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On booking, we send you a list of activity ideas (with contacts) suitable for the time of year you are visiting and that your group might be interested in. Here’s a taster of some activities that will suit adults and children alike - and most will keep your carbon footprint fairly low during your stay at Milden. None of the on-site facilities are shared .... except the 500 acre farm. For further ideas go to http://www.visitsuffolk.co.uk/categories-what-to-do
Fine weather options
- Guests can borrow our 40+ adult road bikes (included in hire charge) to explore the historic Wool Towns and villages with a bike trail quiz or just follow our planned short or long quiet road circular routes that take in nature reserves and friendly pubs
- Play badminton, outdoor table tennis, croquet and boules – and in between laze in the sun and barbecue in the garden
- Barn guests can organise a tennis tournament amongst themsleves
- Potter or orienteer around the farm tracks or further afield - around nearby medieval wool villages and nature reserves on planned footpath routes
- Take your binoculars and enjoy the buzzards and barn owls
- Borrow the moth trap and see what moths are flying
- Work with willow – get a tutor into help make trugs, spheres, birds, spiral plant trainers
- Go painting – bring your palette and easel and find a quiet place to paint ancient buildings, trees and flowers, pretty villages further afield or ... bring a tutor or hire in a model for the afternoon
- Families can try some ideas from the family activity pack – build a den, put a meadow in a matchbox, do tree hugging, leaf weaving or pond dipping
- Hire in garden games such as sumo wrestling, quoits, giant chess
- Play football or rounders on one of our fairly rough meadows - if the lambs have gone or the hay has been cut!
- Play cricket - for a small fee on the nearby Milden village cricket pitch
- Bunkhouse guests can hire the village hall (£5 per hour) to dance or do yoga
- And in the evening enjoy a barbecue and eat outside
Further afield
- Kayak or canoe down the River Stour from Sudbury (the Outdoor Hire Centre) or hire a rowing boat from Flatford Mill
- Paddle board down the River Stour (the Paddle Company)
- Walk to beautiful Lavenham for pub lunch and come back the other side of the valley
- Take a coastal river cruise – birding, seals or pub
- Antique hunt - in Long Melford and Lavenham
- Go Ape in Thetford Forest
- Pampering sessions at local spas
- Play a round of golf – at Newton Green and Stoke by Nayland
- Organise combination ‘adventure days’ locally – clay-pigeon shooting, archery, fly-fishing
- Local courses – book onto a painting or natural history course at Flatford Mill Field Studies Centre
Wet weather, winter or indoor options
- Bunkhouse guests can play table football in their covered area (but the table tennis is outside), and barn guests can play table tennis & table football - and keep fit on a wet day!
- Barn guests can delve in the children’s dressing up box or adults' Tudor costume cupboard – and put on a play or a dance
- Board & quiz games, puzzles – have a rummage in the cupboard for some giant puzzles, Monopoly, Cranium, Trivial Pursuits, Scrabble or Twister – and play a family game
- Barbies & lego – plenty of these for children
- Food safari - work with a professional chef and try your hand at making a curry, plucking a pheasant, and learn how to match the wine with your food
- Willow weaving – get a tutor in to make trugs and baskets
- Have a wine-tasting in the barn with a local expert
- Visit local sports centres on a rainy day – for swimming, team games such as indoor football or basketball, or a session in the gym
- Visit local museums – Ipswich, Stowmarket, Lavenham or further afield in Cambridge
- Go cheese-making, have a pampering session at the nearby spa or do life drawing with a model
- Yoga – take some time to enjoy the peace of the place
Singing & dancing in the Tudor barn
- Borrow our keyboard – bring a guitar and create a mini-concert
- Bring your ipod – and plug it into our sound system but please not loud late at night
- Get a dance tutor in – for Tudor, Tango or Street dance
- Try out the barn dance-with-caller CD
- Get a fiddler and caller in - for barn dancing
- Organise a singing workshop
- Borrow our costumes and enjoy a Tudor evening - put on a feast, do our quiz and dance Tudor style
Local visitor attractions
- Enjoy the history and architecture of the famous medieval Wool Towns and villages of Lavenham, Long Melford, Kersey, Clare ....
- Antique & junk shop in Lavenham, Long Melford and Clare
- Visit National Trust properties – Flatford Mill, Ickworth House, Lavenham Guildhall, Melford Hall, Sutton Hoo
- Paint in the local pretty medieval villages and churches – Kersey, Monks Eleigh, Chelsworth
- Visit the coast – an hour or so to Dunwich, Aldeburgh, Southwold – and Frinton for sand
- Visit a Kentwell Hall Tudor re-enactment, WWII or Halloween event
- Visit National Trust local properties – Melford Hall, Ickworth House, Sutton Hoo, Flatford Mill
- Take a tour of the National Stud at Newmarket
- Visit local, national, Suffolk Wildlife Trust and RSPB nature reserves including Bradfield Woods, Redgrave & Lopham Fen, Minsmere
Juliet and Christopher Hawkins, The Hall, Milden, Lavenham, Sudbury, Suffolk CO10 9NY
Tel: 01787 247235 Email: hawkins@thehall-milden.co.uk