New Forest Day 4 - Longdown Farm

Day 4 and it was off to Longdown Farm for some animal encounters. As a family farm Longdown is far more rustic and a proper working farm when compared to our local Marsh farm or Old Mcdonalds farm. The beauty of this is that you get to be more involved in farm life and have a much more hands on experience. The first port of call was to bottle feed a load of calves.

 

OK, so they are big calves but they still all needed their bottle feeds.

Brandon didn't want to feed the calves. Joshua tried briefly, but they were pretty strong and pulling the bottles away and therefore I took over.

One hungry calf finishes his bottle.

 After feeding the calves we went into the main entrance of the farm where the boys found some full size table tennis tables and some pedal tractors.

Two against one as the boys take me on at table tennis.

Joshua loves his little tractor at home (despite being too big for it). So he loved playing farmer with these larger pedal tractors.

Brandon could reach the pedals fine and get about. Anyone for tractor bangers!

Next on the agenda for the day was to bottle feed some goats. Joshua absolutely loved doing this and went back a couple of times to feed several of the little goats, Brandon was not overly interested in this. 

Joshua bottle feeding goat 1.

Then back for seconds as he bottle feeds goat 2.

His face may not show it, but he was actually really enjoying feeding the goats.

Brandon came into his own when we got to the chicken coop. He was really smitten by the little chicks. 

Brandon making conversation with some new born chicks.

Check out this little cutie.Brandon was dead keen to get his hands on one of these.

How adorable is this, Little B sitting there having a cuddle with a baby chick. We had to prise the chick away from him as it got quite attached and fell asleep on his lap!

Everyone knows Brandon loves guinea pigs. He was equally as enthusiastic with some rabbits.

And then to finish off his animal encounters he got to brush the coat of this little goat.

In the chicken coop they have holes allowing you to put your arms in to retrieve some of the fresh eggs and then take them to the shop in reward for a sticker. Joshua was amazed with the concept of an egg coming from a chickens bum and waited for ages until he finally got his hands on one. 

Joshua with his war, fresh egg which he retrieved from the chicken coop.

It became a bit of a competition to then find as many eggs as possible. Both boys found a few. Meanwhile Tina was nicking a few for breakfast the next day.

To finish our day at the farm we had a ride on a full size tractor and then the boys found some more go karts and some ride on electric cars. 

Joshua having a go on the pedal go karts.

How cool is this? Brandon was too small to ride on his own but they had 2 seater go karts so that Joshua could take him for a ride.

It was too much for me to resist having a go myself. So Joshua went solo and Brandon rode shotgun with me. I let Brandon steer and I did the pedal power. Yes we had lots of crashes.

Brandon on the yellow electric tractor.

Joshua on the green one,

A spot of tractor racing.

At the end of day 4 me and the boys headed deep into the New Forest for a spot of den building. The pictures do not do our den justice as it was quite a size. All 3 of us easily fitted inside. As in Bewilderwood earlier in the year, den building was accompanied by Joshua's very repetitive song of "lift, hold, lift and hold, lift, lift, lift, lift, lift!".

 

The boys in our finished den.

Can anyone see my boys?

Ill huff and Ill puff and Ill blow your house in.

Brandon is getting quite handy with a digital camera these days.

After den building we settled in for our final nights sleep in the tent ready to get all packed up first thing in the morning. But the excitement was far from over as we planned to stop off in Lego Land on our way home.