Hadlow Road Station (Wirral Way)
A country station restored to look like the 1950s, at the Cheshire end of the Wirral Way, with toilets and a traffic-free old railway path to Parkgate. Bring bikes, and mind the 2.2m car park height barrier.
Days out with the kids in Ellesmere Port
12 places in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, 4 of which cost nothing. Everything below is within easy reach if you live locally.
12 in Ellesmere Port4 free7 indoor
Ellesmere Port is honest about what it is: a motorway-and-retail town holding two of the best wet-weather cards in Cheshire. Blue Planet Aquarium sends sharks over your head on a moving walkway, worth going round twice, and the National Waterways Museum fills a historic dock complex with narrowboats, locks and boat trips, cheaper, gentler and better in fair weather.
Whitby Park is the free local lung between the two, with playgrounds and enough grass to run off an aquarium gift-shop sulk. Chester is fifteen minutes one way, the Wirral's beaches and Eureka! Science + Discovery about the same the other, so nobody is ever stranded here. A day out in Ellesmere Port with kids comes down to fish or boats, and both survive a downpour.
Places in Ellesmere Port
Rivacre Valley Local Nature Reserve
184 acres of wooded valley and brook a minute off junction 7 of the M53, and the traffic noise is gone two hundred metres in. Paths, picnic meadows, a permanent orienteering course, bluebells in spring.
Stanney Woods Local Nature Reserve
Twenty two hectares of ancient oak and birch woodland with a small free car park, level compacted paths and no gradient steeper than 1 in 10, so prams and wheelchairs manage it. No toilets, and the gates shut at five.
Whitby Park
Ellesmere Port's main park and a Green Flag one: a play area for children up to 12, a wheels park, parkour kit, climbing boulders, free tennis courts in season and a fish pond, with Theatre Porto in the old hall. Free, with parking off Stanney Lane.
AW Arena
A soft play and indoor football centre on Stanney Mill Industrial Park, and about as cheap as soft play gets round here: £5 a child, adults free, babies under six months free. Open until 8pm on weekdays.
Ellesmere Port Sports Village
Ellesmere Port's biggest leisure centre: two pools, a cafe, parking on site, and a day that runs from half six in the morning until ten at night on weekdays. Under-threes swim for £2.
Hooton Park Hangars
Three of the oldest surviving First World War hangars in the country, holding historic aircraft, vehicles, engines, a Chester tram, a printing museum and cockpits to sit in. Volunteer run, and open on set days only.
Tenpin Cheshire Oaks
Twenty-four lanes on the Coliseum Leisure Park, next door to Paradise Island golf, with laser tag, escape rooms and an arcade. Tuesdays are half price in term time, but in the school holidays the deal only starts at 6pm.
Climbing Hut Ellesmere Port
A bouldering centre with two areas built for children: Boulder Play for under 5s, with soft walls, pool noodles and a tunnel, and Boulder Zoo for 2 to 10 year olds. Low walls, thick mats, a parent alongside.
National Waterways Museum
A real working dock kept as a museum: historic narrowboats, locks, indoor galleries, boat trips and a waterways playground. Under 6s free, and the annual pass costs less than two visits.
Paradise Island Adventure Golf, Cheshire Oaks
Two indoor 18-hole adventure golf courses in 13,000 square feet of fake tropics on the Coliseum Leisure Park at Cheshire Oaks. Rain-proof, easy to explain to a four-year-old, and two courses for the price of one on term-time weekdays before 4pm.
Blue Planet Aquarium
Sharks over a moving walkway tunnel, all under cover. A dependable answer to a washout forecast that still feels like a proper day out.
What’s on in Ellesmere Port
3 dated events coming up, 2 of them this weekend.
Boo! Planet Aquarium
Blue Planet Aquarium, Ellesmere Port
until 1 Nov. Daily through half term, 24 October to 1 November
Half term at the aquarium with spooky trails, activities and skeleton scuba shows in the tanks, plus the odd ghoul wandering about. Indoors and warm, which counts for a lot in the last week of October. The page prints no year, but those dates only fit this year's half term.
Written by us
Halloween half term and Miniature Steam Weekend at the National Waterways Museum
National Waterways Museum, Ellesmere Port
until 1 Nov. Miniature Steam Weekend 24 and 25 October, then half term activities daily 26 October to 1 November, 10am to 4pm
Half term opens with a Miniature Steam Weekend, then a week of children's activities with, the museum says, a few spooky Halloween happenings. Detail was thin when we checked, so treat it as a museum day with extras.
Written by us
Festive Boat Trips & Santa's Grotto, National Waterways Museum
National Waterways Museum, Ellesmere Port
5 Dec to 24 Dec. 5 and 6, 12 and 13, then daily 19 to 24 December, 10am to 4pm
Father Christmas in a snowy woodland grotto inside the museum, with the option of a festive canal boat trip first while an elf runs stories, games and a Christmas quiz. The grotto ticket covers up to two adults per child and gets you into the museum for the rest of the day, which is the useful bit on a cold afternoon.
Written by us
Also worth the drive
Not in Ellesmere Port, but close enough for a day out.
Walton Hall & Gardens
The reliable default: gardens, a children's zoo, a big playground and plenty of room to run. Pay for parking, nothing else.
Jungle Parc
Treetop rope courses in the woods at Walton Hall Gardens. The Warrington site runs the Adventurer course, built for children from age 4 with a minimum height of 1.05m, with over 60 activities at different heights. Children £19; supervising adults walking below go free.
Gulliver's World
A theme park deliberately built for ages 2 to 13 rather than teenagers, so both of them can ride most of it. The classic full-day option on your doorstep.
Apple Jacks Adventure Farm
An adventure farm off Stretton Road built for 4 to 12s: tractor trailer rides, zip wires, drop slides, jumping pillows, roller skating and a tent full of inflatables. Despite the name there are no animals to see, and in October it turns into Spooky World's daytime Fun-By-Day.
Giggles Play Mill
Two-tier soft play frame, low climbing wall, pirate ship, crawl tubes and a bouncy slide, plus Messy Monday and sensory sessions during the week.
Jellybeans Play Centre
Bigger than the average soft play: multi-level frame, a spooky room, an astro slide, a climbing wall, two mini bowling lanes and a slot racing track. The bowling is what makes it work when you have a toddler and a seven-year-old to keep happy at once.
Fun2b
Straightforward multi-level soft play with a café that adults can actually sit in. Nothing fancy, reliably works.
Tenpin Warrington
Soft play plus bowling under one roof, which solves the two-different-ages problem in a single trip. Ask for the barriers if anyone is under about six.
What’s on near you, every Friday
One email a week: what is on this weekend within a sensible drive, and the places worth booking before they go.