Jersey travel writer Dom Picksley recently visited the TerSpegelt Eurocamp in the Netherlands, enjoying a week of activities, including lakeside waterslides, ‘TubbyJumping’ – and the mildly alarming practice of ‘dropping’
THERE are over 400 Eurocamp destinations on the Continent and we headed out to the Netherlands for a few days this summer to experience our first-ever visit to one – and we were blown away by the park at TerSpegelt.
Located just south of Eindhoven, next to the town of Eersel and a ten-minute drive from the Belgian border, TerSpegelt was a wonderful introduction to life at a Eurocamp venue, as we rubbed shoulders with Dutch, German, French and British holidaymakers, all enjoying a glorious few days at Brabant’s “top family park”.
With rental accommodation in the form of lodges and glamping tents, along with pitches for caravans and bog-standard tents, and all of it situated in this large, scenic park in the Dutch countryside, centred around three lakes, with an indoor swimming pool, a cycling pump track, crazy golf course, restaurant, tubbyjumping (about which more shortly), and more. It proved a real eye-opener as to how good these parks are and why they are so popular – especially when the sun shines like it did for our few days.
It was just under a two-hour drive south-east from the Hook of Holland, where we’d enjoyed a serene seven-hour ferry trip with Stena Line from Harwich, arriving at the Dutch coast excited about what lay before us – and, indeed, something unique was lying in wait that very same night.
A couple of days earlier, I had booked us into one of the activities organised by TerSpegelt for that evening, something called “dropping”, where they take groups of people away from the park, drop them at some random point, and from there they have to make their way back to base.
My teenage daughter, Amelia, and I only just made it to the “starting line” after arriving on site literally a few minutes earlier. We then boarded a coach with blackout curtains to stop you from seeing where you were going – I took a couple of sneaky peaks out of the window, not that it would have made any difference as this was the first time we’d ever set foot in the place, and I wouldn’t have recognised anything anyway.
Ten minutes went by, then 15, then 20, and I noted to Amelia that we had “been on the bus a while” and wondered where on earth it could have been taking us. Eventually it came to a stop just before 10pm and we got off on some back street in the middle of nowhere – we had been told that we would have to walk back to TerSpegelt without the aid of maps (we would be penalised if caught using one, and hitching lifts was also “outlawed”), although we could ask people for directions.
Oh, and we had to be wary of “spotters” who would give us time penalties or make us do tasks if caught.
We joined an English family for solidarity purposes if nothing else, but our hearts sank when the dad had a crafty look at the map to find out where we were, only to discover we were an hour and 45-minute walk away from TerSpegelt.
We set off in three-minute intervals down this street and that street, comedically diving for cover every time we saw a car coming, behind hedges, laying on the floor and even ducking for cover in driveways. We must have looked like a bunch of idiots to the locals.
Along the way, we managed to get some help from a dog walker who told us of a shortcut, which involved taking cycleways, a route through an industrial estate, before taking us over a dual carriageway into a forest – in the dead of night.
We saw lights up ahead so naturally the thing to do was hide, just in case, and then run when we thought they had spotted us. It was terrific fun, despite the teenage boys in my group getting spooked by every bit of noise coming through the trees, convinced we were going to get eaten alive by non-existent bears.
Just under two hours later we returned to TerSpegelt, only ten minutes after the fastest group to our surprise – although we had gone wrong earlier, losing around ten minutes, so that faux pas could have cost us a shock win.
What a way to begin our break at TerSpegelt, during which we stayed in a lovely, premium three-bedroom lodge, with air conditioning and decking area out the front with a barbecue for us to use (the pork burgers cooked on there the following night tasted lovely).
Tucked away in the corner of a plot of nine lodges, it was just right for us, near enough to all the activities, but also far enough away to have some peace and quiet.
Next day came TubbyJump, a recent addition at the park, which consisted of a tower with three slides, where you propel yourself down one of the slopes on a doughnut dinghy – there’s a smaller slide where you just come to a stop but, on the two 30m ones, you’re launched into the air onto a large cushion – and the bigger the person, the more “air time” you get, and bigger the scars on your arms and elbows. Great fun, though.
Amelia was then “blobbed” into one of the lakes – she had to crawl to the end of a large inflatable pillow and then a designated “jumper” leapt from the adjacent tower onto the other end of the cushion, launching her high into the air and into the water. This same chap must have propelled nearly 100 participants into the air and no wonder he was blowing through his cheeks by the end of it after climbing what must have been hundreds of steps.
With health and safety concerns seemingly not a thing in the Netherlands like it is in the UK (see the previous “dropping” as an example), my son Ben took part in archery tag, which was basically paintballing but with bows and arrows (not sharp arrows, but with rounded balls on the end, and with just a face mask for protection).
Two teams battled it out against each other on a small course, with the aim to knock five blocks out of their opponents’ target to win – or to just hit their rivals with an arrow and knock them out of the game.
After an hour of watching some utterly brilliant carnage, it was the parents’ turn to join in and go all psycho and shoot as many kids – sod the targets! – as possible, or one of the enthusiastic entertainment team, although my aim was mainly not good, but I did strike one person in the neck. I nearly, though, had my head taken off by one young sharp shooter, but I emerged relatively unscathed.
There’s an indoor pool on site and a large slide, with a play area called the SterrenStrand, but if it gets too busy in there, just transfer to the lake outside with its two slides.
Once you’ve done them, swim across the lake to the other one and then back again. But be careful when you fly off the slides – there’s shingle on the lake bed and it comes quite sharp.
We also went all Dutch and hired bikes – they are incredibly popular out there – and went exploring TerSpegelt as well as the picturesque town of Eersel, where we enjoyed talking football to an enthusiastic local gentleman in the tourism office.
We also had games of volleyball and table tennis, while sampling some of the ice creams from the on-site restaurant, as well as chips from the “takeaway”, and all while admiring the views across the lakes – it looks even better in the dark when all the lights come on.
With a shop on site, as well as a launderette and activity tent, where you can do a bit of crafting, play pool or watch Dutch football live on the big-screen, most things are catered for here and there’s barely any need to step away from the park, although we did tick off another country by heading to Belgium and the town of Lommel for a couple of hours, which was only around 20 minutes away by car, while Eindhoven – home of PSV – was about 20 minutes away in the other direction.
Just make sure you don’t drive down a cycle road – like I did!
Key features
Indoor play area and waterpark with pools, waterslides and spraygrounds.
Sand-fringed swimming lake with a twisty waterslide.
Free kids clubs for ages 12 and under.
Sports and activities including mini golf, bicycle track and tennis.
On-site lake with watersports and ‘the Blob’ giant inflatable.
Hire a bike to explore the cycle paths of Nature Gate TerSpegelt.
Located just 35km away from Efteling theme park.
Getting there
Stena Line ferry from Harwich to Hook of Holland. Prices start from around £80 per person return and £400 per family of four with car, without a cabin. Cabins start from around £35.
Seven nights from Saturday 4 April 2026 (Easter holidays) staying in a Comfort three-bedroom holiday home that sleeps up to six guests, from £832.72 per party.
Seven nights from Saturday 4 July 2026 staying in a Premium three-bedroom holiday home that sleeps up to six guests, from £1,152.48 per party.
