Moonfleet Manor

After my work trip to Mexico, and to coincide with First Born’s second week of half-term, we nipped down to Weymouth to Moonfleet Manor for some family time together. Well, “nipped” implies an alacrity that reality determinedly denied us.

I’d booked an A3 with Zipcar, to make it easy to pick up with easy admin. I don’t use Zipcar very often, and this was NOT a good experience. It actually was no cheaper than a similar vehicle from Hertz Finchley Road, even though with Hertz, I’d have the car for all of Sunday as they’re closed Saturday evening (and Sunday), so I certainly wasn’t using Zipcar for financial reasons. I strolled up to the relevant car club parking space at the allotted time…no car. Looked around a bit, tried to honk the horn through the app – nada. Called them up – whilst nice as pie, why did they need to further authenticate me on name, email address and postcode? I’m calling from my registered phone number, isn’t that enough? Eventually got them to book me the next nearest A3, in Cricklewood, summoned an Uber which arrived almost instantaneously, and we were off. However, I reached car v2 and couldn’t get in – the app was still locked to my old booking, despite the new booking being visible now. I couldn’t use my card, as the card-reader device (like they always seem to be) was unstuck from the windscreen. So another call, with further authentication, required to get in the car. Even then, the car was a bit of a mess, and there was a tyre air pressure alert too. So by the time I’d gone home via the garage to top up the air (which still didn’t remove the alert, so I think it’s a sensor rather than real problem), we got the car loaded and shipped out.

Usual headache getting out of London, and the whole drive was pretty busy and irritating – and it was Wednesday at 2-3pm. I do not miss driving. We got most of the way before 2YO had her usual travel sickness, poor thing, but we made it to Moonfleet Manor in the end.

It’s a good place, very dog and kid friendly. Chilled out, not too chi-chi, with loads of old colonial material (tigerskins, artwork, tons of photos, wood carvings) which give it character. It also has a vast indoor play area with trampolines, climbing wall, snooker, softplay, crazy golf – quite amazing. The girls passed 2 hours by quite cheerfully there this morning, making the loose, yet fiercely hierarchical friendships that are the hallmark of extreme youth.

We were a little more adventurous yesterday, going to the actual beach in actual Weymouth. A short stroll was enough to decamp back in front of an open fire and readily-accessible grub and hot/alcoholic/both drinks.