First Family Holiday!

---

Today marked a very special event - out first ever family holiday! Ocean is only 8 weeks old so of course she won't remember it, but we will take alot of photos throughout the week to show her later on! We haven't ventured far, just 30 minutes down the motorway to Center Parcs at Whinfell forest. The highlight is that my parents and my sister are here too, the trip being their christmas present from us.

We weren't allowed access to our house until 3:30, but we arrived at about 2pm and went straight to the swimming pool instead. I wondered how Ocean would handle her first experience of swimming...

Turns out she absolutely loved it! After getting her into her first ever swim nappy and a gorgeous little pink & white striped swimming costume with a seahorse on the front, we took her straight into the deliciously warm baby pool. To start with we had her sat in a bright orange floating device to ensure she didn't drown. I say sat, but lolling is probably a better way to describe how she was as the seat is meant for those aged 3-12 months. After watching her slide lower and lower we took her out of that and just held her in the water while she kicked back and relaxed, treating us to beautiful, happy smiles every now and then. I must admit it was pretty nervewracking having her in all that potentially dangerous water, but I just held her as tightly as possible so couldn't twist away as she is in the habit of doing.

The swimming pool itself is brilliant. As you walk in you are greeting by sights that you would expect to see in a tropical country - various pools surrounded by lush green foliage, wooden bridges connecting them all, a bar serving food as well as a variety of cocktails, and though you can't see them immediately, water slides catering for a range of adrenaline levels. Combine this with an atmosphere of fun and an ambient temperature of 29.5 degrees and you can safely say that Subtropical Swimming Paradise is in fact the perfect name for it!

After a while I left Ocean with her grandparents in the baby pool and went off with my sister to zoom down some slides - the first fun I've had in 10months! Well, that's what it feels like anyway. Most of the slides are pretty standard, but the Wildwater Canyon Ride is the exception. It starts off innocently enough, but before you know it you are being rushed down an open topped tube, veering from side to side and being swept up the sides of the halfpipe. Occasionally the force is so great that you are flipped over onto your stomach, and before you have time to catch your breath you are flipped again...and again... and again. Swallowing mouthfuls of water seems compulsory on this ride as your mouth always happens to be open, attempting to actually breathe, when a big rush comes along. Oh and did I mention that the majority of this ride is outside? You are finally shot out at the bottom into an outside pool with such force that you go straight under the water and do a couple of involuntary roly poly's. Fortunately the water temperature is the same as inside - a fact that might not seem as important in the height of summer, but in the first week of March it is an experience in itself to be nice and warm in the water, and yet still outside.

Alot of people probably think that this sounds absolutely horrific, but I personally am a bit of an adrenaline junkie and love the whole being flung around, hitting my head, gasping for breath and swallowing large quantities of water thing. The only downside is that my hair gets ridiculously tangled and I have to spend 20 minutes in the changing room afterwards attempting to get a brush through it. But hey, it's a small price to pay!

After 45 minutes in the pool Ocean had had enough, so we got changed and ventured towards our accommodation for the week...

---