I have travelled to Craig Tara Holiday Park in Ayr on a yearly basis for the last four years and watched it go down hill faster than an avalanche. I can honestly say the first year I went (2004) I loved it, came home with lots of good things to say about the place but since then I have been a lot less enthusiastic about it. After a poor holiday last year I had to give returning some serious thought but as they have done every year before my fiancées mum and dad went ahead and booked for the following year. As our holiday approached this year we tried to put last year out of our minds and be optimistic about this years holiday, all telling each other that it would be as good as we made it and that last year hadn't really been that bad but we were kidding ourselves and really we should have prepared ourselves for what lay ahead rather than try to look forward to it.
Arrival:
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On arrival the first thing we noticed was the lack of people waiting to check in and this left us worried straight away. The first year we went we were all ushered through to one of the show bars to line up in massive cues waiting to check in, the second year we checked in at the front lounge but still had to cue for ages, last year although the cues were no where near as bad we still had around a quarter of an hours wait, this year we just strolled in, went straight to the desk and picked up our keys. This by the way has nothing to do with the time of the year we travelled because give or take a couple of days it has been the same time each year. On arrival you get a map and your keys to the caravan or chalet you will be staying in and enough passes for everyone in your party to get them entrance to the bars at night and the swimming pool, this is all they cover and you have to pay and pay dearly for everything else!
Our caravan:
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Our caravan this year was the one saviour of the holiday. Last years caravan although supposedly of a higher calibre was an absolute disgrace where as this years was fairly new and quite clean well with the exception of the condom wrapper under the mattress of the bed I intended to put my son in. The kitchen was clean and all the utensils were there, the table and stools in the living area were at least stable unlike the wobbly legged ones we had last year and the caravan was slightly warmer although the weather was very similar, I guess this must have been because it was newer and maybe not as many draughts got in. Our caravan was situated in Carrick village which for me is one of the better parts of the park, quite central but away from the noisiest parts although this year there weren't enough people at the park for it to be noisy anyway.
Things to do for the kids:
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My four year old son is very easy to please as a lot of kids his age are so for him it was still a great holiday despite the lack of things to do. We knew from previous years that the variety of things for the kids to do was not great but this was saved by the daytime shows and activities in one of the show bars however this year the shows and activities were few and far between the reason for which we were told was the fact that the park wasn't busy! Like that's our fault. We have paid our money and expect to get treated the same as others would at busier times otherwise they should just stay closed until peak season. Besides the shows or lack of them as the case may be there is a small area sectioned off with a few kiddies rides and the worst kept crazy golf park I have ever seen, a couple of bouncy castles and go karts which this year were no good to my son as they had taken away the two seater kart so I wasn't able to take him on and you have to be eight or over to drive them yourself. Outside of this area there is a fairly decent play park although it is unattended so the older kids tend to run riot through it making it difficult for the younger ones to play peacefully. Then there is the dreaded amusements which I will go into in greater depth later, apart from that unless you get good enough weather for the beach or want to spend your entire holiday at the pool then you have had it. I will also go into more detail about the pool later.
Things to do for the adults:
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I have always seen holiday parks as fun for the kids through the day and good entertainment for the adults at night, which this park used to provide I might add. Now however the entertainment or lack of it is a thorough disgrace. Two years ago we were treated to showaddywaddy and paper lace as well as an entertaining circus which provided balancing acts, fire eating and comedy of a high standard, as well as great music and dancing from the on park entertainers known as the funstars. This year however we were forced to play prize bingo or listen to an endless rabble of local singers who couldn't actually sing. Worse still there were shows advertised which never took place and sometimes the show bar you expected to be read more