Disclosure: We were given a bundle of ride tokens in exchange for this blog post and promotion on social media

Our visit to Carters Steam Fair last autumn was one of the highlights of our year. Their beautiful colourful rides absolutely charmed us all, and I’ve kept a keen lookout to see when they would be visiting near us this year, and I was thrilled to see they would be close to us again in Woking.

If you’ve not heard of Carters Steam Fair before, you’ll more than likely recognise them, as they’ve featured in numerous films and TV shows, including Paddington 2, and Call the Midwife. They’ve spent the past 40 years rescuing and restoring vintage fairground rides and taking them on tour across the South of the UK. The fairground has a really lovely feel to it, with pretty bulb lights, beautifully painted signs, and old fashioned candyfloss on a stick (Max’s first port of call on arrival!). When the candyfloss is as big as your head you know it’s good!

One of the things I love about Carters Steam Fair is that it’s massively family friendly. There are so many rides for little ones to go on, with two little carousels, a little train, and lots of little car rides that we pretty much had to drag Ben off of!

Entry to Carter’s Steam Fair is free, and you buy tokens to pay for the different rides. Most of the toddler rides cost the equivalent of £2, with bigger rides costing £2.50-£3 per person.

Max and Ben both played Hook-a-Duck and Max managed to hook his first duck (with a little help from the guy manning the stand!) He was so proud of himself!

There were quite a few rides which were different to last year, so I loved that they mix it up a bit. And I loved this rather dystopian view across the green with Woking town centre dominating the background.

I wasn’t sure if Max would want to go on the dodgems this year, as last year he wasn’t quite brave enough, but he was massively keen this time around. I think it’s safe to say that it was the biggest hit of the day with him, but sadly I didn’t get any photos of him on them, as Ben was so put out that he was too small to go on, that I had my hands full trying to stop him having a full blown tantrum!

The boys had a little ice cream break, sat by The Skid, which I always find very hypnotic to watch, whizzing around.

But my favourite ride is always the Carousel! (Or the Gallopers in this instance - did you know it’s only called a carousel if it moves anticlockwise?) It was our last ride of the day, and Ben really wanted to go on with me - that is until he noticed that Max had gone on the little cars again, and decided he would have much preferred to do that! His little face here makes me laugh so much - I suspect that’s my grumpy face too!

We loved our second visit to Carters Steam Fair every bit as much as the first, and it was so lovely to see both boys that little bit older and able to enjoy it in a slightly different way. It’s clearly going to be an annual tradition for us!