Rufford Abbey Country Park
There are many country parks throughout the UK, they vary in size and what they offer, Rufford Abbey Country Park is one of our favourites of those we have been to so far. Parking is £4, which we think is an acceptable charge, as some charge more but offer less. On a beautiful summer day, we visited this place for the first time and enjoyed a casual walk around this beautiful place for the first time and it offers quite a bit for a family day out. Not only is there plenty to walk around, there’s also an adventure golf, kids play area, Maze, sculptures. shops and loads of open space to sit down with a picnic.
If you didn’t bring a picnic, there’s 3 places to eat, Coach House, which is near the main entrance and is more of a café with loads of outdoor seating, Lord Savile’s Restaurant, which is as the name suggests, a restaurant offering more of a restaurant menu and also has outdoor seating for the nice days and the third is The Mill Café, which is at the other end of the park and was quite small, only offering basic sandwiches, sausage rolls and hot drinks. There was a surprisingly different attraction over near the mill café, a ford, with what appeared to be a viewing point, where many people had gathered watching different vehicles navigate their way through the ford, some slow some fast and some even turned around and had several attempts going through.
The other side of the mill café location, was a great view of the lake, from here you could walk back along the opposite side of lake or just through one of the car parks, there was Broad Ride, a nice walk between the trees, back up to the Abbey ruins. The Abbey is not like most ruins, form several positions, it doesn’t even look like it’s in ruins, but it is, unfortunately we couldn’t enter, as it was closed off for some reason. A nice place to sit is near the main entrance, sat on a bench in one of the garden areas, we highly recommend visiting Rufford Abbey Country Park.
If you didn’t bring a picnic, there’s 3 places to eat, Coach House, which is near the main entrance and is more of a café with loads of outdoor seating, Lord Savile’s Restaurant, which is as the name suggests, a restaurant offering more of a restaurant menu and also has outdoor seating for the nice days and the third is The Mill Café, which is at the other end of the park and was quite small, only offering basic sandwiches, sausage rolls and hot drinks. There was a surprisingly different attraction over near the mill café, a ford, with what appeared to be a viewing point, where many people had gathered watching different vehicles navigate their way through the ford, some slow some fast and some even turned around and had several attempts going through.
The other side of the mill café location, was a great view of the lake, from here you could walk back along the opposite side of lake or just through one of the car parks, there was Broad Ride, a nice walk between the trees, back up to the Abbey ruins. The Abbey is not like most ruins, form several positions, it doesn’t even look like it’s in ruins, but it is, unfortunately we couldn’t enter, as it was closed off for some reason. A nice place to sit is near the main entrance, sat on a bench in one of the garden areas, we highly recommend visiting Rufford Abbey Country Park.
