I’ve been itching for some amusement park time before the Florida summer brings two things every Florida resident hides from: the heat and tourists (sorry, no offense!). Rather than spending Mother’s Day at home eating breakfast in bed, I thought it would be fun to trek out to Legoland Florida in Winter Haven.
Legoland Florida is the newest addition to the already awesome Florida amusement park landscape. Located away from Orlando in Winter Haven, Florida, the area surrounding Legoland is really nice! We noted tons of restaurants right outside the gates and plenty of hotels to choose from. You may even want to consider staying away from the hustle-bustle of Orlando and traveling in Winter Haven.
As a military family, we always stop into our installation’s Information, Tickets and Tours (ITT) to see if any of our selected destinations offer military discounts or rates. Legoland Florida did not disappoint. For 2013, military families can purchase deeply discounted tickets and the active duty member gets free admission to the park!
DID YOU KNOW? There’s an ITT office located in Orlando at the Shades of Green Resort. It’s a great resource every vacationing military family needs to know!
Legoland Florida Ticket Pricing via MacDill AFB ITT office.
You have the option to buy a 1 or 2-day Legoland or Legoland/Water Park Combo ticket. We opted to purchase the 1-day Combo ticket in advance at ITT. You can buy tickets at the gate, but you will not get the same pricing as ITT, nor will you get the tax-free purchase benefit. It is good to know that Legoland does provide 10% military discount at the gate just in case. For Homeskillet’s ticket, he had to show his ID at the ticket counter, and voila! Instant admission!
Let’s get to the fun stuff now…how is the actual park?
Legoland Florida is Perfect for Families with Young Children
Homeskillet said it best. If you have kids between 3 and 10, Legoland Florida is the perfect park for your family. Crowds were non-existent during our visit. We waited max 5 minutes for every single ride.
TIP: Download the Legoland app for your android or iPhone to keep the park map, hours, and showtimes at your fingertips.
La Rubia (age 2, 36 inches tall) was able to ride about 75% of the rides in the park. La Grande (age 6 and 49 inches tall) could ride EVERYTHING. Needless to say, La Grande thought that Legoland Florida was a slam-dunk.
We loved that Legoland Florida was intentionally constructed with kids and the Florida sun in mind. There’s plenty of shade, a great mix of indoor waiting areas and play spaces with air conditioning, and, our personal favorite, lego play corrals where children can play while parents wait in line.
Must Have Park Snack: Apple Fries. Holy cow! Talk about an addictive snack! The apple fries are served fresh and hot, sprinkled with cinnamon sugar, and served with a whipped cream dip. To. Die. For.
We finished the main park in under 4 hours, but we didn’t watch any shows. Once we wrapped up the park, we headed to the Legoland Water Park.
Legoland Florida Water Park
The Water Park was pretty cool. Once again geared towards younger children, the water park offers a small lazy river, toddler slide and pool area, pretty expansive big kid water play park, small wave pool, and four other large slides perfect for older kids and adults. I don’t have any pictures from our water park adventure, mainly because I feared for the safety of my iPhone, sorry!
We made three loops on the lazy river thanks to the innovative lego inner tubes that allow your kids to build Lego creations using giant rubber legos while floating down river. La Rubia amassed a pretty impressive stash of Legos by the time we finished our trip.
Legoland’s water park has tons of life jackets for children located near each of the main attraction areas, including baby-sizes as well.
Final Verdict: Would We Go Back To Legoland?
Our final verdict? Yes. We’d definitely go back. It’s a perfect a low-key park experience. It’s much less overwhelming than other larger parks in the area and if you’re a military family, you can’t pass up the pricing.
Have you been to Legoland Florida? What did you think?
