Nudefest

Last month we returned to Nudefest, a week long naturist holiday in Cornwall.  This was the first year it was a week in length, previously it was a long weekend, and it was our second visit.  Somehow I had got roped into organising kid's painting, which meant in the week beforehand I had to buy paint and paper, and all the accessories for a total of £30, so there was enough for an hour's painting a day, for an unknown number of kids.  This was also our first time camping with DD2, and our car was FULL!

But we got there alright, and although the weather on that first Sunday wasn't great, we eventually managed to get the tent set up, even with the DDs screaming in the back of the car.  It was windy and pouring with rain.  Newperran had a new restaurant, but we had missed dinner time, by the time we arrived, so we had a few sausage rolls in our tent and snuggled up for the night.

Over the week there were some new activities, and even though we did have the children with us, DH and I did our best to do what we wanted too.  DH had a go at archery, and I had a go at Zumba.  I'm sure it was probably because I'm half the age of some of the people there, but it was not as fast paced, or hard work, as I was expecting.  I'm sure, if it was a 'normal' Zumba class (rather than one catering to the guests) I would have found it much more hard work!  DD1 loved painting everyday, and it was a good thing it was a naturist holiday, because she literally ended up covered head-to-toe with paint!  The campsite has really good facilities, so we would head off straight for the shower, and we looked as good as new.

There were also some 'world first' naturist trips.  We went to Newquay Aquarium, one evening.  Unfortunately there were far too many people there, for the size of the place, which menat lots of waiting around.  DD1 was easily bored, and with DD2 in her pushchair meant it wasn't much fun for us either.  Not to mention there was lots of press about (and as our family don't know we're naturists, we certainly don't want to appear in any papers!), which meant we were on guard and couldn't enjoy ourselves.  And because it was an evening trip, both children got overtired, so we left early.

The following day, they did a trip to the Zoo.  Given how the Aquarium visit went, we didn't fancy that - sillily, we had already mentioned it to DD1 and she was looking forward to it.  So, we went by ourselves during the day, rather than on the organised trip.  It was much better and much more relaxed.  Friends who went said the Zoo was much better than the Aquarium trip, but I think we made the right decision. 

We also went to Paradise Park ourselves, and have a lovely photo of DD1 with a parrot on her arm collecting money.  This was very expensive though, but it did have a soft play (thankfully as it was pi$$ing down with rain!) so we spent a fair amount of time there.  They had 'death slides' which took me straight back to my childhood as I was petrified of them (I'm still scared of heights).  I did go on the bumpy slide with DD1, but for some reason she prefered to go on with DH than me.  That was a shame, because I really enjoyed it, but felt silly going on it on my own - so I didn't.

And we went to Perranporth again.  We spent a brief time on the beach, but it was very windy.  We bought a windy break, in the hope it would protect our tent - it didn't work.  We did have ice cream, which was nice, and spent a fiar amount of time in Newquay too, and bought too much fudge and too many cream teas.  Yum!

The wind was atrocious, and by the end of the week, our tent (thanks to only 1 high guy-rope and the poles that are designed to bend) was practically flattened.  So much so, that we were tempted to leave a day early, but we stuck it out and our tent did last.  We did promise ourselves to get a more wind-resistent tent, though.  Our tent wasn't the worst, though.  Some actually broke, and another friend had the infamous floating tent - a pop up tent, with not enough pegs to hold it to the ground when the wind blew!

Despite how this probably sounds, we did actually have a good time, and will hopefully be back next year (with hopefully better weather too). 

Incidentally, we have now bought a new tent - an 8 berth (our previous was 4-berth) with more wind protection and is large enough that if we are in bad weather again, we don't feel too cramped.  We freecycled our old tent, and it was really popular.  Despite me saying that it has been collected - twice(!) - I'm still getting emails requesting it.  Hmpf.  If they continue tomorrow, I may contact the email-group owner.