The Monday Review: Millets Farm & The Maize Maze

July 26, 2010 at 7:25 pm | Posted in Daily Life, Days Out, Reviews | 7 Comments
Tags: days out, farm, maize maze, Millets Farm, pick your own

On Saturday, the bear,  Grandma and I headed to Millets Farm in Oxfordshire to check out their Maize Maze – a big thank you to Emma at Me the Man and the Baby for letting Millets know that I was a local blogger and would like to come too!

We had a fab day!  You can check out the list of Millets bloggers here, as well as Millets Farm and the lovely Hallane from Energy PR.  Helen from the farm was on hand (and foot, despite crutches!) to give help and advice and was also very lovely.

We arrived and met our fellow bloggers in a gazebo by the maze entrances.  The maize maze is an annual attraction at Millets, with three to choose from – a short, middle and a long maize, each with different challenges.  The small maze has a slide in the centre and the middle size a big bridge to go and stand on.  We didn’t attempt the biggest maize, Grandma was concerned about our lack of GPS, or at least Grandad who has the best sense of direction.

The bear is a teeny bit young to really appreciate the maze but with a little incentive of pretending the flag role was a horsey to chase around we had a brilliant time navigating our way around.  You take the flag with you to wave as a distress call if you really do get lost!

My favourite is the small maze, for the bear (nearly two), it’s great because you visit five points each with coloured paint to apply to one finger.  At the end you work out what your challenge is based on the order of colours on your fingers.  We had to pretend to be sharks.

We managed to fit loads into the day – the bear had his face painted as a rabbit, with a carrot on his arm, we rode tractors, went to the play park, visited the pigs, goats and ducks, rode on the carousel (which was a tad faster than I expected), and in the sandpit.

It costs £5.95 for a grown up and is free for under 2’s.  3-16 year olds are £4.95.  Within the maze complex there is also a bouncy castle, seesaw, football challenge, sandpit and big board games.  Loads to do.

We had a great picnic lunch, the farmshop is full of gorgeous treats – and the restaurant is really good too – especially for a traditional roast in winter.

We also wanted to go and pick strawberries but ran out of time, but the strawberries are ready to pick now, and are planted in troughs and easy picking height so no crawling along the floor.

The bear also spent ages with the circus duo (the maze theme this year is clown school), learning plate spinning, juggling and diabalo.  He was engrossed for ages, and Grandma got to do her proud showing off moment when the circus lad said how intelligent the bear was, ahh!

Like most families who came that day, the bear was asleep by the time we got to the traffic lights at the end of the road.  Brilliant family day, lovely peaceful affernoon for mummy – who was also exhausted!

Thanks for a brilliant day to both Millets and all the mums!