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!

Sorry silly question. The refillable drinks are they only useable on one day? Or can we bring them and use them on our second day ( will be consecutive days)

You're not supposed to, know. It says they can ask for your receipt when you have it refilled though I've never been asked. But, you will have a bag search on the way in and it's not just cursory - I doubt they're looking for drink cups but I would be embarrassed if they found one.

Are the park staff discrete when families are using the disability access scheme? DS (8) has ASD but as he has a dual diagnosis he only knows about the other half so far. If I show the park staff the letter it will have both on there and I would rather he hears from us at an appropriate moment rather than overhearing at Legoland!!

I'm going in August and there will be me and my mum (pensioner) and my two kids aged 7 and 5. I have 2 adult free passes but I will still have to pay £100 for two children. Is there any cheaper way of doing it? I also have £5.50 of Tesco vouchers but I don't think I'm allowed to use them against the child tickets if I'm using a free adult voucher. Any suggestions? Thanks.

Has anyone stayedd in any of the travel lodges nearby. Where wud be best windsor, slough or bracknell. Esp for eating/keeping kids occupied in evening

tartanterror

You can email guest services the dx letter beforehand to register for your ride access pass, then on the day you just go in and they help you set the app up on your phone and stamp your hands, no awkward questions etc.

We went about 3 weeks ago and it was BRILLIANT! Having the virtual queue made such a difference for our 7 yr old.

Thanks Hatties. Very useful

Legoland...kids enjoyed it, however it really isn't value for money. Got back from a day there a few hours ago. If your kids love Lego then this is the place for them. If they don't you can spend a quarter the price for a family of four (and they will probably have a better time, ours did) by going to Green Forest Park in North Wales (which we went to a week earlier) if it's closer to you then Windsor. Take 99% of the advise on this thread for a good day. I will warn you though, the rides are underwhelming from a physics perspective, no better and perhaps worse then your local town/village bankholiday fair. The length of each ride is surprisingly short when compared to other big three theme parks (Chessington, Thorpe Park and Alton Towers). Some rides are also limited to the number of adults that can ride at any one time, this increases queuing time. Everything and i mean everything is overpriced. Book at least a week in advance to save money. If you don't, a ticket for a family of 4 (including one child under 3) with Q-bot £216. Q-bot is a perk that reduces ride queuing times. Ironically, this is worth buying to help reduce the feeling of having your pockets turned out. However, from a practical point of view Q-bot is awesome. Priory parking £10 (really isn't worth it, they over sell it, once full you have to park in standard parking). Once in the park £2.95 500ml of fizzy soft drink. Nearly £9 for two coffees and a packet of crisps from a popular high street coffee outlet. Nearly £3 for a ice cream cone. £1.50 for 250ml of water. Take all your food and beverage with you. Very poor sign posting, however, there are static maps to refer to. Park opens at 9.30am, first ride opens 30 mins later. Get there early or you'll use over an hour perhaps two to complete your first ride that is not covered by Q-bot. Park is only open until 6pm even in the summer months. If you go you'll probably have a good time all considered, but please don't think because it's expensive it must be a market leader, Lego the brand is, but they have a thing or two to learn about running a thrilling Theme Park.

Hello, so sorry if this has already been asked but - we're going with only one DS who is 2.5 - are the Qbot things worth it or are they only really for rides for older / bigger kids? TIA

For those who brought swim gear, are there lockers you can leave stuff in all day or do you bring the stuff with you (I'm thinking about the logistics of wet towels etc)
Thanks :)

There are lockers in a few locations, they take a non (note non!) refundable £1. But one of you will have to run back to get your stuff. We left our lunch in a locker till we needed it.

[b]Mistressiggi[/b] thanks :)

Hi, I am going next Saturday with my 11 and 9 year old...will it be manic? wondering about buying a qbot and if I do whether to get the basic or express one is there much difference? Also I'm planning to get the green line 702 bus from London city centre where we are staying, can anyone tell me if this is a very busy service i.e. Do I need to be there early to queue to get on it? Thanks

I'm planning to go on Monday 4th sept as I've heard a lot of children are back at school by then, my 6yo DS is back on the weds. Would take him on the Tuesday but he'll be too tired for first day of term!
I'm really struggling with the idea of paying £20pp for a q-bot, but really don't want to regret buying one.
Also planning on getting the 702 from London Victoria as I live in SE London and I get really anxious making multiple changes in unfamiliar places. I'd rather just stay on the coach all the way there.
My son is under assessment for autism/ADHD so will his most recent paediatricians letter and maybe school letter be acceptable for a special pass?
I'm booking with the NowTV bogof offer.

Just back from a 2 day trip, we had a fab time, both DCs (10 & 6) loved it.
Hill train was out of order both days.
Wasps what Wasps? yes there was one or two but no where near the plagues I expected based on previous threads. Perhaps the wasp traps are working that seem to be hung from every other tree.
We didn't bother with qbots the longest we waited was just over an hour for ninjargo ride, but we expected that.
We brought the refillable drinks bottle and used it both days without issue and was good value for money.
We would like to visit again and where thinking of visiting around Halloween, has anyone been before do they decorate it to be spooky?

We got back yesterday from 2 days. It was very busy but not overwhelmingly so IMO. We didn't bother with QBots and still managed to do nearly everything, including an hour in the splash land and time in a huge playground.

We definitely needed two days though, it took a full day to get our bearings and were much more time efficient on day 2...but we wouldn't have done half the things we wanted in just one day.

We also got one £8 refillable drink. They're small (250 ml maybe?) but the refill stations are everywhere and we filled up at every one we passed and all used one bottle.

I was annoyed about paying for parking tbh. We paid £12 online in advance for 2 days and took the print outs with us. They didn't leave my bag. You go straight in and on leaving (6.30 one day and 7pm the next) we were just waved out. It took us about 20 minutes to exit the car park and it was so busy they were just trying to get the cars out as quickly as possible, no one gave a monkeys about the parking proofs! I definitely wouldn't buy in advance again as it seemed so easy to get away with not paying!

I think there are a lot of inset days on the 4th September so I wouldn't bet on it being quiet.

Re Qbot it depends on what your DS would like to do. At that age my DS would have been ecstatically happy with Pirate Bay show, 4D cinema, Miniland, playground, splash play (weather permitting), train, fairytale brook, a variety of the other smaller rides, and one or maybe two more popular rides (e.g. the boats or Driving School) first thing in the morning before the queues built up. If he's a thrill seeker or obsessed with Ninjago then yes a queuebot may be useful.

@WinterIsComingKnitFaster thank you. No my ds is not particularly fussed with ninjago he's into Lego City and Friends, just worry about a meltdown while queueing.
I would definitely be naive to think the 4th will be dead quiet but I'm hoping it won't be absolutely rammed! Wanted it to also be a end of holidays surprise because we have never done a theme park before. I used to love them as a kid.

I think you'll probably not be doing the sort of things for which a Qbot would be really useful then. I may be being over optimistic though, because the last time I went was on a mid-term inset day that was pretty quiet except for a few school groups doing end of term treats.

Does anyone know if there are any offers on at the minute apart from the cadbury vouchers? We'd supposed to be going on Saturday and I just happened to check the T&Cs on the cadbury's website and it says the vouchers aren't valid in August! I'm glad I checked!

@iwould if you get a now tv free trial you get an email giving 2x50% off tickets for Lego land/merlin attractions. Just remember to cancel before you're charged for a pass.

So we're planning on going this Friday 8th and I've just been reading reviews of how ridiculously busy it has been today on fb and I'm wondering if we're doing the right thing. Our son starts school this term but has a phased start so I'm thinking this Friday should be ok. He's 4 and half and won't be interested in the big rides etc. And I've been doing my research so we've tesco tickets, will take pack lunches etc. Am I mad? Should we be heading elsewhere? I don't think we will manage to get there until just after 10am but I reckon he'll be pooped after 5 hours or so.

mrsdiddy- how did it go?

We have just booked two days in October 28/29th .. so it shouldn't be all done up for brick an treat and there will be fireworks on the Saturday night ... really looking forward to it! It's my sons bday present as he loves rides and isn't into anything else :)

Does anyone know if the land train is working again or when it is due to be fixed? We go in 3 weeks and my ds loves anything like that!