Ardsley House Hotel - Day 3 - Cannon Hall Farm

Cannon Hall Lasagne £6.95

Friday mornings breakfast was a little better than Thursday, a little quieter, less mishaps. I expect a few of the party people were skipping breakfast.
Friday also meant home time, but there was still one thing on the list we could do. I gave Lauren the choice "home" or "farm" and the farm won hands down. So once we were all packed up and checked out, off we set for Cannon Hall Farm.
Cannon Hall is actually quite a big estate and when we first arrived we actually stopped at the wrong place, near the lake and the Garden Centre and I think even a house, but unless that's where you want to go, if you carry on for another half a mile you come to the farm.
It's a very well organised day out. Just off the car park there's a restaurant, a delicatessen and a farm shop. Oh and don't forget the obligatory gift shop and then you can enter the farm. It was £11.90 between us to get in and this included a pumpkin activity.

The cow looks quite surprised!

It was hard to know where to start when we got in, so we started with rabbits and guinea pigs, Lauren milked a giant plastic cow, newly born piglets, a baby donkey, a day old baby llama and some lovely pregnant goats who just wanted to be stroked, we didn't want to leave them!
Or there were the play areas, there was a network of mole tunnels, a wooden assault course and several adventure play areas. The play areas were really good, something for all abilities and most important of all, some great seating for the grown ups to relax in the sun and read a book while their children play.
There was the sheep racing on the hour, every hour, highly entertaining and even a little bit of betting to be done with the chance of winning a family pass.

Pop goes the pumpkin!

Then of course we went off to make our pumpkin. It was a well organised activity, get a pumpkin, a sticker for your name and a marker to draw your design. Pass it to some experience grown ups with bread knives (they did 4,000 last year apparently and were hoping for 9,000 this year!) to carve out your design. Make an owl mask while this happens, collect pumpkin, grab a spoon, scoop out the innards, get yourself a candle and a carrier bag and away you go. Unfortunately when we arrived back at the bungalow, I opened the boot and the pumpkin fell to the floor smashing it's face in - bad mummy!
For lunch we got a pass out and visited the on site restaurant. It was pandemonium in there, absolutely rammed. One of the pitfalls of holidaying in the school break I suppose. We queued and queued, once we had ordered we had no table, but we eventually got one and the food finally came. As we were not going to be eating later - Lauren had a swimming lesson - we decided to have dinner and as it was £6.95 and I had a £3 voucher from the car park I got us both a lasagne. I didn't expect what we got. A huge portion of lasagne, home made chips and a lovely fresh salad. Lauren's eyes nearly popped out! She managed a good bit of the lasagne and a few chips, to be fair it wasn't a child's portion, but so many places don't do a child's lasagne and it's what she nearly always wants. She had also requested a scone which we put in the bag for tea. I was so full up I didn't eat again for the rest of the day - unheard of!
After lunch we had a look around the delicatessen and the butchers and picked up some treats, a pork chop and some beer for Tony, small consolation for him having to stay at home working. Lauren then went back to play until it was time to head home.

In summary, we had a brilliant few days away. It's difficult to pick out the highlight - Johnny English had Lauren in fits of laughter, Magna was amazing but probably not for the faint hearted and Cannon Hall a real surprise.
As for Ardsley Hall, it was comfortable, the staff were great, but it's tired and needs some attention, but if an offer came up at the right price I would probably do it again, now I know what to expect!