Eype Beach Holiday Park

Pebbly Eype Beach (five minutes’ stroll) welcomes dogs all year round and you can let the kids loose with buckets and spades to go rock pooling or ferreting for fossils. This peaceful beach sits on the spectacular Jurassic Coast, famous for its fossils, craggy coastlines and beautiful beaches. Wherever you walk along this coastline, the sweeping curves of Lyme Bay are your stunning backdrop. Coastal paths run over the clifftops to Thorncombe Beacon (20 minutes’ walk), Seatown and the landmark Golden Cap (both 50 minutes) to the west, or to West Bay (25 minutes) and the cutesy village of Burton Bradstock (an hour) to the east. Backed by soaring cliffs, West Bay (10 minutes’ drive) has a pretty fishing harbour to have a mooch around, while Weymouth (35 minutes) has fine Georgian architecture, sand sculptures to enchant the kids and plenty of harbour-side pubs to keep adults happy. And surely you can spare one day away from this gorgeous coastline to indulge the kids on the go-karts, chute slides and carousels at Crealy Theme Park and Resort (55 minutes)?