Raphael Park Reviews Summary

Park Facilities

Pros:

• "Great tennis courts, some football pitches and kids playground."
• "The playground is more modern and safer."
• "Huge play area for the children at the rear of the park."
• "Raphael Park is a huge park with tennis courts, and a really nice play area, and a great place to walk dogs."
• "A beautiful and clean park with a nice lake, great for picnic activities."
• "Massive green fields, an open air theatre, a lake filled with ducks and ducklings, ice cream truck, and a well kept play area for children."
• "A nice park with lake, bandstand, open playing field and a recently updated children's play area."

Cons:

• "Don't appear to be any signposted restroom facilities. The ones by the tennis courts are permanently closed."
• "Public toilets could do with more attention, no paper."
• "Just wish they had a sign at the lake part to let people know it was closed, as many kids were disappointed."
• "Park lovely and tidy grandson love the swings slides and rope climbing only problem was when he wanted to go toilet had to walk to other end of park as ones near play area closed."
• "Only thing that annoys me and several other people I have spoken to, is that next to the play area they always have big inflatables, which they charge you to use."
• "Can get too crowded at times and footpaths are narrow."
• "However, the lake is only accessible on one side of it."

Food and Refreshments

Pros:

• "There's a fab cafe for refreshments and top quality playground equipment for the kids."
• "Restaurant offers good coffee and lunches from sandwiches to full sit down meals."
• "Raphaels Restaurant which again proved popular for diners or just wanting refreshments."
• "Very nice restaurant. Relaxing with good food and drink."
• "Fantastic service and great food."
• "Extremely nice food, great service, and excellent staff and to top it off a lovely view of the park."
• "There is also a fabulous restaurant with good quality tasty food at a reasonable price."

Cons:

• "Bring cash, I only had a credit card and could not buy anything 😬"
• "Food is overpriced compared to other places, it would of been fine if the food was nice but it wasn't at all."
• "Wish the restaurant at the entrance was more of a coffee shop with a relaxed setup rather than a more formal restaurant."
• "There's a restaurant, but can be pricey."
• "Cafe crazily expensive - on a super hot summers day there were zero people queuing up to buy ice-cream."
• "Service was good and the setting is lovely but the food was overpriced and to a poor standard."
• "Changed so much from when we had our Wedding Anniversary there. Disappointing to say the least, food gone downhill and staff not so helpful or friendly, seem disinterested in customers."

Parking and Accessibility

Pros:

• "Lovely park on the outskirts of Romford. Plenty of free parking. Paved path for all weather enjoyment of the park."
• "Parking is very reasonable at 20p for 3 hours during the week and free on weekends."
• "There’s a street parking close to playground and also there’s another free car park just in front off main entrance."
• "Parking available in Lodge Farm car park just opposite."
• "Parking across the road is 20p for up to 3 hours."
• "Raphaels park is fully wheelchair accessible."
• "The paths are well maintained and I've pushed wheelchairs along them without trouble."

Cons:

• "Cheap parking nearby but the parking spaces are limited."
• "On a busy days car parks fills quickly."
• "4* because no designated free parking. Street parking only or there are limited spaces off Main road which I believe are pay and display."
• "No parking in the larger side but plenty on side roads."
• "Tried to visit but car park is tiny. The parking ticket machines were not working."
• "The two stars I have to remove is during the summer months when inconsiderate people chuck litter all over the park."
• "Just disappointed by how yellow the grass is! Such a beautiful park should be more green."

Wildlife and Nature

Pros:

• "There are so many ducks and swans around."
• "The pond/open water is lovely and allows you to feed ducks and pigeons."
• "Squirrels, dogs, ducks all enjoyed the scenery, great family place to be enjoyed by all."
• "Lovely park with lots of squirrels and birds to feed worth spending time here for a walk or exercise."
• "Love this place, and always amazed at the number of Canadian Geese returning for winter."
• "Large pond with some really beautiful swans, ducks, in fact quite a variety of water birds."
• "There's a beautiful fountain in the middle of the lake there with ducks to feed."

Cons:

• "I would advise to always keep your kids close and hold their hand walking alongside the lake as there is no netting (or similar) to prevent any accidents of falling into the water."
• "Scary geese though."
• "It shouldn't require a dog bite before a problem is recognized as a problem."
• "Beautiful park however from my perspective it's ruined by dog owners and sometimes even mass groups of runners."
• "If you want to just sit and relax, expect crazy barking dogs and their owners walking past every minute."
• "Their dogs made physical contact with my body and there was no attempt to call them back though we were obviously not inviting the contact."
• "However, the pavements near the lake could be cleaned more often."