Cerrito Vista Park - 6/10

A few weeks ago Isabel sent me an email about a play group that would be forming and meeting in the El Cerrito area. She found out about it from a mom that she met at one of the Library's. She takes Sarah almost every morning at around 10:30 to story time, or singing and music time at one of several local library's near her.It just so happened that the Berkeley High Pool was closed for maintenance and the play date was on a Friday afternoon when we had no plans, so we decided to go. Isabel wasn't able to make it because she had to do something in the city on that day, but Holly and I ventured out and found this amazing park.This is Rowan and his Mom Maya, who are friends with the Organizer Becky. We were the only two who actually showed up. Becky had to cancel because her daughter was sick, and the group hasn't gotten together since. But we did discover a fun new park and had a fun time.The tot structure was in the back of the park, and the park is on the top of a hill, so when we parked we walked up about 50 stairs to get to the main area where the Giant structure is. I spent about 20 minutes looking for "Becky" and then Maya heard me asking someone, and introduced herself.There were no baby swings in the park which was a draw back, but Holly did swing on her belly for a little bit. the park has newly reopened and is very new, with bouncy turf and grass everywhere, and if you are about 6 this park is like six flags.This was a neat little wobble spinning chair. I placed holly in it and spun her around, she was interested but not a fan, and after a spin or two was ready to get down. This is a huge twisty tube slide, and must be about 3 stories high. In order to get to the opening of the slide you have to climb up a latter. Holly actually crawled and walked and climbed all the way through the structures to the little room underneath.I was glad that there was a ladder, this prevented little ones from getting all the way to the slide and perhaps going down unintentionally. Holly loved sitting at the base of the slide waiting to see the kids come out, you could hear them laughing all the way down with shouts of glee.Back in the tot area Holly was happy to clang and make some noise of her own with these little chimes. She rattles them, but i should think about bringing her "Bam Bam" so she can hit them.This is a tricycle that another little boy rode to the park. He was sweet enough to let Holly play with it. At first she was eager to push it around but the steering was tricky and it went around and around in circles.She really like just playing with the fringe too, it was bright red, who wouldn't want to play with that. I let her try it out and ride it, what was really cool about it was that when the front wheel turned the pedals moved around too, so it actually helped you learn to peddle the bike and then when you got older you could move it on your own. We had a fun afternoon playing. We stayed maybe ninety minutes, because even though the park was really cool, there wasn't a lot Holly could do yet but this is someplace we will need to come back too as she gets older.Slides - 1 - There was a single mini slide in the tot section of the park, the other structure had one slide that with help Holly could use, but the other twisty slides were amazing, but too big for Holly to use.

Swings - 0 - Big Kid swings, but no baby swings.

Surface - 1 - Bouncy turf and grass and some sidewalk. it was really nice.

Shade - 0 - There was no shade. the day we went wasn't very hot or sunny, but on a hot day I could see not wanting to stay and play.

Climbing - 1 - Lots of stuff to climb on. Although not super safe for her to be on the big kid structure she climbed all the way to the top with Mommy at her tale.

Parking - 1/2 - was on the street and not super close. I parked at the bottom of the "cliff" there is also parking across a field and tennis court, that you could use, street wise but not have to walk up stairs.

Bathrooms - 1 - Yes. There were bathrooms, though we didn't use them.

Distance - 1/2 - It is relatively close and in a part of town I am familiar with, but it was more then a ten minute drive.

Friends - 1/2 - Most of the kids playing were older, even on the tot structure the kids were 2 and 3 and in the main park there were many kids running around, but they were like 6--7-8 or more.

Fun - 1/2- It was fun, but at this age we had more fun at other places.