Find Baby-friendly Boltholes
A new website helps parents find baby-friendly UK holiday cottages
Holiday cottages which are really baby-friendly can be hard to search out, but a new British website helps anyone planning a vacation with a baby to do just that
'I want to find places that go significantly beyond just providing a high-chair and a travel cot,' says Sian Williams. Sian is the Director of the new website, www.babyfriendlyboltholes.com, which aims to help parents find holiday cottages in the UK that are both baby-friendly, and stylish. Like boutique hotels for babies, that's what it sounds like.
'I'm a boutique hotel junkie,' says Sian, who runs her own travel PR company, 'but I couldn't enjoy them as a parent. I'd be on toddler-induced tenterhooks awaiting the next food-splattering.' Trying to track down baby-friendly boltholes for herself and new baby daughter Erin proved harder than she thought, giving her the idea for this website and a Baby-Friendly Boltholes Pocket Guide, which will be published in January 2007.
The website at the moment concentrates on Devon and Cornwall, with some coastal retreats in Northumberland, but soon Sian hopes to be answering the requests that she's had to locate similar properties in other parts of England as well as Wales and Scotland. Each property featured has to go through a strict selection process, ensuring they provide not just the basics but things like baby-sitters and nursery equipment, from stair gates to sterilisers, but also extras which might include strollers, sand pits, dressing-up boxes and even play rooms.
For the parents, the cottages have such treats as pools, saunas and steam-rooms, as well as pre-bookable beauty therapists, and private chefs to do the catering. They also range in style from seaside chic to funky farms. You can check out the properties and the prices at the Baby-Friendly Boltholes website.
To read my piece about Boutique Boltholes, click here.
