Lydia turned 11 last month (which seems to have happened way too soon, she’s my little girl!) and so we took her and her best friend, along with her big sister Georgie, for an afternoon out at Air Nation in Kings Heath, South Birmingham to celebrate.
Air Nation opened last year and we thought it would be a nice change instead of going to Rush trampoline park in Cotteridge, which the girls have been going to for years now, as it is a popular choice in the area for group outings and parties. It was definitely a good decision to make the change to Air Nation as they really enjoyed the outing and it was fun to try somewhere new.
Basically, Air Nation is a giant inflatable indoor play area – like a huge bouncy castle with 18ft tall slides, an obstacle course, and so on. It also has a small bouncy basketball area and a separate toddler area. We went in without having pre-booked a slot and sent the three girls in for a two hour bounce session with no problems.
All three girls had a lot of fun sliding, bouncing, and clambering around to their heart’s content. They decided to play some weird combination of hide & seek and tag for around half an hour, and were happy, tired & sweaty when their two hours were up. James and I chilled out in the upstairs seating area which overlooks the play area – the seating was fairly comfortable although it was very noisy!
As far as facilities go, there is downstairs seating in addition to the upstairs balcony area, several party rooms for birthdays, a cafe, and toilets. The food menu is a variety of fast food with pizzas, burgers, chips and so on, as well as some basic jacket potato options.
James and I had a hot drink each and the girls all had a slush drink but we didn’t order anything to eat as we were taking the girls out for dinner afterwards. The drinks were all OK – pretty typical for an indoor play area cafe. I did ask James to buy me a chocolate bar to go with my drink and he came back empty handed – so they could definitely do with improving their grab & go selection with some snacks.
You can buy one hour or two hour sessions, and they also do a tots only price that limits you to the toddler area (which is walled off from the main area, with it’s own entrance), as well as an after school bounce & eat offer. Socks must be worn, but unlike Rush you don’t need special ones so you can wear your own.
Here’s a quick video tour of Air Nation & a few extra photos from their facebook page:
We followed up our bounce session with a quick visit to Professor Willy’s Sweet Shop and Curiosities which is also in Kings Heath and is a weird & wonderful shop with all kinds of strange things on display and sells traditional sweets in jars – along with some plenty of more modern offerings.
Professor Willy’s used to be an antiques shop but started selling sweets instead during lockdown, and now it’s probably the oddest sweet shop in the country. There is a seating area so you can go in and enjoy a hot drink or ice cream, and they’ve started running some clubs for the local community – what a gem of a place. They even gave Lydia an extra treat as a birthday gift.
We finished the afternoon with a meal at our new-ish local Wetherspoons and took all three girls home happy and well fed, with only a slight sugar buzz going! If you’re near the Kings Heath area it is definitely worth checking out Air Nation & Professor Willy’s – I’m pretty sure we’ll be back to both.
