Things to do in Ayrshire | Family days out in Scotland

As you all know we absolutely adore Scotland and visit at least once or twice a year for our family holiday. Over the years we have visited a number of different places and found the best hidden gems and family friendly places to visit and make the most of your trip. I'll be putting them all into handy little guides over the next few weeks for you all so you can find our suggestions and recommendations in one accessible place! 

We start in Aryshire, which is the first place we visited as a family of three and was such a lovely part of the World to visit. Lots of cute family friendly things to do, places to have some wholesome chill out time and interesting things / places that I would not have thought were family trips, but can confirm are! 

The first thing on our list is Heads of Ayr Farm Park - this was such a great place for the kids! A great park with lots of animals, playgrounds, fun activities and a great cafe for food and drink. We've posted a lot about Heads of Ayr Farm Park over on Instagram, (@thelittlelifeoft) and easily could have revisited a few times during our week long stay. It is also located right next to the Craig Tara Haven site so really convenient if you are staying there. 

Next on our list is Culzean Castle and Country Park - We have posted about this separately as park of the Castle Casanovas Challenge and the full review can be found here. As our post says, we really rated here as another exceptional family friendly venue. There was so much to do for the children outside of just a castle and it had a lot of parks, ground and different areas to keep everyone entertained. Again, this was a place that we easily could have visited a few times during our week long stay.

Third on our list is Ayr Beach / Seafront - This was the first beach Alex ever visited, and despite the blustery weather we had a lovely time. The town itself is a great place for a spot of shopping and there are lovely pubs and restaurants within easy distance (majority of which are family friendly). The seafront has its own playpark which is lovely and there is a soft play centre (Pirate Pete's) located nearby as well. Another great family friendly day out with something for all the family. 

Troon beach is another excellent beach for a lovely family day out. Lots of soft sand to play in, nice clean sea to swim in (if cold seas are your thing) and located close by to shops and supplies should you need them. We did not spend long at either beach given Alex was only 6 months in these photos and when we visited! I have no doubt we would spend significantly longer there now given he is 2 years old! 

Another lovely place we visited was Dunure Castle - again as part of the Castle Casanovas challenge - This was a really interesting place to visit as it is situated on the coast with beautiful scenery and a pebble maze nearby. We are huge history fans and visiting castles is sort of our thing - we've got to get them in before Alex decides he is too cool for such fun - but the castle was very accessible and it was great to learn about the local history. You can read the full post here.

We also headed to Girvan for Fish and chips - A little seaside town with some nice shops and a 'different' world feel to it. We were really lucky as the local fish and chip van also came to the Lodges where we were staying so we got to experience two fish and chips, which were stunning! Girvan is also where the local ASDA was so we got our food shop here for the week. It was well stocked and would highly recommend as a place to head to for supplies whilst in Ayrshire. 

We also did a lot of driving around the scenic roads and headed to the nearby national park for a walk around the beautiful scenery and for the fresh air which is such an underrated thing given we live in a city! Highly recommend and I slept like a baby afterwards. 

We stayed at Landal Parks and nearby, within walking distance, there was both Old and New Dalquharran castle. There was also a lovely riverside walk along the way and a gorgeous oldey worldey style pub but it was closed unfortunately. 

You'll find a number of museums nearby with different interests, galleries, swimming pools and soft play centres, but I have kept this guide to solely places that we visited and can vouch for as a family. 

We will be heading to Ayrshire again so if you have any suggestions for places we should visit, please let us know as we are always looking for new places to visit and check out for you! 

Until Next Time 

T

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