Maddy Carr Rushby 

Travels round Britain with dad

Maddy Carr Rushby, 14, has been accompanying her dad on Guardian assignments since she was three. Here she chooses her top five UK activities
  
  

Maddy at the Forbidden Corner in 2010.
Maddy at the Forbidden Corner in 2010. All photographs: Kevin Rushby for the Guardian Photograph: Kevin Rushby/The Guardian

The Forbidden Corner, Leyburn, North Yorkshire

I loved it when I was little and I still do. Basically, it’s a huge garden full of magical and weird experiences: water jets that shoot you, tunnels that whisper or get so narrow you have to squeeze through, underground rooms that revolve – it’s brilliant and they keep adding stuff.
Adult £12, 4-15 years £10, theforbiddencorner.co.uk

Wild camping at Sandwood Bay, Sutherland, Scotland

We hiked in and wild camped in rainy weather. It was cold and the midges were terrible. But we lit a huge fire on the beach and made fly swatters from kelp, then played music on our phones and danced. It was a disaster that was a lot of fun. You hike in from Kinlochbervie, the nearest village.

Hike Helvellyn, Lake District

If my Dad is planning a hike, he never mentions the word “walk” – he knows how I feel. Walks are for dogs. But Helvellyn is different. I’ve done it three times from Glenridding. Striding Edge is a great scramble. Wilf, our dog, who does like walks, had his first swim in Red Tarn on the descent. And I saw my first red squirrel at the bottom.
Stay at Side Farm Campsite, Patterdale, adult £9, child £4

Whitby, North Yorkshire

This is my favourite town. We walk to the pier end and climb to the lower level, then do the Dracula Steps and the graveyard. Afterwards – always – we get fish and chips with mushy peas from Robertson’s on Bridge Street.
Stay at La Rosa Hotel, doubles from £86 B&B

Surf lesson at Rhossili beach, Gower peninsula

This was just a really good day: first a surf lesson on Rhossili beach – I stood up for the first time on a surfboard. Then we went a few miles up the coast to the Blue Pool, a natural rock basin that fills up at high tide, and searched the beach for treasure. My Dad reckoned you could find gold doubloons there, but he might have made that up – to get me walking.
Half-day junior surf lesson £25 with Gower Surfing Shop

 

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