Butlins, Bognor Regis

Bullins is great fun for younger kids. Inside the giant marquee there is a free soft play climbing frame, lots of bob the builder themed rides, a puppet display, workshops and loads more.

The main skyline evening shows are great fun too with the Skyline gang getting the kids dancing and screaming.

The outside fun park is good too although some of the rides have been there for ages and look a little tired. The bumper cars are always good fun though.

The accommodation was okay though the balcony walkways seem to amplify every footstep and it’s difficult to get asleep.

The food halls aren’t bad and if you go half board then you can eat as much buffet food as you like. The restaurant was really busy when we went and we had to search hard for a table.

For the money it’s not a bad holiday. The nearby shingle beach is nice in summer and you can also catch a little coast train to the town centre.

You will either love Butlins or loathe it. There does not seem to be any middle ground.

I am one of the ones that loves it. I think that it is a really good place to take children away, because if the children are occupied, then you can have a more relaxing break and at Butlins, there is always something for them to do.

The swimming pools are great, with big slides etc.

The evening entertainment is good, with shows put on by Redcoats or visiting guests.

The accommodation is basic, but you don’t really go there to spend a lot of time in your chalet.

If you want to leave the campsite itself, there is a beach just outside, but it is pebbly, not sandy, or the town centre of Bognor Regis is only 15 minutes walk away.

I stayed in self catering accommodation and not the new Hotel - unfortunately! The accommodation was absolutely awful. The carpet was so dirty, smelly and disgusting that we all had to keep our slippers on indoors and not walk round in socks as they would have got filthy. The furnishing were awful too.

I went to the office to complain and ended up in a huge queue full of people with various complaints about their accommodation. The member of staff who was dealing with the complaints was very rude telling one customer who complained that her kettle didn’t work “if that was me I would have boiled a pan instead”. I decided not to complain in the end as I could see it was a complete waste of time and would just make me frustrated and angry so we simply stayed away from the accommodation as much as we possibly could only coming back to sleep there.

The amenities on site were great for children and families. They had outdoor rides and a lovely outdoor swimming pool plus a great adventure playground. They had similar facilities indoors plus a large indoor swimming pool with slides which my son loved.

There are Plenty of places to eat too and the night life was quite good and entertaining.

It was also lovely to have the seaside on your doorstep and we went for long walks nearly every day.

I would consider returning but would definately stay in the Hotel and would not go near their self catering accommodation. By the way we stayed in Silver Accommodation so goodness knows what the budget accommodation was like I dread to think!

Butlins is a vey large Holiday Centre, They have lots for Children and Adults.
They have have many different Activities and Amusements in one Place.And they have new things on every day.
They also have a wide range of restaurants on site.

Been to bognar regis many times although not for a year or two as my kids are getting older now.
Loads of things to do here especially if you have younger children.
Everything takes place in and around the massive dome tent, and here they have the main entertainment centre which hosts differant acts every evening.
They have a large funfair weather permitting which is free and for the younger ones smaller rides.
They have a large heated indoor pool with slides and stuff.
Bognor is around a 20 min walk away and has a good selection of shops.

I have been to Butlins 3 times now and it is fantastic. My little boy has an absolute blast. I do need a holiday when I get back though as there is something on all the time but you never get bored. The entertainers work so hard and must see some right little terrors but they are always bouncy and friendly and always have a smile on their face. I have been self catering and half board and always found somewhere and something to eat. The accommodation was very good and we have stayed in the Hotel once and a Silver Apartment. There is plenty to do day and night and the resort is close to the beach. The pool is clean and was so much fun. I would go back in an instant.

we went to butlins for the first time this year with the kids 10,9,7,3,and 2 year old and they loved every minute of it there is loads to do. a fair ground outdoor and indoor wich is free. swimming baths bike rides.and for the younger ones theres bob the builder ,pingu ,barney,ben 10 lots more.the accommodation was also good you can have bed an breakfast or just buy some food from the local tesco wich is just off site 5 min drive .the staff are really friendly we cant wait to go back next year

I haven’t stayed at Butlins but do go occasionally as a day visitor. My 2 little girls love it and its good value for money. The swimming pool is great it has water slides for adults and children, fountains, wave pool, everything you could want. A lot of the attractions are under the pavilion so its great for rainy days. There is an assortment of arcade machines, bowling, pool, little children’s rides a soft play and plenty of places to get food and drink. They have really good shows for the children at various times during the day which are always popular. Outside there is an adventure playground, fairground rides, mini golf, sports academy. You can’t get bored.

Day visitor. I haven’t ever stayed here but go fairly frequently as a day visitor. For me another nostalgia thing, used to go there as a kid, now take my own kids, but somehow it feels disappointing now! I guess when I was young there was nowhere else for all the rides and fun stuff and now there’s so many places, but I’m just not sure if it is good value as a day out now as there don’t seem to be enough things that are 'free’ to use with your entry fee, its really geared up to extract more and more money from you at every turn. The one thing that does make it worthwhile though is the pool. This is great fun for kids with wave pools, slides and lots of water chutes and if they’re into this then it’s worth it

Ok so let me get this out of the way I hated it here! I stayed for a weekend with my family so I could attend the nearby Goodwood festival of speed, big mistake. I found that we were unable to get to sleep due to the noise from not only the screaming children but the screaming adults as well.
After the first night I tried to be as distant from the on site activities as possible as it seemed to be code for scream and run as much as you can. We had to leave early to be at the festival and this was what I enjoyed about my stay the quiet as every one laid in n slept off the hangovers from the night before. I would never return unless an obscene amount of money was offered and even then you would have to wait for my answer.

I have been here about 3 times with my children when they were younger and they have always thoroughly enjoyed themselves. They love the swimming pool with all the slides and the beach is on your doorstep.
Always something on in the evening entertainment wise.
As far as holiday camps go one of the better ones :)

I visited this camp a couple of years ago for an SF convention. I won’t go into that (it had its own problems), but the venue was a nightmare.

I was sharing with a friend who uses a wheelchair: she can walk short distances, but has chronic severe pain, is sensitive to cold and has sleeping problems. On arrival at the station we found out that the ‘accessible’ taxis could only take folding chairs, not her powered one, so we had to make our own way to the camp. Not too much fun with heavy bags to carry.

We’d been told that the convention goers would have their own area of villas, well away from other groups using the camp that weekend. Our ‘accessible’ chalet was tiny. Getting the chair in and out was like doing one of those puzzles where you slide bricks about and it had to be left, basically, in the way. It was cold (yes, it was winter, but we’d been told the heating would be up to it) and the sliding door to the loo had to be lifted up so my friend couldn’t close it unless I was around to open it again for her. (We also discovered we both snore, and spent the night alternately keeping each other awake, but I guess that’s not the venue’s fault… except we’d had to push the beds together to get the chair in…)

The second day we did get moved to a newly built accessible two bedroom chalet, which was much nicer. 2 bedrooms, HUGE bathroom, (wet room style so the shower could be used with a chair or a fold-down seat), living room with kitchen. Pretty amazing! (Though I did have to pin some towels over the bathroom windows: staff gave me the pins!). Unfortunately it’s there we discovered the other major problem…

The other big group there that weekend was for Butlin’s own ‘adults only’ weekend. Basically stags, hens and others up for mayhem. Don’t get me wrong, SF fans can party. Some of us even drink, and miss the morning talks because we’ve been up all night. And people have been known to get injured while dancing to ‘Star Trekkin’ (I’m serious, someone had to go to hospital at one con I went to, and I’ve had bruises myself). But generally we party in the party area, are fairly quiet on the way back to our rooms, don’t play loud music there and shut up if asked.

Anyway, we basically got kept up every night after by upstair’s loud music and what sounded like acrobatic displays complete with thumping and cheers (though they were too drunk for that), and had to call security several times to shut them up. We didn’t have the energy to ask for another move. And it probably wouldn’t have helped… Back in the SF con’s allocated accommodation area they had people from the other group passing through on their way home. Shouting, screaming and banging on all the doors as they went. Very scary apparently. Some friends came back one night to find a couple banging on their doorstep, and in this case I don’t mean knocking.

If that wasn’t enough, we shared some venues. Our talks hall was used for their disco at night. One day I went to kneel in the aisle to take a picture and felt a wet patch. Though it had been slightly cleaned there was still enough vomit in the carpet to leave a lovely pink patch on my jeans. On the last morning I did actually (not politely) ask someone I saw coming out upstairs if they minded they’d wrecked our weekend, to which the (also not polite) response was that no, he just wanted to get laid (he put it somewhat less delicately). Though they were a load of louts, I have to lay the blame with Butlins. They’d come expecting to be able to ‘live it up’ all weekend, so being told to shut up must have been annoying. They’d also been giving a list of venues available to them, some of which were actually used by us in the evenings, so they’d got short changed on that too.

As for general facilities… the swimming area was open, but only the same hours as con talks were on, so I never got to use it. For food there were some fast food type places, a supermarket, and a canteen where we got some meals included. I thought the canteen wasn’t bad: a bit institutional of course, but a good range of food choices. Some people hated it, but I’ve had a lot worse. The outside attractions were closed. The big fun fair / amusements type area was open, and was often the quickest route to other places. Clever! While Butlins might be cheap to stay at, this was a total money trap, with coin slots everywhere! Parents taking children, beware…

Generally I found the staff absolutely lovely, and it’s thanks to them this place scrapes 2 stars. (Added note: I did write this before seeing the other reviewers were ex-staff!) However I did rather get the feeling that they knew we’d been screwed, and there was nothing they could do about it. Head office didn’t care.

Back in 1997 I started a summer job between college and Uni here. I worked in the clothing stores and was paid £77 with accommodation and food. Back then there was no roof over the site and in winter the carpark flooded.
But the present day all is changed. There is a white roof over all venues. Butlins has gone the way of franchise with the likes of Burger King. The music venues have good standard shows on. The food is far better. There is more to do. Also they have more disabled accommodation than before. There is a hotel on site too.
Day visitors can enjoy the themed pool. The fun fair is worth checking out too.

I made the mistake of working here about ten years ago. Of course maybe it’s lovely now, but somehow I doubt it. The staff were all paid very low wages, £120 a week minus £50 for room and board. I am curious to how Butlins gets round the new minimum wage laws, but anyway. Not curious enough to be employed there. Redcoats got £50 a week more and their own quarters in proper chalets (baths and fridges hooray for them.)
Never go there if you are female, young, in any way attractive. there are certain awful men on the staff who make it a duty to abuse as many women as possible. The doctors surgery was always full of clap cases, although that was mainly due to a woman on the staff who slept with hundreds of fellow workers.
The staff quarters where we were housed had a inch wide crack running up the staircase, so basically the place was falling down. My room didn’t have a window, just a lightwell shared with 5 other rooms.
Every night the staff would get drunk and get rowdy, and at least once a week there was a fight in the huge main nightclub room, possibly the largest room I’ve ever been in. Took about ten minutes to walk round it.
Best things: cheap cinema, free old cinema showing projected dvds, and a massive old snooker hall filled with 12 foot tables. The Irish Pub that had this fantastic singer in who knew every song there was, and the pints of Beamish stout.
Worst things: Butlins had a policy of not supplying rooms with towels to stop people nicking them, so they’d have to get them from the hire shop, which made everyone very angry, as related by one of the guys who worked there. And the accommodation was spooky to walk round, feeling a little like deathcamps.
The countryside around it is very nice, and I think it is the place where William Blake got arrested for trying it on with a soldier at a pub. God’s country.