Callander – Soft Play, a Swim and a Toy Museum
A day.
The route
Callander has a children's day that is almost all under a roof.
McLaren Leisure's Woodland Kingdom soft play and its pool fill the morning, and Mhor Bread's pies and cakes make lunch. The Hamilton Toy Museum on Main Street finishes it with cabinets of toy soldiers and figures gathered by one family. It suits families with children under about eight, and grandparents who remember the toys.
Before you go
Book accommodation nearby
If you are staying over: here are ours nearest where the day starts and ends.
The nearest of ours is Cromlix, 10 miles away.
Then Monachyle Mhor, 12 miles away.
Book McLaren Leisure soft play and swim
Book the Woodland Kingdom soft play session and a public swim at McLaren Leisure online before you go, as the centre suggests: soft play is £6.50 a child at the time of writing, and the pool timetable posted to 25 October has public swims through most of the day.
The day
Callander
A morning of slides and splashing, a pie and a cake on Main Street, then an afternoon among a family's toys.
About five hours
McLaren Leisure
McLaren Leisure is on Mollands Road on the south side of Callander, open Monday to Friday 6.15am to 9pm and weekends 9am to 5pm. Its Woodland Kingdom soft play is for children up to eight, with a baby and toddler area, a preschool area with a double slide and hideaways, and frames with a tunnel slide for the older ones. Sessions run Monday 9 to 11am, 12 to 2pm and 3 to 5pm, Tuesday to Friday 9 to 11am, 12 to 2pm and 3 to 6pm, and at weekends 9 to 10.30am, 11.30am to 1pm and 2 to 3.30pm. It costs £6.50 a child and £3.70 a baby over six months, with adults free, at the time of writing. Then have a swim in the 20-metre pool, which runs public swims through most of the day, for £4 a child and £7 an adult. Book either online, as the centre suggests. A child under four must have an adult with them in the water, and the pool has a lift into the water for anyone who can't manage steps.
4 min by car
Mhor Bread
Lunch
Drive 4 minutes on into the middle of the town. Park in the big car park up Station Road, at the west end of Main Street, where the board sets the charge and there are public toilets by the entrance. Mhor Bread is at 8 Main Street, a bakery with a tearoom beside the shop, open every day from 8am to 5pm. Have one of its pies or a sausage roll, then a cake or one of the giant meringues. There's a step at the shop door. If it's full, the café at McLaren Leisure is open seven days for food to eat in.
Hamilton Toy Museum
The Hamilton Toy Museum is about 400 metres east along Main Street at number 111, an easy walk from lunch. It is one of the largest privately owned toy collections in the UK, gathered by the Hamilton family, who between them have been collecting for 175 years. It opens Tuesday to Saturday, 10.30am to 5pm, with last entry at 4.30pm, from Easter until the end of October, and is shut on Sundays and Mondays. Tickets are £4 an adult, £2 a child and £10 for a family of four. The collection is over two floors, so it can't take visitors with limited mobility, and only guide dogs are allowed. It's a family business and very occasionally can't open, so ring 01877 330004 or check its Facebook page if you're coming far. From November to Easter the museum is shut, and the day is the soft play, the pool and lunch.
If it rains
All of it is under a roof: only the walk from the Station Road car park along Main Street is out in the weather.
Ben Ledi Coffee Company, a café in Callander.
Photographs by PL MacLeod and Driftwood via Google