A Day out at Belhus Woods Country Park | A Gnome Trail

[Ad- gifted product] When it comes to getting out and about, there are a few parks and woods that the children really, really love. Belhus Woods Country Park, which includes a musical-themed play park, is one of those places that the children always want to go too. Last year, around the month of December, they had a reindeer trail which everyone enjoyed, so we hopped along again in the muddy wintertime to see if a new trail was set up – and to our delight, they had put together a gnome trail for us all!

At the time that we ended up going, the park seemed to have switched to putting the packets for the trail up on the outside of the building, and due to ongoing COVID guidelines, we felt that taking a picture of these signs and using them to do the trail made more sense then going into a building, getting the paper packets, and trying to write in them on our walk. However, people are still welcome to do so, if they’d like to have a paper packet to remember their time. Right by the visitor centre, our reindeer friends from last year were waiting, with some new gnome friends! We had remembered some of the names (especially Pickles!) and were happy to see them again. This trail actually wasn’t the same trail as last year either, with a new start point, that included the park.

Each of the hidden Christmas Gnomes had a riddle to solve at Belhus Woods Country Park, which actually told you some hints about where they were. These riddles rhymed and were fun for the children, who then would try to guess their names before we found the gnomes and the signs which did tell us what their names were. These gnomes were spread out along the gnome trail, and allowed you to really explore the grounds, following the first path up to the play park. Once there, we had found three of the gnomes already, and took a needed break by playing with the instruments and enjoying what the park had to offer. Getting back on the trial, then followed along the lake, showcasing a few gnomes around the outside of the gnome trail itself, before bringing us back towards the carpark we had came from. In total, there are 6 gnomes on the trail, which is very easy to follow and makes for a not-too-long walk around.

We all quite liked how the names had to do with the riddles, with the gnome that is always falling asleep called Sleepy and the gnome that loves to swim called Jaws, which really added some fun to guessing them! The designs of the gnomes on the gnome trailat Belhus Woods Country Park were interesting as well, since they were rounds of wood, painted, with hats on them. All of them were also high up in trees, so the children could see the colors and get excited as we walked!

The one thing about exploring woods this time of year is how wet and unpredictable the weather is in the United Kingdom. We all keep our rain boots in the back of the car, in a plastic tub, so that whenever we are out we can just switch into them before walking on the muddy trail. I took along my Lighthouse Waterproof rain jacket, which is both light in weight and warm due to the internal fabric, perfect for a chance of rain. This jacket has a lot of pockets too, which ended up filled with the various rocks and sticks Robin picked up along the way! When it started to drizzle a little, I was super glad at my choice of coat!

This post is apart of our Blogmas series, with each and every post being about Christmas or Winter.