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Dorset family holidays: Lashings of fun in Famous Five country

No wonder Enid Blyton set so many of her Famous Five adventures around these rugged coves and dozing villages.

Writing in the depths of World War II, she needed somewhere magical and mysterious where her young readers could escape from grim reality. Her memories of holidays in Dorset gave her the perfect setting. And that magic is undimmed today.

Ancient glory: Dorset's Jurassic Coast - including the view across Charmouth Bay - is a world wonder

Perhaps, it's in the soil, with the Jurassic Coast forever yielding up fossils and bits of dinosaur. Perhaps it has something to do with Dorset not having a yard of motorway.

Since our last attempt at a summer holiday had largely been spent waiting for rain to stop, we had promised ourselves a half-term break somewhere which would entertain three children under the age of six regardless of the elements. We plumped for Dorset.

  More... More Dorset delights in our West Country section Cider, cheese and chopping down trees in Somerset A spot of monkey business at Dorset's wildlife haven

Our base was Bridport, a pretty and mildly eccentric town with more than its fair share of junk and antique shops plus a busy Saturday market. The town centre is about a mile inland from the charming harbour plonked between the shingle of Chesil Beach and some stupendous cliffs. Known as West Bay, some will recognise it from ITV's Broadchurch or the BBC series, Harbour Lights.

In the centre of Bridport stands The Bull, a handsome 16th-century coaching inn now transformed into a delightful boutique hotel with swish bedrooms, a cobbled courtyard, chi-chi cocktail bar at the back and a pizzeria in the old stables. The main restaurant leans firmly in favour of local ingredients.

At breakfast, I had the best kippers I can recall. Come dinner, it's hard to trump the Lyme Bay scallops and the local lamb. Having tried the fish and chips on arrival, our children refused to eat anything else for the duration.

One reason for choosing Dorset was the memory of a trip to Weymouth on what felt like the only sunny weekend of 2012. I was there to watch Olympic sailing and Ben Ainslie's triumphal pursuit of a fifth gold. But I was also struck by its Georgian grandeur and felt it deserved a more leisurely look.

The best way of getting your bearings is to take a trip up the Sea Life Tower, a cross between London's Millennium Eye and a revolving restaurant.

For £7.20, you sit on a 69-seat circular bench which rises 174 ft above the sea and gently spins around for 15 minutes giving a brilliant view of the Costa Jurassica.

Castles of a different colour: Corfe Castle (left) is the ruined jewel of the 'Isle' of Purbeck - while Brownsea Castle (right) lights up the shoreline on Brownsea Island (despite being inaccessible to the wider public)

Our three little ones were more taken with the view of the stingrays, seals and otters at Sea Life World, a lively aquarium-cum-theme park at the other end of the vast sandy crescent which stretches for a couple of miles along Weymouth's eastern seaboard.

The town itself is a proper old-fashioned fishing port with pretty back streets offering the traditional variety of fry-ups, boozers and bucket-and-spade ephemera.

It was sunny but also perishing so we drove inland to the chocolate box village of Abbotsbury, a cluster of honey-coloured houses clinging to a limestone hill. It also includes the remains of an old monastery which is now a children's farm. Our girls, aged five and four, were almost speechless with excitement when it was time to feed and - joy of joys - walk the goats. Older visitors will be more interested in Abbotsbury Swannery or the award-winning subtropical gardens.

On another day, we drove an hour to the Isle of Purbeck. A peninsula rather than an island, it encompasses the fist of land to the south of Poole Harbour, one of the largest natural harbours in the world.

At Purbeck's heart is ghostly Corfe Castle, a spectacular hilltop ruin. This is the true epicentre of Famous Five country. Enid Blyton is said to have based Kirrin Castle and Kirrin Island on Corfe and the village below is full of olde worlde shops offering 'pop ices' and ginger beer.

We took the steam train from Corfe to Swanage and back in a lovely old carriage with seats like sofas. It's a 12-mile round trip along a track straight out of a period drama.

Steam buffs are now in heaven following recent news of a £1.5 million grant to reconnect the Swanage Railway with the main line at Wareham.

Travel to Purbeck's eastern shore and the short car ferry takes you across the mouth of Poole Harbour to Sandbanks, the famously expensive spit of land where footballers and hedge funders pay Riviera prices for a pad on the waterfront. From swanky Sandbanks, however, it's a half-hour journey (and a £5.75 return ticket) on a foot ferry across to enchanting Brownsea Island.

Beyond Brownsea Castle (now a holiday home for John Lewis staff), lies an abandoned hamlet, a church, peacocks, deer, a teeming red squirrel population and no vehicles, other than the odd electric buggy and National Trust Landrover.

West Country waltz: The Hardman family enjoyed a fine week in Dorset

Henry VIII built a castle here to guard the harbour entrance but the whole 560-acre island could be a monument to British eccentricity. During the 18th and 19th centuries, a succession of rich fools blew entire fortunes building ornamental gardens, bathing lakes, a pottery works and even a small railway.

During World War II, it was heavily bombed after fake fires were lit to deceive German pilots into thinking that they were bombing Poole and Bournemouth. The Luftwaffe dumped more than 1,000 tons of explosives on Brownsea instead.

You can spend all day exploring its woods and heathland. In 1907, Robert Baden-Powell held the first Scout camp in history on Brownsea and it's been a place of scouting pilgrimage ever since.

For much of the 20th century, the island was owned by the batty Mrs Bonham-Christie who banned all visitors and let the whole thing decay until her death in 1961. Her heirs gave it to the nation in lieu of death duties and, today, it is run by a small but devoted team of resident Nat ional Trust wardens.

Brownsea must be relieved to be in the safest hands since the monks of Cerne Abbey ran the place in medieval times. In Enid Blyton's books, Brownsea is recast as Whispering Island. It certainly was by the time we reached the ferry for the mainland. After a long weekend of goats, steam trains, sea air, otters and fish and chips, our children had completely conked out.

Driving home, I reflected that we never did get round to those lashings of ginger beer. Another time.

Travel Facts

The Bull Hotel has double rooms from £85 B&B, 01308 422878, www.thebullhotel.co.uk.

For more on Dorset, www.visit-dorset.com.




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