![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/1_SG_BGS_22-08-25-pitville_result.jpg\")
A glimpse of the play area at Pittville Park(Image: Sophie Grubb\/Bristol Live)<\/p>\nThe family-friendly spot also has a lake, cafe and is within walking distance to a pretty town centreA glimpse of the play area at Pittville Park(Image: Sophie Grubb\/Bristol Live)<\/p>\n
Not so long ago, my idea of a perfect weekend involved a leisurely lie-in, a coffee and pastry somewhere fancy and maybe some evening cocktails in the sun. These days, my tiny human alarm clock rarely ticks beyond 6am and we are slowly making our way around the many playgrounds, soft plays and other family-friendly attractions that make Bristol ideal for an energetic toddler.<\/p>\n
So far this summer we’ve loved the pretty Victorian park with a massive paddling pool<\/a>, a farm cafe near the M4 with alpacas and epic cakes<\/a> and the lakeside trail with a playground and posh chippy<\/a>.<\/p>\n Recently our search for a different family-friendly day out took us to the Gloucestershire spa town of Cheltenham, which was a handy half-way point to meet some friends from the Midlands. It’s an area I’m familiar with, but not in my relatively new role as a parent – I used to be fairly well acquainted with the shops and bars but the parks were nowhere on my radar.<\/p>\n I had heard of Pittville Park from colleagues at Gloucestershire Live<\/a> and we decided that would be a good meeting point, making the hour-long drive to the pay-and-display Pittville Pump Room car park. It’s right by the park entrance and wasn’t too extortionate, especially as you can pay via an app and extend your stay remotely if you’re unsure how long you need.<\/p>\n A short stroll along the gravel path leads to the impressive Pump Room, described by the local tourism board as “the jewel of Cheltenham\u2019s Regency architecture”. This grand stone building, which is now an events space, overlooks a huge expanse of lawn leading down to a beautiful lake with a water feature in the middle.<\/p>\n There were plenty of trees offering shade and we spent a bit of time on a picnic blanket taking in the view, before clocking the fenced-off area opposite that every passing family seemed to be heading for. Curious, we made our way over to the bright yellow gate and found a massive adventure playground as well as animal enclosures with exotic birds and rabbits (supposedly, though they must have been being shy as we passed).<\/p>\n Aviaries at parks can be controversial from an animal rights perspective, though the cages at Pittville are huge compared to others I’ve seen and the birds appeared well looked-after. Children were excitedly peering in, pointing out all the different colours and counting how many birds they could see.<\/p>\n We turned our attention to the play equipment and didn’t know where to start – in our eyeline there was a zip wire, a water play area with a fountain and a little stream running through and a massive sand pit with a wooden ship and climbing net ‘sail’. There were a couple of different swings, climbing frames, slides and a more unusual spinning contraption that looked a bit like the swing carousel you see at fairgrounds.<\/p>\n There were wobbly platforms for balancing fun, rope walks, tyre swings and even an area with little sunken trampolines, which were proving popular. Too much to mention from memory but it was understandably packed on a sunny Saturday and was clearly paradise for older children, so I’ll definitely be bringing my daughter back when she is big enough to explore more of the equipment.<\/p>\n I can’t remember a more impressive playground that was free to access, and it’s a bonus that there’s a cafe on site too as well as a smaller kiosk for much-needed refreshments and snacks after all that running around and climbing. According to Cheltenham Borough Council, there is another smaller children’s play area on the western side of the park too, along with tennis courts, a pitch and putt golf course and a skate park.<\/p>\n We had pre-booked lunch in town and found it to be a pleasant stroll from Pittville to reach the main shops and restaurants of the town centre. We also stumbled upon another gorgeous green space, the Imperial Gardens just off the main Promenade, which was absolutely filled with flowers – apparently 25,000 bedding plants bloom there every year.<\/p>\n As we drove back to Bristol later in the day we also had a brief glimpse of Sandford Park, known for its ornamental water features and yet another play area. You could easily spend an entire day just park-hopping around Cheltenham, making it an ideal place for a low-cost family day out for as long as the sun stays shining.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The family-friendly spot also has a lake, cafe and is within walking distance to a pretty town centreA…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":366535,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8818],"tags":[2420,381,748,393,4884,15125,16,15,42643],"class_list":{"0":"post-366534","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bristol","8":"tag-parenting","9":"tag-bristol","10":"tag-britain","11":"tag-england","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-things-to-do-in-bristol","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-west-country"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115076574036523668","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366534","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=366534"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366534\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/366535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=366534"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=366534"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=366534"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/1_SG_BGS_22-08-25-pitville_02_result.jpg\")
The lake at Pittville Park in Cheltenham(Image: Sophie Grubb\/Bristol Live)<\/p>\n