Hyde Park Winter Wonderland

[Eggs]

I wanted o bring the children to a Christmas thing to get them in the whole mood. Would anyone recommend this? Or could you ug get anything else in London. Three DDs to entertain, ages 3 to 10. Thanks.

Hi eggs, I really wouldn't recommend WW! Went last year with 4yo and although its free to get in, everything inside is crazily expensive. Father Christmas is free but DH queued for over 2 hours to see him (with dd!).

It's a bit like a fun fair. Your older children may enjoy it, but to give you an idea of price, my 11yr niece went last year with £50 spending money and that lasted her 90 minutes.

And IMHO it's a bit naff and just a big money making exercise....

How about seeing FC at one of the big department stores, seeing he lights on Oxford/Regent Street, the big Christmas tree in trafalgar square, ice skating at the natural history museum...?

thanks so much for that, I thought that it all sounded a bit too good to be true. Might have another think about it all.

We went last year and DS had a bit of a cold so wasn't really into it. It was very quiet (a Friday afternoon / early evening) and after the initial shops it was just fair ground rides but well themed for winter. It was expensive, we got a spud for the boy and a couple of hot chocolates but were put off by the prices of everything else. Would find it hard to recommend, probably good for teenage kids.

We have been for the last couple of years and will probably go again as DD has been asking about it after passing it on the bus last week and seeing it being set up. I would expect it to be an expensive, stressful day and you'll probably be fine!

When you say expensive - what are approx costs for rides/attractions? Thanks

We went last year too - i think it was about £3 per ride. It was a sunday afternoon and it was pretty busy. You couldn't just pay for rides you had to buy tokens, then ended up with odd ones (so you queued once to get tokens then again for the ride iyswim).

By the stalls it was really busy, so just kind of got swept past everything (in the one way system...) without really seeing or buying anything.

And the gluehwein wasn't anywhere near as good as the christmas market in birmingham. And actually i have been on the helter skelter and the carousel for free to take dd on when she was little (she paid, i didn't) in birmingham, there was no chance of that in hyde park.

We won't go again, but we shall be returning to birmingham, although that is close to us, it's much more christmassy and much less like a massive, crowded funfair.

I wouldn't even think about it,.....nasty, tacky, totally ripoff fairground type thing

we went a couple of years back and after a quick nosey at the market stalls we trotted briskly on through.

I don't recall seeing anythign for £3 a go, more like a fiver a go, and iirc you have to queue to get tokens, which you then have to exchange for rides. ...i may have that wrong though!

My DCs are still little and the rides for their ages were 2.50 - 3.00 each in tokens. So that means with 2 of them spending 6 quid for a ride lasting a couple of minutes, a few of those soon adds up! The year that we went when DD was 2 and I was 8 months pregnant with DS I remember getting pushed out of the way by a charming man who was getting his DD off a ride and obviously thought I wasn't moving fast enough for him .

DP and DS (then 10) went last year and had a ball.
But they came home having spent the food shopping budget for the month, give or take a fish finger....

Go on a bus down Oxford St and Regents St, then to the South Bank - there are lots of markets on the S Bank, a Xmas one, and a choc festival, and there is always somethng free happening in the Royal Festival hall, and you can walk along the S Bank and see the street entertainers, and they usually have an old fashioned carousel so you could splash out on one ride.

I'll second the South Bank as a far better experience.