The Orchards Holiday Park
The Orchards is an independent, family-run holiday park set in fifteen acres of former apple orchards at Newbridge, in the quiet West Wight on the Isle of Wight. It rents static caravans, a four-bedroom house and touring pitches around a heated indoor pool, a heated outdoor pool, a shop and two children's play areas. It's a self-catering, car-free base built for families who want a calm countryside week with easy days out around West Wight.
On this page
Is it worth it?
The quick read before the detail: who the park suits, what's on site and what to skim first.
The Orchards is one of the best-rated independent parks on the Isle of Wight, and what families choose it for is the quiet. It's a small, family-run park in the countryside near Yarmouth, with two heated pools, a shop, a takeaway and two play areas, and no driving on site once you've settled, which makes it feel safe for children to move around on their own. What it doesn't have is a kids' club, a restaurant, a pub or any evening entertainment, so it's a self-catering, self-directed week rather than an all-in resort. It also has no beach of its own, so the sandy West Wight beaches are a short drive away. You'll get the most from it if you'd rather cook, potter and drive out to beaches and attractions than be entertained on the park.
Best for
You want a quiet, car-free countryside base near the Yarmouth ferry, with two pools and easy days out around the island, and you're happy to cook and drive to the beach.
Maybe not for
You want a kids' club, evening entertainment, a restaurant or pub on site, or a beach you can walk to.
Best ages
Any age. The car-free grounds and a play area for under-fives suit toddlers, though there's no organised programme for older children or teenagers.
What stands out
Both an indoor and an outdoor pool, which is rare for an independent park, a car-free site and staff that guests single out again and again.
What to check
Whether the park can supply a cot or baby kit, and the outdoor pool's actual closing date if you're travelling near early September.
Where is it?
Newbridge, near Yarmouth in the rural West Wight on the Isle of Wight, about four miles from the Yarmouth ferry.
Quick facts for families
What the park is like
Where it sits, how it's laid out and how getting around works with young children.
The Orchards is an independent, family-run park that has operated since 1955, on the same fifteen acres of former apple orchards that give it its name, with no ties to any of the big holiday-park brand groups. The current owner, Michael Jordan, has run it since buying the park in January 2020. It sits at Newbridge, a small hamlet in the West Wight about four miles east of Yarmouth, on slightly raised ground with wide countryside views across the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty towards the Solent. The whole Isle of Wight is a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, a designation for places that balance nature and people, and the West Wight is the quieter, less built-up end of it. For more on the wider island, see our Isle of Wight guide.
The site splits into a few areas: four paddocks for touring and camping, a separate static caravan area in the orchard, and a newer development of 20 owner-occupied holiday homes called the Meadow, built between 2020 and 2021. A central Facilities Centre houses the touring utilities. Paths between the caravans are flat or gently sloping concrete and slab, with gravel car parks, so a pushchair rolls easily around the core of the park.
The thing that shapes a stay most is the car policy. You deposit the car on arrival and park it in the car parks, then don't drive on site for the rest of the stay, with a five-mile-an-hour limit for the few vehicles that do move. In busier periods, or for guests with walking difficulties, some cars can park beside a caravan by permit, but by default you deposit the car and walk. Families consistently say this is what makes the park feel safe, since children can move around without traffic. There are also two EV charging points by the reception and shop, used through an app, and an hourly Southern Vectis bus stops at the park entrance.
Dogs are welcome in several of the caravans and now in Orchard House too, and there's a secure dog exercise area with a short loop walk and a river for dogs to cool off in.
The caravans, house and pitches
The hire fleet at a glance, the four-bedroom house, the touring pitches and which suit a family.
There are three ways to stay: a hire caravan, the four-bedroom Orchard House, or your own tent or touring caravan on a pitch. Every one is self-catering, with a full kitchen in the caravans and the house. The hire fleet runs to twelve named caravan types, each with several units, and the table below is the range at a glance; the notes after it explain what each is like for a family.
| Caravan | Sleeps | Bedrooms | Size | Dogs | Notable |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sundance | 6 | 3 | 38 × 12 ft | No | New in 2021; en suite off the master bedroom, decking and country views |
| Roxbury | 6 | 3 | 40 × 12 ft | No | Patio sliding doors and decking |
| Cameo | 6 | 3 | Not published | No | New in 2022; bright, modern interior |
| Opal | 6 | 3 | 38 × 12 ft | Yes | New in 2023; light and airy |
| Bramley | 6 | 3 | 38 × 12 ft | No | Good-size kitchen |
| Pearmain | 6 | 3 | 36 × 12 ft | Yes | Central heating throughout |
| Regent | 6 | 3 | 35 × 12 ft | Yes | Central heating throughout |
| Discovery | 4 | 2 | 35 × 12 ft | No | Two layout options |
| Gala | 5 | 3 | 35 × 12 ft | Yes | Refurbished; popular with dog owners |
| Pippin | 4 | 2 | 28 × 10 ft | No | The smallest and cheapest; gas fire in the lounge |
| Platinum Sovereign | 4 | 2 | 37 × 12 ft | Yes | New in 2022; accessible, with a wet room and ramped access |
| Gold Sovereign | 4 | 2 | 38 × 12 ft | Yes | Older accessible model |
All the hire caravans are double-glazed and centrally heated, with an equipped kitchen (a hob, oven, fridge-freezer and microwave), and the beds are made up for your arrival with a tea and coffee welcome pack waiting. There are at least two steps up to the door, apart from the two accessible caravans, and no internal stairs. One thing to pack for: towels, tea towels and bath mats aren't provided in the caravans, only in Orchard House, so caravan guests bring their own. Smoking isn't allowed in any caravan.
For a family, the three-bedroom caravans that sleep six are the mainstay, with a double and two twin rooms, so parents and children have separate rooms. The bedrooms open off the same open-plan living area, though, so there's no properly separate child's room, and night noise carries; a baby waking in the evening will be heard. The two-bedroom Discovery and Pippin sleep four, and the Pippin is the smallest and cheapest van. Short breaks start from around £210 for the Pippin up to around £480 for the top-of-the-range Sundance (prices checked March 2026), and they shift with the caravan and the season, so treat the park's own booking pages as the guide for your dates. For a longer stay, a family price-comparison site logged the cheapest one-week August booking, on the Pippin, at around £845 (checked December 2025), well above the short-break starting price. Hire caravans arrive on a Friday, Saturday or Monday for a week, or on set short-break days.
Orchard House is a stone-built, four-bedroom house on the park, sleeping ten, with a garden and patio, a large gas barbecue and a fully fitted kitchen. Unlike the caravans it comes with towels, tea towels and bath mats, and it's dog-friendly. It suits a larger group or two families together, or a multi-generation booking. One point for families with a baby: the front door has a single step, and while the kitchen, lounge and a bathroom are on the ground floor, all four bedrooms are upstairs, so there's no ground-floor bedroom for a night feed without the stairs. A £200 deposit is taken to book, with short breaks priced from around £900 (checked March 2026), and it runs on Saturday-to-Saturday weeks or short breaks.
The touring and camping pitches sit across four paddocks, some with countryside views. Each has an electric hook-up, water and mains drainage, and some are hardstanding; parts of the fields slope and a few pitches are terraced. Pitches start from around £40 a night (checked March 2026); a family of four on an electric pitch for a week in August has been quoted around £490 (checked December 2025), though Red Funnel's ferry-and-pitch bundles can bring this down. It's one car per pitch, and touring guests can arrive on any day of the week, unlike the hire caravans, with check-in at 2pm and check-out at 11am. Touring guests use the Facilities Centre, a heated barn building with shower cubicles, a family bathroom and shower room, accessible facilities, a token-operated launderette and a washing-up area. The showers are free; only the baths are metered, at 20p a go.
Eating and food shopping
Eating on a self-catering park, the two pools, what there is for babies, and how you'll fill the days.
There's no restaurant and no pub on site, so most meals are cooked where you're staying or eaten out locally. Three things fill the gap on the park itself. An evening takeaway serves hot food such as pizza and scampi, with self-service collection; its hours are seasonal and drop to Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings only out of season, so check the current times at reception. A shop, open March to October, stocks basics and provisions, local produce, local beers and Mermaid Gin, an Isle of Wight distillery, and its cakes get a mention in reviews, though fresh produce is limited. There's also a coffee shop in the garden conservatory by the indoor pool, the only sit-down spot beyond the takeaway. For guests with mobility difficulties, the takeaway and shop will deliver to your unit.
For a full week most families do a proper food shop. The park shop covers top-ups rather than a weekly shop, so guests routinely have a supermarket delivery sent straight to the caravan, which is the easiest way to stock up. The nearest pub, the Horse and Groom Inn, is under a mile away at the A3054 junction, with a small discount on the park's Welcome Card, and Yarmouth has more pubs and restaurants four miles off.
The pools
There are two pools, and for an independent park having both an indoor and an outdoor one is unusual. The indoor pool is open the whole season, from March to October, with three shallow steps down into the water and a pool attendant on duty; the garden-conservatory coffee shop sits alongside it. Its hours vary through the season, and sessions can be more limited over school and bank holidays, so it's worth checking before you go. The outdoor pool is heated and open from late May to early September. Both are supervised in season, but the attendant is there for the pool rather than to watch individual children, and children under sixteen must be accompanied in the pool areas.
There's no splash pad and no separate paddling pool anywhere on the park, so a baby or toddler is in the main pools with you rather than a shallow play area of their own. The outdoor pool has finished a little before its stated end date in at least one past year, so if you're booking for close to early September it's worth checking the actual closing date with the park. Isle of Wight residents can also buy seasonal pool memberships, which the park runs through the summer including school holidays, with the detail given on application.
Babies and toddlers
The best thing here for a family with young children is the car-free ground, so toddlers aren't near moving traffic while they play. There are two play areas, one with equipment for under-fives and one for older children.
What it doesn't have is organised childcare or entertainment. There's no kids' club, no crèche and no children's activity programme, and no babysitting or on-site childcare service, so a baby or toddler's time on the park is the pools, the play areas and the grounds. Children under twelve should be accompanied around the park, which is the park's own wording, and under-sixteens must be accompanied in the pools.
On baby kit, plan to bring your own. There's no cot, travel cot, high chair or baby bath to count on here, so pack what your baby needs, and contact the team before you book if you want to check what they can lend. In short, this isn't a park built around babies in the organised-entertainment sense: no infant programme, no baby kit to count on, no splash area and a limited shop. It works as a safe, quiet, self-catering base for families who bring their own kit, cook most meals and drive out to the beaches and attractions.
On the parkThings to do
The two pools are the main draw on the park itself. Beyond them there are games rooms (a single step up into them, and floodlit); the park's own pages don't spell out what's inside, though island guides list a pool table, table tennis and amusement machines. There's a recreation area or playing field alongside the two play areas, and the secure dog exercise area with its loop walk and river. Free WiFi covers the park but isn't strong enough for streaming or working online, and the caravan TVs are Freeview only, so download anything you'll want to watch before you arrive.
What there isn't is an entertainment programme, live shows or organised activities, which is the clearest line between The Orchards and the big commercial parks. There's no spa, gym or sports courts either. This is a park you use as a quiet base rather than one that fills your days for you, so the days out below matter more here than at a resort that entertains on site.
Beaches nearby
The park is inland, so the beaches take a short drive; which suit toddlers and which suit older children.
There's no beach on the park and none within walking distance; it's a rural, inland site, and the nearest sandy beaches are about a ten-minute drive. That's the main practical trade-off against the countryside setting, so a beach day here is a drive rather than a stroll from the caravan.
Colwell Bay, about ten minutes away, is the easiest for little ones: sandy, south-facing and sheltered, with a gentle shelf into shallow water and a café on the beach, and dogs are allowed outside peak hours. Compton Bay, also around ten minutes, is a National Trust beach of sand and shingle under dramatic chalk cliffs, popular for fossil hunting, with a large pay car park; its waves are stronger, so it suits older children more than toddlers in the water. Freshwater Bay, a similar distance, is a scenic mix of shingle and sand, more exposed and better for older children. Yarmouth, about ten minutes off, has a small sandy beach by its harbour, handy for an ice cream and lunch. The island's largest sandy beaches are over on the east coast at Sandown and Shanklin, but that's about a thirty-five-minute drive from this side.
The sea around the island is at its warmest in August, roughly 17 to 18°C, and sheltered, south-facing Colwell may feel a touch warmer than the more open bays.
The area and days out
The West Wight is the quieter, less built-up end of the island, an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and the park makes a central base for it. Tapnell Farm Park, about ten minutes away, is the closest big family attraction, an animal farm and adventure park, and the Isle of Wight Aqua Park nearby is an inflatable water obstacle course with age and height limits. The Needles Landmark Attraction at Alum Bay, around fifteen minutes off, is a classic West Wight day with its coloured sands, a chairlift, sweet-making, a carousel and a pier.
Further afield, Blackgang Chine, about thirty to thirty-five minutes away, is the UK's oldest theme park, with dinosaurs, pirates and a Fairyland, and a return ticket that lasts up to seven days. Robin Hill Adventure Park near Newport, about twenty minutes, has rides and parkland and shares a season pass with Blackgang. Osborne House at East Cowes, roughly twenty-five minutes, is Queen Victoria's seaside home, with its Durbar Room, the Swiss Cottage and a beach in season, and Amazon World Zoo near Sandown is a tropical zoo about twenty-five to thirty minutes off. Yarmouth, about ten minutes away, is a historic harbour town with a castle, the ferry port, independent restaurants and pubs.
The park's Welcome Card gives discounts at several of these and around: 10% off at West Wight Alpacas, where you can trek and feed alpacas, and 10% off bike hire at Wight Cycle Hire, useful because the island has more than 500 miles of trails and traffic-free family routes like the Red Squirrel Trail run near the park. The card also covers the Horse and Groom pub, Sandham Gardens, vehicle hire and a run of local cafés and ice cream parlours.
Loves and gripes
What guests rate and what frustrates them, and how it stacks up against the island's other parks.
The Orchards rates well across the review sites: 4.4 out of 5 on Trustindex from 521 TripAdvisor reviews (a wider snapshot of 613 TripAdvisor reviews is shown via the widget on the park's own site), 4.6 on Google and 9 out of 10 on ukcampsite from 103 reviews, with an island-guide composite near 90 per cent. Of the 521 Trustindex reviews, 65% are five stars, 21% four, 8% three, 3% two and 2% one star, so the weak end is a small minority. It also carries silver awards for best campsite and best holiday park, along with a Practical Caravan readers' poll win and a TripAdvisor Certificate of Excellence. The read below is our synthesis of what families consistently say, the good and the less good.
What families love
- The staff, the most uniformly praised thing about the park: warm, helpful and long-serving.
- The peace and quiet, and children roaming freely on car-free ground.
- Children make friends easily with each other on the park.
- The countryside views across the West Wight.
- Both pools, and the poolside coffee shop.
- The evening takeaway, with the pizza and scampi singled out.
- Dog-friendly caravans and the secure dog exercise area.
- A strong base for exploring West Wight, and good ferry value booked through the park.
- Beds made up on arrival and the tea and coffee welcome pack.
Common gripes
- Cleaning, mainly in older reviews and less prominent recently.
- Weak WiFi and Freeview-only TV.
- Push-button showers.
- Limited stock in the shop, with little fresh produce.
- Some vans without outdoor furniture, and the dog-friendly vans being more dated.
- The outdoor pool finishing early in at least one past year.
- Little for older children and teenagers to do on site.
The park culture is quiet and not heavily commercialised, and reviewers who like it say plainly that they want it kept that way rather than turned into a bigger entertainment park. Management responds to reviews in detail, and there were no recurring complaints about safety, illness or pests in the reviews we read.
How it compares
The Orchards sits apart from the Isle of Wight's big commercial parks, and the choice really turns on whether you want an entertainment programme or a quiet base. Whitecliff Bay, an Away Resorts park about thirty-five minutes away, has a private beach, indoor soft play and an organised entertainment programme with activities like archery; The Orchards has none of that, but it's cheaper, quieter and better-rated for its staff. Nodes Point, a Parkdean park, runs a waterslide pool, character meets, discos and toddler sessions, all of which The Orchards lacks. Lower Hyde at Shanklin has a similar pool offer but is busier and nearer a beach, where The Orchards is more rural. Appuldurcombe Gardens, another quiet independent near Ventnor, scores a shade higher overall but has no indoor pool.
What sets The Orchards apart is the combination: the best scores among the quiet independent parks, both an indoor and an outdoor pool (uncommon for an independent), a staff reputation guests keep raising, the car-free safety, and the shortest hop from the Yarmouth ferry, all at the lowest prices among the island parks with two pools. The short version is that it's right for a calm, self-catering week with easy days out, and wrong for a family who wants a kids' club, a restaurant or entertainment laid on.
Getting there and the ferry
The three ferry routes, which lands you closest, and the practical points on arriving.
Getting to the park means a car ferry across the Solent. Three routes serve the island, and the one you pick makes a real difference to the final drive, since the park is right at the western end.
| Route | Operator | Crossing | Then to the park |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lymington to Yarmouth | Wightlink | About 40 min | Under 10 minutes by road (about 4 miles); the quickest route for the park |
| Portsmouth to Fishbourne | Wightlink | About 45 min | About 30 minutes across the island |
| Southampton to East Cowes | Red Funnel | About 60 min | About 25 minutes across the island |
The Lymington to Yarmouth crossing with Wightlink is by far the most convenient: Yarmouth is about four miles from the park, about ten minutes by road, so families who can reach Lymington in the New Forest should look hard at that route. The park runs a full car-ferry booking service through both Wightlink and Red Funnel and often gets trade rates, so it's worth asking them to price the crossing when you book rather than booking it yourself; Red Funnel also lists ferry-and-pitch bundles for the touring pitches that can work out cheaper on some dates. Cars can't be booked as last-minute walk-ons in peak season, so book the crossing ahead.
Sat-nav is unreliable for the park, so the directions are to follow the signs for Newbridge from the Horse and Groom Inn on the A3054, about three miles from Yarmouth. When you arrive you deposit the car and then use the car parks, since there's no driving on site once you've settled.
When to goWhen to go and weather
The park is open from March to the end of October. The indoor pool runs the whole season; the outdoor pool opens from late May to early September, when both pools are open, the weather is warmest and the island's attractions are all running. The late-July-to-early-September school holidays are the peak, so the busiest and priciest, while May half-term and September are quieter alternatives that are still warm enough for the pools and the beach. The park sits sheltered inland; the exposed coastal headlands like the Needles and Compton can be windier, but on an island only about thirteen miles across the weather is much the same wherever you are.
| Month | Daytime high | Overnight low | Rain | Wet days | Sea temp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| March | 10.5° | 4.5° | 60 mm | 10 | 8° |
| April | 13° | 6° | 54 mm | 9 | 10° |
| May | 16° | 9° | 52 mm | 8 | 13° |
| June | 18.5° | 11.5° | 54 mm | 8 | 16° |
| July | 20.5° | 13.5° | 52 mm | 8 | 18° |
| August | 20.5° | 14° | 67 mm | 8 | 19° |
| September | 18.5° | 12° | 72 mm | 9 | 18° |
| October | 15° | 9.5° | 113 mm | 13 | 16° |
Typical monthly averages from weather-station records. Sea temperature is the open-water figure, so a sheltered bay can feel a degree or two warmer.
Getting around and accessibility
The paths to the caravans are flat or gently sloping concrete and slab on hardstanding bases, with gravel car parks, and the car-free policy keeps them safe, so a pushchair rolls around the core of the park easily. There's no buggy storage inside the caravans, and the standard doorways are narrower than the accessible ones, so a pram tends to be left outside the caravan or in the car park. Two caravans are built for wheelchair users and their families, the newer Platinum Sovereign and the older Gold Sovereign, and the Facilities Centre for tourers is step-free with an accessible toilet and shower with turning room, rails and an alarm.
At the pools, the indoor pool has level access over gravel with three shallow steps into the water, and the outdoor pool has level access with standard pool steps. An accessible taxi service and a firm that delivers mobility scooters and wheelchairs to the park are both listed by the park if you need them. Mobile phone signal varies by network across the site, so don't count on a reliable signal everywhere.
Shops and healthSupplies and health
For a bigger shop, Newport is about twenty to twenty-five minutes away and has an Asda, Tesco, Co-op and Lidl; Yarmouth, four miles off, has a small Co-op for top-ups. Many families skip the trip and have a supermarket delivery sent straight to the caravan for the week, which the park is set up for. The nearest pharmacy is at Yarmouth or Shalfleet, a couple of miles along the A3054. The island's only A&E is at St Mary's Hospital in Newport, about twenty to twenty-five minutes away, so it's worth saving the route before you travel.
Questions
The things families ask most, useful links and when this guide was last updated.
Do we need a car?
For the beaches and days out, yes: the beaches are a short drive and there's no walkable sand from the park. Once you arrive you deposit the car and don't drive on site, and an hourly bus stops at the entrance, but with young children and beach kit a car of your own is far easier for getting about the island.
Is there entertainment for the children?
No. There's no kids' club, no evening entertainment and no organised activity programme. On site that leaves the two pools, the games rooms and the two play areas, so a wet day usually means the indoor pool or a drive to an indoor attraction like Blackgang Chine. Pack for self-directed days rather than a park that fills them for you.
Which pool suits a toddler?
The indoor pool, which is open the whole season and has three shallow steps down into the water. There's no separate paddling pool or splash area anywhere on the park, so a little one is in the main pool with you; children under sixteen have to be accompanied in the pool areas in any case.
Can we bring the dog?
Yes, if you pick a dog-friendly caravan when you book. Several are, including Opal, Pearmain, Regent, Gala and both Sovereigns, and Orchard House now takes dogs too. There's a secure dog exercise area with a short loop walk and a river to cool off in. Worth knowing that the dog-friendly vans tend to be the older ones rather than the newest stock.
Where’s the nearest sandy beach for little ones?
Colwell Bay, about ten minutes' drive. It's the one to aim for with a toddler in the water, with a shallow, sheltered entry and a café on the sand, and dogs are allowed outside peak hours. Compton and Freshwater are a similar drive but get bigger waves, so they suit older children.
Is it cheaper to book the ferry through the park?
Ask the park to quote it for you. As a booking agent for Wightlink and Red Funnel they can often land a better fare than booking direct, and if you're touring, Red Funnel's ferry-and-pitch bundles can come to less again. Book early whichever route you choose, since car spaces sell out on peak-season sailings.
Are there accessible caravans?
Two. The Platinum Sovereign is the newer one, with ramped access, wider doorframes, a wet room and a helper frame, on Saturday-to-Saturday bookings; the Gold Sovereign is an older model to a similar spec. The Facilities Centre for tourers is step-free with an accessible toilet and shower too.
When does the outdoor pool open and close?
Late May to early September, weather and staffing permitting; the indoor pool runs the whole March-to-October season. If you're travelling close to early September it's worth checking the outdoor pool's actual closing date with the park, as it has finished early in at least one past year.
See more of The Orchards
Open The Orchards photo gallery →Useful links
- The Orchards Holiday Park: the park's own site for the caravans, facilities and booking.
- The Isle of Wight with little ones: our guide to the wider island, its beaches and when to go.
Last updated July 2026.
