Woodland trails at Basildon Park.
Three pounds, a map for a route around a field and a Cadbury's Easter Egg at the end? No thank you. We're going to go for the two pound map that leads us on the Wild Play Trail through the woods. As far as I'm aware, Cadbury are still in bed with Mondelez, who despite making promises about how they're going to improve their control over their palm oil supply chain have yet to fulfil those promises. I'm of the view that mega companies don't just get to say 'we can't control these things', or 'we pledge to improve by some point in the future' - this shit needs to happen now. Go make some reparations, plant some trees, do something other than rewarding people for running about outside for an hour with some chocolate - I love you National Trust, but this is not a good way to solve the obesity crisis!
The Cadbury/Mondelez link can be seen here: https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/orangutans-palm-oil-habitat-rainforest-cadbury-mondelez-oreos-indonesia-greenpeace-a8630801.html This article is 6 months old, and I know they yes they are doing some things to improve - as their WWF scorecard shows http://palmoilscorecard.panda.org/check-the-scores/manufacturers/mondelez, but still, there is no sodding transparency with companies that fuel the destruction of our environment. And, having made a crap ton of money out of doing so, should they not be made to put some good back into the world, rather than just promising to make their practice less shitty?
This is the analogy I'm going to go with: I'm driving my car way too fast - because I'm a dick and I think getting where I'm going is more important than anything else - I then crash into someone's house. I'm pretty sure I would have to pay for the damages I caused, and I'd probably go to jail - if I hurt anyone, I'd sure as hell go to jail. No one would accept me saying in court, 'I promise to start driving better in 3 to 5 years time'. But if you're a big company and it's the rainforest that helps generates oxygen that we need to breathe, is home to loads of animals and might help curb climate change? Fine, you don't need to make any reparations or undo any of the massive harm you've caused, just as long as you say you're going to get a bit better in a few years time. Not bloody good enough.
I've no idea what the relationship between Cadbury and National Trust is - there isn't much information about concerning the finances being exchanged between the two. If Cadbury was doing anything genuinely useful for NT surely there would be a lot more shouting about it - so I'm going to call foul - National Trust, you wonderful organisation looking after our nation's heritage and significant chunks of our countryside - get into bed with someone better - or at least make them plant a shed load of trees.
So, instead of feeding into anything that causes this:
we did this:
and the children ran free like this:
(the people you can see on the paths are the families having less fun than us doing the Cadbury hunt)
There were ball runs and trees to balance on, or not and fall off on your butt whilst your mother is trying to take a picture of her family looking all cute together. There were musical wooden chimes and all sorts of bits. We did opt for the shortcut walk back for little legs back across the park to the house, but as both Sally and Pip do in fact have little legs it did seem a legitimate option. Pip did do amazingly well on his little legs - he walked far longer on his little pins than we ever would have expected Sally to do at his age. I'm not sure if its personality or altered expectation of a second child or a mix of the two, but I am still very proud of how sturdy and adventurous he is.
Ball run fun:
and the littlest one got herself pushed around in comfort for her first NT outing - also the first trip with the new buggy that a friend very kindly gave me after the catastrophic failure of the UppaBaby.
