Nestled in 400 acres of beautiful historic forest just five kilometres from Ballymahon, Longford Forest is Center Parcs first village in Ireland. You’ll find plenty of activities, restaurants and accommodation options tucked away amongst the trees, offering everything you need for a perfect short break.
Accommodation
Lodges with provisions for disabled people were limited and as a result I could not use one.
Though the lodge I did use did not have a wheelchair accessible shower and a kitchen counter I could not reach, I found that the open plan made it easy to navigate and there were no steps to obstruct my access.
While a short distance from the village square it was not a problem for me, the car park was quite a long distance however which could be problematic in bad weather.
Activities
Not all activities are wheelchair-friendly such a Treetop Adventure, but there are plenty that are and I never found I was at a loss for what to do.
The subtropical swimming pool was used by me and my family nearly every day – the pool was in an indoor space that was very easy to get around and had a wheelchair accessible changing room that had lots of space.
Restaurants and shops
All were no issue to get around in my wheelchair and staff were very friendly.
Hiring Transport
Wheelchairs and scooters can be hired if needed though I brought my own.
We visited Centre Parcs, Longford Forest, in Summer 2021 and 2022, on both occasions staying for 1 week in an accessible lodge. We are a family of five with three daughters. Our middle daughter is a young teenager with severe physical and learning disability. On our first stay, a number of covid restrictions were in place. This review will therefore cover both stays.
On both visits we stayed in the same standard accessible lodge. As a family with a disabled member it was permitted for our WAV to remain outside our lodge for the duration of our holiday.
The lodge had a large wheelchair accessible bedroom with separate direct access from the front of the lodge. The bedroom had a profiling bed. On our first stay we had no mobile hoist in the room but on our second stay one was already in place upon arrival.
The profiling bed was much more open on the sides than we expected. Our daughter needs fully enclosed bed rail protection to prevent her from falling out. We reported this to service/contact centre and we were delivered extra middle panel sections but the bottom end still remained fully open. We had to rearrange the bedroom to ensure our daughter would be fully enclosed and safe in bed. The bedroom had a large ensuite accessible bathroom. Although our daughter doesn’t use the toilet, we noted that there may have been an issue with the proximity of the toilet to the sink for other wheelchair users.
Our daughter loved the swimming pool and there is a changing places toilet in the swimming pool changing area. On our first visit the electric changing bed and hoist were not working but this was rectified for all further visits and staff were excellent at helping and directing us when we came to the pool.
The pool has a standard plastic pool chair with wheels so we could wheel our daughter from the changing area directly into the lower-level pool. We had difficulty accessing the higher-level outdoor pool with our daughter as it has a stepped pool access.
When we last visited Centre Parcs had 2 accessible bikes. On our first visit we booked an accessible bike on arrival but when we went to collect it the following morning, we were told it was broken and the other accessible bike was booked out. Our disabled daughter had no bike access for the full one-week stay. As Centre Parcs is greatly associated with family cycling we found this to be extremely disappointing and it affected the quality of our holiday. On our second visit we did get an accessible bike for the full week of our stay which was much better.
An issue with the accessible bikes is it requires a transfer into a supported seat on the front of the bike. This will be suitable for some but not for all wheelchair users. It would be good therefore if they added to their accessible bike range including power assist wheelchair platform bikes.
In terms of activities, our disabled daughter enjoyed the owl adventure, the swimming pool and the ten-pin bowling. As my daughter has PMLD there were certain activities that she was unable to participate in which maybe other wheelchair user children and adults could access and enjoy. However, we did feel that there could have been better access to the boating activities on the lake had there been a way of safely transferring a wheelchair user into the boats, to the horse and carriage ride and to the water’s edge beach area etc.
As a family overall we enjoyed our stay very much and would most definitely return. There are however a number of access and inclusion improvements they could make. I’m not sure that had we only had our disabled daughter on holiday with us that we would have found enough activities for her alone to fill our week-long stay, however our disabled daughter is very sociable and enjoys being in busy spaces with lots of people and activity.
The staff were great and very welcoming and accommodating.