Lochbroom Leisure Centre – Soft Play, a Swim and Lunch
A day.
The route
When the weather closes in over Loch Broom, Ullapool's leisure centre is where the children can still burn off their energy.
There's a pool with a shallow baby pool beside it, and Family Fun soft play in the games hall for the little ones. Lunch is a short walk away at the Ceilidh Place, a row of white cottages with a wood-burner and a bookshop under the same roof. It suits families with young children.
Before you go
Book accommodation nearby
If you are staying over: here are ours nearest where the day starts and ends.
Book Family Fun soft play at Lochbroom Leisure Centre
Book a Family Fun soft play session at Lochbroom Leisure Centre on High Life Highland's website, where the session times are listed, for the morning before lunch.
The day
Ullapool
A morning of splashing and soft play in Ullapool, then a warm lunch by the fire and a browse among the children's books.
About four and a half hours
Lochbroom Leisure Centre
Lochbroom Leisure Centre is on Quay Street, signed from Market Street as you come into Ullapool, with its own car park at the door. It opens Monday 7.30am to 8pm, Tuesday to Thursday 10am to 8pm, Friday 10am to 5pm, and Saturday and Sunday 10am to 4pm. Start with Family Fun, the soft play for younger children in the games hall: book a session on High Life Highland's website, where the times are listed. Then have a swim in the 25-metre pool, with a baby pool beside it. On the timetable that runs to 11 October there are family swims on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday afternoons and Sunday mornings, and public swims most days, so check the next one on the centre's page. A swim costs £9.10 an adult and £5.50 a child at the time of writing, with a family ticket and under-3s free. Under-4s need an adult each in the water, and 4 to 7s one adult to two children. Poolside changing is mixed cubicles, and there's a Changing Places toilet and a ramp to the door.
7 min on foot
Ceilidh Place
Lunch
Leave the car at the centre: the Ceilidh Place is a 7-minute walk away on West Argyle Street. Lunch is in its café-bar, where the day menu is served from noon until 8pm every day and there's a wood-burner to dry off by. Dogs are welcome too. Afterwards, the bookshop under the same roof has a shelf of children's books and stays open as long as the café. If it's full, Cult Cafe on Argyle Street, a few minutes' walk away, usually serves until 4pm.
If it rains
All of it is under a roof: only the 7-minute walk to lunch is out in the weather, and the car can take you if it's pouring.
Cult Cafe, a café in Ullapool.
Photograph by John Mackenzie via Google