The school holidays are long, and every single day I’m trying to work out how to wear my kid out. Today I want to recommend a real treasure of a climbing gym, Climb N’ Play in Maidstone. Personally, I think this is one of the best in all of Melbourne. There are very few people […]
Forest Hill Chase Free Kids Play Area
Hadn’t been to Forest Hill Chase in ages. Didn’t expect it to have changed this much. Found a completely free play space too, on Level 1. Everything except a slide. Drawing station, a car track, books, blocks, a play kitchen, basically a mini kids cafe without the price tag. Suits kids up to about four. […]
Collingwood Children’s Farm Reviews
We found this place completely by accident back in 2023. We’d driven out to look at Dights Falls, parked, and on the walk back there was this gate we hadn’t noticed on the way in — Collingwood Children’s Farm, right there on the Yarra, five minutes from Abbotsford. We’d lived in the inner north for […]
Myuna Farm Petting Zoo Reviews
A $10 day that completely over-delivered I didn’t research this one beforehand, just the opening hours, and honestly I’m glad I didn’t, because the whole day turned into one nice surprise after another. Myuna Farm is out in Doveton, about 40 minutes south-east of the city, and for what it costs to get in, it […]
Must Visit Dinosaur Parks near Melbourne
My son has been carrying the same three dinosaur picture books around the house for weeks, correcting anyone who calls a Triceratops a Stegosaurus, so this school holidays we more or less surrendered and did the full dinosaur circuit — DinoFest out at Nortons Park, the dinosaur trail running through the zoos, and a longer […]
Little Amigos Southland Review
We went back to Little Amigos at Southland on a quiet weekday morning, deliberately avoiding the weekend rush. It’s on Level 2 of Westfield Southland, and the easiest way in is through the Village Cinemas entrance, that side of the centre puts you almost right at the door. If you’ve got a Westfield membership, it’s […]
Playgrounds Near Forest Hill
Every time I’m around Forest Hill I have the same problem: I genuinely don’t know where to take the kids. There’s no big drawcard playground worth a special trip out here, and even the free kids play space up on Level 3 at Forest Hill Chase is pretty forgettable once you’ve been a couple of […]
CubeTown Glen Waverley Review
A Sweaty, Screen-Free Way to Burn Off School Holiday Energy We had already done the library, the trampoline park and two wet-weather playgrounds by day three of the holidays, and I was running out of ideas. A friend mentioned she’d taken her kids to CubeTown on the fourth floor of Kingsway Central in Glen Waverley […]
Diggerland Braeside Review
My son’s face the second we walked in was worth the drive on its own. Eyes wide, that high-pitched noise kids make when they can’t get a sentence out fast enough. He went from one machine to the next, sweaty, wouldn’t leave. There’s a huge sand pit with a spinning slide built into it, a […]
The Melbourne Museum Where Kids Get to Drive the Tram
There’s a particular kind of joy that comes from watching your child do something they’re normally told not to. Climb into the driver’s seat of a vehicle. Ring a bell as many times as they like. Turn a big steering wheel that actually does something. At the Melbourne Tram Museum in Hawthorn, that’s more or […]