Lockeys on Holiday have been made aware of some cracking bargains available on booking.com over the Easter holidays.
Grab an extra 15% off through our affiliate link shown above and enjoy a trip to the capital. Catch a show in the West End, pop and see The Queen, there's so much to do in London so don't miss out on this great offer.
5. Accomodation
Where to start? The choice of hotels, apartments, rentals available through holiday booking sites can be really daunting. Here's a few tips to help narrow things down. Do you plan to stay in one place or are you travelling around? One place is easy, you want the biggest, best, most lavish villa or apartment you can afford for the cheapest price possible. We have tried most of the main sites, Owners Direct, Home Away and even Air BnB. To get the best results, narrow down your searches by location and facilities as much as you can. This said our best villa holidays have always been booked independently and directly with villa owners, maybe we've been lucky! Always, always, always look for well reviewed places and if possible contact a couple of random reviewers for some feedback.
Travelling around to several locations has always been our preferred option and these days couldn't be easier to organise.
With booking.com, hotels.com, Expedia, Trip Advisor and Agoda all offering a one stop shop for hotels, apartments, hostels and rentals the options are limitless. Again it's important to refine your search to rule out the multitude of unsuitable properties. A good rule of thumb is to use the following parameters- a. Location (where do you want to stay) b. Budget (set the budget to a maximum slightly higher than your desired average accommodation spend) c. rooms/occupancy/bed configuration d. Amenities (we usually want A/C and a pool is often nice) e. Ratings (ignore at your peril! Though a few bad reviews isn't the end of the world, some travellers are soooooo fussy). While all of the mentioned sites offer the ability to refine your search, we've found booking.com suits us the best as we can select bed configurations, amenities etc to match our needs. This is why we've joined their affiliate program, where we place ads on our pages in return for a small commission. Our readers get a great price and we are paid a very small % of the commission earned by the company. It doesn't make us rich, in fact it doesn't even cover our website expenses but it does guarantee our readers are getting a great deal.
6. What do you want to see?
In every place we visit on a trip we try to make a list of things we really want to see or do. Of course Trip Advisor proves invaluable for the new places we visit. But in reality for most people, you've chosen a destination based upon what is there, so you have some ideas already. What we find is important, especially when travelling with children, is to not overdo it. Make sure there are plenty of opportunities to relax and chill out for a day, plan in beach trips, pool days in between the 'big' trips. If we are travelling around, or even visiting a destination for a specific sight, we usually book at least 3 nights accommodation so we get to see what we've come for at our own pace, as well as usually discovering something we didn't expect by having time to explore a little. It's tempting to get all the big trips out of the way early on into a trip. Don't be too tempted to do this! Once all the 'exciting' things are done you can leave yourself a little burned out, or sometimes we've not really appreciated what we've seen because we've been too frazzled by the whizzing around cramming in all the sights. It's much better to pace yourself, make sure there's something to look forward to towards the end of your trip. Again it's super important to give yourself time in a destination. Meet the locals, walk the town/village/city streets, find the amazing café/restaurant/shop you've never heard of. Get a flavour for a place and you will no doubt find a hidden gem or pick up a vital piece of information from a local that will enhance your visit. We've saved £££'s and discovered loads of useful tips.
6. How will you get around?
When taking a longer trip where you might visit several destinations it's important to plan your itinerary carefully. Make sure you allow yourself travel days and don't plan to do a lot when you first arrive. There's nothing worse than a grouchy teenager, or exhausted child being dragged around another temple. They get nothing from the experience and you miss out. One crucial thing we've learned is that travel plans often need to be flexible. Buses/planes/trains get cancelled, roads get closed, weather can ruin the best made plans. Before you even reach your destination you need to know the how, where, when of getting to all of your different destinations. Booking flights in advance offers security and in most cases a hefty discount on last minute prices. While flying the longer journeys (Bangkok to Chiang Mai) saves time and is economical, don't rule out other options. We've taken sleeper trains, a great way to save money, your travel costs and hotel costs are combined and you are saving some money while having a new and fun experience! Buses are often the cheapest form of travel, but can be long tiring journeys. Hiring a private driver is another option, though often a little more expensive it does provide you with the flexibility of leaving when you choose and stopping when you want. Often these private drivers have really nice mini vans - we've seen this first hand in Sri Lanka, Mexico, Thailand and Ecuador so imagine it's a well established method of travel world wide. Car Hire can be a daunting prospect in some destinations. We've found it cheap and handy in Europe but wouldn't dream of it in some SE Asian cities. This year we plan to have our own hire car throughout the Costa Rican trip, though it's very expensive there it does seem the best fit for our needs this time around. FINALLY We really want to help and support other families getting out travelling the world. Feel free to contact us using the comments option at any time. We do place some adverts on the blog, we do this for 2 reasons, 1 - we get a small commission for placing these ads which support our costs running the website (we aren't getting rich trust me), 2 - we only place adverts in the blog for companies we have used, trust and will help get you the best prices. Some ads down the side are linked to your own browsing history. Please click on adverts and help to support us. Keep travelling and keep exploring. 1. Know when you can travel Flexibility is obviously an important thing to bear in mind. The more rigid your travel dates the trickier it is to find the best and cheapest flights. Try not to tie yourself down to exact departure dates if you want the best prices. Sometimes just altering your search by a few days can bag a real bargain. As an example, this summer we were looking to travel to Costa Rica in August. Skyscanner showed the cheapest departure date as the 7th August, however to get around 3 weeks away the return flights were bringing the total to £850 per person. By juggling our departure dates and trying a few days earlier we found the perfect flights with the same Airline for only £600 per person. 2. Know where you want to go! It may sound silly but knowing where you want to go is essential when researching any trip. We always have an impromptu family 'meeting' and outline what everyone wants from our family holidays. This year the boys wanted to avoid another trip to Asia. So after a little discussion we set our sights on the Americas. We were flexible in out ultimate destination, knowing that flight availability and cost would ultimately determine our final choice. Though we did have a shortlist of several possibilities. 3. Set your budget Unfortunately in life we can't always have what we want. To avoid any false hopes and wasted planning time it is imperative to set your budget early. Have a pretty firm idea of these three areas - flights, accommodation and spending money. How you allocate funds to each of these areas really depends upon your destination. In Europe where low cost airlines make travel so cheap it is easy to keep flight costs to between 10-25% of the total holiday cost. Longer haul these costs grow to between 30-50% depending on destination. By finding the cheapest flights possible though you do allow yourself more freedom when booking accommodation and planning activities. We aim to average £50-60 per night on our travels if research shows it's possible. For example in Thailand this was easy to do without any compromise, sometimes we went for the £20 a night family room with basic facilities then followed it up with a splurge in a £100 a night beachfront place. What was important was I knew how much I had to spend and planned accordingly. This year in Costa Rica I've had to up the budget as accommodation is more expensive though we've gone a little higher than previous years by aiming to average £70 per night we've pretty much stuck to budget. 4. Booking your flights As mentioned previously, FLEXIBILITY is the key to getting what you want. We all have constraints on our travels, money, holiday entitlement, school term dates, seasonal variations in weather, however being as open to the full range of options will help you get what you want at the price you can afford. Bearing this in mind we can caution against being too flexible. On our Sri Lanka trip we compromised on our flights out, accepting a 17 hour layover in Oman as worthy of return flights for £440 each. Was it worth it? For us no. We learned from our experience and have never repeated such a lengthy lay over. Our outward journey ended up as 37 hours door to door and took us 2-3 days to recover. Skyscanner has been our saviour every long haul journey we have made. Other flight search engines such as Google flights, Momondo and Expedia are useful but so far we have never beaten Skyscanner for prices on flights we've identified an interest in. As explained earlier be flexible in the dates you select to fly, and even when you identify the cheapest departure be aware that the total flight cost might be cheaper by selecting a more expensive departure. Mix and match, try lots of different combinations. Also don't tie yourself to one departure airport. Scottish airports are cheaper from mid August as their schools return, different areas have different school holidays so use this to grab a bargain. Airport parking can be cheap and by departing elsewhere you can save serious £££'s. Rather than dispensing advice on this minefield of a topic, we thought we would post a plea for help and advice.
It seems car rental in Costa Rica isn't A- cheap B- straightforward or C- easy to understand. So what is making things so tricky? Well the numerous bad ratings and horror stories from renters isn't particularly comforting. Though as ever we are certain it's more a case of only the bad news getting reported. Nevertheless there are a few burning questions we'd love our readers to offer advice on. 1. To rent a 4x4 or not? 2. What insurance is needed/best value/recommended? 3. Which company can be trusted to charge you a fair rate with no 'hidden' extras? 4. Why is it so expensive? Lockeys on Holiday would love to hear from you with any advice on how we can find a 22 day rental for under $1000 including insurance. Thanks and keep travelling. It's never an easy job keeping everyone happy when we choose hotels for our Lockeys on Holiday trips.
What I've learned is this....... pools are good, air con is essential (where possible), 2 bedroom family rooms are in short supply at affordable rates, boys don't want to share double beds. So here's our 2018 run down of accommodation! www.casalimacr.com/ - our arrival night in Costa Rica www.villasvilmahotel.com/ - 3 nights near Arenal volcano www.losranchosjaco.com/ - 6 nights on Jaco beach www.junglevilla.com/ - 3 nights at Miguel Antonio National Park www.hostelcasadelis.com/ - 3 nights Turrialba, Central Valley casamarbella.tripod.com/ - Tortuguero to see the turtles 2nts www.3bamboo.com/ - 5 nights Cahuita Caribbean chilling www.casareflejos.com/ - finishing off in San Jose for 2 nights We've managed to roughly still to the £65 a night budget, some have breakfast included which helps. There you go a 25 night whistle stop tour of Costa Rica. Next stop the tricky car hire search! Keep travelling, keep exploring, Lockeys on Holiday are here to help. Well after much searching we took the plunge and booked Summer 2018, deciding that £600 per person for flights to Costa Rica was a great deal. We've got a whopping 25 nights to fill on this trip so the plan will take a little bit of finalising. So far we plan to visit volcanoes, pacific beaches, wildlife sanctuaries, rainforests, cloud forests, white water rafting, turtle nesting grounds, the Caribbean coast and most of all we need to find sloths! I'm currently booking up hotels all over the place so will share these once all are confirmed.
Whilst certainly not a budget destination, we will as ever be looking for value for money. More importantly this is our trip of a lifetime so the budget needs to be generous so the Lockeys on Holiday can do everything they want to do. After lots of deliberation Lockey on Holiday had set out their stall to do a mini tour of the Yucatan and Chiapas in Mexico. The challenge for Daddy Lockey was finding the flights! Nothing doing so far, the cheapest is with Tui for £701 each + £32 for seats and £35 per bag! At double the cost of flights to Thailand it's looking like a challenge. Then from nowhere these flights to Costa Rica! We've been looking at over £800 each to travel there when we've looked previously. Whilst still not 'cheap' or for 3 weeks as we'd prefer it's something not to be dismissed.
We'd best make a decision sharpish. We've recently signed up to Jacks Flight Club and would recommend this as a good way to find some cheap flights. Take a look. Lockeys on holiday are in a dilemma!
Cheapish flights to Bangkok found but 3 visits in 4 years...... Suggestion of onwards flights to Vietnam ruled out by kids....... Bali....too many bad reports and ongoing volcanic issues....... Kids suggesting Costa Rica but not offering to pay for flights........ Mexico touring around the Yucatan and Chiapas is the current suggestion BUT flights are still so pricey! Any suggestions for a Lockeys on holiday adventure? Flights for 4 people for around the £2,000 mark a must! Please comment below with suggestions.
Look what Amazon are offering you through Lockeys on Holiday. Please share a link to this page so your loved one can receive all their parcels and TV for 6 months FREE!!!
Since returning just over a week ago I've been questioned almost daily about how I can afford to take the family to Thailand for just over 3 weeks. People seem to think I'm making it up when I tell them it cost a little over £5,000 including all our spending money! We took £2k spending this year as the exchange rate wasn't quite as good as previous visits. 40 baht to the £ rather than 53 baht like our last visit was quite a difference and to some degree did influence how we shopped, ate and lived on our trip. Here's some of the highlights to whet your appetite.... So here's the low down.
FLIGHTS - £1462 for all four of us to fly from Glasgow > Dubai > Bangkok and return. Scottish schools return early/mid August so the prices to fly from there were a lot cheaper than from Newcastle. It cost £70 to park the car 5 mins from the Airport in Glasgow. ACCOMODATION - Bangkok - 3 nights £44 per night for a 2 bedroom apartment on Sukhumvit Soi 11 in the Citadines 11 Hotel. Breakfast was bought from the 7-11 supermarket and we made our own (cost us £8 for the 3 days) toast, cereal and eggs. Chiang Mai - 5 nights in the Arch 39 Hostel/Hotel for £232. Here we shared one large room with the boys beds over ours (see the picture). There was some toast and coffee on a morning but we usually went out. Ko Phangan we stayed 7 nights at Salad Hut £600 (if we'd secured the beachside 2 bedroom villa for ALL 7 nights it was £120 a night but we shared a room 3 nights) Then 3 nights at Thong Nai Pan Yai in the Longtail Resort in a house shaped like a boat with 2 bedrooms for £145 for 3 nights. Back to Bangkok for 4 nights in the very smart Siri Sathorn Executive Apartments @£75 per night was a bargain, it's usually £175 a night for the enormous 2 bedroom place we had. TOTAL around £1400 for 22 nights (we had another night in Dubai at the Premier Inn for another £80 on the way home) INTERNAL FLIGHTS - 4 flights each worked out at around £450 for us all. 2 with Nok Air and 2 with Air Asia. All in around £3350. You could easily spend £8000 to have this holiday organised by a travel agent. So get planning and do something exciting for a bargain price. Thanks Lockeys on Holiday
Instagram photos of our Thai adventure 2017 should appear here.
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Well someone suggested I add Instagram to here......... Sam!!
So I'm trying to get it embedded. Apologies of there is one or two strange blog posts in the next few hours. It was our first visit to Berlin and for two of us the first visit to Germany so there was an element of the unknown about our trip. Thankfully despite the maintenance works on the S Bahn from the airport we managed to reach our hotel pretty easily. This is because the public transportation in and around Berlin is fantastic! Imagine the London underground only better, less busy and best of all cheaper! Add in the trams, buses and various railway services you can access with one 7 euro daily ticket (7.70 for zones ABC to include the airport), and you have a wonderful system of transportation. Another bonus was kids under 15 travel FREE with a parent using a day ticket, in fact 2 children can travel with each adult free of charge. As with previous trips we'd done a little research and planned what we wanted to see while we were there. We had 4 days to cram it all in and to be honest I think it was a little ambitious to expect to get everything done in such a short space of time. TOP TIP - don't try to cram too much into a visit to Berlin, relax a little and come back again. Top of our places to see was the famous Brandenburg Gate (above), the iconic image of the gate is plastered all over tourist memorabilia and it's officially Franks "favourite monument in the world". Day 1 began with a quick 20 minute trip from the excellent Hotel Big Mama (apartment with 2 bedrooms for 70 euros) to visit the Brandenburg Gate. We followed this with a short walk towards Potzdamer Platz and a stop off at the Monument to the Jews killed by the Nazis, this was an amazing monument (see below) As the museum below the monument was only suitable for children aged 14 and over Frank and I explored above ground. On our travels we found a huge Ampelman statue! Ampelman is the green for go crossing man on pedestrian crossings that were once part of East Berlin, an easy way to discover if you are in the old East or West of the city. Back to the Jewish Monument museum, it was deemed well worth a visit by Sam and Sid.
The rest of the day we visited the Mall of Berlin just off Potzdamer Platz for lunch, popped into the Topography of Terrors another fascinating museum about the rise of the Third Reich and Hitler which outlines the many atrocities committed in the name of German Nationalism. We then headed to see Checkpoint Charlie (massively underwhelming) and strolled through the city around Gendarmemarkt area admiring the expensive shops. We finally rounded off the day with some Mexican food! What a fabulous evening we had last night at the Tyne Theatre listening to Levison Wood, author and star of 'Walking the Nile', 'Walking the Himalayas' and most recently 'Walking the Americas'. If you get the chanche to get tickets for his tour please go and see it. He is engaging and amusing and so enthusiastic about seeing everything the world has to offer. Something we are firmly in favour of here at Lockeys on Holiday.
I'll not spoil the surprise but his show does contain a mystery guest with some added entertainment value. Of course in the Q & A session at the end he was asked "Where next?" His answer.......................................................................................... "Not telling! Wait and see!" While we looked around for Summer 2017 we happened across some bargain flights to Bangkok from Glasgow with Emirates. For the princely sum of £1460 all four of us will fly out for 23 nights this summer. We've decided to branch out a little and stay on the other side of Sukhumvit on Soi 11 in the Citadines 11 hotel, a little nearer the action and a few more local eateries to visit in walking distance. We then fly up to Chiang Mai once again after missing out last visit. We are staying to the north of the old town this time in another new hotel, the Arch 39 Art and Craft Hotel, an interesting little place with climbing walls in the rooms up to the boys bunk beds. https://www.booking.com/hotel/th/arch39-art-amp-craft.en-gb.html?aid=375654;label=msn-lgYHzelhO10rEleIe9QEnw-8876279517%3Atikwd-16487116146%3Aneo%3Amte%3Adec%3Aqsbooking;sid=ab97ec813d221b9318e11637f6085cc2 We are planning to do some of the local temples and some white water rafting. Oh and as ever shopping time needs to be factored in for Sam. Then we fly back down to Ko Phangan via Surat Thani to visit our favourite The Salad Hut. http://saladhut.com/Home.html Then we are trying a new resort on Thong Nai Pan Yai, The Longtail Resort where we've booked the Boat House, a cabin in the shape of a boat. Then it's back to Bangkok for a few days.
Finally we are staying over in Dubai for a night on the way home. Looking forward to keeping you updated on our 2017 travels. A while ago I posted about reclaiming from EasyJet if your flights drop in price. Well we've just booked flights from Newcastle to Berlin for the total cost of £0 We travel during the Easter school holidays so will keep you all up to date with our adventures and recommendations during our stay. We'd love to hear your tips and advice for family travel through our comments pages.
We have booked a nice 2 bedroom place to the north of the centre in the Wedding district. Big Mama's Hotel will be our home for a short while. Well it's that important time of year again for summer sun worshippers. EasyJet release their summer flights this Thursday 3rd November, take a look at http://www.easyjet.com/en/ Remember though that you can make this a win/win situation! An important part of the Customer Charter is that IF your flights drop in price you can ring EasyJet and claim back the difference in vouchers.
DON'T BELIEVE ME? We successfully claimed £274 back from last summers flights and have just booked a trip to Berlin next Easter! Don't worry, this information is free and given in goodwill. Though you might want to use our ad-links on the right hand side for booking.com to find and book some accommodation, using this link helps support us with our web costs. HAPPY HOLIDAYS We visited Elche or Elx during our recent trip. Known as the City of Palms there certainly were a lot of palm trees around the place, particularly in the park! Elche is a nice walkable city with some lovely old streets and architecture. It felt very relaxed, almost like a sleepy little town rather than a city. A great place to spend a quiet afternoon. We hear it's even nicer on an evening so will have to return! Like many places in Spain there is a lot of graffiti, some of which is quite interesting. In fact the river has been turned into a huge piece of art work. The park was lovely and shady and full of free exercise equipment as well as lots of play areas for children. The huge palm trees were quite spectacular as well. There are several small museums and galleries around the city, however some do close during 'siesta' time so check before visiting. I've heard it said that it's all in the planning! Well that mantra rings true for our holiday home this summer. Along with our good friends the Parker family we took our time to find the property that suited our needs and we came up trumps. Located about 1 mile outside of pretty Catral our villa for the first 15 nights was an easy 25 minute journey from Alicante airport. The lovely 5 bedroom 5 bathroom house was ideal for up to 10 people. As the photos show the pool area and outside eating area were amazing and where we spent most of our time. Potentially there will be 2 more bedroom added upstairs to increase the capacity.
The owners were a lovely Spanish family (only their son Cesar speaks English) who were more than happy for us to pick fresh vegetables from the adjacent field they owned. The onions, green peppers (sweet not bitter!) and courgettes were amazing. Anyone who gets off the beaten track in Spain will know just how cheap the cost of living can be. Catral was no exception with the 8 of us regularly eating out for under 60 euros. If you want any details on the property feel free to ask. We would certainly recommend it. Back in October you might remember the clamour for the Summer flight releases and the huge disappointment in the lack of cheap flights available through EasyJet?
Well never fear, there is still a chance to save a few quid from your already booked holiday price. It seems the corporate bigwigs at EasyJet might have misread the market and over priced their summer release (as many of us felt they had at the time). Flights today can be snapped up for CHEAPER than they were on release as their dynamic pricing system slashes the prices due to unsold seats. So it's WIN/WIN! Just follow these simple steps! Here's how..................... If you didn't book, grab a bargain! Simple! What if you have booked? Well all is not lost............. Check online for the flights you have booked. If the prices have fallen then don't delay ring EasyJet customer services on 0330 365 5000 NOW! Give them your flight booking reference and they will refund you the difference through a voucher code. That's the only catch. It's not a hard cash refund but vouchers to the value of the difference to be booked within 6 months. The flight can be later than 6 months though as long as it's booked before the voucher expires. I've just secured a £274 voucher refund today. Happy days! Well Leicester won the Premier League!! What better way to celebrate than host some Kasabian gigs? Well for us Kasabian fans who don't follow the Foxes it was a dilemma. We didn't want to crash the party but we couldn't turn down the chance to see Kasabian play. Tickets secured, we were venturing to the King Power Stadium as a foursome. Sid and Frank were about to attend their first large music event. What a belter of a gig! We all loved it. More importantly for Lockeys on Holiday we booked a bargain family room for £35 at the Nottingham West Premier Inn. Great location 3 minutes off the M1 at Junction 26 and a wonderful restaurant for breakfast. Want to grab a bargain holiday this August?
Then best get searching now. There are some amazing flights still available with many of the low cost airlines. Take for example EasyJet's Newcastle - Alicante route...... booking for August back in October on the release day was just under £990 for a family of 4 - the price has only risen by £15 per person since then! Looking like a good price. Better still are the deals to be grabbed from Edinburgh and Glasgow during August. A family of 4 can fly with Ryanair for under £400 to Malaga, YES UNDER £400!!! If you are looking for a late booking for this summer, get creative and start searching now. Use the Skyscanner link to the right to find the best value flights - DON'T FORGET > enter "anywhere" in the destination and search for the "whole month" to find the best prices. Bargains can be had if you look to avoid the usual 14 days, try going for 16-20 days it's actually possible to cover the extra accommodation costs with your flight savings. Get accommodation using the Booking.com link to the right as well. Hotels and apartments are desperate to secure a fully booked summer right about now and are offering great prices. Good Luck and feel free to get in touch if you want any tips or advice. Grab a copy here -
www.amazon.co.uk/Supertato-Veggies-Assemble-Sue-Hendra/dp/1471121003/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1458061188&sr=8-2&keywords=supertato Here at Lockeys on Holiday we think we can do most things pretty well. But sometimes we need to get in some experts to give us a hand. When we received SuperTato Veggies Assemble by Sue Hendra and Paul Linnet we soon realised we might need a little help. Quick to the rescue came Reception Class at Bishop Ian Ramsey Primary School and our fabulous friend Miss Jackson! The children read the book together and it appears to have been a huge success as they asked if they could keep it. Indeed 20 of the children asked if they could read it again! A few of the comments received from the wonderful Reception class include - I absolutely loved it because it had a Super potato in it. I liked the part about the tomato. I loved the Super Veggies. I like the evil pea. It was really good. I like when Super Potato got the pea. So there you go it seems that the children were both entertained and educated while reading this lovely follow up to Supertato. Miss Jackson their teacher though she would like to include the book when she does a healthy eating topic next year as it would allow the children to explore their knwledge of different veggies. The book also provoked a class discussion on whether it was ok to have different opinions after one child said they hadn't liked the evil pea! Back at Lockeys on Holiday HQ myself and the boys were all entertained by the quirky story, who imagined that such antics took place in the supermarket after closing? If you'd like a copy then please follow the link below - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Supertato-Veggies-Assemble-Sue-Hendra/dp/1471121003/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1458061188&sr=8-2&keywords=supertato The Lockey boys and I have all been enjoying this latest offering from Abi Elphinstone, The Shadow Keeper.
This book is a sequel to her popular story The Dream Snatcher and continues following the adventures of Moll Pecksniff and her friends. Moll lives her life living in the forest with her collection of friends, however their life is complicated by the Shadowmasks a secretive group of sneaky and not so nice witch doctors. This wonderfully written follow up adventure sees Moll once again pitting her wits against the Shadowmasks and their nefarious attempts to bring dark magic to the world. As Moll faces more problems and obstacles in her quest so you will once again be swept along into her weird and wonderful world of magic, mystery and the never ending premise of good versus evil. Moll and her friends have taken refuge as outlaws in a coastal cave to keep the Shadowmasks at bay and reach their goal of finding the Amulet of Truth. Will they succeed? Will good triumph? What magical adventures will they encounter on their journey? It's a must read if you want to find out. At times Sid was so absorbed by this book that I believe it could have been a read in one sitting (a day long sitting of course), we even caught him reading the book in one hand while taking the wheelie bins out!!! Who will enjoy this book? Well I'm reliably informed that both boys of 8 and 11 found it interesting and engaging. Though Sid did feel that it was possibly a little bit sinister for anyone younger than 8 he did think readers up to 13/14 would enjoy the book. I agree that some of the content might add a thrill and feeling of unease but this book is certainly not scary, so don't fear buying it for your children, nephews, nieces or friends kids. All kids need a hero and a magical one is infinitely more interesting so give this book a try. Both boys enjoyed the idea of a story set in our own world but filled with a real sense of magic and adventure. I've already been asked when the next book in the series is due out........over to you Abi and the publisher Simon and Shuster |
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April 2023
AuthorHi, I'm Ian Lockey. As a family we have loved travelling and just wanted to share our experiences online with friends, family and anyone else who drops in. |