WWT Washington Reviews Summary

Visitor Experience

Pros:

• "Great day out with the grandkids."
• "Brilliant day out! The place is absolutely huge and is lovely to walk around."
• "A brilliant afternoon out!"
• "Peaceful and beautiful. Great experience."
• "Very busy today, first day of the Puddle Jumping Championship so lots of youngsters - it's good that they can enjoy themselves and enjoy nature at the same time."
• "A lovely relaxing day out. Informative and fun."
• "Fabulous place to visit with the kids. We need more wildlife sanctuaries like this."

Cons:

• "It's nice if you haven’t been, but I won’t go again as nothing to do there really."
• "It's very hard work pushing a wheelchair around for sure, loads of hills and some very stoney/gravel paths that smaller wheelchairs struggle with."
• "To start I was feeling like I had wasted my money (£25 for 2+2) as initially there was very little in the way of wild life especially in the Duckary!"
• "Average. A lot of things were closed and was mainly ducks in ponds and some flamingos."
• "Play park shut but no mention of that on website."
• "Grass everywhere is overgrown."
• "Shouldn't be open with state it's in at mo."

Accessibility

Pros:

• "Paths are well maintained and mostly level."
• "Good access for wheelchairs and pushchairs."
• "All wheelchair and buggy accessible."
• "The pavements are in good repair and suitable for wheelchairs, mobility scooters or prams so the whole site is accessible to all."
• "The whole site is very much wheelchair friendly from the toilets to the hides and viewing platforms."
• "Assistance dogs are welcome and paper site maps will be enlarged by a member of staff on request."
• "A really good amenity for us was the free availability of mobility scooters."

Cons:

• "Tried to use voucher code from National Lottery Days Out as Washington Wildfowl Trust was one of places listed. Didn’t work."
• "Came for the play area which is small and the water was turned off due to covid."
• "Be extremely careful in the car park for Off lead dogs bred for hunting in packs."
• "It's hard to get to if you don't drive and it's an hour walk if not less."
• "There are toilets in the visitor center, but only one other toilet (the compost variety) out in the wetlands."
• "Would of given it 5 * but one downside, the disabled toilet you have isn’t any good for a person who is wheelchair bound, incontinent and needs a changing bed! Your facilities Needs to be updated!!"
• "The rude man that sells bird food too also put me off."

Food and Cafe

Pros:

• "They offer a brilliant selection of cakes, pastries, toasties, pies and ice cream."
• "At the end as warmed up with Parsnip Soup with sour dough rolls before we left. It was delicious."
• "The cafe is excellent and good value."
• "Cafe on site with good food."
• "The cafe was well stocked, nice and clean and the staff were lovely."
• "Fab cafe with Lovely homemade food and kiddy friendly favourites."
• "Cafe good for hot food, cake and a brew too!"

Cons:

• "The only disappointment was the food in the cafe."
• "The veggie pie was awful and the mince and dumplings were full of greasy fat."
• "The cakes and scones were dry."
• "They do need to work on the cafe though - the food is good but the service is slowwwwwww."
• "Nice place if not a bit pricey. Enjoyed our day apart from the cafe stood in long queue ordered then had another 25 minute wait for food to arrive."
• "BUT the cafe omg massive price raise but massive decline in quality certainly won't eat there again hard jacket potatoes salad fit for the bin, poorly cooked frozen vegetables."
• "A little on the high price for food could be lower in price."

Staff and Service

Pros:

• "The staff were all really friendly and helpful."
• "The activity on the day we went was fun and the staff were great at engaging the kids."
• "The staff were all lovely and welcoming as it was our first time visiting."
• "Very good information boards and lovely helpful staff!"
• "Helpful and friendly staff."
• "Pleasant and helpful staff from walking in."
• "All staff were friendly, restaurant staff were exceptional, keepers all bursting with information."

Cons:

• "Your workers left mess behind, destroyed path by heavy duty vehicles."
• "Nothing for a vegan option well 1 kind of cake but no sandwiches."
• "The hot food was awful. Microwaved and rubbery."
• "The otter talk, the microphone didn't work and you couldn't hear a thing the people were saying."
• "Peaceful and relaxing day. Uncertain why visitors are still expected to use horrible portable toilets."
• "The only down side was the lack of choice and expense in the cafeteria."
• "None of the birds were that interested in food (probably because everyone throws seed all day)."

Wildlife and Nature

Pros:

• "This is a vitally important nature reserve situated on the natural corridor of the River wear."
• "The birds and other wildlife and the play park were great and kept our 3 year old interested in the walk."
• "Enjoyed a walk along the river visiting all the hides and watching a great variety of birds."
• "Great place to take the kids or just for adults to have a walk around."
• "Many smaller children will also enjoy it because there various activities for every season."
• "Fabulous location for spotting and photographing wildlife and wildfowl."
• "Most importantly, they have made it incredibly accommodating for the wildlife."

Cons:

• "Now the birds are all shut in pens and water is putrid."
• "The flamingos were in a mud pond with no water."
• "Not a massive amount of birds to see but my 5yr old Granddaughter was quite happy and had a good time."
• "Only a few pounds are not clean enough, but the majority of the park is good."
• "Amazed at seeing the flamboyant flamingos, the black swans and the family of Asian otters."
• "What a wonderful place! By coincidence we arrived just before 11am on the 4th Sunday of the month when they do a 60min ‘walk with the warden’."
• "A little overpriced in my opinion, but it did have great highlights of flamingoes and otters."