisingly difficult!
Our visit then continued round to the house where we saw this beautiful fountain.
The kids enjoyed standing next to it and getting wet from the spray when the breeze blew it towards them, and were enchanted when a mummy duck swam past followed by five little ducklings.
It was getting late by then so we walked back to the car park through some woodland and set off on the drive home.
However, as I mentioned earlier, we didn't have time to see all of Cliveden by a long way and next time I would especially love to do the Woodland Play Trail through the woods and also see more of the beautiful gardens.
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