How to do Legoland at half term
Unless you are lucky enough to have a school who takes random Inset days in the middle of term or you home school, you have to take your children to theme parks during the busiest, peak times, there is just no way of getting around it.
My children had been had been badgering me to go to Legoland (‘EVERYONE apart from us has been to Legoland’) and to be honest, the thought of taking them during the school holidays made me want to vomit into any near receptacle. However, as they were 8 and 10, and I’d been swerving the inevitable for a good five years, I finally caved and took them last October half term. And do you know what? We actually had a fabulous day, and we managed a fully packed day. Let me let you in to our secrets of success.
Game Plan
I heard so many different tips regarding Legoland, and how best to tackle it: Start at the back, queue during lunchtime, hit the big rides early and late etc. But we largely ignored this. We did have our own game plan though. Both children chose a ride they really wanted to go (the lego friends Horse Riding and The Dragon Apprentice Rollercoaster) and one they both wanted to go on (Pirate Falls), and we made sure that these three rides were done. This way, I knew I would take home happy kids who could regale their classmates with tales of the great rides. They also snuck in the driving school, which according to my kids, is a must-do at Legoland. We found the queues alright for all of these, never queuing for more than an hour on any of them (sometimes substantially less).
Entry and Exit Time
I had read repeatedly that you need to be at the park when it opens. I had also read about customers queuing for considerable amounts of time just to get in. Basically, because we can be quite tardy in the mornings during holiday times, we ended up leaving Tooting late, so we arrived at the park at just gone 11. At this time, we walked straight in, no queues, and we knew we were going straight to Heartlake City, and we were on the first ride all within about half an hour of parking up.
We left the park at around 530 pm. We’d had enough by this point and were ready to leave. Bar a little queuing on the single lane back to the roundabout, we were out of Legoland and back on the M4 home in about 15 minutes.
It is worth noting that we were there when it turned dark from 330 onwards. This meant that some rides closed early, when creating your game plan, make sure you are aware of this.
Food
If you are looking for organic, healthy, 5 a day type food, Legoland is not the place for you. It’s hot dogs and fizzy drinks pretty much. Take water, snacks and fruit. All of this is easily eaten on the hoof, and once again, you avoid the queues for food!
Non-ride Entertainment
– The shows are really good! Take time to watch one.
– Miniland is fabulous! We all really enjoyed this part and spent a good amount of time looking round it and marvelling at the models. It is, after all, why Legoland is there!
– There’s a great adventure playground called Castaway Camp, which my kids loved, and bombed round for while. It also gave me a chance to sit down and have a restorative coffee!
– It was Halloween while we there and the enchanted forest was holding Bricktacular. Time to build lego pumpkins, meet a lego vampire and generally enjoy this little bit of the park.
Queues are quite fun
Dragon Falls had a mini playground which the kids played on, and some of the rides had lego building tables to entertain the kids. I can easily be entertained with social media! I really didn’t find queuing that much of a chore. If you really hate them, there is always the Q-bot option …
In conclusion, between 1115 and 530 we managed to go on:
Mia’s Riding Adventure
Spinning spider
The Dragon’s Apprentice
Pirate Falls Treasure Chest
Legoland Driving School
Fairy Tale Brook (this was a short queue – win! And the lego models were fantastic!)
Plus the Enchanted Forest, a good bit of a show, Olivia’s house, Castaway Camp and Miniland.
To me, we got loads done, in spite of the park being at pretty much full capacity and had a fabulous day out. The fact I couldn’t speak to my husband when we got home due to extreme tiredness is an entirely different matter …!
Do let me know your Legoland hacks too.