The New shiny LEGOLAND 2017 hints tips and reviews thread! Come on in!

[HRHQueenMe]

LINK TO 2016 THREAD

Welcome to another season of LEGOLAND madness!
Please ask any Legoland related questions, there are loads of seasoned Legolanders here who know the place inside out. There have been loads of really great tips last year so please keep them coming!!!!
Please remember none of us work for Legoland, we are all mums dads childminders and locals who are sharing what we know!
Please keep it friendly. If you had a good bad or plain ugly experience share it too!

THE BASICS OF A SUCCESSFUL LEGOLAND VISIT.

1. Do not pay full price at the door!! There are coupons and offers galore, and tesco vouchers are still your best bet! Annual passes are a snip with tesco vouchers as well. Look out for midweek preeschool offers too!

2. LEGOLAND is all outdoors, there is very little shelter from the cold. Bring plenty of warm clothing if you are visiting, and a change of trousers for all as the water rides get you wet. VERY WET.

3. Q bots will make your life much easier, if you can afford them GET THEM. The basic one is good enough, you dont need anything else.

4. bring FOOD, DRINK AND A PRAM. food is crap and expensive, but there are lovely lawns to picknick on, and you can picknick infront of the pirate show to maximize time. There will be lots of walking so prams are essential esp to load your picknick and wet clothes on.

5. IN SUMMER BRING SWIMMING GEAR!! the splash area is excellent, even for grownups to cool down.

6. write your mobile number on the arms of all your children, wristbands for this are available free from customer services.

7. if your toddler is under 90 cm they are limited in the number of rides they can do. If your child is borderline 90 cm get them measured at customer services, who will issue a wristband to say they are ok to ride, this will save you arguing with the attendant at every ride.

8. there are LOTS of fun to do with babies and toddlers under 90 cm, dont be put off! You can easily spend a full day having fun with baby! Everything is easily accessible with prams and I have happily BF everywhere with nothing but smiles from the staff.

9. traffic is horrible leaving at closing time. Please please follow the alternate route, it will save you about 1 hour in travel time. Upon exiting LL at the bottom of the hill TURN RIGHT TOWARDS ASCOT FOR ALL ROUTES. DO NOT BE TEMPTED TO GO LEFT TOWARDS WINDSOR IF TRAFFIC IS NOT MOVING. Turning right will take you to the M4 jct 5 in 20 mins and M25 jct 13 in 25 mins. Turning left will take you to jct 6 on the M4 in 1h+ at closing time. You have been warned!

10. have fun!!!!
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    HRHQueenMe Sat 14-Mar-15 10:52:20

TAKING BABIES TO LEGOLAND. Whilst I agree 3 is a good age to go, but babies will have a fab day out too.
A) its free entry for the child
B) you can have a brilliant fun day with a baby!
Im a childminder and often go with baby mindees, there are quite a few rides you can do with a baby, and shows to watch, and loads to look at. I would say over 1 is good. My own children have gone from day one and have always loved it. Bring a sling for queing and there is plenty of pram parking!

Picknicks are definitly allowed, there are lots of lovely lawned areas to picknick on, and tables down by the playground near the hotel. They might not let you picknick in the playground at duploland but there is always trouble finding a free bench there so people do sit on the ground, as long as you are not blocking anything you should be fine. They dont search bags for food.

40 minutes is a good bench mark to arrive before official opening time.
Dont wait for the rush, be there well before opening time, go through the ticket stalls and wait in the ''beginning'' area, there are shops and a coffee shop, hang around until opening time when they open the gates down to the park. Use this time to toilet, coffee, and familiarize yourself with the map so you know your plan of action. Utilize the time well as if you dont you will only manage 1/4 of the park and you will be exhausted. If you are getting a qbot get this now as well. It is a waste of time and money not to arrive on time as it is a big park and you will just get dissapointed if you cant see and do everything you set out to do.

HOTELS AND ACCOMODATION
The Legoland Hotel. Kids love it. Expensive though.

The nearest travellodge is in Windsor, 5 mins drive from LL and right in central windsor with everything on your doorstep. There is a Holiday Inn Express nearby too in Alma Road in Windsor which is ideal.
The Copthorne and Holiday inn at M4 Jct 6 are both handy too, straightforward drive to LL.
Holiday inn Express by Slough Station is also good.
Lots of the Heathrow hotels do deals, I know a few posters last year stayed at the Premier Inn on Bath road, which has its own McDonalds and views over the runway, so quite good fun if thats your cup pf tea, but traffic is bad and its a bit of a trek.Hilton T5 does Legoland Deals and is very child friendly.
Bracknell has several hotels, again a bit of a drive and maybe not the prettiest of towns (sorry Bracknell folks) or best location.
Slough has several hotels but is not quite the place for a holiday either.
The Slough Windsor Marriot is quite nice, its just off Jct 5 (2 mins) M4, so easy access and has a nice pool. For a quaint villagy feel there is the Manor Hotel in Datchet, or the Toby Carvery in Old Windsor do rooms, both easy access.
There are several b&b's near by and Airbnb is always great.

Thanks for starting this thread and the useful tips so far. We're going for the first time in the spring with our 4yo DS. I have some questions if anyone can help.

1. I have taken advantage of the recent Times ticket offer but still need one more ticket. What is the cheapest way to buy a single ticket?
2. Re. Quebots, as we have to go on a weekend (not during the hols though) would getting these be advisable? If so, which one?
3. How much time do you have to allow to get parked and through the entrance gates at a weekend?
4. What is the best area within the park to start our visit?
5. Packed lunch or not? I expect food is expensive but is it ridiculously so and what are the restaurant queues like?

I'm sure I'll have more questions as the time approaches, any advice is appreciated

QBOT is a little gadget that you rent for the day. It works by choosing a ride, and the gadget will put you in a queue for that ride, giving you a time to ride. So say you choose the Viking River. It gives you a time of 10.45. You rock up at 10.45 and the attendant scans your gadget and off you go. As soon as you have been scanned you choose your next ride. It gives you approximate waiting times when you choose so be SMART people. The one hour wait is great when you can utilize this time to do a non queing activity like watch a show or playground time. The 35 minute wait is perfect. You do the ride you are on, and leisurely walk to the next one in time for your allocated slot.
SO DO I NEED A Qbot?

1. can you afford it? It is not a necessity. But it does make your experience STRESS FREE and you can manipulate your time wisely.
2. DO YOU WANT TO QUEUE? In summertime it can be ridiculous. Again choose stressfree vs money.
3. Nobody needs a qbot. Its up to you. Plan your visit. Eat your picknick infront of one of the shows. Use your time wisely for maximum experience. Dont start queing for the first ride you see. Plan Plan Plan.

You mostly get herded into a parking area, but if you can slip away the top of carpark B, C or D are all equally great for distance to the park. If the park is really full ( this happends after lunch in summertime) you might be allocated parking in the overflow field which will give you a walking distance up to the entrance of maybe 10 minutes max. Even if you are at the bottom of the field you are still close to the entrance.

From Parking your car, walking up to the entrance and queing to get in, its hard to say. If you have already bought tickets, you just bypass the queues and go and scan yourself in with the self service gates. 5 minutes tops. The people who queue are the mugs who didnt buy tickets ahead.

If you have vouchers for your full value of your entry, then grab a staff member queue combing. They will often just give you a ticket there and then in exchange for your vouchers. Ask.

PACKED LUNCH> YES YES YES> Food is not great.
Coffee is good at the Harbour cafe in Lego friends Harbour. Pizza place is edible but expensive. Papa Moles Icecreams are OK. Mini Donuts always a hit.
BUT BRING your PICKNICK. Not only does it save on spending ridiculous amounts of cash on food, but you also eat better. The hot dogs have an expiry date several years away, this is cheap cheap cheap artificial crap. You dont really want to eat it.

Does the qbot give you a time? When we were there it buzzed when time for your ride it didn't give a time
I love the qbot.

What date does the park reopen

Can I ask about lego discovery in manchester?

I have heard the Manchester one isn't great but if your kids like Lego they may enjoy it

Brilliant! (Though I feel a bit bossy now )
We are going in July, from Scotland so English schools still on and will stay in a caravan somewhere for a week as it's our main holiday.
When I went a few years back, the accommodation we booked offered two day tickets that worked out quite cheaply and we really want to use that type of ticket again - but I can't see it anywhere.
Any two day ticket offers gratefully received!
Have recently started doing main shop at Tesco so will look into that too.

My main tip (apart from reading this thread) is that the horrendously expensive drink container thing actually worked out quite well - on a really hot day, we had it refilled (for free) umpteen times and shared it around. Better than carrying in loads of drinks, though we did bring in a picnic.

We went last year with two boys 4 & 9. My top tips would be:

Take your own food and drinks.

We stayed at the crowne plaza Heathrow. Lovely hotel with huge rooms, balloons and welcome packs for children and a great breakfast the next morning. We got a cab from there to the pheasant pub in Heathrow and had a great meal, few drinks and then a cab back to the hotel. We really needed it after a full on Legoland day!

Get a q-bot. Sell a kidney, only take your favourite child, whatever it takes. There's nothing more soul destroying than spending 90 mins queuing for a ride you could go on at your local supermarket for 50p! You'll go straight to the front, meaning you'll get to go on everything and then on your second day you can enjoy the shows etc. Ignore the tutters in the queue as you walk past. There are plenty of them!

My only tip to add is that the toilets outside the gates are always quieter than the ones inside, even though they are basically the same block.

Of course, they won't be now. Maybe I shouldn't say.

I've been to the legoland discovery in manchester. It's not a theme park is basically a lego based playcentre with a couple of rides but my small boys love it. Dead quiet term time weekdays. Very expensive on the door but again, lots of offers available.

I have been meaning to start a thread to ask a few questions. Great thread with lots of useful info.

Would like to go when it will be less busy. Have 3 kids 2,4,6. Will be coming from NI so hoping school holidays are different. Was thinking of the 2nd week of our Easter holidays on a weekday so that's a day between 17-21 April. When I look up school holiday dates in London it seems that kids will be back to school then. A few areas seem to be off. Are holiday dates not the same?
Or else the first week of July Ina weekday?
When do u think would b less busy? Don't want to b queuing all day n don't want to 2 b paying for 5 q bots.

Noenergy, I don't know about Easter but the English schools don't finish till around third week of July so you would be safe enough on a weekday first two weeks. Follow usual tips about getting there early etc.

A question about clothing you can buy there:

we will go again during a June Inset-day and DD has more Lego at home than she will ever use. She got a T-shirt last time (2 years ago) which she obviously outgrew since then. So I thought we get her a top instead of bricks as a souvenir again.

Problem - the top she had was size 12 (so 11-12) and she was nearly 8. I pretty much assume she is able to get away with a XS or even S adult size (she has some from the US when DH went on business trips). She will be virtually 10 when we go and just start 12-13 sizes.

So, my questions - do the shops sell adult Lego Friends wear or what is the biggest teen size they offer?

Hi OP whats it like mid week on the pre school er pass EG, which I am looking at.

I'm going via Times offer the last week in March hopefully before most schools break up as ours is shutting early for building work.

We used to live nearby about 8-10 years ago and I went regularly. Now I will have a 3 yr old 9 yrs old and 10 yr old.

What's best for the older children? I assume the dragon coasters still there? They moved the other tall coaster to America to build the resort I believe did anything replace it?

I understand they aren't the target audience but bet they will lobe it anyway. I just want to be sure they get a good on whatever is for their age too as youngest ds will be in heaven

Planning on going weekend 10th/11th June (am I mad going on a summer weekend?)

Was looking into the priority parking and noticed website said this..

"There is also priority parking where guests can park closer to the fun! Priority parking costs £10 unless booked online in advance, but please note that this car park is open from 9am to 12.30pm."

Does this mean you'd have to move your car at lunchtime???

Has anyone taken a child with a disability? We're desperate to take ds this weekend as we've been promising him a trip for so long. He's 8 and autistic, and from what we've read this entitles him to a special pass so he doesn't have to queue? The legoland website seems to suggest that one adult would get in free with him, though this isn't a problem if not. We'd like to buy our tickets prior to getting there though so how would we do that? I've never been to a theme park (sheltered life) so have no idea what to expect. We've just bought ds a mobility pushchair as he gets tired so easily, will there be safe places to leave this if he wants to go on rides or should we bring a lock for it? Any advice much appreciated x

We are booked to go just before the easter weekend, does anyone know how busy this time of year is? I know it's the school holidays and I'm guessing the weather will make a big difference..?

We have two days there and we are taking dcs 5 and 3.

Can anyone give tips on the best rides to head to first? I mean the ones which will have the long queues all day? Or is that all of them?!

I am umming and ahhing about a qbot... we can't afford them for both days and I don't know which day would be better if we did get them.

Any advice would be great!

Sloane We've been taking 8yo DS who has ASD since he was 3. He loves lego, and his first stated job ambition was to work at the Legoland Hotel.

We started going before he was diagnosed, and have always just bought annual passes, so we've just continued with that, so afraid that I can't help on the best way to buy for a one-off.

However, there is an excellent ride priority access scheme - you need to take evidence of your child's need - the original consultant diagnosis letter has always sufficed for our DS. Then the disabled person gets a hand stamp and a card with 10 tear off bits, and I think up to 3 people who will be going on rides with them also get a hand stamp. That means you can have priority access to 10 rides.

Full info is here. We've not had to register in advance before, just gone to guest services either at The Beginning or in Heartlake Village - but that might be new for this year.

The staff have always been very helpful, including coming out to do our hand stamps when DS refused to go into the building.

Definitely take the buggy if DS gets tired, as there is a lot of walking. You can hire legoland buggies (but for toddler sized children), and there are loads left by the entrance to rides, so yours will not be the only one.

The ride guide includes helpful info on what the rides involve, so that you can pick ones that your DS is more likely to enjoy.

We have found that it helps DS to know at the start of the day what he is allowed to spend in the numerous lego shops, and indeed we often start in the Big Shop by the entrance, so that he can have a browse of his options so that he can be mulling on it during the day before making the final purchase. But that might just be our DS!

Hope you enjoy. We have had some lovely (and some challenging) times at Legoland, but with the ride access pass, it feels like we can relax and enjoy things more than most places. We often only go on about 3 rides, as DS prefers the play areas.