This Saturday, we drove out to Scandia Family Fun Center (http://www.scandiasports.com/), near Sacramento, central California. It’s about a two mile drive from the San Francisco Bay area. They also have locations in Vacaville, Northern California, and Ontario, down near Los Angeles.

As you can see by the website, there are a number of attractions on offer. It’s just off the highway, which is a little disconcerting, as when you are playing miniature golf, you feel like the cars and trucks are right on top of you! Fortunately, not even I am capable of slicing a ball up over a fence with a putter. Though, of course, I did give it a good go, as you’d imagine.

The adventure world, built in 1977, has a mild Scandinavian theme; personally, I’d have liked a bit more of this, but I’m a sucker for parks that have any sort of regional focus. I was hoping, I must admit, for pickled herrings. There were at least Viking helmets in the gift shop. We discussed, given the history of the Viking raiders, whether or not it would be an appropriate thing to pillage all of the prizes on offer, but in the end we decided that this might be tough to explain this in a court of law.

Frustratingly, it was raining heavily when we were there (make sure the check the forecast if you go!), so most of the attractions were shut. We did go out and brave the miniature golf course, but we couldn’t go on the rides, or the go-karts (though the track does look pretty great – they have a giant windmill!), or in the batting cages. However, the staff there were very understanding, and offered us a refund on our all access wristbands ($20), or the equivalent in tokens to play on the arcades. Having travelled for a couple of hours to get out there and not wanting to have had a wasted journey (not that any journey to play miniature golf is ever a wasted one), we opted for the latter, and spent a few hours playing alien invaders  and shooting basketball.

I have a definite soft spot for these family started, non mainstream adventure parks. They aren’t the brightest, or the loudest, or the biggest, but neither do they try to sell you overpriced merchandise at every turn, and nor do they have lines for everything that go on for hours and hours. Scandia Family Fun Center certainly lives up to its name – we didn’t have children with us (I suppose we qualify as adults, just!), but there’s probably something there for every member of the family to enjoy, in a sort of low level fun fashion. There are certainly worse things to be doing in the capital corridor, that’s for certain.

So, tell us about those days out that you’ve had that aren’t… exhilarating, or life changing, but rather, just good, clean, fun, and that can fill up a spring weekend without breaking the bank. Hey, we could all use that!