Last weekend we popped over to Lower Drayton to try out their Pumpkin Patch. Having always been huge fans of Essington Farm, we have never ventured to another before… until now.
I have to admit, I am gutted that we have only discovered it this year. It was absolutely fantastic. So much fun.
The Bower Family who run Lower Drayton Farm have been growing pumpkins for 4 years and this year alone, they planted over 21,000 different pumpkin seeds with 8 different pumpkin varieties. Different sizes from tiny to huge, from the bright orange colour to white pumpkins. They had a pumpkin for every one.
This year they also had a potato field where everyone was given a bag to pick their own bag of potatoes which was so much fun. The girls had never picked potatoes before so it was a first time experience for them and they picked loads. The potato picking has finished now and it is the Pumpkin Picking only, but that’s okay as the Pumpkin Picking experience was fabulous.
When you arrive, you are guided to park your car on the field. then you head to the Pumpkin Patch where you first find the play tractor and a giant Pumpkin Hay Bale to pose next to.
Walk through that area to pick your wheelbarrow. Not only do they have full sized adult wheelbarrows but we absolutely loved that they had a number of children’s wheelbarrows too. The girls were absolutely thrilled. Matilda sensibly chose one from the front and in true Jemima style, she wanted the red one right at the back, which a kind member of staff made sure she got.
We headed over to the Pumpkin Photobooth for a pose. Such a great area and we have seen some great Pumpkin Creations showcased in this section.
We took our pumpkins home to carve closer to Halloween but the Pumpkin Carving Station seemed a fantastic idea, where you can use the farms utensils (all washed and cleaned between uses) and all the pumpkin pulp is saved and given to the greedy pigs over at PLAY@ (you can read our review of PLAY@ here: https://www.smallhousebigtrips.co.uk/lowerdraytonfarm) .
The girls loved running around the very wild Pumpkin Field, looking for the perfect pumpkins. They couldn’t decide between little ones or huge ones. White ones or Orange ones. Matilda even found a green/orange one which looked lovely. My personal favourites are the orange ones with lumps and bumps on. I’d make a witches face and use the bumps as warts.
After the girls chose their pumpkins (£6 each entry lets everyone choose a pumpkin each – however we let our girls choose ours for us too as they were so excited), we headed over to the ‘Meet the Machines’ area, where you could see some of the farm machines that get used on the site.
We then headed to the Pear Tree Catering food tent which was run by two very lovely people who had cooked fresh pumpkin soup using pumpkins from the farm and pumpkin muffins which my husband enjoyed so much, the kind lady gave him the recipe for. They also stocked hot dogs, cakes, biscuits, Halloween sweets and plenty of drinks. We chose our goodies and went to sit down in the tent at a picnic table which had hand sanitiser on ready for people to use before eating or drinking.
We had such a brilliant time and will be back again next year.
For more details on Lower Drayton Farm, check out their website here: https://playatthefarm.co.uk/
Disclaimer: We were invited along to the pumpkin event but were under no way obliged to write a review. All thoughts are ours.