Parks & Open Spaces
Sandham Grounds
Just across the road from miles of golden sands, on what was once Sandham Fort, demolished in the mid-19th century the council maintain the site which includes a skate park, a playground – the Steven Jenkins Rainbow Park, and a sports and multi-use games area.
Location
The grounds are located at:
Culver Parade,
SANDOWN
Isle of Wight
PO36 8AT
By Car:
The site is served by the Fort Street Car Park, a long stay car park run by the Isle of Wight Council (PO36 8BA)
By Train:
The grounds are 0.8 miles or approximately 15 mins walk from Sandown Station.
By Bus:
The nearest bus stop is the Wight City Stop on Culver Parade at the entrance to the centre. Routes 8 and 24 serve the stop.
Skate Park - "The Fort"
The skate park was opened in 2008. Equipment installed includes:
- Two flat banks
- Two quarter pipes
- A 9ft x 8ft roll in
- A table top
- A grind rail
- A set of three wide steps
- A large flat area for freestyle.
Steven Jenkins Rainbow Park
The playground was first opened in 2001 in memory of 6-year-old Steven Jenkins who sadly died in 1999 was refurbished in 2021. Equipment in the park includes:
- Tree Top Towers Multi-Play Structure (including accessible slide)
- Magic Toadstools
- Swirl Roundabout (accessible)
- King Cole climbing frame and slide (low level)
- Castle Climbing frame and slide
- Donkey Springy
- Tea-cup twister
- Crazy Twister
- Junior swings
- Basket swings
- Make it rain and Xylophone play boards
Multi-Use Games Area
The area between the Skate Park and the Rainbow Park is multi-use. Equipment, aimed at those over twelve, includes:
- Multi-Use Games Area with Football Goals
- Multi-Use Games Area with Basket Ball hoops.
- Climbing Area
- Free Rider
- Tornado Carousel
- Basket swing.
Los Altos Park
Los Altos park is an area to park land to the west of Sandown along the railway. The park includes a vernal pond, three large grassed areas and small wooded areas with tree canopy’s.
Location
The park can be accessed via various entrances:
Melville Street, PO36 9DH,
Simeon Path, PO36 9FE
Through the carpark at the Heights off the Broadway, PO36 9FD.
By Train:
The parks Simeon Path entrance is 0.3 miles or approximately 5 mins walk from Sandown Station.
By Bus:
The nearest bus stop is at the heights where the park can be accessed through the carpark. Routes 2, 3 and 8 serve the stop.
Route 24, serves the Beachfield Road stop which is just 5 minutes walk away.
History
Sandown’s Los Altos park owes its history since Victorian times to Sheffield-born banker and merchant George Wilkinson Drabble (1823-1899). Drabble made his fortune as Chairman of the London and River Plate Bank and director of six companies in Argentina and Uruguay.
The name of the family mansion he built in Sandown reflected his South American connections. Los Altos means The Heights in Spanish. The estate remained in the hands of the Drabble family until the 1950s, when Sandown-Shanklin Urban District Council acquired part of it as a public park.
The mansion and some of its gardens survive in private hands as the Broadway Park Hotel. One remnant of the Victorian structures can still be found in the public parkland, the semi-circle of steps which once led to the lower grounds and a thatched two-storey summer house, later used as dog kennels and long since demolished.
Within living memory, a stone bridge linking the house with the steps used to cross Drabble’s Path, the walkway which runs to and from the railway crossing. The bridge has now been demolished after falling into disrepair.
(contributed by Paul Coueslant)
Sunshine Trail
The park includes part of the sunshine cycle trail, a 12 mile circular cycle route.
