Places to Visit That Don’t Need to be Pre-Booked!

None Go Bye Farm 

If you like to see and feed animals, None-Go-Bye is a great place to take your children. Not only do you not need to pre-book, but it’s nice and cheap too (£1 per adult and 50p per child including a bag of feed)! A clear one-way system is in place to walk around the animal enclosures, where you can expect to see goats, pigs, alpaca, donkeys and geese! Browse the Farm shop to enjoy their own produced meats and other local produce. Read more here

Make a Day of It: Head to Yeadon Tarn, for a walk around the Lake, play at the playground and feeding the ducks.

Outdoor Sandpit

There are loads of things to do, including feeding and stroking the animals, having fun inside – maybe in the giant sandpit or playing hide and seek with your friends in the straw maze. The Farm Park is idyllic, with around 10 acres of greenery overlooking the Yorkshire hills and the Embsay and Bolton Abbey Steam train whistling by in the valley below. Hesketh Farm is still a working farm with over 1,000 livestock including cattle, sheep and pigs.

They are no longer using a booking system. You can just turn up at the farm. They are not turning anyone away.

Leeds City Museum

With FREE entry, six galleries, and a programme of family-friendly exhibitions, Leeds City Museum is a great place to visit with children. Just be warned it’s not the easiest to navigate with a buggy! 

Make a Day of it: Yipeeeeee! You’re in the City Centre!! There’s lots of shopping and eating to enjoy. For something a little different, have you ever done the Owl Trail to find the 25 owls around Leeds? Download the map here and learn about Leeds’ rich heritage as you search!

Abbey House Museum

Explore Victorian life in Leeds with a trip to Abbey House Museum and transport yourself back to the 19th century! Inside this wonderful museum are realistic Victorian Streets, including the ‘High Street’, a poorer residential district and even a Victorian Drinking House! Upstairs, the childhood galleries host a range of 19th-century toys, games and dolls!

Entry to Abbey House Museum is ticketed. There may be a queue for entry as they are limiting the number of people in the Museum. Visitors do not need to pre-book unless they are attending a specific event. This May half term they have the Animals of the Abbey take over the Museum event. Details can be found here.

Certain areas remain closed due to a lack of social distancing space.

Make a Day of it: Just across from the museum is the glorious Kirkstall Abbey, where you can wander around the historic ruins of one of the most complete Cistercian monasteries in Britain! Take a football to kick around in Abbey Park, and enjoy a bite to eat in the cafe. There’s a play area there too! They also have the FREE Gnome Trail running this half-term.

Wakefield’s Story Trail Walks

There are four-story trails now around Wakefield, which involve bit of activity to encourage children to do the walks! My absolute favourite is the Gnome Roam, which is a 1.8-mile walk through the beautiful forest at Newmillerdam to find the Gnomes. At each gnome, you have to do a little activity! Another popular choice is the Room on the Broom Trail at Anglers, where sculptures and models are based on the popular story. To learn about the other story trail walks, head over to Wakefield Mumbler’s post on this.

Make a Day of it: If you head to Angler’s there is much more to see than the Room on the Broom Trail…. with a great play area and cafe. Also head to Haw Park Wood which is just magical!

Oakwell Hall & Country Park

Just outside Leeds in Kirklees, Oakwell Hall offers families an insight into a post-English Civil War household. Entry to Oakwell Hall is currently free, and open between 12 pm and 4 pm and weekends. The house is still currently closed but you can still enjoy the grounds and the nature trail, picnic sites and playground.

Make a Day of it: The real fun for children comes in the extensive grounds! There’s a great Nature trail (not buggy friendly), playgrounds for younger and older children, a scrummy cafe, and download the Love Exploring App to do a Dinosaur Safari!!

Leeds Industrial Museum

A great choice for a rainy day, this place is HUUUUUUUUUUUGE! There are loads of interesting spaces and displays including a media gallery and an old 1920s cinema (which is my personal favourite)! Sadly you can’t sit in the cinema at the moment but you can still pop inside to take a look and they should be showing film reels from the archives. They often screen family favourites in there and it’s only £9 for a family ticket. Hopefully, that will start up again next year. There’s also the Leeds to Innovation exhibition and pop around the side to check out the Colour Garden whilst you’re there!

Opening times are:

Tues-Fri: 10am-5pm (last admission 4pm)

Sat-Sun: 1pm-5pm (last admission 4pm)

Outdoor areas including the Colour Garden are also fully accessible during opening times.

They do not have a pre-booking system. Please pay on arrival. Card payments preferred, but cash is accepted.

Make a Day of it: Pop just across the little footbridge to get to Cardigan Fields, which is jammed pack with entertainment including restaurants, a trampoline park, IMAX Cinema and Fast Food.

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