Food and Drink Experiences

 
 
 

Lets meet just inside the park next to the car park (just down the road from the train station) at 2.30pm to say ‘hello.’ My mobile number for anyone that can’t find us is[masked]. I’ll let you know what I’ll be wearing.

What we’ll do
Lets have a leisurely stroll around Cassiobury Park and enjoy the sunshine, trees, exercise, fresh air, barge, waterfall and canal and then enjoy an ice cream and coffee/juice and nibbles at the cafe or bring a picnic, play tennis or go paddling in the stream or children’s play-pools! Or a game of cards in the sun! – all is good! Children and Dogs welcome!

Cassiobury Park is a Green Flag award winning park and the principal public park in Watford, Hertfordshire.
The park contains a wide variety of sports facilities, attractions for children and parts of the park are designated as a Local Nature Reserve. Cassiobury Park is one of Watford’s most popular attractions receiving around 800,000 visits per year and hosting a number of popular sporting and entertainment events.
It was created in 1909 and comprises over 190 acres (0.77 km2) and extends from the A412 Rickmansworth Road in the east to the Grand Union Canal in the west, and lies to the south of the Watford suburb of Cassiobury. The western part is a 25.1 hectare Local Nature Reserve managed by the Herts and Middlesex Wildlife Trust.
History
Extensive history about Cassiobury Park, the estate and house, the Grand Union Canal and the Earls of Essex, dating from 14th Century, can be found on Wikiopedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassiobury_Park
Lay out

Much of the park is covered by mown grass and scattered trees. There are notable specimens of American oaks such as thepin oak and the scarlet oak and the cedar of Lebanon is a prominent feature. Many more recent plantings of exotics have been made, such as swamp cypress and various Asian rowans.
The park slopes generally downhill from east to west, into the alluvial valley of the River Gade. The broadly meandering river and its bridges add much charm; the canal takes a more direct route. The direction of flow is north to south. The Gade is a tributary of the Colne, which ultimately flows into the Thames at Staines.
The valley is partly wooded and very beautiful; alder is frequent beside the streams and original springs are still flowing. Beyond the river and canal the ground rises quite steeply, beyond which lies Whippendell Wood. The whole area is freely accessible and surprisingly unspoilt. Man-made structures in the park include a complex of paddling-pools and an adjacent miniature railway near the Gade, tennis-courts, a bowling green, a system of all-weather asphalt paths, and a number of shelters. The Watford Miniature Railway has a gauge of 101⁄4" and runs for 1010 yards around part of the park.
Fauna and flora
The bird-life of the formal areas is typical of parkland in southern England. The canal, the river and its associated streams provide more interest for the bird-watcher. Teal, water rail, grey wagtail, grey heron and kingfisher are regular visitors or resident. The disused cress-beds can yield waders: most often snipe but also redshank and green sandpiper and, more rarely, jack snipe and dunlin. The valley is a good place to see willow tit, reed bunting , and sedge warbler. The alders attract flocks of siskin and redpoll. Lesser spotted woodpecker is frequent. Some of the old ditches and surrounding woodland have been made into a local nature reserve. Marsh marigold grows here, and there is a fairly large bed of great reed-mace.
An obvious feature of the riverside flora are three species of balsams: small balsam, jewel-weed, and policeman's helmet.
Filming location
Cassiobury Park has been used as a filming location in a number of cinema films and television programmes due to its proximity to several major film studios such as Elstree Studios. In 1997 Whippendell Wood served as a Star Wars filming location.

Link to website:
https://www.google.com/search?q=cassiobury+park&oq=cassiobury&aqs=chrome.1.69i59l2j69i57j0l3.9388j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Reviews:
it's beautiful parkland, the Grand union canal and the river are lovely places to just sit, walk on your own or with a dog. Go for a stroll, take a picnic and just enjoy the lovely surroundings.

Lovely park with lots to keep you busy. A walk down the canal is always very peaceful. There is also a kids playground and water park that is perfect in the summer.

Cassiobury park is the best park for a family day out. A nice stroll by the woods at the back or a picnic by the greens or fun in the splash park. There is everything for everybody!
A fantastic large park to spend the day in. At one end of the park there is a small cafe serving hot and cold drinks (good coffee) and food (sandwiches and cooked food) with some healthy options, ice creams and both indoor and outdoor seating, friendly service. At the bottom end of the park there is a second food outlet serving good coffee, hot and cold food, ice creams with indoor and outdoor seating. This is next to newly built large paddling pools with fountains and kiosk, great fun for the kids. Next to this a giant play park with tons of equipment, picnic benches next to this too. There is a great and historic minature train next to the park which is great fun. On top of all this wide open spaces for picnics, wonderful trees, a canal and river to walk along and explore some woods and a nature reserve. The park is busy and lively without being too crowded. There is a small car park but you can park on the surrounding streets at the weekend for free, there are multiple park entrances. Overall this is a great park and a great asset to have on our doorstep, a great day out.

What to Bring:
A smile and sense of friendship, support, interest and enjoyment :)

 
 
 

Lets have a leisurely stroll around Black Country Park and enjoy the sunshine, trees, exercise, fresh air, water and then enjoy an ice cream and coffee/juice and nibbles at the cafe or bring a picnic, go swimming/paddling or explore the woodland! Or a game of cards in the sun! – all is good! Children and Dogs welcome!
Address
Black Park Country Park
Black Park Road
Wexham
SL3 6DS
Contact Us
Phone:[masked]
Email: [masked]
About the Park
Black Park
530 acres of woodland, heath and open space, majestic trees and a 14 acre lake with family friendly activities & events all year round.

Black Park covers over 500 acres of woodland, heathland and open space in South Buckinghamshire. With family friendly attractions, such as the adventure playground and Go Ape, miles of beautiful woodland tracks and trails, and opportunities for wildlife spotting, the park offers something for everyone to enjoy.
Black Park is a country park in Wexham, Buckinghamshire, England.. It is managed by Buckinghamshire Council. It has an area of 250 hectares (618 acres), of which two separate areas totalling 15.7 hectares (39 acres) have been designated a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest(SSSI) and a larger area of 66 hectares is a Local Nature Reserve.
Wildlife
Black Park has heath, alder carr – both rare in the county – mixed and coniferous woodland and some areas of acid grassland. It has a varied fauna, and insects include the nationally rare Roesel's bush cricket. There are eighteen species of butterfly, birds including hobbies and nightjars, and snakes and lizards.
Filming location]
Black Park is adjacent to Pinewood Film Studios and has been used as an outdoor location for many film and television productions. The woods and lake featured prominently in the Hammer Horror including The Curse of Frankenstein (1957), The Brides of Dracula (1960), The Curse of the Werewolf (1961) and Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966). The park has also been used in film productions such as the James Bond film Goldfinger and Casino Royale, plus several Carry On films, Fahrenheit 451, Wombling Free, Batman, Hawk the Slayer, Sleepy Hollow, Bugsy Malone, the Harry Potter film series, Cinderella (2015 film), Captain America: The First Avenger, Robin Hood, 47 Ronin, Eden Lake, the Monty Python film And Now for Something Completely Different, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, and Jurassic World: Dominion.
In television, Black Park, together with its lake, was used extensively in location filming for the Doctor Who story.
Recreation and sports
Black Park is popular with walkers and dog owners due to the wide open spaces and well-maintained routes. During summer 2010 a 'Go-Ape' activity centre was established in the park with the construction of climbing rigging and zip lines between the trees. Runners are commonplace within the park. Mountain biking is popular in the park as the combination of dense woodland, open plains, technical sections and narrow but quick draining trails make for exciting riding.The lake is open for fishing during the normal rod licence season.
Black Park at war
During both World War One and Two the Park saw service for the Empire with troops from the Canadian Forestry Regiment helping to farm the Park and harvest the wood, for use in the trenches of France or building air strips in France for the Royal Flying Corps. To this day the lines of trees they planted can still be clearly seen.
Link to website:
https://www.google.com/search?q=black+country+park&oq=black+country+park&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i59j69i60l2j69i59.11295j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Reviews:
It’s so lovely here.

There is a nice cafe at the edge of the lake. It’s got a large deck with lots of outdoors seating, as well as seating indoors. There are also quite a lot of benches dotted around that you can use for picnics. Their ice cream was really good and service for hot food was very quick.

A little area at the side of the lake just past the cafe and the playground area, here the water’s edge is shallow and for quite a long way in so you can splash around for ages. It was the proper, outdoors children’s fun that I grew up on and made me feel kind of nostalgic.

There are loads of footpaths around the park though, including cycling paths. There is also a large meadow with lots of picnic benches which is great for playing games in.

We will absolutely be back to explore further.

What to Bring:
A smile and sense of friendship, support, interest and enjoyment :)