Whether you’re looking for ideas for family days out or inspiration for family holidays, there is plenty to see and do in the South East England this year.

To help make planning days out for the family, VisitSouthEastEngland has launched a dedicated fun family days out website filled with great ideas for days out with the family.

Take a trip to the Isle of Wight

Mark Tisdale revisits his childhood with a nostalgic family holiday on the Isle of Wight

Enjoying cream teas in Rylstone Gardens and buying my first ice-cream on Shanklin beach are just two fond memories I cherish of family holidays on the Isle of Wight. How wonderful then to revisit this magical isle with my own children and find that so much of what I remembered was still there and waiting to be discovered all over again.

We took the Wightlink car ferry from Portsmouth across the Solent which was so easy and great value especially as you can buy ferry tickets with hotel and attraction packages. Thanks to Wightlink’s wonderful booklet Secret Wight which we downloaded from the Internet, I was able to navigate my way back to the towering cliffs, green rolling landscape and virgin sands which were my playground 30 years ago.

I hunted for sea anemones in the rock pools with my eight year old twins Ben and Harry, just as I had done with my brothers at the same age and rediscovered the virgin beach at Whitecliff Bay where we used to build sandcastles with my father.

Every day was action-packed as we followed the 10 adventures in the booklet, preparing to unlock the mysteries and challenges on our way. I went to re-find the Pepper Pot, Britain’s oldest lighthouse near Blackgang Chine and watched the boys climb all over it as I had done. We then walked the grassy ridge to admire the incredible views and look for birds through our binoculars.

The boys were beside themselves with excitement at the prospect of finding dinosaur remains in the soft clay cliffs around Compton and Brook in the south of the island which we followed with a trip to Dinosaur Isle, a fantastic interactive museum which houses collections of dinosaurs and fossils. We rode bicycles along the road to nowhere past the Enchanted Manor to a lost landscape of grassy mounds, a perfect spot for a picnic and hunting some Hound’s Tongue and Wild Liquorice plants. “Do fairies and elves live on this island?” asked Ben as he sunk his teeth into his sandwich. “I am certain they do,” I replied. “In fact I know they do.”

Special Offers

We have these special offers to support Family Fun:

Conditions

• Car offers valid for travel after 0955 Mondays to Fridays, anytime at weekends. Restrictions apply.
• Foot passenger offer valid for travel after 0925 Mondays to Fridays, anytime at weekends
• Foot passenger offer excludes travel 9, 10 & 13 June and 8, 9 & 12 September
• Car offers exclude travel on certain peak travel days
• Offers must be pre booked at least 2 hours before travel either online or by calling 0871 376 1000 (calls cost 7p per minute plus network extras) and quoting "Family Fun"
• Tickets are non refundable
• First amendment to bookings is free of charge, subsequent changes at £5 each
• All offers subject to a limited allocation of spaces
• Offer may be withdrawn at any time
• All offers valid until 31 March 2012
• Standard and Promotional Terms & Conditions apply.