I am off work at the moment as I am recovering from bowel cancer and my husband booked two weeks off as our son was getting married and he wanted some time off around that. I received an email from Parkdean Resorts saying we could book a four day holiday for £89. I was a bit sceptical but it was true, so we booked to go from Monday to Thursday at St. Minver Holiday Park, Wadebridge, Cornwall, PL27 6RR.

Day One

The journey from Southampton to Wadebridge is roughly four hours, so we booked to stop off at The Jamaica Inn for lunch. This was a bit of a bucket list item for both of us, as every time we drove to Cornwall we threatened to go there, but never actually got there, but because it was my birthday, we decided to go for it.

We stopped off at The Jamaican Inn, luckily we had booked as it was very busy.

Please click on this link to read about our visit and what we did there.

Our onward journey took us another 45 minutes where we found St. Minver Holiday Park quite easily and after booking in at Reception we found our caravan.

We booked a four berth caravan and when we entered we were pleasantly surprised by it. Sure, it wasn’t the biggest caravan we’d stayed in but it was only for the two of us and we wouldn’t be spending that much time in there, we were more concerned with the facilities the park had to offer and the location of it.

On looking at the map of the site and the entertainment programme it looked like there was a lot going on. We saw that there was an entertainment hub which housed the pub, showbar, restaurant, arcade and soft play area and the list of activities for the children was quite extensive, including an indoor heated swimming pool, plus bingo, karaoke and even a tribute band for the adults. I was quite impressed that you could order food from your table via their App and even have food delivered to your accommodation.

After unpacking, we decided to visit a beach called Polzeath Beach which is popular with surfers and we could see why when we arrived, the waves were awesome! We took a walk around the town centre, purchased an ice cream and took a wander down on the beach. There were lots of surfing classes and we spent a while watching the surfers ride the waves and some quite spectacular wipe-outs.

As it had been a long day, we drove back to the caravan and as we were both still full from the lunch at Jamaica Inn, we had a cup of tea and went to sleep….

Day Two

Today we had decided to go and visit Padstow which is one of my favourite places in Cornwall, my very favourite being St. Ives. But, instead of driving to Padstow we were going to park at Rock, which was only a couple of miles away and then catch the ferry across the bay to Padstow. This was a good decision as the car park in Padstow is way up on a hill and whilst this is fine in the morning walking down, it’s very tiring after a long day and having to walk up this steep hill, plus after chemotherapy and bowel surgery, I’m still not up to full strength so I’m not sure I would have even made it!

We arrived and parked up and went for a walk along the sea front to take a little look at the place where the celebrities live, people like Gordon Ramsay and Dawn French. We spotted Paul Ainsworth’s restaurant, The Mariners on the sea front and it did look fabulous, somewhere we’d love to go for a special occasion.

We walked back as we could see the ferry was approaching Rock Beach. The ferry only took card payments and it cost £3.00 – Adult Single, £1.50 – Child Single and £3.00 – Bike.

The ferry dropped us off at the harbour and after checking what time the last ferry back to Rock was, we went off to explore.

Padstow is a fishing port and is situated on the west bank of the River Camel. There is a lot of shops to visit, we particularly like the glass art that you can get from Cornwall, plenty of tea rooms, restaurants and of course, pasties. After a cup of coffee and a piece of cake, we took a stroll round and sat on a bench on the harbour just people watching and enjoying the view.

Then it was time for my birthday treat – lunch at Rick Stein’s St Petrocs Bistro. To read about the full experience please click here.

After a delicious meal at Rick Stein’s, we had another wander and stumbled across a craft fayre and never one to walk past one of this, we went in. There were lots of stalls to have a look around and I bought a ceramic heart necklace which was very pretty.

We then caught the ferry back to Rock, thankful that we didn’t have to go up that steep hill back to the carpark and drove back to the caravan site.

We were going to go to the Entertainment Hub but we were very tired and so we just chilled in front of the television watching The Great British Bake Off, munched on a few pork pies that we had brought with us and then departed to the bedroom and I haven’t slept that well for a very long time…

Day Three

On our journey down to St. Minver Caravan Park, we saw a sign for Pencarrow House, it wasn’t a National Trust house but privately owned, so we made a mental note to visit it if we had time over the next couple of days. Well, day three afforded us this chance and so we headed over to it early morning to book a house tour.

It’s a standing joke between us that wherever we go somebody always knows hubby and today was no exception. As we walked into the shop a voice said, “Hello Phil, what are you doing here?” The lady who worked behind the counter used to work in one of the buildings he runs as the Catering Manager!

A walk around the gardens and a guided tour of the house and we were on our way to Lanhydrock house, but not before have a bite to eat at a pub we passed along the way.

We had downloaded a free National Trust pass so we used this to gain entry to Lanhydrock House, which was just as well as it was quite expensive at £20 each.

After a look around the House, we would have loved to had spent more time there but we had a meal booked at Bodmin Jail before we went on our ghost walk, we had to move on.

The rain was coming down which added to the eerie feeling about the jail. We arrived fully expecting a meal but was told that even though we booked it online for a time of 16:45, they weren’t open at that time for meals but did open at 17:00 for a set menu. On looking at this menu it was £50 per head, so we decided against it and found a lovely little pub down the road and had a bowl of tomato soup each!

Back to the jail for 18:30 and we booked in for our ghost walk.

The walk around the jail was very interesting, we were told about the different ghosts that haunted the jail, facts about some of the inmates and we got to look inside the jails, which was a bit creepy.

The person who led the tour was very knowledgeable and we were surprised to find out it was his first tour he had ever done, so well done to that man!

It was at Bodmin Jail where the episode of Most Haunted was filmed and Derek Ocorah (a medium) was set up by Ciaran O’Keefe (sceptic) to expose him as a fraud….

After the tour we headed back to the caravan site where we went to the entertainment centre and feasted on a £12.49 pizza and a couple of drinks.

We took a picture of the different menus:

After feeling full after eating the pizza we did a quick tour of the amusement arcade where we won a couple of small teddies and then we headed back to the caravan for our final night before we packed to go home.

Day Four

Phil got up early to go to a bakery we had seen at Rock the day before to buy some pasties and scones for when we got home. Phil is very partial to a cream tea and we hadn’t had time to fit one in this trip, so we bought one to take home with us.

We didn’t stop on the journey home, mainly because we sailed past the services we were going to stop at, so it was nice to have a ready-made tea when we did get back.

My view

We thoroughly enjoyed our time at St. Minver Holiday Park, so much so that we’ve booked five days next year this time staying in a lodge so that our families can come and stay if they want to.

We found the park to be central for where we wanted to visit and there was plenty to do, from playing bingo, karaoke, swimming to walking through the woods.

All-in-all very good value for money!