Did you know The Gruffalo by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler is celebrating his 15th anniversary? The Forestry Commission are marking the anniversary with special trails in some amazing woodlands around the country. My children adore the story of The Gruffalo so we were very excited to head off to our nearest Gruffalo activity trail at Wendover Woods.
Wendover Woods is lovely with numerous walking, cycle and horse riding trails; a children’s play area; a Cafe in the Woods; toilets; fixed barbecue stands you can book in advance and Go Ape adventure course for the very adventurous.
You can buy a Gruffalo activity leaflet from the Cafe in the Woods or the Forestry Commission Chilterns Forest Office. We were given a little pack which included a Gruffalo colouring sheet, pack of crayons and leaflet which cost £2 but the trail itself is free.
The trail uses the existing Hill Top Trail which is mostly level and suitable for pushchairs. There are a number of trail panels to look out for and each one features a fun activity, such as writing your name using a stick or looking for different shaped leaves.
There were also large cut outs to look for along the way. We found Owl, Fox, Snake and the Gruffalo hidden in the trees.
There’s a large den building area which we all enjoyed. Some of the trees had been cut down so there were plenty of branches for you to build your own den. We’d never done anything like it before but we’ll definitely be back, we could have spent hours there! The children also loved climbing and walking along the fallen tree trunks.
The activity trail ends with a huge wooden sculpture of the Gruffalo.
The length of the trail is about half a mile and took us 45 minutes which included spending time in the Den Building area.
The Gruffalo activity trail at Wendover Woods is open until 30th September 2014. No booking is required.
The next activity trail is the Gruffalo Child’s Activity Trail from October 2014.
Linking up with Country Kids
My girls would completely love this. What a great place! Glad you had a lovely time x
This would be such a good day out. Glad you had a fab day x
Wow! Want to go! We love the Gruffalo in this house 🙂 I have just had a look and there is one near us and we are holiday there in August! Thank you for sharing, can’t wait to do the trail x
We did this locally to us a couple of years ago.
Thanks for this post, I’ve just checked my local forestry commission website and they have a similar event in August that we will definitely be attending 🙂
We are off to Daulby at the end of the month and really looking forward to this
We read this again last night. I want to visit one of these events this summer.
thats an awesome activity for kids, maybe one day we will do something similar with my little one
seen so many people going here lately and i wanna go, its too far though x
I got so excited when I first heard about this but then I kind of forgot about it. Thanks for the reminder. It looks like great fun.
This looks lovely, my 4 year old would be entranced, off to find out where my nearest Gruffalo trail is!
I love how the Gruffalo is springing up everywhere! We have a trail at a park near us!
I have seen quite a few people post about this recently. It really does look like an amazing day out! Wish we were closer.
Oh wow ,did not even know they had one its amazing .x
Wilf would absolutely love this! Sounds like you had a fab time x
We’ve been reading the Gruffalo and would have loved to get to an event but Little Mr is still a little bit too young for meeting the main man in a forest yet..Maybe next year if they stay a bit longer
This looks like a lot of fun. Must check when the next one runs nearer to where we are.
My two loved it, can’t wait to go back again soon.
How cute is that Gruffalo statue – my two would have loved this a few years ago x x
Have heard a lot about this, it looks fab x
This sounds amazing. The Gruffalo is a favourite of ours, and to link in with nature in this way is great. Wonder if there is something like this going on in the East Midlands
oooh that looks fab. My girls would love it!
My girls (and me!) would absolutely love this. I’ve just Googled it and there’s one close enough for us to visit in the summer. Thanks for sharing 🙂
This is our dream walk! Someday we will visit this forest and see him, the Grufallo =) #letkidsbekids
looks a great day out. we love the Grufalo x
Love a good Gruffalo trail. It is such a good way to get the kids out in the forest having fun. Looks like you all enjoyed it.
Thanks for linking #LetKidsbeKids
This looks an amazing spot to visit! We all love this book in our house (especially me!)
This looks like a real fun.
I would love to go myself… I might take kids with me 😉
Oh my I want to go! What a great sounding trail! x
Oh this looks like a wonderful trail – I think we have one near us in Bristol, I should really look into it a bit more!
wow we have one of these too, my kiddies were over the moon to see the Gruffalo. Such a lovely idea. x