It’s been a couple of years since our last trip to Legoland but as soon as I started planning, I remembered the drill. Harvester breakfast, check:
We still miss the pre-Covid buffet but you can’t dwell on the past indefinitely.
Trolling the kids that we weren’t actually going to Legoland and were planning on staying in Harvester all day for the free coffee refills, check. They didn’t believe us when we tried to tell them that this *is* Legoland, Windsor:
Tickets bought with Clubcard vouchers, check. Parking bought online, check. Ridiculous amounts of snacks, check. Legoland itself did throw us a slight curveball by directing us to a brand new car park that wasn’t there last time we went but that’s OK – we remembered where we’d left the car because it was by the new woodland village that wasn’t there last time we went and still seemed to be under construction. I think the adventure golf by the front gates was also new and the giant letters as we drove in all had new minifigs. Times, they are a-changing.
And for us too there was change afoot – Eva was in charge, given it was her birthday treat, and she asked to turn left at the top of the hill instead of right. Like Zoolander, we never go left so this was a bit of a novelty. Roo had wanted to start at the Star Wars exhibition, given it was May the fourth but sadly that was no longer there. I think I read somewhere that they lost the licence.
On the way, we stopped at the sweet shop by the hill train to buy some refillable cups. We don’t always get these but it looked to be a hot day and the idea of being able to just grab a cold drink whenever we wanted was appealing. It’s £14 per cup, which is steep, but we got two to share between the four of us and that worked fine. It’s ten minutes between refills so we couldn’t exactly share one cup between four like we have done in the past but neither did we want to have to have a full cup each every time we filled up and then all have to be carrying something….so this worked.
With the preliminaries finally out of the way, we were ready for our first activity. And while Eva had Miniland in mind, we found something along the way – the Ferrari-sponsored “Build and Race”. There was a very short queue, which Roo used to add a Lord of the Rings reference to our day:
Then we were in after just a few minutes. The first room is a lifesize Ferrari made of Lego, which I’m sure some punters would spend a long time examining. We had a quick pose and moved on to the building room next door.
We did get confused and think that the idea was to design cars on the screens in this room but the “lights flash” buttons were actually controlling the Ferrari model. The actual idea was to build a mini Ferrari and race it on the tracks:
Sensors would give you your lap time and display it on the screen. One track also had a camera in it for action replays. All very hgih tech but the concept was scuppered by a more low tech problem. Well, two related problems.
The first being a distinct lack of wheels in the brick trays:
A sign near the exit made us think this might be due to light-fingered wheel enthusiasts.
The second problem being that the wheels were quite grippy so actually the cars didn’t roll well down the tracks and rarely made it as far as the sensors. It might be a technique issue but Reuben experimented and found that it worked better to just throw a small stack of bricks down than anything even vaguely car-shaped.
Eva, meanwhile, had located the camera in Track 2 and was using it to rickroll people. Standard tween stuff.
There was also a giant virtual racetrack at the end of the room and you could scan your car to make an avatar of sorts for racing round. That was fun, even if Reuben’s avatar looked like a small pile of bricks, for obvious reasons.
We were in there for about 30 minutes I reckon and it’s not a place I’ve ever noticed before – I don’t know whether it’s new or just out of our usual route but it was good to start with something different and it’s interesting for older kids with an interest in cars and/or the law of physics. You can guess which one my geeky boy leans towards.
Next up, we considered the new Minifig Speedway. Eva talked a brave talk and we even stood in the queue for a bit but after watching the ride a few times, she changed her mind about wanting to go on it. I’m going to say that Nathan and I were both a bit relieved as I don’t think either of us really wanted to go on it either.
So instead, we went for the gentle delights of Miniland and trying to spot the bus that Eva remembered from the “Inside Legoland” TV show. We didn’t spot the bus but did get a photo of Roo in Canary Wharf, where he went for his actual work experience. Actual as in, it wasn’t just a small boy hanging around a Lego version of Canary Wharf and posing. I know – the latter seems the more plausible option, doesn’t it?
And we also got a shot of Eva in her beret by the Eiffel Tower. Hopefully we can get this too in IRL before the end of the year:
Next, we wandered down to the Kingdom of the Pharaohs, where there were more gentle delights on Desert Chase and Thunder Blazer, which are basically just a carousel and a swing ride. But Eva enjoyed them and Roo was game for the “flap your arms to make this work” patter on Thunder Blazer.
Then we went on Laser Raiders, which is an old favourite as it’s not very scary and the kids get to chill out in their own zone while we do the queueing. As we snaked round the queue with the kids out of sight and not much to do, I started frantically refreshing Google on my phone for any news on the mayoral election. No real news was forthcoming but I did reach the front of the queue more cautiously optimistic than when we’d joined. That might be because I downed half a packet of Fruitella and made art out of the wrappers to stop myself draining my phone battery. No, I am not going to share my wrapper-art. Sorry.
We had a quick go on the PS4s on the way out of Laser Raiders and then decided to be a bit more intentional about where we wanted to go next. The queue for Laser Raiders had taken an hour or so and it was 13:30 already so we were slightly running out of time before we’d even really got started.
We decided to go to Mythica, stopping briefly at the loos in Heartlake City on the way. There Eva remembered how much she’d enjoyed the Hydra’s Challenge last year. It was another long queue, so we sat down for a few minutes to have some crisps before joining it.
I decided to let Reuben drive the boat again, slightly against my better judgement. At least I wasn’t feeling as seasick as I was last time we went on this ride but still, I was slightly dizzy afterwards. The announcement said we’d be battling Duo the Hydra, which made us think that this is what happened when you didn’t complete your Duolingo….Duo evolves from an angry green owl into an absolutely furious, two-headed abomination.
Quick, stop whatever you’re doing and complete a sentence about potatoes. You have many of them but you don’t have a cupboard.
Anyway, Hydra’s Challenge is fun but if you’re at the back you’ll get a rougher ride and act as human shield for the blasts of water. It’d be good when it’s hot out but it just so happened that we went on it during one of the only slightly chilly spots of the whole day and I packed waterproofs for the kids but not for me. Ah well, I dried out and warmed up eventually.
As is tradition by now, Nathan took Eva on the Fairytale Brook while Roo and I went on the helicopters. None of us want a repeat of the 2018 incident. But we darn near had a 2024 incident as our helicopter got stranded at the top of the pole and wouldn’t come back down. Much as Roo kept pushing the “down” lever it was not going down and we were pretty high up. When we did go down a bit, it was when a distinct “clunk” and then no more movement.
Nathan and Eva had reappeared after their trip on HorrorBrook so I tried to signal to them that we might be in a little bit of trouble. They didn’t necessarily pick up on my signals and just kept waving cheerily back at us and taking photos. Eventually, I tried turning the helicopter to the left and that got us past the sticking point and back to the ground. Who knew that the Duplo Airport was just as Xtreme as its watery neighbour?
Again, I was feeling a bit motion sick after all that so as we passed the Haunted House Monster Party I mentioned that I was glad Eva didn’t want to go on it because it was the last thing I felt like doing right that moment. Then Reuben clocked that there was no queue at all and Eva suddenly decided that she did want to go on. So I found myself in a disorientating spinning room with a very tight lap bar. The motion sickness remedy that absolutely no one recommends. There was a fair bit of faffing from the staff at the start as well, because the ride wasn’t full and they kept counting spaces and counting again like they couldn’t believe it. I mean we could barely believe it either, as last time we’d queued for an hour. But it did break the spooky atmosphere somewhat to have quite so much fussing. The ride itself was fun and I still can’t quite figure out how they do it. I’m just glad that Eva wasn’t screaming in my ear this time.
I’d promised Eva that we could visit The Hungry Troll at some point, which was a chip shop in Mythica. I don’t normally stop for any meals between Harvester and Heston but it was her birthday and she wanted chips so who am I to deny her?
Turns out I couldn’t deny her but the eponymous troll could. The chip shop had closed already and the statue of the troll with his handfuls of chips was just…well, trolling us really. So we checked the app and set off in search of treasure at Pirate Shores.
Bounty successfully plundered! And despite all my meal-avoiding at Legoland over the years, it seems that buying chips is not actually going to bankrupt us. In fact, they’re cheaper than Five Guys but the portions aren’t nearly as generous. Still, salty fries are one of my recommended motion sickness cures and they worked a treat. So much that I was ready for a rollercoaster, albeit a very tame one.
Oh yeah, Dragon’s Apprentice. That’s about our level. Reuben used the in-queue Lego to leave what is fast becoming “his tag”:
It was gone 5pm by this point but the park didn’t close till 6 so we thought we could squeeze one more ride in. Looking at the app, Hydra’s Challenge only had a five minute queue so guess where the birthday girl wanted to return to? Yes, that’s right – with the weather rapidly cooling down and the sun going in, it was time for the birthday girl’s mother to get soaked for a second time.
I’ll leave you with that thought. Happy family days out…!
