Center Parcs – time to leave the UK behind?

Eleven years ago, when my oldest son was two and my youngest wasn’t even a twinkle, we went to Center Parcs at Elveden in Suffolk. British and many other European readers will know what I’m talking about, but for those who don’t, Center Parcs is a chain of family resorts with self-catering ‘cabins’ set in a woodland setting and lots of activities to choose from. They’re famed for their swimming pools (like mini water parks), which are included in the price, and for using bikes to get about. Anyway, we went to Center Parcs because we’d heard lots of good things and it seemed like a good destination to visit as a family.

The other thing that UK Center Parcs are famed for is their extortionate school holiday prices. I know, I know, supply and demand, it’s the way of the world – and I accept that prices will always be higher during peak times. But the price hikes at Center Parcs really are something else. For example, a four-night midweek break for two adults and two children in a ‘New Style Woodland Lodge’ during May half-term is £1099. The same thing but two weeks later (when the weather is actually nicer but the kids are back at school!) costs just £529. That’s a hell of a difference!

Of course, our son was too young to be at school when we went to Center Parcs. However, both my husband and I were teachers at the time, and had long been the victims of school holiday prices. But even if we could have afforded the cost of staying in Center Parcs, we couldn’t have justified it. But then a friend and I had a plan: we would all go together and save money. By the two families staying together in a three-bed lodge, we saved ourselves a fortune in comparison to going on our own. I should probably add here that it still wasn’t cheap by a long way, but it made it just about affordable.

It worked pretty well. We did things together, like swimming and cycling, the husbands took the kids while my friend and I went to the spa, we took the kids while the husbands did paintballing and archery, and the kids went to a kids’ club while we played badminton, went zip-wiring and jumped off a ridiculously high pole (without doubt the most terrifying thing I have ever done!). We went out for dinner one night, hired a babysitter and went to a quiz another night and spent the rest of the time chatting and playing board games. We had a great time, and there were definitely benefits to going away with friends in addition to cost-saving. But although swimming is free – as is cycling if you bring your own bikes – you have to pay for the other activities. The prices are not particularly bad but neither are they bargains and, of course, it all adds up. So although we enjoyed ourselves and saved considerably on the cost of going on our own, a cheap holiday it most definitely was not.

And this is why it was the first and last time we considered Center Parcs as a destination (until this year). Once our youngest became more than just a twinkle, and our money situation tightened and holidays became more expensive, we just couldn’t justify the cost of going to Center Parcs, with or without friends. We began to wonder what Center Parcs really offered that other holiday options didn’t. What made it so special? What made it worth spending that amount of money? We tried Butlins a couple of times. This was great for young children, it was much cheaper overall and most of the activities are free once you get there. We had a good time but it hasn’t got the ‘natural’, secluded feel of Center Parcs and it’s not such a great option for older kids. As regular readers will know, we’ve tried all sorts of different holidays over the years, favouring campsites as a great money-saving option, but we never really considered going back to Center Parcs.

The situation changed when, a few years ago, I started seeing pictures on Facebook from friends who’d been to Center Parcs in Belgium and Holland. I’m not sure it had ever really crossed my mind before that there were Center Parcs in the rest of Europe, even though the brand had actually originated in the Netherlands. But the photos showed that the Center Parcs abroad looked pretty much the same as the one I had been to in the UK, and conversations with friends suggested that they were pretty similar – just MUCH cheaper. I’m a sucker for a bargain, so this got me thinking – maybe it was worth trying a Center Parcs on the continent? It took a long time to get around to doing it, but this year, we finally decided – we were going to spend a week in the Easter holidays in one of the European* Center Parcs.

I started investigating prices. It soon became clear that the Center Parcs in France were generally more expensive than those in Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands, and that there was a theme in terms of getting cheaper the further away you went from Calais and, therefore, the UK. As you’d expect, different parks had different facilities – although broadly similar – which also affected prices. We balanced price with facilities and how far we were willing to travel, and eventually settled on Het Meerdal in the Netherlands. This was just over three hours from Dunkirk (or three and a half from Calais), had lots to do and, most importantly, was A LOT cheaper than any of the Center Parcs in the UK.

I can’t remember the exact UK price for the equivalent holiday, but I did check for comparison at the time, and it was around twice as much. I’m not entirely sure why they are cheaper outside the UK. The obvious answer would be the difference in school holidays. From what we could gather when we went, it was not the Dutch school holidays, which is bound to make it cheaper. That said, I believe from the huge numbers of Belgian visitors that it was the school holidays in Belgium, so this may have had an impact on putting up the price. Out of interest, I have just done a search for a week starting from 5 August, assuming that this will be the summer holidays everywhere, in order to make a direct comparison. For a week in Elveden in Sussex for two adults and two children in their most basic accommodation, the price is £1,848. For the equivalent week in Het Meerdal in the Netherlands, the cost is 1,098 euros. The ‘euros’ here is an important point to note too; although at the time of writing – and pretty much ever since the dreaded ‘B’ word – the exchange rate is not exactly working out well for Brits, euros are still worth less than pounds, and the equivalent price is £947 (and would have been a lot less a few years ago). Clearly, even during school holiday time, Het Meerdal is massively cheaper then Elveden. And although there will of course be differences in prices among both European and UK resorts, there is a clear pattern of the UK Center Parcs costing almost twice as much to stay in.

The closer we got to our Center Parcs holiday, though, the more I began to wonder whether it was actually money well spent. Sure, it was a bargain compared to Center Parcs in the UK, but was it a bargain in itself? It had cost us just under £700 for a week, and we’d normally spend no more than £300 for a self-catering holiday at Easter. Sure, there were lots of facilities and the whole ‘Center Parcs experience’, but did that justify the price – which, let’s be honest, still wasn’t cheap? My husband had started talking about using it as a base to explore the region – in which case, wouldn’t we have saved ourselves a fortune by just renting a cottage instead? I tried to remember just what it was about Center Parcs that we had enjoyed the first time round, but although we’d had a good time, my memories were pretty hazy by now. I remembered having to book activities in advance and ending up on quite a rigid timetable. Would we have the same problem this time? If we didn’t book anything, would we end up missing out? Would anybody speak English? Would the kids make any friends? Was it really worth the money?

It turns out the answer was a big fat ‘yes’. I’ll do a proper review of Het Meerdal in another post, but suffice to say we had a really great time and we’re thinking very strongly of going back next year. There were lots of things to do, which, as in the UK, cost extra, so it really wasn’t a cheap holiday. But it’s a brilliant place to go as a family with children of any age, everyone was very friendly and spoke excellent English, and the kids loved it. We did explore the area on a couple of days but we spent most of the time in the park itself – partly because there was so much to do and partly because it just felt… well… ‘nice’. I’m not really sure how to explain it. The weather – dry and unusually warm – definitely helped. The woodland surroundings and the corresponding wildlife – red squirrels, deer and an array of different types of birds – was a huge part of it. But there was something else indefinable too. It was one of those holidays – rare for us, as you’ll know if you’ve read about some of our holiday disasters – where everything just went right.

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Overall, in addition to the cost-saving, there were a few other advantages of going to Center Parcs in the Netherlands as opposed to the UK, as well (of course) as the odd disadvantage. I’ll try to sum them up below:

Advantages

• Cost: I think I’ve already covered that pretty comprehensively!
• Arrival/departure day: In the UK, you have to arrive and leave on a Friday or Monday. This is obviously inconvenient for half-term or for anyone wanting to book a week’s holiday from work. At Het Meerdal, we were able to go from Saturday to Saturday, which worked so much better. I’m not sure that the choice of day was completely free, but it was certainly more flexible than the UK, and I believe this to be true of other Center Parcs.
• Cottage choice: I’m not sure if this is offered in the UK – it certainly wasn’t when we went, or perhaps you can do it if you pay extra – but as we booked far enough in advance (and this was actually only a few months), we were given the choice of which number cottage we wanted. There was a map, so we could see where they were – this meant that we were able to choose a cottage at the end of a block, near a playground and not too far from the Market Square, where most of the facilities are.
• Free activities: This was another bonus if booking ‘early’, where we were given three free activity vouchers. These can’t be used for any activity but there is still a wide choice of activities to redeem them on. We used ours on pedalo hire and a family game of bowling (which was worth two vouchers).
• Free evening entertainment: Evenings were relatively quiet at Het Meerdal, with the entertainment finishing fairly early, but there were shows and a quiz – depending on the night – all of which were free. From memory (and this may no longer be the case – feel free to correct me!), evening entertainment is not free in the UK – we certainly had to pay to take part in the quiz at Elveden!
• Novelty of being in another country: Okay, so this might not be an advantage for everyone, but I always think it’s more exciting to go abroad for a holiday. The food is different, the language is different and it just adds a little extra to the holiday. It also makes it more interesting if you decide to leave the resort and explore the local area.
• No need to book activities: It may well be that this would not be the case if we went at a busier time in the continent, but when we were there it was just the right amount of ‘busy’. There were plenty of people, so it didn’t have a ghost-town feel, but we had no problems at all booking any activities that we wanted to do, even if it was just half an hour before. This was certainly not the case in the UK, where we had to book everything before we arrived. Not only did it give the week a regimented feel but it meant that we had no option to change our minds and do things on a different day. In Het Meerdal, we were able to look at the weather and plan accordingly!

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Disadvantages

• Travel: This is the obvious issue, although it depends on where you live in the UK. We live less than half an hour from Dover, so it didn’t take us much longer to get to Het Meerdal than it would any of the UK options. In fact, had we gone to one of the other European options, it may actually have been closer. Of course, this wouldn’t necessarily be the case if you lived elsewhere in the UK. The cost of crossing the channel is also an issue. We were lucky enough to have free ferry tickets (click here to find out how!), but most would need to pay for these or for the Eurotunnel. That said, even including the cost of the channel crossing, the European options are cheaper.
• Language: We didn’t have any issues at Het Meerdal, as everyone spoke very good English. However, the Dutch are renowned for their English speaking (their secondary education is conducted purely in English), but language may be more of a barrier in the French or German Center Parcs, for example. Evening entertainment was generally carried out in Dutch, although they did make sure that they repeated the quiz questions in English purely for us. Menus were often in Dutch and German, although English ones were provided when staff realised where we came from. We were one of only three British families we came across during our week at Het Meerdal – this wasn’t an issue for us, but it may bother others. It certainly wasn’t so easy for the boys to make friends, but they had each other and us – and they did make friends with one Dutch boy – so, again, it wasn’t an issue. So overall, language was never a problem but I guess it wasn’t as straightforward as being in an English-speaking country.
• Cottage facilities: If you do a direct comparison between the cheapest accommodation that Elveden has to offer and the cheapest at Het Meerdal, Elveden has more facilities. The Woodland Lodge at Elveden offers a dishwasher, an oven, a DVD player and an extra TV in the main bedroom, none of which are offered in the Comfort Cottage at Het Meerdal. Linen and towels are included at the Woodland Lodge, but only linen is included at Het Meerdal (for a compulsory charge) and you have to make your own beds. BUT (and this is a big ‘but’), you can pay for towels and linen at Het Meerdal, and higher-grade accommodation (Premium Cottages, for example) do include all the facilities mentioned at Elveden. And – no surprise – even if you pay for these facilities, it still ends up cheaper than staying in the UK. In fact, you could even look at the cottage facility situation as being an advantage of the European Center Parcs – you have the option to save money by not having them, but don’t get the choice when you stay in the UK.

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Overall, the disadvantages are pretty minor (if they’re even disadvantages at all) and are far outweighed by the advantages in my opinion. The price difference is, of course, the main draw, but there are many other reasons to choose Het Meerdal or one of its European neighbours. Although I’m sure that the summer holidays would be great too, I would recommend going at Easter or May half-term, when you have a better chance of avoiding the local school holidays (and having half-decent weather) – not only does this mean that you have a better chance of doing all the activities you want to do but it means fewer crowds, both in the pool and outside the park itself.

I very much doubt we’d go back to any of the Center Parcs in the UK now, but I’m pretty sure we’ll go back to Het Meerdal, and will probably explore some of the other options that the continent has to offer. If anyone else has been to both, I’d be very interested to hear your thoughts on the comparison!

(Disclaimer: A lot of the points made about UK Center Parcs are based on my memories of a trip 11 years ago, so may not be entirely accurate or up to date!)

*Yes, I know the UK is in Europe, and will remain so geographically regardless of whatever happens with (shudder) Brexit. However, I’m using ‘European’ and ‘the continent’ in this context to describe those Center Parcs based in the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Germany, and NOT in the UK!