high-quality standards

CUMBRIA COUPLE CELEBRATES VISITENGLAND’S TOP 100 RECOGNITION

Posted on November 4, 2024

Rachael and Ian Gowing from Kirkby Stephen are thrilled after their holiday business, Pennine View Park, was named one of Britain’s top accommodation providers by VisitEngland. The park received this year’s ROSE award, recognising exceptionally high quality standards.

The accolade was presented by Lady Victoria Borwick at a special ceremony in Newbury, Berkshire. Rachael, a former Red Bull events organizer, launched the park in 2017, with Ian leaving his construction job to join her. They transformed a former railway yard into a premier holiday destination. Pennine View Park has achieved a five-star grading from VisitEngland and is shortlisted for Cumbria Tourism’s Holiday Park of the Year in 2024.

The park, which includes 80 pitches for campers and touring caravans, has also added cozy timber glamping pods. The couple opened The Engine Shed, a family bar converted from an old railway goods shed, featuring outdoor seating and a street-food inspired menu with live music events.

Now among the top 100 businesses recognised by VisitEngland, the ROSE award highlights their commitment to providing an exceptional experience for guests. Rachael expressed pride in this recognition, emphasising that it reflects not just the park’s facilities but also the warmth and hospitality of their team.

“We’re already receiving bookings for next year, with many guests returning or coming through personal recommendations,” she noted.

Pennine View Park
www.pennineviewpark.co.uk

CELEBRATIONS FOR DREAM DEVON DESTINATIONS

Posted on May 10, 2023

CELEBRATIONS FOR DREAM DEVON DESTINATIONS

THE BEVERLEY TEAM is celebrating the park’s 65th anniversary.

Eighty years of providing happy holidays on the Devon coast are being marked this year by the family owners of Ladram Bay Holiday Park in Budleigh Salterton. The five-star park is possibly the oldest in Britain to have remained under the same family’s ownership for such a length of time – and a full year of celebrations is planned. The celebrations will come to a climax in June when an all-stops-out party is planned to mark the same month in 1943 when Ladram Bay first began welcoming visitors.

It was then that farmer Frank Carter and his wife Margaret decided to allow Scouts to pitch up on their front field amid some of Devon’s loveliest countryside. The spectacular views of the bay and access to the farm’s private beach soon won the site an enthusiastic following which quickly grew in numbers as news of it spread. Eight decades on, Ladram Bay now welcomes customers from across the world, and provides one of the West Country’s best equipped parks for family holidays.

Its high-quality standards have won a top five-star grade for excellence from Visit England, and past accolades in the Devon Tourism Awards and South West Tourism Awards. Attractions at the park include an indoor climbing wall, indoor swimming pool and outdoor splash zone, watersports equipment hire, and adventure golf course. In addition to the planned birthday celebration weekend in June, there will be other themed events throughout the year, and a competition to try and find the earliest memory of the park.

OWNED BY THE SAME FAMILY SINCE 1943, Ladram Bay Holiday Park is set to celebrate 80 years of service

Every guest aged 80-plus who pre-books their holiday in 2023 will be offered a cream tea. Meanwhile, more than six decades after the first families booked a seaside caravan stay at Beverley Holidays in Devon, the park is marking its 65th anniversary. Celebrating the milestone will be members of the Jeavons family, who originally opened up part of their farmland to visitors in 1958. A series of events is planned throughout spring and summer, including themed party nights, special get-togethers for children and grown-ups, plus live entertainment.

The year has also seen the opening of a new £800,000 holiday home development, and new facilities for camping, touring caravan and motorhome guests. The investment is on top of almost £2.5 million spent in recent years on a fleet of holiday lodges and caravans with private hot-tubs, and a nautical themed play park. Located in Paignton on the English Riviera coast, Beverley Holidays has won a raft of national and regional excellence awards over the years, plus accolades for its environmental work.

WISH YOU WERE HERE – Treasure Chest

Posted on February 15, 2023

WISH YOU WERE HERE - Treasure Chest

We pay a visit to Dorset's Wareham Forest Tourist Park...

Named as the South West’s Campsite of the Year 2022 by the AA in its annual celebration of Britain’s top park destinations, Wareham Tourist Park stood out for its high-quality standards, first-class hospitality and tranquil location. Not far from Poole, Dorchester and the Purbeck coast, Wareham Forest Tourist Park was acquired 20 years ago by husband-and-wife team Tony and Sarah Birch.

Since then, they have invested much time and energy into creating five-star facilities and surroundings for campers and owners of touring caravans and motorhomes. Today, the park draws guests from all over the UK and mainland Europe and says that 70% of its customers comprise people making repeat visits. As well as paths to explore around the park’s wooded grounds, there is a heated outdoor pool, children’s play area, park shop, and comfortable modern shower and toilet facilities.

 

 

Wareham Forest Tourist Park also has a reputation for its pet-friendly nature, and even provides a warm shower to pamper pooches following their countryside rambles. Highlights include an outdoor heated swimming pool, open from late May to early September, a popular play area and the Park organises regular visits, for the convenience of guests, of a wide range of street food stalls.

The park is managed today by Tony and Sarah, assisted by their daughter Chrissy and her husband Benn the park is open all year round, enabling touring guests to enjoy the countryside throughout the four seasons, and when nearby visitor attractions are less busy. Wareham Forest is also a member of the Best of British group of independently-owned parks in Britain and has won other awards for helping to sustain wildlife.

Wareham Forest Tourist Park
Tel. 01929 551393
www.warehamforest.co.uk

PARK HOLIDAYS UK FLEX MUSCLE

Posted on August 2, 2022

PARK HOLIDAYS UK FLEX MUSCLE

PARK HOLIDAYS UK takes its portfolio to 54 locations with the acquisition of Park Leisure.

 

Park Holidays UK has confirmed its acquisition of holiday parks group Park Leisure which owns 11 holiday parks in popular locations in England, Scotland and North Wales. It will bring to 54 the number of parks now operated by Park Holidays UK – and follows the company’s acquisition of nine parks from Bridge Leisure in 2021. The enlarged portfolio, says the group, will provide it with an even stronger national platform from which to serve Britain’s fast-growing domestic holiday market.

Park Holidays UK director Tony Clish said the coming together of the two well-established groups presented exciting new opportunities in one of tourism’s most dynamic sectors: “Both companies have invested substantially in their parks over recent years and created a range of high-quality holiday products which people clearly enjoy,” he said. “Park Leisure’s 11 parks have all gained top five-star tourist board awards and represent the high-quality standards we have been working towards in recent years.

 

“Whether customers are looking to rent or buy a holiday home, we can now offer a wide geographical spread of parks able to deliver a first-class experience at an affordable cost. “We will continue to invest in all of our parks to ensure that that their facilities and standards of service are maintained to the highest possible levels,” said Mr Clish. “The domestic holiday market continues to gain traction in the post-Brexit and post-pandemic market, and we are continuing to see an ever-increasing demand for UK holidays.

“Quality is the main driver of bookings and holiday home sales, and this union will consolidate some of the finest holiday parks in the UK into one single group,” said Mr Clish. Parks in both groups provide extensive leisure facilities and family entertainment, together with carefully managed landscaped grounds in which holiday lodges and caravans are located. Park Holidays UK was formed over 35 years ago, and its parks today span the length of Britain from Cornwall in the west to Moray in northern Scotland. Park Leisure has operated holidays parks for more than 20 years, and has a presence in Cornwall, Herefordshire, Lancashire, Northumberland, Yorkshire and North Wales.