The LEGOLAND 2014 thread all your tips and questions answered here!!

[HRHQueenMe]

link to the 2013 thread here

Starting afresh for the new season! The new pirate playground is not yet built (what have they been doing all winter????) but the park has been pruned and tidied and looked lovely yesterday! Xbox room is still closed as well.

The new Pirate Captain Birdsnest is a bit more of an eyecandy man for us mums than last years young man, so thats an improvement, and the lovely pirate Georgie is back in all her glory, still as charming as ever!

Please add your hints and tips, and there is a few of us LL regulars who come on here and will happily answer all your questions!!

Lastly, there is a new burger joint under construction, so that will be a great improvement (as long as they keep the prices reasonable). The coffeeshop in the harbour still does great latte!

Enjoy!

HRH - I found that children need to be over 130cm to go on their own. Oat of the rides which was a bit of a pain as DD is just under.

We had a fab day today - our first trip but definitely not our last - and the tips on this thread were really useful (took picnic in otherwise-no-longer-used buggy) - thanks!
Driving/Boating School, Atlantis, Duplo Valley and Miniland were the big hits for my boys.
Traffic and general busyness/queueing was fairly light - we arrived for about 9.30 and left about 4.15.

If you have a pushchair, do not take the hill train! I made this mistake last week. The hill train has three carriages, two with seats and one with an area for pushchairs. We were the second family on and the first with a pushchair and I felt so smug as I put the pushchair in the pushchair bay and sat down with DD next to it. And then the smugness turned to despair as more and more people parked their pushchairs in the bay effectively trapping me in and went and sat in one of the other carriages. We were the last off the train!

Thanks noramum you are right, none of mine are that tall yet so not quite on the ball there!:)

Pirates playground opens on friday!! Come in pirate gear over the weekend and enter the facebook competition!:)
Finally! (Only like 6 months late.....)

Ooh, we go next week! Really need to sit down and work out the logistics of what rides we can go on as a family, what ones are best for the two year old and what will please the almost-seven year old. Think my head will be Hurting even before we go!! Glad to have two days - and very glad to have this thread, thank you to all contributors and especially HRH for starting it!

Thats really helpful HRH thank you...I did message Legoland on FB and they said that because the Avios tickets don't have barcodes on them we still have to queue up but will see in the morning.

I haven't booked Qbots yet so will see how busy it is tomorrow...in all honesty he might be quite happy going on a couple of rides and looking round Miniland. He will want to do Driving School so have got copy of his passport to prove he is 3.5 because he is tiny and looks younger.

DS1 and his friend are both quite tall for 9...about 148cm I think (Im only 4ft10 and they are both nearly as tall as me!) so figure they will be able to go on stuff on their own. DH will go round with them...Im not brave enough to let them completely loose on their own yet!

We are leaving at 6am and stopping for breakfast on the way so aiming to get there at 9 isn.

wellthatsdoneit you don't still happen to have your photo voucher do you?

Hello! Anyone know if the alternate routes are always signposted or just at peak times? Travelling from Henley direction, and have noticed sat nav wants me to go from M4 J6, which this thread says I should not do!!

Iggi, there are permanent signs up for the alternative routes!
From henley I would come down via Bracknell Ascot back roads to avoid traffic if possible. Head to jct 10, go tp bracknell, verge off through winkfield, hit NORTH STREET, take a left at the big roundabout and you are there. Simples!

Oh thank you! (Though dh has just reminded me we are staying in Hurley, not Henley, but on the same road! )
I've been googling but can find nothing to say if there's an Inset day this week (we could go any two days bar Friday). Trying to remember it's supposed to be fun feels more like an assault course at the minute!
Loads more prepared for having this thread though

Hello. We were at legoland for the first time, and we're just home. It was brilliant. The alternative route into the park was great. We thought we were going round in circles but suddenly arrived at the park. On the way out, it wasn't very well signposted and we're still not sure if we did it correctly, as it isn't so well signposted.
The food in the park was poor. We used the "kids eat free after 3pm" at the Burger Kitchen. It was pretty awful food but 4 of us were fed for 16 quid. Half of my burger bun was like a crunchy biscuit. I took it back and was offered a replacement. I refused but asked for an ice cream instead, which they were happy to do. The ice cream was awesome btw.
The ponchos (I think) were £3.50 each but we didn't need to built any.
I had a 9yr old ds and 3yr old ds with me. The best rides for us were the 6-13 yr old driving school, Atlantis was brilliant, all of Miniland and Star Wars were amazing, and dino safari.
I totally objected to the extra fairground-style stalls where you have to pay even more cash to win prizes - I think they bring down the tone of the place.
Finally the refillable drinks bottle was £7.50. We bought 1 of them and shared it. We must have had it refilled 15 times the first day, and we were asked to show the receipt only once. So I'm pretty sure you'd be able to have it refilled on subsequent days for free if you were that way inclined
And fwiw the legoland hotel was amazing.

Igggi there are buggy parks at each ride. We left a massive beach bag and the buggy every time. Everyone was doing the same. I didn't leave any the camera or purses at any point but did leave lego man bottles etc. Nothing got knicked. And tbh some people left their legoland carrier bags, which also didn't get stolen. So if you're sensible you'll be fine.

Iggi - I take a "grab bag" with me (last time, it was DC2's little life reins rucksack as I'd forgotten my usual little bag) which I keep my purse, car keys & phone in and I take that on every ride. The rest of the stuff in just piled in, on & under the pushchair. Yes, someone could go through all of the bags but I figure everyone has got pretty much the same stuff with them and it's not really stuff anyone wants to nick (nappies, clothes & picnic stuff really). If you buy stuff in any of the shops, you can arrange to collect it on the way out so don't have to leave expensive Lego sets lying around.

Have been! Looked round me for mumsnetters arriving at 9.16 via a circuitous route and armed with picnics
Picnic at the pirate show was a hit, nothing stolen from buggy and barely a queue. Back tomorrow which may be worse, I hope not! Went on dragon roller coaster twice as no queue at all. Things like Boat School busier though.
Resisted buying a refillable cup, but spent more on individual drinks than it would have cost - just too hot not to drink!

Two year old wasn't overly happy (being under 90cm) until we discovered the duplo bit and he also loved Atlantis, which we went on twice.
Think we'll split up tomorrow and take turns with each child, so not so much waiting around
So knackered....

Went to Legoland for the first time yesterday with 4yoDD and wanted to thank everyone for reeally useful tips - had a great time (although I think DH was fed up of hearing "someone on mumsnet said").

Used Tesco clubcard vouchers, which was a really good deal - much better than the BOGOF vouchers would have been. Paid for parking online first which I would recommend as saw queues for pay machines at end of day. Standard £4 parking was fine. Grateful for the people who said to take a buggy even if DC growing out of them - haven't used our for year but was a godsend not to have to walk every where at DD's pace and listen to her moaning about hills, and great to have somewhere to dump the picnic, drinks, swimming stuff and (unused) waterproofs whilst we were on rides / looking around. Like other posters have said, just took small cross body bag for camera, money, phones etc and kept that on me at all times.

Plenty of people in the park, but being midweek term time we didn't have any problems with queueing depsite not getting Q Bots. Followed MN advice - got there early and headed for Atlantis first. I think were the first people on! Didn't queue for more than 15 mins for anything, and plenty of things we walked straight on. We did walk away from Lazer raiders mid afternoon as signs said 45 mins, but was then practically straight on when we returned in last hour of day. All in all did 15 rides, plus Stunt Show (fantastic and great time for a picnic!), both play areas, both splash parks and of course a look at Miniland. My only regret is not doing 4D cinema, due to my bad planning and DD and DH not seeming interested enoujgh to go out of our way to get back ot it. 2 days would be ideal to be able to take time and really look at the details of all the amazing models, and go on everything, but by rushing around I certainly felt we made the most of one day! DD was ideal age I think - young enough to appreciate all the younger attractions and simpler rides, but just over a metre tall so old enough to go on anything she wanted to (Viking River falls and Dragons Apprentice probably her most adventurous choices - we didn't do the log flume, pirate ship or Dragon).

Oh, we found a great traffic free route home, despite it being rush hour, by following the advice here: www.uglw.co.uk/legoland-windsor/i.php?page=23. Would definitely reccommend if you heading for M4 - especially westbound. This website was also useful for familairising myself with what we might want to go on beforehand, as was this blog: www.madeformums.com/school-and-family/legoland-for-2-3-and-4-year-olds---best-rides/29585.html

Sorry for long post - must still be excited!

Hello wise ones, does anybody happen to know whether there is an entrance to the park directly from the legoland hotel or do you have to walk right round to the main entrance? Thanks

bronners17 the LL hotel has its own entrance at the hotel next to Dino Safari/Atlantis, so you will start your day at the bottom of the park.

Day2 for us (wed) even quieter than day 1. Between us went on Atlantis four times - no queues. Sometimes a school group would appear at the same time as you, that was the only busy times. Loads of people milling about though. Lots of Scottish accents!
Wouldn't have thought to bring a picnic without this thread, lunch at the pirate show was a success on both days. Weather obviously helped though too hot really by the end

Thanks hrh x

Brilliant thread, thanks so much to all the contributors. We are going to LL on either the 26 or 27 July, first weekend of the standard school hols I think we are mad but a birthday is a birthday is a birthday when you are six!

We are coming from Reading so that Bracknell route suggested earlier sounds like a good idea, plan on leaving home 7.45am so should be there for 9am??? qbot will be a must have, will two be ok for 2 adults and 2 children? Will bring buggy, wetsuits, change of clothes, in car DVD players lol and a picnic.

Do we buy qbots online prior or buy on the day? Same q with parking, can we secure car park c in advance by purchasing online?

Great support for going down the hill and starting rides with Atlantis annnnnnnd ummmmmm boat school was it, knights something or other, might need to do some more research on the actual rides :) DS loves the star wars range so the miniland thingy sounds really good.

Keep the tips coming :)

Star Wars exhibition is within "The Beginning" so you can go to it before 10, when the gates into the rides open.

I've done some reading on the Qbots, do most people go for the basic option where you have the normal wait time but your place in the queue reserved so you can go off and do other fun stuff instead of standing around or do people stump up for the extra feature which cuts your wait time in half?

Great thread! How much is the Legoland Hotel and what's it like staying there. We plan on going midweek August for a long weekend.