Every summer our family falls back in love with camping, and every year the so-called ‘end’ of the camping seasons rockets around faster than we can say ‘but we haven’t been camping enough yet!’. Hardier families than ours might enjoy nights under canvas well into the autumn, but for us, our outdoor adventures need to be cosy and relatively comfortable for everyone to enjoy themselves. And we’ve discovered a place that fits the bill perfectly: Humble Bee Farm near Scarborough.
What it is
Humble Bee Farm is a family-run glamping and camping site on a working farm. There’s a range of accommodation for every budget, family size and season, from pretty bell tents to gorgeous yurts, Wigwam cabins and holiday cottages. There are even a few camping pitches if you want to take your own tent.
Location
Just under an hour from York, Humble Bee Farm is located a hop, skip and jump from the Yorkshire coast in the stunning Yorkshire Wolds. It’s a beautiful part of the county, and the drive is so pretty that it’s actually enjoyable (even with three excitable children in the back of the car). It’s a very short drive from Humble Bee to some of our favourite places on the coast: Scarborough, Hunmanby Gap, Bridlington and Filey. We could easily fill a week with great things to do in the area, but this time we just had a night.
Where we stayed
We hot-footed it over to the coast after school one Friday night to stay in one of Humble Bee’s Running Water Wigwams. We’ve stayed in no-frills camping pods before, but this was something else. With fairy lights, bunting, flowery bedding and lots of homely touches, our Wigwam certainly lived up to the glamping name.
The most luxurious of the Wigwam options, the Running Water Wigwam has – no prizes for guessing – running water in the form of a little bathroom with loo, sink and shower: ideal for anyone with young children prone to request a midnight trip to the toilet. With a little kitchen area with a sink, kettle, microwave, crockery and fridge, you could certainly knock up a simple meal. There’s even a TV if all that nature gets too much.
Officially sleeping four, there were two basic but comfortable double beds. The boys of the family took one while the three girls shared another. Had the girls been bigger, we might have struggled to sleep, but we have it on good authority that Humble Bee is introducing new, more spacious accommodation for large families very soon.
Site facilities
There’s a large, well-maintained toilet and shower block, family bathroom and washing area. The reception also has a shop for the basics, and the friendly owners are often around with any advice and help that you may need. There is also the all-important play area.
Things to do
We were lucky enough to be greeted by our own steaming hot hot tub on arrival: our entertainment sorted! We spent most of the evening in the water, chatting, listening to the sheep and enjoying the fresh air and just being together. When we’d been in so long that we were in danger of becoming wrinkled raisins, we fired up the fire pit (the fire pit’s provided, just buy your wood on arrival), toasted some marshmallows and had a drink or two.
In the morning we explored the site a bit more. The children particularly enjoyed the play area and sports field, and could have spent all day jumping on and off the giant straw bale sofa. We all loved meeting the animals too. It’s worth keeping an eye out for special events at Humble Bee during the holidays as they often run fun activities: watch out for something special at Christmas. But one of the main draws of the site is its fantastic location on the Yorkshire coast. It’s a fantastic base for families to explore the area at any time of year – that’s if you can manage to drag your kids away from Humble Bee Farm.
Humble Bee Farm, Flixton, Scarborough YO11 3UJ – humblebeefarm.co.uk
