A NEW woodland adventure playground has opened in the grounds of Stonor Park.
The Wonder Woods at Stonor is adjacent to the estate’s visitor centre, which opened a year ago, and features a 50m zip line, a climbing structure, ropes and a tree house with a wavy slide.
It is suitable for children up to 15 while for younger children there is a sandpit, tunnels, water play area, a climbing tower, see-saw, rocking deer, wobble dish and a nest swing. The playground was built over the summer and is the brainchild of the Hon William Stonor, son of Lord Camoys.
He said: “What we wanted to do was broaden the age group and demographic of people who come to Stonor. It was very much wanting to encourage a younger crowd, both younger parents and children as well.
“I really wanted to create somewhere magical among the trees where people could come and have a great time and a lot of fun.
“We wanted it to be more of a day for the whole family. Everything is wooden as we wanted it to be sympathetic to the environment and the park here.
Everything’s designed to be quite challenging but safe.”
Timberplay, which built the Diana, Princess of Wales play area in Hyde Park, installed the equipment.
It has been open just two weeks but is already proving popular.
Mr Stonor: “We have had some lovely feedback from people.
“We have permission for something double this size. The rest could go through the woods at the back. It’s all about encouraging families to come and enjoy Stonor. Now there’s a lot more for people to do when they come here.”
The playground is open five days a week, Wednesday to Sunday, from April until the end of October.
A new bicycle repair station has also been installed next to the visitors’ centre as the area is popular with cyclists.
For more information, visit www.stonor.com/wonder-woods
