As I approach middle age, with a small child to entertain, Lord save me from the inevitable hell of another Center Parcs mini break.

In fact, scrap that: at least Hell is probably always warm and there would be a few fun people there.

Instead, a holiday in Center Parcs is a never-ending grey-skied, pine-filled purgatory, teeming with either the most ghastly, gurning, smug, self-satisfied drones you could ever meet, or those counting down the hours of ‘forced family fun’ until they can crack open a drink.

Clad in sportswear, the former cycle their hired, creaking bikes, merrily unaware of what berks they look in their attempt to appear ‘active’, while witlessly traversing a Tarmac path through hastily planted young woodland on the edge of Milton Keynes.

In the evening, having done their time, the latter eat in themed restaurants, joylessly knocking back Heineken (at almost £8 a pint).

As I have watched these men, I am reminded of the rumour that circulates in some circles that wives will countenance certain ‘non-vanilla’ sexual practices that they would never consent to at home – but only if their husbands agree to a holiday in Center Parcs. (If you don’t believe me, just check Mumsnet, where a conversation has been going on for many years about this very topic.)

All of which explains why I am hardly impressed by the news Center Parcs has been given planning permission for its first holiday village in Scotland, near Hawick in the Borders.

I can say this with conviction: Center Parcs is the worst place in the world. I know this because I, too, have seen the dark side. Three times.

A holiday in Center Parcs is a never-ending grey-skied, pine-filled purgatory, writes Annie Kinsella

I can say this with conviction: Center Parcs is the worst place in the world. I know this because I, too, have seen the dark side. Three times

Thrice I have been duped by the lie that a good time can be had with family and friends in man-made forests just off the M1, all squeezed into a soulless log cabin not much bigger than any of our respective living rooms.

The first time, I was just 15. I didn’t know any better and probably didn’t have much say in it.

Taken by the parents of a friend, and their friends with children of a similar age, we teenagers passed the weekend swimming and stealing bikes during the day.

By night, we disappeared into the woodland after pilfering from the inordinate stash of booze our families had smuggled in the back of their cars, leaving our mothers and fathers to neck Chablis on the leatherette sofas.

The second time, I should have known better. In my early 30s, male friends with boring wives who don’t allow them to drink suggested a couples’ holiday to celebrate the birthday of one of the poor beleaguered blokes. It was clearly subterfuge. It was always going to end badly but still I went.

Pitched to one of their wives as an ‘active, wholesome holiday’, I was shuffled off with the women to take part in endless games of badminton which we had to book six months previously, while the blokes went to a sports bar to ‘watch the game’ and guzzle overpriced beer from noon.

When eventually they wobbled back to meet us for dinner at one of the faceless ‘Italians’ or ‘Indians’, I forget which, one of them promptly fell asleep at the table.

The rest of the meal passed in silence. But we had booked a lodge with a hot tub and a sauna – for about £2,000 for four nights – and so were duty bound to use it! Back we filed, the men stuffed to the gullet on focaccia (or naan?) and beer, to strip semi-naked and stew fragrantly alongside each other in a human soup of mute awkwardness. One of our party later passed out in the sauna.

Center Parcs opened its first UK resort at Sherwood Forest in 1987. There are currently five resorts in the UK

The third time, I went with my own family. Sisters, nieces, nephews and boomer mother who, in fairness to the game old girl, would much rather have been anywhere else.

It was a last-minute decision and, having failed to book any of the activities in time, we were resigned to spending the weekend in the dreaded glass dome that will be familiar to all devotees of Center Parcs. It’s the one thing you don’t have to pay for separately – the deceptively named Subtropical Swimming Paradise.

In reality, this is where all hope goes to die. It features a ‘pool’ which is actually a wide, sloped basin, which erupts into a wave machine at a minute’s notice.

Your only warning is the haunting, pre-recorded cry of what presumably is meant to be Tarzan, from which point you have exactly 60 seconds to fight your way past the bobbing masses back to ‘shore’, in order to avoid being smashed mercilessly against the cement ‘rocks’.

If you don’t fancy that appealing prospect, you can instead experience the Wild Water Rapids, where you will be hurled ferociously down a perilous outdoor aquatic ride by the sheer force of water – and the weight of a portly man inevitably named Darren (I only know this because his wife is usually screaming his name as she hurtles alongside him), who barrels apologetically behind you, while your skin is ripped off as it scrapes against the sides.

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If you are a thrill-seeker you can take your life in your hands by hopping on the Typhoon, a two-seater tube ride, during which, I swear, I glimpsed God. And if that sounds too energetic, you can squeeze your pimpled thighs into an inflatable ‘donut’ on the Lazy River.

Here you’ll try to bob nonchalantly alongside your fellow park-goers and pretend you don’t notice when a red-faced and embarrassed woman spills out of her swimsuit as she battles to free herself from the rubber ring as you wait to disembark.

The kids love it, obviously. And that is why I now face my 40s with the grim realisation that my time at Center Parcs is not over.

I will have to go again. Because that is what you do when you are middle-aged, think you are middle class and have a child.

It is an affliction peculiar to modern parents but, at some point, you arrive at the realisation that your holidays are no longer about what you want to do, they are ‘all about the kids’.

And if your friends and family are like mine, they will for some reason need to tick off a stream of ‘activities’ and organised fun before they allow themselves the pleasure of relaxing.

So it is with heavy heart that I approach 2026 knowing my holiday dream of hiring a rustic French farmhouse and filling it with friends, du pain, du vin and some nice fromage remains a fantasy.

I will at some point once again be forced to join the throngs of Sweaty Betty-clad, cycling, jogging, badminton-playing morons, who have left their new-build estates, got into their Jaecoos and driven eight miles down the road to set up camp in a faceless counterfeit Nordic lodge.

But hopefully I will, at least, be quietly sozzled.

Annie Kinsella is a pseudonym (because her holiday pals would never forgive her!)