Southwater Country Park Reviews Summary

Cafe

Pros:

• "Cafe is good. Cakes are nice and a variety of drinks. Staff are lovely and friendly."
• "The cafe has toilets and is very reasonably priced, it's sells food and amazing cake and of course ice cream 😀."
• "Visitor centre and cafe friendly with good food selection."
• "Great cafe with lovely cakes, sandwiches and pastries."
• "Sausage and bacon baguettes from the cafe were delicious and the staff are great."
• "Cafe is great and has a fab selection of food and drink."
• "The cafe serves delicious ice cream, great coffee or a delicious chai latte. The cakes and sandwiches look lush."

Cons:

• "Don't bother visiting the cafe, it's pretty much out of everything and the service isn't very helpful either."
• "the toilets that were by the cafe smelt and looked like they had never been cleaned"
• "Cafe is ok with some nice ice creams. Tends to shut exactly on time if not before."
• "MASSIVE queue at the café and it moved very slowly."
• "The toilets at the rear of the cafe needed some TLC as toilet paper all over the floor and lots of litter around the cafe."
• "Absolutely appalling prices in the one cafe there were disgusting"
• "The cafe is a complete and utter rip off, extortionate."

Park and Play Area

Pros:

• "Lovely large and rambling park."
• "We love visiting here, through out all seasons there is something beautiful to see/hear here."
• "Dinosaur Isle playpark is brilliant, so many fun things for the kids to do."
• "Adults and kids absolutely loved the lake and dinosaur park."
• "Excellent dinosaur themed playground with loads of play equipment to use."
• "The dinosaur playground is lovely for the children and they always want to go back."
• "The play area for the children is PHENOMENAL."

Cons:

• "If you want to go to a place where there are hundreds of people not caring about social distancing then this is the place for you."
• "Now there are no dogs allowed on the beach and you have to book a time slot to swim."
• "Horsham Council need to invest heavily in this little gem, the toilet and café facilities were in poor condition."
• "Not for adults who want to cycle."
• "play area is always crowded which u would expect, could do with more things 4 babies in the play area as only have baby swings"
• "Recent changes decreased my rating. Gating the paddling beach and having to book limited time slots is ridiculous."
• "A bit overtaken by seagulls at the moment."

Parking and Accessibility

Pros:

• "Parking is reasonable and can be paid on apps like Ringo too."
• "Car parking is easy and plenty of spaces. 1 hour for £1."
• "Parking was free for blue badge holders in November."
• "Parking is good but note that they do lock the car parks at 8pm/dusk whichever is sooner. You can pay by app for your parking."
• "Plenty of reasonable priced parking directly at the park."
• "Parking free in dinosaur lsland Park, on boating side £3 all day or less."
• "Parking isn't too horrendously priced either."

Cons:

• "Car parking has gone up from spring 2021, you now pay per hour... Check website for prices, I was a bit shocked by the increase."
• "However, it costs £15 to take your own boat on the water."
• "Maybe a bit expensive? For the time on the lake, £50 for 2 kayaks for 50 mins."
• "Parking is paid for by change only, 50p for 1 hour, £1.50 for 1-3 hours, etc and is charged until 6pm up to the 31st October."
• "Yellow lines everywhere and parking charges hit you before anything else remotely pleasing nor attractive."
• "Pay to park, although £1-2 so not expensive (but coins or app…no card)."
• "Parking machine in the overflow/overheight car park was out of order."