We recently had our first summer holiday of the year (yep, we’re greedy, we’re having two), and headed to Cornwall. We had a wonderful week there and as usual didn’t have enough time to do everything. Every time we venture to Cornwall or Devon I like to break up the journey a bit and stay overnight somewhere. On the way back this time we stopped at Kingsmead Centre near Taunton for two nights in a yurt.

I had no idea what to take for our first camping break – though let’s be fair, it’s glamping rather than camping. All we needed was towels and food and toiletries – bedding is included, as is wood for the fire. We didn’t need to use the fire in the end as it was so warm and cosy, though did use some for the BBQ outside which is included in the price – made from an old washing machine tub! What a brilliant idea!

You’re provided with a cool box to keep anything you’d normally put in a fridge – and within the shower block area there are more fridges, though they’re popular. You can refill your cool box with specially marked Kingsmead frozen blocks when they thaw.

You get your cups, plates, cutlery, cooking tools all neatly stored in the chest next to the cooking area – heck, there’s even a small gas stove inside, perfect for filling up the kettle first thing. You really are spoilt!

Sleep-wise, there’s a comfy double bed with a super warm duvet on it, as well as a fold out futon and bedding stored in a chest at the bottom of the bed.

So what else is there in the yurt? A bookcase, a chess set, a table and chairs for sitting down and doing civilised stuff (like play chess – Shaun taught H). It’s a lot of space well laid out.

The Woodland Yurt at Kingsmead Farm is made from local materials too, which I thought was pretty cool.

Outside of the yurt, you’ve got important things like a shop in the reception area (a slightly longer walk) which is open until late most nights with all essentials. There’s a laundry room near there too which we didn’t need to use. The toilets and showers are brilliant – with one electric shower and one wonderful one that is tap operated. It was easily the best shower I had on my whole trip! I was able to share the cubicle with H and have loads of space too, but take some shoes which are good for walking on wet floors (like crocs, flip flops). The toilets are fine too – there were two of them in each room. Between the toilets is the previously mentioned room with fridges, which has a wonderful memory tree – I left a note there!

Kingsmead has a strict no noise policy after 9pm, and 10pm at weekends which everyone stuck to apart from the idiots who pitched their tent next to us. They stayed up talking LOUDLY until 4am… which was annoying. We should have reported them to the owners of the campsite really. I would say as long as you have considerate neighbours you’ll have a wonderful time. Noisy neighbours aren’t the campsite’s fault, so I have no problems there.

We paid £85 per night with extra for H – and I’d happily stay in the yurt again (although they have a gorgeous looking bell tent now too). It’s a good location for exploring some of Somerset and North Devon, or if you fancy just chilling around the campfire, doing just that. H went off to make friends and it felt like a safe place where she could – although be aware there are roads for cars to get to the tents, with a 5mph speed limit. H’s road sense isn’t quite there yet, but we’re working on it.

In summary, what did I think of our stay? Were it not for the noisy neighbours it would have been perfect, wonderful. The location is fantastic and it is somewhere I would happily book again. We don’t have any camping gear, so this is ideal – especially as we had a car full of things with us, so no room for extra things. H thought it was brilliant too!

Kingsmead Centre’s page for the yurt can be found here. It looks as lovely as that too – I can only hope we’ve done it justice!