Legoland: Making the best of it

We'd always planned to have a day out at Legoland during our stay in England as it's only a 2 hour drive from Grandma and Granddad's house, but we hadn't actually booked anything before we arrived in England. As an early Christmas present, Grandma and Granddad kindly shouted us a night in a hotel near Legoland so we could get an early start at the park the next morning. It was such a shame that I woke up feeling like death warmed up though, I was lying there awake from 4am wondering how on earth I was going to be able to make it around the park all day,  and at one point I was sitting contemplating over the toilet bowl while the boys were in the dining room at breakfast feeling very sorry for myself. I wasn't actually sick but felt so full of flu with a pounding head as well that I knew the day ahead was going to be a hard ask. But I also knew I just had to suck it up and make the best of the bad luck!

We arrived and immediately went to the Star Wars Miniland displays. Noah recognised many of the scenes from the movies and told us what they were as were going around.

We then scoped out a few of the other rides (none of which I was contemplating doing with my head spinning). Mylo felt game enough to go on the Dragon's Apprentice - a baby coaster as he called it. Then Noah and Dad headed off to try out the big Kahuna roller coaster - the Dragon - while we cheered on from the sidelines.

Then we headed into the Kingdom of the Pharoahs - Noah having a lovely ride on the Carousel before we headed indoor for some Laser Raider fun - shooting at targets in the mummy tomb in the dark with lots of things jumping out at us.  

Then it was onto the Scarab bouncers - which lift you up high then drop you down so you practically lose your stomach or as Noah always says - it makes my willy go funny.

After tackling the JCB diggers which proved harder than they looked, we managed to find a spot to watch the live Pirate show at midday - great entertainment and lots of daredevil action with the pirates all taking turns diving daringly off the lighthouse tower at various points during the show.

Then it was onto Atlantis and an underwater submarine voyage where we spotted stingrays, sharks and a few Nemo and Dory fish along the way.

After this we queued up for the safari boats - Mylo was quite the dab hand at steering the boat and we managed not to get sprayed by the giant Lego elephants at the water's edge and waved to the Lego polar bears who were waving at us as we cruised by.

Mylo hadn't been on as many rides as Noah so we let him queue up for the Learner Drive ride - he was buzzing to be able to drive his own car round a little circuit with other 3-5 year olds, graduating with a Learner Driver licence at the end.

We then wound our way back up the hill, past the police helicopters (which begged to be ridden) and onto Miniland.

This would have to be my favourite part of the park - a range of different scenes from countries and cities throughout Europe in miniature and also the NASA Space Center in America with a real-life countdown and mock take-off.

mini Holland

 mini Holland

mini Eilean Donan (Scotland) - just for Nana

mini Blair House (Scotland) - this one's for Nana too

miniature Tower Bridge - it even opened up to let boats through

guards marching at Horseguards - they actually were marching round in a circle

mini Buckingham Palace

mini Wembley stadium

mini Stonehenge complete with punch buggy camper vans

the mini Underground - complete with a working elevator

a mini open-top bus tour - just like the one we went on

mini London Eye and Big Ben entrances the boys

mini Picadilly Circus

watching the mini spaceship take off

After Miniland, we split up and Noah and Mark rode the 2 water rides (rapid ride and log flume) while Mylo and I cruised around the park on 2 different trains.

We all met back up just in time to catch the 4D movie - just like 3D except we had snow fall on us, flames leap out at us, water sprayed at us and wind blown at us. It was nice to have a sit down even if it was just for 20 minutes!

For our last ride of the day we hopped aboard the Sky Rider - for a gentle view over the park showing it off at it's beautiful autumn best. 

Then it was time to get this weary body in the car and back home to Somerset. And just in the nick of time it turned out as Mark came down with a tummy bug only an hour after we got home!

But bad health aside, the boys have such amazing memories of the day that will last them for years to come and even if I had to do it all over again feeling like absolute crap, I still would!