
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.
Ellesmere Port, Cheshire

AW Arena is an indoor football and coaching centre that also has a proper soft play: multi-level frames with slides, tunnels, climbing walls, rope bridges and ball pits, split into a baby zone (0 to 2), a toddler zone (2 to 5) and a junior zone (5 to 11). It is on Stanney Mill Industrial Park at Dutton Green, on the southern edge of Ellesmere Port.
It is £5 for anyone over one, £2 for babies from six months, and nothing for younger babies or for adults, so two adults and two children come to £10. Term-time weekday packages at £10.50 add breakfast, lunch or an after-school snack. Opening is 9.30am to 8pm on weekdays and 9.30am to 5pm at weekends, with an SEN session on Saturdays from 9am to 10.30am. Book through the website or just pay on the door.
What it costs: 1 year and over £5, 6 to 12 months £2, under 6 months free, adults free with a child. Term-time weekday packages at £10.50 bundle entry with breakfast, lunch or an after-school snack and a drink.
Worth knowing: Zones for 0 to 2, 2 to 5 and 5 to 11.
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Sharks over a moving walkway tunnel, all under cover. A dependable answer to a washout forecast that still feels like a proper day out.

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.

Ellesmere Port's main park: two play areas, a skatepark, tennis courts, formal gardens and a fish pond, with Theatre Porto in the old hall. Free, with free parking off Stanney Lane.

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.

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.

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.
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