Pontins

Author's product rating:   

Transport links

Average

Advantages:	Great Family Entertainment
Disadvantages:	Ants in the challet

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

Pontins at Brean Sands Somerset

Holiday Camps.

No longer a hi-di-hi experience with heavy tents that falls down in the midnight rainstorm, or the dirty dancing encounter where your parents assume that you love to sit huddled in the corner whilst some drab old man stands on the stage telling ridiculous and un-funny jokes that make you wish you had stayed at the bottom of the pool and never emerged. These days holiday camps have had a vast improvement and whilst I can not comment on all of them around the country, or all of this particular camp, though let me take you to Brean Sands in Somerset to the campsite of Pontins where we recently stayed for a week.

***Location : Brean, Somerset***

Brean is situated on the coast of Somerset between Burnham-on-sea and Weston Super-Mare. Brean itself is a very quaint and quiet village size place with sandy beaches running right next to the Pontins campsite right through to Berrow which is another small village size area just down the road. It is about 15 minutes away from Burnam and about 25 minutes from Weston which is the bigger seaside resort area and possibly the best place to go into for the beach and amusements.

There are many places you can visit around the area, though you will need a car or be open to traveling on public transport and a lot of the area within an hour drive either way is centered around children. Yes, there are places to go and see, such as Cheddar caves and gorge, though a lot of places you will feel out of place if just visiting without any children. Great for family holidays, though.

I don't want to go into too much detail about the surrounding area as this is a review mainly upon the Pontins here, though I will attempt to write a more in depth review of Brean, Burrow, Weston and surrounding areas at a later date if my 5 month old daughter allows me!

One thing I will mention, though, is about the beaches in this area. Whilst sandy with many places to park with varying prices, the area has the second greatest rise and fall of tides causing dangerous sinking mud/sand in various points. All these are sign posted, though it must be something to be aware of. Also due to this are very strong currents. On our recent holiday it was too cold to go into the sea so I can't say from personal experience what it was exactly like, though this is also something to be aware of.

***Pontins, Brean Sands***

And now onto what this review is centered around. Pontins site of Brean Sands situated a few minutes walk from Brean and Berrow beach.

After our four hour journey, we were eager to step out of the car and stretch our legs. Check-in wasn't until 3pm unless you were a club member, though you were free to go to the site pub (The Queen Victoria!) or restaurant or wander around the amusements in the main reception area. We went into the pub area and sat and had a quiet drink, though unfortunately some drunk decided to cause some trouble and crashed into some glasses knocking them onto a poor little girl and started coming our way - the staff acted quickly here and one great staff member came and stood by us and even when his boss asked him to go do something, he replied that her didn't want to until the drunk had been sorted out because of the baby. It made me feel really safe and a few other staff members came up to ask if we were alright afterwards. Not a great start to the holiday, though it did get better!

Some advice: If not a club member, start queuing at check in desk early as the ine went on for ages!

Finally we had our keys and the chalets (the camp site only had chalets) were well positioned in both being able to find them and also near by somewhere you can park your car. After a couple of return journeys to unpack our things, we finally began our holiday!

***The chalets***

There are three types of chalets at this Pontins; Budget, Classic and Club - the later being the most expensive, though I will discuss costs further down.
(links included to diagrams fro Pontins website)

*Budget*
We stayed in the budget chalet which was quaint though perfect for myself, my husband and baby daughter. The slide glass door opens into a small living area with a sofa double bed (which was average comfort, though putting duvets from unused single beds under sheet helped!), a portable television (without scart sockets so no use taking a freeview box!) on a chest of draws. There is a small round table and four chairs further back near a dressing mirror and the kitchen is off to the right all in one open room. The kitchen has a decent storage with a cooker, sink and worktops. The usual pans and plates etc are included, though if you want a decent size cup of coffee - take your own cup!
The bathroom is perhaps the best part of the chalet. It is just off of the kitchen area and is a decent size with shower and mini bath, sink, toilet, large mirror on wall with sideboard, radiator and towel rails. The shower was slightly annoying, though, as you had to keep pressing the button otherwise the water would turn off automatically and you would be standing there freezing! There is also one single room off of the living area with cupboard space in the middle and a singe bed either end. Our baby slept in her travel cot between the two beds with plenty of room either side which shows the length of the room.

Clean and folded bed linen was waiting for us when we arrived and there were adequate plug sockets around the chalet. The one gripe we had with this chalet was the ants!
Sound wise, each chalet is in a long block and occasionally we heard our neighbors but we were lucky enough to have decent neighbors. All chalets are well lit outside to aid with late night return, though it was slightly annoying having a bright light on all night right outside the room you are sleeping and the curtains were not exactly thick.

I'll include some main photos of the chalet though here is a budget chalet diagram
http://www.pontins-breansands.com/page/accommodation/budgetMap.gif

Altho ugh we didn't sleep in the other two types of chalet I thought its best to describe what I know - please note, though, the following two are not personal experience accounts.

*Classic*
The classic chalets are three bedroom apartments with all the same things as the budget though from what I understand, in a slightly larger capacity. Here couples can actually have a private room with double bed rather than living area sofa bed and there are two other single rooms, one with two single beds and the other with one, as well as the double sofa bed. Bathroom and kitchen area looks the same size as budget though slightly different layout.

Classic apartment diagram:
http://www.pontins-breansands.com/page/accommodation/classicMap.g if

*Club*
From what I understand it to be, club apartments are for members, though please correct me if I am wrong. The club apartments are two bedrooms; a double bed room and a single room with one bed, as well as double sofa bed. Bathroom seems same size though bigger living area with more room around table. I believe that you also get digital television included in this package as well as a microwave oven which we missed for our babys food, and also apparently complementary tea and coffee, though how much I don't know.

Diagram of Club apartment:
http://www.pontins-breansands.com/page/accommodation/clubMap.gi f

For more information please ring Pontins, Brean Sands

***Discovering Brean Sands***

Brean Sands is quite a small site from others I have been to, though was quite a busy site with lots going on around, though I must warn adults without children - if you are the sort of people who prefer staying on the campsite in the day rather than going out and about, this site is mainly aimed for youngsters between the age of 3-17 in the day. There are a selection of adult only activities, though, but many of these were not open as they did not seem to have enough people for them at time we went.

*Activities*

*PGL Go Active*
Many of these activities for under 17's are subject to a cost which may vary. To find out more, call 0844 576 5930Included in this section are:

• Abseiling and Climbing Wall - We saw this going on one day we were there at the back of the site with two staff members present. The climbing and absailing wall is reasonably high.
• Zip wire and high ropes - We only saw this briefly near out chalet. The line is reasonably high.
• Karting - A very small area for karting
• Snorkeling - Unsure of where this occurs. Wasn't in day planner we received.
• Trapeze - Another activity which I did not see in the day planner.
• Archery - I didn't see any archery targets around, though these could have been brought out when needed.
• Quads - The hire of quads is available though I a unsure of what area you are allowed to ride and on-site I couldn't see a whole lot of space for them.

*Family Activities*
All the family can participate in certain activities as follows, though still most are aimed for youngsters. Included are;

• Various sport days - Soccer, Rugby, Table tennis, basketball, volleyball
• Crazy golf - A tiny area set aside for this. Not really worth it.
• Circus skills
• Cabarets (please see clubhouse section of review for more information)
• Snooker and pool

*Younger Children*
As with most sites like Pontins and Bultins there are always some great entertainment for children. The children's gang of friends include Captain Croc (A large crocodile) a duck lady and an action man person (sorry names have gone from my mind). We saw these a few times in early evening at clubhouse and were quite good.

Childrens shows were going on in early evening into the night until 9.00/10.00 depending upon what else was happening. At the time we went, they were doing High School Musical shows which were actually really good.

There are also a section for 'Ponteenies' where your young children can take part in the following;

• Face painting
• Play area
• Nursery pool (see H2O section below for more information)
• More live entertainment
• Slides and childrens fun cars

***Clubhouse***

For me, the clubhouse at a site like this is perhaps one of the most important parts of night time holiday. If the clubhouse is rubbish then the campsite generally is, though I can safely say that this clubhouse was great.

The clubhouse is very large in size with stage and dancefloor at front with section for photographer to take photos of you and your family, Many tables and chairs around the whole hall including in the bar area at the back which is also very large, though as usual, quite expensive. Also at the back end is a fast food area and a hot dog stall. We didn't eat anything from fast food area, but you must try one of the hotdogs. They are quite expensive, but they are huge and absolutely delicious!

Early evening in the clubhouse centers around young children with above activities. Bingo sales open at 6.00pm and bingo starts at 7pm for about 1 hour. We took part in a couple of games but unfortunately won nothing. There are about 8 games, some one line games and other full house games and depending upon how many are playing, could mean a pay out of over £100 for a winning full house.

At 8.00pm there was usually music and then a show of some kind for the family, High School Musical was playing which was great.

At around 9pm ish adult competitions occurred which was anything from silly games to group competitions - very funny and entertaining.

At approximately 10pm live cabaret came on and this was brilliant each night. Two which stood out for us were who I call the monkey man who was a stand up comic with puppets - trust me, he was brilliant. On the last night we had a trio of comics called the madhatters which were hilarious - pure adult comedy and unforgetful.

Clubhouse stayed open until way after midnight each night.

***Bluecoats***

The bluecoats of Pontins, Brean Sands, were very helpful and kind. As mentioned at the beginning of this review, a problem was sorted out and bluecoats aided in the care of out little baby girl - something I am very grateful for. Most were really brilliant with the children and a lot of fun with the adults. Most were young, possibly between the ages of 18 and 27, so had bundles of energy.

***Facilities***

*Baby Changing and Disabled Access*
The facilities at this site were quite good. As a new mum, baby changing areas are a lifesaver as well as easy access areas for pushchairs (and of course disabled people) and this was all available. There was no where which had limited access and baby changing was available in main womens toilets in main reception area. Mens toilets did not have this which I always feel is wrong as there are some single dads out there with babies but I guess this is normal.

*Food and Drink*
There were many options for eating out at this site. Of course, all chalets are self catering and we ate in a couple of nights, though eating out was a good choice too.

The main restaurant was next to the Queen Victoria pub in the main part of the site with adequate seating and high chair availability. Food the first night was really lovely. I had a chicken and bacon dish and was served hot and very quickly. The second night eating out, though, we both had a 6oz burger and chips and were very disappointed as the burgers were burned and the chips were cold. Prices were average, though more on that below.

Captain Cods fish and chips shop was also on the site though opened very late on the days we were there so suffice to say, too late for us to eat and therefore we didn't get our fish and chips on the beach (there is an off-site fish and chip shop just down the road).

As mentioned in clubhouse section, you also have fast food place and hotdog area which opens in evenings.

The on site pub, The Queen Vic, is very small though outside seating is available. Karaoke and quizzes run in the evenings here

Luna's Bar - another pub area where competitions and more cabaret goes on only for older teens and adults. We didn't go here, though, so unfortunately I cant comment on this area more that I have done.

*Shops*

The main shop is near the main reception and sells and range of food for cooking in your chalet as well as souvenirs, magazines, cigarettes, alcohol and much more - a mini supermarket with slightly corner shop prices!

There is a character store and trick or treat store for all the children activity souvenirs, Halloween type things and cuddly toys which is in the clubhouse area.

There is also a launderette which is coin operated.

***Cost***

I would like to mention here that we got this holiday via the Sun newspaper deals which was about £9.50 per person and so a real bargain and we couldn't have been happier!

For chalet prices without this you are looking at between £100-£200 for three to four nights so I would definitely recommend the Sun deal.

Costs around the site are average for these sites, a little more than you would find at home perhaps. For example, our food cost approximately £6-10 in the restaurant (a main meal) and alcohol prices were possibly up to 50p more than in a usual pub which isn't too bad.

***End Note***

Did we enjoy our holiday?
Most definitely! The site was brilliant, though we did spend all of the days off site as there were only myself, my husband and 5 month old daughter so not a lot to do in the day, but evenings and nights were great.
Would I recommend this site?
For certain, especially for family holidays. Perhaps too much is aimed for youngsters than some adults would like, though Im hoping to write a review on Brean and surrounding area at a later date so you can see more of what is available around the area.