Returning to Centre Parcs two decades on

Some things belong in the past, and, for me, Center Parcs sat firmly in that box. Trips to Longleat Forest in Somerset, a woodland respite for the weary middle classes, were a staple of my childhood.

Every year, my parents would cram my two brothers and I into a people carrier and shuttle us to the forest for a long weekend of recuperation, if not rest. We’d swim and cycle our way to exhaustion, returning to our villa for an evening barbecue in the forest.

It sounds idyllic, and it was, mostly. But unlike other families, the reason we kept returning wasn’t just the draw of one more afternoon in the pool. My older brother has severe, non-verbal autism, which made going away hard.

Routine was paramount, and new environments unwelcome, so foreign holidays were pretty much off the cards. Center Parcs became our haven.

But, just like every other family, we grew up. I went to university, my older brother left home, and my younger brother moved abroad, taking the prospect of more family holidays with him.

My parents swapped trudging up the hills of Longleat for sipping Aperol in Lanzarote. Until, earlier this year, I got a message from my Mum.

“Would you like to go to Center Parcs in June?”

Would I like to go to Center Parcs? Not likely. We’d not been for nearly a decade, it’s expensive, and we’d outgrown it – what would there be to do?

Yet, I found myself replying “yes” almost instantly, the idea of a blast down memory lane too good to turn down.

Apparently, I’m far from alone.

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