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Reviews of Drum Manor Forest Park Campsite

Campsite Search > UK > Northern Ireland > County Tyrone > Cookstown > Drum Manor Forest Park Campsite > Reviews

Drum Manor Forest Park Campsite
Drum Road
Cookstown
County Tyrone   (Browse area)
BT80 8QS
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Pitches: 32
Open: 01/03/2024 to 30/09/2024
           01/03/2025 to 30/09/2025

Rating: Average Review Score: 7/10 from 9 Reviews
                7/10 from 9 Reviews

 Tent Pitches   Caravan Pitches   Motorhome Pitches   Small Campervans 
 No Glamping Units   No Statics for Hire   No Statics for Sale   No Seasonal Pitches 
 Electric Hookups   No Hardstandings   No Fully Serviced Pitches   Show Full Facilities
Who's it for
 Families Welcome   Not Members Only   Rallies Welcome   Not Naturist Site 
 Dogs Welcome   No Dogs Allowed   Groups Welcome 
Facilities
 Toilet Facilities   Hot Showers   Washing Up   No Bathroom 
 No Baby Changing   Laundry On Site   Drinking Water   Disabled Friendly 
 Chemical Disposal   No Battery Charging   No Gas Exchange   No Recycling Facilities 
 No Kitchen Facilities   No Freezer / Fridge   No Motorhome Point   No Wifi Access 
 Shop <5 miles   Bar <5 miles   Restaurant or Cafe or Takeaway <5 miles 
Activities
 No Playground   No TV Room   No Games Room   No Evening Ents 
 Fishing <5 miles   No Wild Swimming   No Indoor Pool   No Outdoor Pool 
 No Horse Riding   No Cycle Hire   No Golf   No Tennis 
 No Beach   No Watersports   No Boat Launch 
Other Features
 No Sea Views   Not Working Farm   No Campfires Allowed 
 No Waterside Pitches   Public Transport <5 miles  Offroad Dog Walk On Site or Direct Access 

Reviews:

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Date of Visit: August 2021 Unit:  Tent
Nights stayed: 3 Travelling as:  Solo traveller
Reviewer: Mzungu 2 reviews from this member

 A lovely, friendly site. Beautiful walks, good facilities (somewhat dated but very good) which are regularly and thoroughly cleaned and regular visits and checks by the warden who likes to meet everyone personally to make sure all is well.

My second visit this year and will definitely be back.

Only negative is that the ground isn't very level in some areas for tents but if it's not too busy you can find a good pitch near the bottom of the site. 
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Date of Visit: July 2020 Unit:  Tent
Nights stayed: 2 Travelling as:  Mature couple
Reviewer: Eileen Barkley 1 review from this member

 Forest site was very good. Lots of tents. Felt comfortable,

Toilets are open, clean and fresh. Hot shower s available free. A nice bonus. Bring own sanitizer wipes etc.

Great for families. Wood and trails, bring your dog or dogs. Bikes great too. Playpark. 
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Date of Visit: April 2019 Unit:  Touring Caravan
Nights stayed: 7 Travelling as:  Mature couple
Reviewer: Karl51 27 reviews from this member

 Our 1st time on the site but we'll be back.

Plus points:

1. Sean the warden who travels around each new caravanner insuring things are ok

2. Homely site with pitches surrounding a large grass area.

3. Plenty of walks.

4. Great for young families as the area is safe.

Minus points:

1. 6amp electric means that you have to mind what your doing or you'll trip the fuse but it's easy to reconnect.

2. Dated showers & toilets.

Sean hope's that funding will be allocated to upgrade soon & I hope so cause it would be well deserved. 
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Date of Visit: June 2018 Unit:  Tent
Reviewer: Carelkat 1 review from this member

 Our family camped at Drum Manor forest park two weeks ago. We booked with the office on the phone and was sent an email with instructions and gate code. We arrived and set up camp with electric hookup and nice soft green grass.

The kids loved it and there were lots of families. Caravans, tents and camper vans.

The area is surrounded by forest with great walks and an excellent play park walking distance from the camp, but but not too close.

There is no security on site during the eve so it is important to ensure you lock the gate behind you to ensure no unwelcome guests arrive. The ranger arrived the next morning and was friendly and helpful.

The only thing I would suggest is to clean the facilities. The showers, toilets and kitchen area has not been cleaned in a long time. I would go back there and hopefully someone cleans the facilities on a regular basis. 


Date of Visit: August 2017 Unit:  Touring Caravan
Reviewer: Maure 4 reviews from this member

 We stayed here last year and while it is still lovely grounds there hasn't been any improvement to the electric supply at all we had to use our gas kettle again. My son and family with 2 girls and a baby 6mths their trip switch broke as he had to reset it that many times while here so had NO ELECTRIC for 2 days we shared our gas kettle and nights were cold enough.

I think because of the very low ampage. 1. People don't seem to stay on here as both times we've been on own till our family arrived this time there are a few campers but I mean few.

The cost at £20pn should definitely be well reduced all year round to low season cost £14 until at least their tender is honoured to 10amp as your using your own gas at your own cost.

2. The toilet block still waiting on being updated and requires it too.

Sean is a great ranger when on but hes on holidays I hope you have a really brilliant time away and spoil that wife of yours at this special time. He's a brilliant person so friendly I won't say much about the other ranger but puts me in mind of the scarlet pimpernel now you see him now you don't. Sean would call in morn and even to ask is all ok he's totally missed.

The grass here is so soggy and it not being cut for sometime doesn't help. We put our awning on the tar mac. I don't know how tge tents manage but one had a very mucky doorway.

I do like here but don't think it'll be on our visiting list until that electric amps are brought up to 10 or a low season rate applies all year round till it is because it is a joke at the public's expense.

Come on Drum Manor you can step up and do so much more for your visitors otherwise you are going to be deserted altogether. 

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Date of Visit: July 2011 Unit:  Motorhome
Reviewer: Swiftowner 18 reviews from this member

 I stayed here with my two sons and had a lovely time. The ranger was not around when I arrived, but the gate had been left open for me as I had prebooked.

I chose my own pitch, and had plenty of choice as there was only 3 other outfits there, two of which were 'travelling community'. My sons made friends with the son from the other family staying there, and had a fantastic time.

The forest itself is beautiful and the dog loved its great long walks through it.

The toilet facilities are a bit dated and could do with a lick of paint, but I found them to be clean, tidy and had plenty of hot water. 


Date of Visit: August 2009 Unit:  Touring Caravan
Reviewer: Fortracfan 6 reviews from this member

 Went back here for the August bank holiday (see my previous review). It was wet and dreary - both the park and the weather. The sites were still very wet and turned to mud if you walked on them. No one felt inclined to even attempt putting an awning up although a couple of people erected open gazebo's.

Again the park was only half full despite most other caravan sites being booked out for this weekend. We accounted for 3 of the sites so there was maybe only another dozen vans in a park capable of at least twice that number. The park is starting to look very unkempt and rundown. I also have to say that the door to the mens toilet was open most of the time which was just as well as when it was closed the smell was overpowering.

Talking to people it would appear that the most of them (and their friends) have had the 'traveller' experience at the park this summer (not the experience I mentioned in my last review) and it is just putting people off coming. Its such a shame that such a pleasant park is being allowed to go this way. 


Date of Visit: April 2009 Unit:  Touring Caravan
Reviewer: Fortracfan 6 reviews from this member

 A typical Forest Park site and one of our regular haunts, situated a few miles outside Cookstown that unusually doesn't seem to suffer too much from flying pests.

The site is only accessible through a padlocked barrier system that relies on the people on site keeping it that way (and they don't). As such it has been prone to the odd 'travellers' invasion. That said we have stayed here during one of those times and I have never yet seen people that kept the site as neat and clean as they did. When they moved off the site the last thing they did was to walk the area, lift any rubbish that was there (and there wasn't much to be lifted), then proceeded to wash and brush down all the pitches. If only the rest of us were that considerate.

You may not see the Ranger when you show up as he appears to look after the whole forest and all the work that entails, but if you are expected then the access barrier will normally be open for you. Ranger is very friendly and is usually found on the site early in the morning and again later in the evening.

This site was very wet in April although being the only unit there on a Thursday night I had the choice of pitches and was able to get one that was dry enough to get the porch awning up. This can be a problem right through the season at this particular park. Pitches are all electric hookup unless you belong to the 'Touring the Trees' group in which case you have a separate area that has about 8 pitches. We stayed over Easter and were very surprised at the number of people who didn't show up - park was only about half full despite being fully booked.

Facilities are typical forest park, just the basics - older toilet blocks in need of a makeover with a separate shower area. Just one word of warning - this forest park (like all the others) does host scout groups at various times of the year and they can get noisy throughout the day. On a previous visit this resulted in the facilities being strained and getting very dirty, mucky and smelly very quickly. There was a scout group there at Easter but this time they weren't allowed access to the campsite facilities.

Again like most of the Forest Parks TV and satellite reception is very hit and miss, but with loads of forest walks isn't really missed. The small cafe hasn't been open during our recent visits (again this now seems to be common in all the forest parks) so if supplies are needed the nearest place to get them is Cookstown which has plenty of good supermarkets including ASDA and plenty of take aways including a McDonalds.

All in all we like this site and are going back tomorrow for a long weekend with quite a few of our caravanning friends. 


Date of Visit: June 2009 Unit:  Tent
Reviewer: Gizmo+Co 1 review from this member

 Hi, just literally returned from an overnight camping trip to Drum Manor which turned out to be a complete nightmare. My kids - daughter 8 and son 4 had been begging to go camping for months, so we bought a nice new tent, all the equipment and let them have a look at campsites in Northern Ireland online. Everyone agreed that, at an hour or so drive away, Drum Manor looked good.

We got to the campsite on Saturday at around 3PM to find that there were no staff on site and after asking a few other campers and caravanners were told the forest ranger would normally call round later and could be paid then and were given directions to the Tent area.

When we got there it was basically a field but had a couple of other families with children there and as such thought OK. We did have to spend a little time clearing the area of where we intended to pitch, as there were the remnants of broken bottles about, but put this down to previous careless campers - also noticeable were several scorched areas were campfires had been lit but thought this was maybe relatively normal and campfires were allowed (in a forest?)

Everything was fine until around 7PM when a couple of car loads of girls in their early 20's arrived but again they seemed reasonably quiet and said hello etc. Any time we passed. By around 1030 several other cars had arrived but again no real problems reasonably quiet with people enjoying a quiet drink on a warm evening.

However by midnight things had started to get noisy with more and more cars of youths arriving and by 1 in the morning, we were being treated to fireworks, screaming at least 3 campfires and what appeared to be a competition between at least 4 cars to see who had the loudest speaker system - at this point, there had to be at least 15-20 males aged approx 15-25, drunk out of their minds and shouting, screaming all over the site - not just the tent area but all around the entire site.

This continued until around 6AM when some cars left and a few stayed behind and slept in their cars or a couple of pop-up tents.

By 930am Sunday they had left - we were later informed that they had brought chains and padlocks and after having someone who was staying 'legitimately' on the site open the gates, they then chained and padlocked them with their own locks. Apart from the obvious concerns this raises with regard to any medical emergency requiring fire/ paramedics, it also shows the site is 100% unmanned overnight without even a passing police visit.

We were told this morning that this is not an uncommon occurrence with gangs of youths from the local Cookstown area arriving at this site and using it as a party venue, knowing full well that they will not be approached by campers due to their numbers and the fact the site is unmanned with NO Security or CCTV and that campers are left to do what they want.

They arrive late and leave early thus avoiding paying and by padlocking gates make sure that even the forest ranger has difficulty accessing the site.

Incidentally the 'well equipped Toilet & Shower facilities' were reminiscent of what you would expect in an inner city unmanned public toilet with a heavy smell of urine and excrement with toilet rolls pulled of walls and lying in puddles of urine on the floor (probably due to the youths but with no staff on site from lunchtime Saturday to Sunday morning, who knows?).

Avoid this place at all costs if travelling with children or if you just fancy a relaxing camping or caravanning trip - whilst I am sure there have been many people lucky enough to have not experienced the behaviour we did - we were not the first and were told we would not be the last as the forestry commission and local authorities do not seem to want to address the problem and there are no plans to make this a managed, manned site or to introduce any form of security or safety for anyone staying there. 


Date of Visit: October 2006 Unit:  Touring Caravan
Reviewer: Oakydoaky 6 reviews from this member

 We love Drum Manor. Its one of our favourite sites. It is right in the forest. There is a barrier to get into it. We always prebook a pitch and the barrier has been open when we arrive.There are plenty of water taps around the site and the covered bins which are made of logs and shared between about 2 caravans. There is a lovely utility block which is very well maintained. The showers are seperate from the toilet area.We always have had loads of hot water (no charge) They are beside the wash-up area, where there are plenty of sinks. There are also laundry facilities, but have never personally used them,so don't know how much they are.

There are lots of forest walks.In summer there is a wee cafe open (limited hours) .There is no children's playground, but my kids never missed it. They played in a clearing just behind the toilet block. They thought they were in the middle of the forest but we could hear everyword they were saying!

Cookstown is just a short drive away, and plenty of shops there 



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Common Questions

Is Drum Manor Forest Park Campsite child friendly?  YES, it accepts children  View all facilities

Where is the nearest shop to Drum Manor Forest Park Campsite?  There is a shop within 5 miles  View all facilities

Is Drum Manor Forest Park Campsite dog friendly?  YES  View all facilities




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