What an adventure!!
Where to start… what a week at PGL Caythorpe Court Lincolnshire!! The kids must have said a million times the best week ever (there was even tears when it was sadly time to head home!) ! It’s not only the amazing adventure activities but the absolutely brilliant staff who are are great fun, thoughtful and helpful, the organisation that makes everything run so smoothly, the extra activities (campfires, pumpkin carving, pancake making and an escape room to name just a few!) and not forgetting the brilliant food that is so welcome after all the excitement! We can’t stop talking about the week, all the memories made for all of us as a family together. It has been the most incredible week, an unforgettable experience, one that we won’t forget and one none of us wanted to leave!
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Click here for the PGL website http://pgl.co.uk/
There is so much to say about the week, there are four awesome activity sessions a day with free time or meals in between and a great space at Caythorpe Court for families to hang out with outside games, inside games and the coffee van! We spent so much time here enjoying the Autumn sunshine together and playing with new friends and the brilliant PGL reps Nico and Beth. It really did feel like a family and home from home 🥰
Caythorpe Hall Family Area
In the brilliant family area at the hall there are family games outside including giant jenga, table tennis, football, giant chess, connect 4, football, croquet, badminton etc) ……
…..and also inside there are loads of board games too!
This is a brilliant welcoming space to congregate and play with new friends, with your family and chill out too. A great hub when on a family adventure holiday! We spent so much happy time here, not forgetting the snack van which served coffees, soft drinks, snacks (and beers and wine!)
There were also additional activities you could participate in at the family area during the day including sports games and a photo competition – we had great fun with this one!
In the evening the activities included a spooky Halloween Cluedo game, Round the World game, campfire and the pretty competitive family showdown including water balloons, paper aeroplanes and plenty of running and laughter!
In the evening there are also even more additional activities that you can do if you wish! Including film nights with a big screen and plenty of comfy bean bags and also organised activities. Our activities included pumpkin carving, crepe making and Halloween crafts. All the materials are provided and of amazing quality, they are so well organised!
For pumpkin carving the children got to choose their own pumpkins and the carvings sets were really excellent with carving designs provided for ideas. We put the pumpkins next to our room door and when we came back one of the very thoughtful reps had put a candle (battery operated don’t worry!) inside the pumpkins and the children were absolutely thrilled!
The crepe making was in the restaurant where they had set up crepe cookers, they had all the ingredients ready to be mixed with some puzzle sheets too. They children made then cooked their own crepes with then the best bit -adding the toppings! There was cream, chocolate, sprinkles, smarties, fruit, sauce, what a treat! Another really well planned and thought out fun activity for the whole family.
The crafts included pottery painting, with money boxes and candle holders to choose from. All the equipment was available and they spent some lovely quiet time just working on their painting. The children got to take their creations home from their holiday as a great momento of their week!
PGL had also prepared a Halloween themed escape room! So much effort had gone into this! We haven’t done an escape room before and really enjoyed it, looking for clues and solving puzzles to make the special spooky potion!
PGL Team
The PGL team deserve a massive huge special mention as they are all amazing with the kids, they make sure everything is done safely and correctly and interact so well with the kids. The team are fun and knowledgeable and it was amazing they all said hi and remembered the kids all week as they passed by! We had two reps who looked after us all week, answered our questions, organised the games and looked after us so well, a dream team. The kids didn’t want to say goodbye to Nico and Beth! We are all missing the wonderful PGL team.
The Room and Site
We stayed in a family room in a wooden lodge which had three bunk beds, plenty of top bunks for the children to choose from! The bedding is all provided and there is tea, coffee and a kettle too. We had a seperate toilet and sink and a walk in shower with a sink too. The rooms are lovely and warm and great showers after a day outside! There was a chair in the room but nowhere to sit as such as you are hardly in your room with so many activities and the family area to enjoy!
The site is 65 acres in total which includes the activity areas, restaurant, various room complexes and communal areas. There is also a shop that is open during lunch and dinner meal times selling drinks and snacks, and marshmallows for the campfire! The site is set up for adventures including for school trips, the family adventure timetables are carefully put together so that activities and meal times don’t clash with the various school trips also on site. The school rooms are also in a different area to the family rooms. Having seen the levels of safety, organisation, quality and meal times I would have no hesitation on the children going to PGL on a school trip!
The Restaurant
One of the things I was most looking forward to was not having to plan, cook and clean up after mealtimes and the PGL meals were amazing! The meals were all absolutely delicious, brilliant quality food for so many people and nutritious and energy giving, perfect for an adventure holiday!
Breakfast- there is a cereal bar you can help yourself to, yoghurts, fresh fruit, pastries, toast, and the hot food counter with sausages, bacon, vegan sausages etc… this was the best start to the day! We all loved our PGL breakfast in a morning, it was very much missed when we got home!
Lunch- every day there is a salad bar, soup and bread and fresh sandwiches that you can help yourself to. There is a hot food counter serving dishes such as pasta, pizza, jacket potatoes, burgers and curly fries.
Dinner- the salad bar is available every day alongside the hot food counter. There is always an excellent choice with meals such as chicken curry and rice, Bolognese, hot dogs. There is always a fruit salad and yummy sweet dessert too.
The meals at PGL are absolutely fantastic, tasty, nutritious and a real delight every meal time!
The Activities
The families were split into groups with approx 12 per group and each group had their own timetable of activities. You really get to know the other families in your group, sharing the experience and adventures together, making new friends and really working as a team and supporting each other.
To list the activities there were so many! There was the trapeze, canoeing, abseiling, archery, climbing, zip line, vertical challenge, giant swing, fencing, rifle shooting, sensory trail, high ropes, micro scooter and my new most favourite sport -Tag Archery! I really didn’t expect to love this as much as I did and it was one of my absolute highlights of the week! Working as a team with our new friends to tag (shoot!) the opposite team with our giant archery marshmallows, loved it, absolutely loved it. Watching the little guy tear around crazy trying to tag people there were tears of laughter, what an afternoon!
You can push yourself as far as you want to go, there is no pressure to do any activities you don’t want to or if you say don’t want to climb to the top of the climbing wall you don’t have to. Likewise if you want to go for the top there is all the help and support to do it, including from your new friends.
The kids absolutely amazed me with their can do attitude and really getting stuck in to everything! At one point the little guy got upset on the vertical challenge and the PGL staff thought he wanted to come down, he was upset because he wanted to keep going up and the climbing wall was tricky for his legs! With some help and encouragement from everyone he got to the top, and then climbed it again!
I felt so proud for the children with what they achieved, they were up there, out there doing it themselves with their own confidence and determination- qualities that really teach children they can do it and also they get to feel that awesome feeling of having reached the top, jumped off the top, climbed that wall! The power of achievement, building of confidence and the tremendous encouragement from PGL can not be underestimated.
The staff are all very well trained and make sure you know how to stay safe and are brilliant with the children, and the grown ups. All the activities are very well run and with excellent equipment, from fencing foils to climbing walls and canoes!
Since arriving home we have been suffering PGL withdrawal! We are looking at when we can book another PGL holiday, everything about it was absolutely brilliant, well organised, well run and fun! I can’t put into words how wonderful our PGL holiday was, just everything about it was an experience that won’t be forgotten, so many incredible family memories we will always treasure! Thank you PGL, for everything.
Just A Normal Mum 
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