FREE or CHEAP! Fang-tastic fun at Osterley Halloween Pumpkin Festival
We are so lucky to live so close to a wonderful National Trust site. Today we went along to Osterley's Halloween Pumpkin Festival and we all had great fun. As you enter into the grounds your walk to the main event area is lined with an orange ribbon trail with which children are encouraged to keep count of the pumpkins hanging at intervals along it. Having completed the first part of the trail we came to the main event area. Here the girls had a conker duel (with giant inflatable conkers), toasted marshmallows, carved pumpkins (additional £3), contributed to their wild nature art wall and bought some bat-shaped biscuits to nibble on later. The kids had great fun getting creative (and yucky) carving out the innards and creating their pumpkin 'friends' (now been named Spookerella and Freakyrina) and what the best thing was - no cleaning up for me - yay! Further along the trail (still counting the pumpkins along the way), they played on a giant spiderweb before entering the Den Arena to build yet another den and stopping at the picnic tables to enjoy some lunch in between rope swings. A great day out and a bonus that it was free with my NT membership. While the park at Osterley is open to everyone, an NT membership gives you entry into the house, the grounds and the kitchen garden - and it is here where a lot of their activities take place. For non-members to take part in the trail it's £6.20 for adults and £3.10 for children, but we make full use of our NT membership and have probably recouped the yearly fee three times over with 6 months still to go, so it is definitely worth considering.
