Alice in Quarantine Land: Festive Edition

Hello and welcome back to our blog! Today's thrilling chapter focuses on our trip to Light Water Valley. This years theme was Alice in Wonderland...Rather fitting considering how topsy-turvy 2020 has been.

So we saw an advert for the event whilst subtly scrolling through Facebook, now I'd never been before and Fitzy had only been with his family when he was younger many years ago. Now with the freedom of a car we excitedly booked the event for as close to Christmas as we could get it. This was the 19th December and invited people along; as we were supposed to be able to have another 4 people with us, before Bojo dropped the devastating news that we had to go by ourselves. By the time others thought of going the date we'd chosen was already booked out. Our fate was sealed.

Having gone to the Santa's Grotto the week before (see previous post), this was an outdoor adventure, so it meant we wouldn't have to be in close proximity to many other people, but also the weather was cold. I was finally going to be able to enjoy some hot cocoa, which I've been going through a phase of craving. As we're based on West Yorkshire, Lightwater Valley is based in Ripon in North Yorkshire, so took about an hour to get there, even with my kind of driving.

We had booked in for the puppet show which was supposed to be at 5pm due to me wanting to go when it was dark, to make the most of the illuminations, but the lady at reception was the sweetest ever and said there was space in the 3pm slot, so with an hour and a bit to go we headed to the GRANARY PIZZA PARLOUR for a pizza, turkey sandwich and that hot chocolate I'd been so desperate for.

Once our bellies were full we headed to the park and started the journey where each tableaux was presented with narrated story. I absolutely adored the caterpillar who had been one of my personal favourite characters in the story, after the Mad Hatter of course! We noticed a few more places you could grab some food, but headed around the park into the trails with fluorescent mushrooms and flowers. The trail took you to an animal petting area, that due to Covid was closed, so limited what you could do at the park.

Coming back around we went through arches of the Card Soldiers before having

Tweedledum and Tweedledee greet us at the entrance of the stage area where the puppet show would take place. Sadly it began to spit with rain at this point, but we used my jacket to make sure V was covered.

The puppet show was....interesting, the Santa was clearly new as at the beginning of the show we were told no singing, but when he came on stage asked everyone to sing. All the parents started looking around at each other sheepishly and just continued to clap. As songs went they weren't that bad, I knew someone of them, but I think the magic was a highlight to the show. Once done we were led through the rest of the grotto until we find gift section and had the choice between a Mr Happy book or a Peppa Pig one and a chocolate...I think it's obvious which one we chose, that annoying pink blob is banned in our household.

After a final brief look around we made our way back to the car as rain was starting to come done and Fitzy didn't bring a jacket. All in all it was a really nice family outing, and once V is a little older, we can all go Dinosaur mini-golfing and head on some water rides.

Below is some footage of the day, we really loved it and look forward to visiting again, maybe do Christmas there again in 2021! If you've ever been to Lightwater Valley before, please comment what rides you love to go on.

As always,

Ciao for now!

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