Moors Valley Country Park & Forest — Attraction in St. Leonards and St. Ives

Quite simply - a beautiful country park that is led and managed well, perfect for walkers, runners, cyclists, families (young and old), golfers, train enthusiasts and nature lovers.

First - I will add this is a working Forest led and managed by forestry England - meaning that it is a place of work with continual management of the land you will explore. The paths are well maintained and there are multiple walks that are accessible to all. I will repeat this - ACCESSIBLE TO ALL - regardless of skill and level.

I took the family as we wanted to try Go Ape (paid extra for this service and have left a different review for the experience) - whilst they climbed I took a short walk around to get a feel for the place. The visitor centre is the hub of activity, complete with cafe/restaurant, gift shop, ice cream stand, water refill station, toilets, dog wash station, cycle hire, Segway hire and the Go Ape playgrounds. There were multiple staff here and with so many families descending on the space I decided to walk off and find some solace.

20 minutes walking took me atop a hill in a heavily forested section of the park. The Lookout. It had a beautiful view of the horizon and had no people there. It was peaceful and a nice spot to lunch for later.

I returned, collected family and took them on a walk starting on the play trail, where there were dozens of unique and bespoke playground/climbing frames that really do capture the imagination. My personal favourite was the Hawk House - it was huge!

The play trail is designed for young families to wonder the woods, therefore it was quite busy - no cyclists or fitness enthusiasts here.

We decided to bypass the last part of the play trail, ascending into the tree top walk and then veered Northward to the Lookout for lunch. When doing so I noticed we were walking another family route which required the purchasing of a kids story book themed guide to follow. Ignoring this, we beelined straight to the top where we found the Lookout again completely empty. We had a peaceful lunch away from the noisy kids on play trail and soaked up the natural atmosphere.

We continued the walk now on the yellow trail that eventually took us out of the woods onto heathland. Here we bombarded by all sorts of butterflies and flying insects. My son also spotted a new species of fungi I hadn’t logged on iNaturist - great find!

This part of the walk also took us alongside a beautiful stream and through a well maintained golf course. Eventually we came to another part of a walking trail designed for those that require a sturdy footpath for their walking habits. This path led to another visitor centre at the other end of park - where we boarded a quaint miniature steam train - bought some ice cream - and railroad all the way back to the beginning visitor centre, disembarking in yet another huge park. Alas, there were many parents and families here, so we decided to move on.

All in all, this was a great day with so much to see and do. In total we were in the park for just under 5 hours - which cost £12.50 in parking. Not a bad price for entry I think and if it contributes to the upkeep of such parks and promotes more of them in this country I’ll happily pay the price.

We...

Spent the best part of a day here with my fiancee & 2 children (4yo & 8yo). We all had an amazing time and we're very impressed with the number of things to do here! Started with a return ride on the steam train which was great! Staff seemed happy & into their jobs and the route itself was exciting for the children. Cost just under £20 for us 4 as return. We then went and did the 'Play Trail' walk which was amazing, so many great play structures, each one different and enjoyable in different ways, and some of them are very impressive to the eye! And this part was all free! We then had lunch at the Barn Cafe which was nice, but a little overpriced in my opinion. Ended up being around £40 for 2x small-ish bowls of fries (which were nice), 1x small side salad, 1x 9" vegetarian pizza (which was lovely) & 4 drinks. In terms of vegan options there weren't much, there was a burger, salad, skin-on fries, onion rings and as far as I remember that was pretty much it. The kids then went on the Adventure Valley Land Rovers, they went on a car each which cost £8.50 each for 2x laps of the track/course, a parent has to walk round with them for this, which was definitely a good idea with my 4yo boy! Was great fun and they both loved it! Well worth the money! There's bumpy bits, multiple corners, a photo-op section & a 'seesaw' type wooden bridge part which was cool. Finally we got some ice creams from the ice cream shop, my fiancee & both kids are vegan do we thought we'd check what (if any) ice cream options there were for them, and actually we were impressed! The vegan ice cream options were; raspberry, pineapple, chocolate, candy floss & bubblegum. These were proper whippy ice creams in cones too, not the usual vegan option of either sorbet (meh) or frozen stiff scoops shoved onto the top of a cone! Kids were very impressed at what they called the best ice creams they've ever had! We didn't actually get time to do the Gruffalo trail/walk, or play in the 2x play parks that are there (although the kids done plenty of playing on the play trail!). There's so much more there too that we either didn't want to do or didn't get time to do. And then finally the parking - there were plenty of spaces even though it was super busy, as there are multiple car parks. It cost £16.50 as we were there a while (I believe £16.50 is the max it would cost for any stay over 5+ hours). Overall a great day, glad we came & would definitely come again when the kids are a little older so we can do some more of the 'bigger...

Such a fantastic day out for families!

We visited for the first time today as a family of four, (two adults, a six year old and a two year old) and there was more than enough to entertain everyone, especially since the entry is free (only parking to pay); huge outdoor play areas, including a beehive, snake pit and enchanted wood, which were particularly popular with the kids; Gruffalo sculptures and trail, with great photo opportunities; great café with incredibly friendly and attentive staff; miniature railway (additional fee); and various places to get additional refreshments like drinks and ice cream (essential when it's hot like today).

We only visited for about four hours, but could easily have spent the same amount of time there again to explore everything on offer.

A standout was the way the café staff looked after us after our order took a little longer than anticipated, they offered to replace our iced coffees with new ones (although I'd basically drunk mine already) and nothing was too much trouble, even though it was incredibly busy and they were clearly all pressed for time.

The only thing which I wish I'd been aware of beforehand is that there are no waste bins at all across the entire site. I understand that it is in a country park / mainly in woodland, but even inside the café or at refreshment stands there were no waste bins. We just kept all our rubbish from lunch, ice creams etc. in a bag under our pushchair and took it home with us to recycle there, but it felt unnecessarily restrictive to have no bins whatsoever across the entire site. I did see one parent walking around for a protracted period hunting for a bin, and I think he ended up depositing the rubbish from his family's lunch in a skip being used for some building waste at the site.

There are signs saying that waste can be deposited at the café but there was no actual bin available, and I wasn't going to leave a bag of my family's rubbish on a table in the café for it to be disposed of.

Other than that small source of confusion, we had a wonderful day (and all for 4-5hrs parking fee of £14.50), so will definitely...