Center Parc

Last week went by quickly after we went to Hampton Court. Tuesday we went to Hamley's - one of the famous toy stores in town. We got out of there without buying anything, although I think the Easter Bunny might shop there. Wednesday Sean and I went to the Science Museum while Mike taught his class. Sean wanted to try and "break into" the room with the safe - trying to beat the laser beams -which he proceeded to do several times by crawling on his belly. The floor was very clean after we left!

Thursday Mike didn't have class - he had them watch the movie "Sicko" by Michael Moore so they could have a long weekend. Can't believe my husband had a Michael Moore film in his class!! We've watched it - much food for thought! Since he didn't have class and the weather was rainy, we decided to go to the mall. There are not many malls over here, and a new one opened up before the Christmas holiday, so we thought we'd try it out. It was a total American experience, except for the awesome Greek food we had for lunch (wish we had that in St Cloud!). We needed to buy Sean a new pair of trainers (tennis shoes) because his feet grew overnight and his didn't fit anylonger! He also has 3 of his 6 year old molars now, and one loose tooth...he insists on growing up! This is hard on mom....

Friday we went to Center Parc, a family resort about an hour away by train. This was a great holiday for us - in fact, Sean said as we were leaving today that he wanted to live here (as long as his MN friends would live here too!). We swam alot in the huge indoor (and heated outdoor) pools, and Sean was able to do the big slides! We couldn't believe it!! First we couldn't believe that they let children on these slides (although they did recommend under 2's not to try it), then we couldn't believe that he would do it! He loved it and did them over and over and over.... The safety standards over here are MUCH more lax than at home - which is both good and bad. The lifeguards were merely suggesting things (e.g., no running, don't go down the fast slide 2 at a time, etc), we could feel the suction from the bottom drain covers, and there were no workers at the top of the slides monitoring when people went down. The lifeguards were in shorts and trainers and only a few had whistles - so if there was a problem, it would be awhile before help could arrive. There were also very few lifeguards. But we managed to stay safe and had no injuries, so that was good! The top picture is of Sean waiting to go down one of the big slides, and the other one is of him on the really fast, but short slide. Mike said the fast slide is a good way to get a wedgie and water up your nose, but Sean didn't complain at all! He loved it! He skidded on top of the water for a bit at the bottom of the slide, where I would sort of catch him. He did wear a life jacket, but only when we let him do the slides by himself.

The other area which is quite different than we were used to was in the locker room - yes room. One room, not two. There was one shower area and several family and multiperson dressing rooms. But if someone forgot to lock the dressing room door (which was easy to do), you got a quick peep show. There was a sign that most people followed about keeping your swimsuit on while showering, and we were pleasantly surprised how few speedo's we saw. The cleanliness standards are different too, and we were the only ones wearing swim shoes. Yuck!! It was quite a different experience! The other photo above is of the family drying room - for a pound your whole family would go into this room and get dried off - kind of like the blower that dries your car after a car wash.