A Tale of 2 Legoland Hotels (Trip Report - Completed!)

This is a trip report of “The” Legoland Hotel and “a” Legoland hotel (Grand Pacific Palisades). I will also cover the Legoland Park and Water Park. The trip was me, DH, DS6, and DD3. It was part of a longer trip to visit relatives in LA and also 2 nights on Catalina Island. Originally, I had booked a 2 bedroom villa at the Grand Pacific Palisades for 4 nights. Then I read on Disboards about all the cute and cool things at The Legoland Hotel, and decided to try it out for 1 night.

This is the plan:
Posts #1 and 2: The Legoland Hotel (need 2 posts since I have more than 10 photos).
Post #3: Grand Pacific Palisades
Post #4: A tour through Legoland and Legoland Water Park, as we experienced it and as memory serves.

LEGOLAND HOTEL

I booked The Legoland Hotel about 2 months in advance and got the 20% off advance purchase rate. The cancellation was 14 days in advance, which I think is different than the regular rate. It was $220/night for the standard room. With the $25 resort fee plus taxes, total came to $268. It was for a Tuesday night in the first week of June. I was happy with the choice of a standard room. As far as I can tell from online photos, the difference between the standard room and the fully themed room is in the adult sleeping area, not in the bathroom or kids’ area. The Lego theming is quite busy to the eye, so I rather enjoyed a little empty wall in the adult area. There are also balcony rooms, which I didn’t miss having. We were there for such a short time and there was enough to look at in the room! Our room faced one side of the theme park, not much to see, but nothing ugly that I might have minded either. There are suites as well, the extra space probably would be nice for a longer stay, though I remember the price difference was pretty big (at least double the standard room).

We were in the Kingdom room, which are all on the first floor (Pirate rooms on second floor, Adventure rooms on the third floor). I let DS look at pictures online and he picked Kingdom, as I suspected he would because he doesn’t like anything remotely scary. He didn’t like the skull in the Pirate rooms and the pharaoh in the Adventure rooms. It’s Legos though, so it’s not really scary – but that’s just DS.
The kids really enjoyed the Legoland Hotel. DS liked the scavenger hunt around the hotel for the combination to the safe with the prizes of 2 small bags of Mixel Legos, 4 chocolate coins, and a Lego magazine. He also had fun with the whoopee cushion in the rug next to the elevator, and the disco ball and dance music in the elevator (since we were on the first floor, we just rode it once to see). They both liked all the theming, the bunk bed, the castle/pirate ship play structure and all the Legos to play with in the lobby.

Kids' area:




Bathroom (notice the built-in potty seat):


Adult area:


Treasure safe:


Additional Lego details around the room:

LEGOLAND HOTEL (COMMON AREAS)

With only 1 night, we didn’t get to the story time, pajama party (kids were too pooped out), early entry (we’re late people), or the pool (pretty standard pool, no pool slide, but there were big foam Legos to play with in the pool). I enjoyed the Lego theming, even though it was very in your face compared to the DVC resorts we’ve stayed at. The wall of minifigures behind the front desk was cute, especially the big bicycle going across where the wheels are actually magnifying glasses. All the Lego sculptures everywhere around the hotel were cute too. There was even some Lego flower arrangements that I didn’t realize were Legos just passing by at first.



The atmosphere is rather hectic and crowded though, especially around check-in time and dinner time. I think I was expecting quieter since it was a weekday and I thought most schools weren’t out yet. To get to our first floor room, we had to pass the restaurants. There is only one hallway in the hotel so it was sometimes a little crowded. Our room was a little further down though, so noise wasn’t an issue. The soundproofing in the room seemed to be pretty good.

Lobby (at a quieter time):


Castle/Pirate Ship play structure:


We checked in early around 11 am, our room wasn’t ready, as was to be expected. They would give us a call later. We were going to the water park that day, so I asked for pool towels. They were able to get someone from the pool to come out and give us the towels.

That night, we had dinner at the Skyline Café in the hotel. It was around 6:30 pm, so the restaurant was pretty busy (the buffet restaurant Bricks was worse though). It’s seat yourself, which we found a little odd, but our waiter noticed us not too long after we sat down. There’s a wall with floor-to-ceiling “windows” with Lego buildings on the other side (really cute) – hence the name Skyline. Service was friendly, but the food took a LONG time to come out, apparently there was some mix up in the kitchen. Food was good though and prices not bad for theme park food. We had the appetizer fish tacos for $9 – it had 3 tacos, the tortillas were small (like street style size), but the fish pieces were pretty big, and the salsa on top was good. The pasta adding chicken (comes plain or can add shrimp as well) was $13.50. It wasn’t a huge portion, but the Alfredo sauce was good, chicken was okay (at least it wasn’t super dry). The kids had the flat bread pizza for $10.



The next morning, we had the included breakfast buffet at Bricks. There was a note on one of the hotel information sheets to come to breakfast before 8:30 am to avoid a long wait. I had read online about the long line and overheard other hotel guests talking about it. We managed to get there about 8:20. There was a small line, but we waited only a couple minutes. When we left around 9:30, there were many empty tables. Again this is weekday though; I would imagine the weekend is quite different. The buffet food was pretty typical. Drinks were self-serve, the orange juice was basically water, seems the dispenser was out of concentrate. They had small cups of mango smoothie and strawberry smoothie in the buffet line, which were pretty good. The scrambled eggs were small clumps, so maybe they’re made from powder, but it tasted alright. The wait for the omelet station was too long, so we didn’t get that. DH and I ate enough to not need lunch, the kids still needed lunch though. They had a woman dressed as a jester go around making balloon animals at each table. I don’t know how she typically makes her way around the restaurant, but for some reason, she went to the table next to ours at the edge of the section, and then moved on to the next section. A guy dressed as a knight came by and told us that she would come back around after the next table, but she never did. After watching her go through several more tables, the knight came back and apologized that it was taking so long and asked what the kids wanted so he could go get it. We were done with breakfast for 10-15 minutes just waiting, but at least we weren’t completely forgotten. Making balloons for every child at a table takes much longer than a character interaction. It was nice that they had it (we didn’t know about it in advance and weren’t expecting it), but it wasn’t very efficient.

All in all, we had a great one night stay and I'm so glad we tried it. For future trips, if the 2 bedroom villas at Grand Pacific Palisades are still cheaper, I would probably choose to stay there since there's so much more space. If I can get The Legoland Hotel for around $150 though, I would stay there again in a heartbeat.

Outside area:

GRAND PACIFIC PALISADES (GPP)

I started out with a booking directly with GPP with a 20% off advance purchase rate. It was the cheapest I could find at the time. But then I happened to check Travelocity later on when they had a flash sale, which pretty much matched the rate, plus I had a $75 off coupon code. We had stayed at GPP a few years ago in a 1 bedroom villa and enjoyed it for the proximity to Legoland. Crossing one street takes you to the Legoland parking lot. There is also a cute submarine slide water play area, which we didn’t get to this time. DD is out of the Pack-n-Play now, so I booked the 2 bedroom villa so nobody would have to sleep on the sofa couch (the 1 bedrooms only have a King sized bed in the bedroom). It was $30 more per night going from 1 bedroom to 2, not too bad. Our rate averaged $195/night (Saturday night was a little more), not counting taxes or the $75 off.

We drove down from Northern California on a Saturday, we left pretty late, so didn’t arrive until 10:30 pm. There were no 2 bedroom villas left! They were remodeling a block of the villas, so I think they must have been behind schedule on that. We were told we weren’t the only ones. We were put in a hotel room and the rate adjusted to $119, which I was told was a reduced rate. I wasn’t happy about that since I knew that was a rate I could have gotten on my own. But it was late and I wanted to get the kids to bed, so I just went with it. The next day, we decided to ask for free breakfast buffet vouchers at their onsite restaurant (Karl Strauss Brewing Company) for the inconvenience. We got it and I felt a little better since moving was a pain and I didn’t enjoy the hotel room. On check-out though, we were told that the first night was complementary. Whoo-hoo! I am still waiting for the refund though since I had prepaid through Travelocity in order to use the coupon. I’ve called back once to check on it and was told they’re still working with Travelocity. It’s been 2 weeks; I’ll probably call and check again soon. There is a $17/day resort fee, which I thought we would have to pay, but were told that we didn’t (yay!). It didn’t sound like it had anything to do with the room situation (the front desk just said no when I asked, not that they are comping it). Maybe it was rolled into the Travelocity fees, it wasn’t very clear to me.

I found the 2 queen room hotel room small. There’s only room for 1 side table in between the beds. Next to the beds on each of the other sides is only about a 1 foot space. One side didn’t appear to be vacuumed (there was some gunk, I didn’t take a close look). The bathroom was pretty big, but could use some remodeling. I would not pay $119/night for the hotel room. The next day, we moved to the 2 bedroom villas and the difference was night and day. It was freshly remodeled with new furniture and oh, so spacious! It must have been at least 3 times the size of the hotel room, so much space for the kids to run around. It had a full kitchen (full size fridge, dishwasher, microwave), 2 full bathrooms, long dining table that could seat 8, and a big living room. No washer/dryer though, that would have been nice to have. The unit location wasn’t the best, on the first floor; the door and second bedroom window facing the family pool area, on the other end the patio and master bedroom window facing the drive-way entrance to the resort. There was no problem with noise though, and given their issue with some villas being out of service, I really can’t complain.

The breakfast buffet at Karl Strauss was good, but pretty typical. The Applewood bacon was a standout, made-to-order omelet was good, and so were the scrambled eggs (fluffy). Drinks were served by the waiter instead of self-serve. We went towards the end of breakfast (around 10 am) and it seemed like they were running out of plates. If we didn’t have the vouchers it would have been $12.95 for adults, $5.95 for kids. Not sure if I would pay that, but DH and I ate a lot and didn’t need lunch (the kids did though).


CARLSBAD RESTAURANTS

Legoland is really close to the Carlsbad Outlets (maybe 5 minute drive). We like San Sai Japanese Grill, which is located in the outlet mall. It’s a quick service restaurant with good salads, good sushi, and the combos are especially a good value. We usually go for dinner after a day in the park, so parking is not an issue. It probably would be an issue for lunch on a weekend. This visit, we also discovered Blaze Fast Fire’d Pizza, also in the outlet mall. It’s like a Subway for pizza, but way better. You can get unlimited toppings for $7.50, but I was a little overwhelmed with the choices, so went with their signature pizzas (Meat Eater and Green Stripe). You watch them make your pizza and then stick it in the oven. It’s thin crust and bakes really fast. It was a little hard to pick up and eat, but delicious.

LEGOLAND

We bought a 3 day park hopper ticket through Costco. They’re usually $89.99 (same price for adults and kids), but DH happened to see a limited time deal online for $10 off. Last visit a year ago, we went for 2 days and didn’t do everything we wanted to. With 3 days, we STILL didn’t get to everything, we were close though. I think we’re very atypical. We usually arrive late around 11 am, DS likes to build, and I guess they kids just dawdle. Please keep in mind that this is our experience Monday-Wednesday in the first week of June. We went on a Saturday one year and said never again.


Day 1 (Monday) - to the left!

Going into Legoland, we usually go left because there is more for little kids that way. It’s more crowded though since most people go left. To the right are more thrill rides. DS doesn’t like thrill rides and DD isn’t tall enough. Going left, one of the first rides is Coastersaurus, which sadly, we’ve never been on due to DS’s aversion to thrill rides (hopefully one day, I can bribe him on ). Next to it is Dino Dig, where kids can dig for dinosaur bones in the sand (we meant to come back to this, but didn't get to it). Across is Safari Trek, which the kids like (DD especially), but is very slow loading since each car only fits 2 people and there are only so many cars. It goes along a track and there are Lego animals to look at. The line can be over an hour long on weekends. Our first day was a Monday, but the line still didn’t look short, so we skipped it. We went on our second day after the water park closed (at 5 pm) but before the park closed (at 6 pm) and DD went on multiple times with no wait.

Moving on, we come to the new Lego Friends Heartlake City area. There is a show featuring people dressed as the Lego Friends singing and dancing. Seating is on the ground, so DD watched for a little bit, but we didn’t stay for the whole show. There is also a new carousel (Mia’s Riding Camp) with Lego horses and I think 2 pink cars. There’s a waiting area with Legos to play with. Around the area, there are lots of cute Lego sculptures of the Lego Friends and animals. The Lego Movie Experience is also around here. It features actual Lego sets from the movie (pretty cool to see). Wyldstyle was outside for photo ops. DS doesn't like characters. DD usually does (the Disney ones anyways), but she refused to stand next to Wyldstyle for a photo. Not sure why, maybe not so cute and soft? Close by is the Duplo Playtown entrance, which is a pretty big playground where everything looks like lifesize Duplos. There are a couple slides, some play houses (hospital, store, police station), stationary motorcycles, and cars (tow truck, ambulance, etc) to ride on. There is also a little train towards the very left of the area (Legoland Express). It just goes around in a circle, but the kids like it. I think we went on twice (no real wait, just for the current ride to be over), the kids got to sit in the front car the second time.

Leaving this area, we come to the Sky Cruiser. This is another slow loading ride with a typical long wait. To add insult to injury, the entrance is up a number of steps, so you can’t even see how bad the wait is until you’ve trekked up. Each cruiser can only fit 2 people, you then pedal around (it still goes if you don't pedal) and see parts of the park from a higher view. It’s nice, but I wouldn’t wait an hour for it. I think we probably still waited 30 minutes. At least there is a nice play area and it’s very easy to rejoin the person waiting in line. There are 2 ramps in the play area and a lot of Duplo train pieces, also lots of regular Lego wheels but we couldn’t find the bases. DS had fun building trains and sending them down the ramp. Kid Power Towers is also up here, which we’ve never gone on (you sit in a seat and pull yourself up using pulleys).

Back down the hill, we come to the Junior Driving School (for ages 3-5) and the Driving School (ages 6-13), they do ask the kids how old they are. These can have a long wait on weekends too, but it was short when we were there, sometimes just waiting for the previous cycle to end. For both, the kids drive around in a Lego car, no track, so they need to step on the gas pedal and steer. Junior Driving School only goes around in a circle, but DD wasn't so great at steering and would get stuck against the side or the island in the middle and needed to be rescued (pulled away) by the ride attendants. It’s very typical for that ride though, the ride attendants are constantly rescuing kids. Driving School is like driving around a real Lego city, with stop lights, stop signs, even a Lego subway entrance. A lot of kids drive on the wrong side of the street though, LOL. Both of the kids like these rides and went on them a few times. There are a few stationary cars (police car, race car) here that the kids like to sit in and press the button (siren or horn sounds). Around here is also Sky Patrol, which are helicopters (police, fire, coast guard) that you can control going up and down. Pretty simple ride, but the kids really like it and went on several times. Fun Town Stage is close by, but we saw the show before and didn’t need to see it again (features firefighters, a fire truck, and some antics).

Moving on, is the restaurant Fun Town Market. There’s a good amount of seating both inside and outside. The food was unremarkable, the kids had some chicken strips. Outside is the Fun Town Police and Fire Academy. This is rather different, you get on a fire truck with your party and then 2 people have to pump a handle so the car goes, another person has to push a lever so it goes forward. It was fine with DH and I pumping, but I’ve gone on with just DS before and a ride attendant had to come on and pump for us (which is actually not uncommon on the ride, ha ha). There are 4 trucks doing this at the same time, so it’s kind of a race. You get to the other side, then everyone needs to jump out and spray a water cannon at a bad guy in the window of a building until the panel drops, then you race back in the truck and pump your way back. Of course, there’s no prize for “winning”, but it’s fun. Across from this, there is soft serve ice cream at Lego Club House Snacks. Next to that is the water park entrance. In this area is also Adventurer’s Club, which we’ve never noticed before. I had to bribe DS into this. We had a deal that if he would try something he thought looked scary or too thrilling, he would get money (a couple dollars) towards souvenirs. After all, if you don’t try something, how do you know you don’t like it? It’s indoors, dark, and there was lightning effects at the entrance, so he was really scared! He held my hand really tightly and we speed walked through. Not that it really was all that scary…. There’s Lego mummies, bears, wolves, and I think the point was to find 7 keys, but we walked through so fast I didn’t see any.

Moving on from this section, there is Flight Squadron (fly in a Lego plane). Again, it’s one of those simple rides that the kids really like and we went on a few times. Further down is Skipper School, which is a small boat ride (2 people per boat) that you control yourself. There was a bit of a wait, maybe 15-20 minutes, but there is a play area nearby with big form pieces to build with. DH stood in line and I watched the kids play, but it was awkward to rejoin him, we had to go through the exit. On our previous visit, there had been an attendant doing iPad check-ins that would send a text when we could come back. Not this time though, maybe it was only a test, or maybe it wasn’t crowded enough this time. Across from this is Captain Cranky’s Challenge, which is a big pirate ship that swings back and forth. DS wavered on if he wanted to try this for souvenir money, but we didn’t end up doing it.

From here, we went downhill to the Miniland area (center of the park) instead of continuing in a circle around the park. Miniland is not to be missed. It has Lego models of cities (San Francisco, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, New York, Washington DC, etc), and also a Star Wars area (the Death Star is new). The are buttons around that will start some action (like the band playing, or a Star Wars spaceship moving). We looked around here for a while and then it was parking closing time.


Day 3 (Wednesday) - to the right!

Yes, I'm going out of order, but we went to the water park on day 2 and it makes more sense to finish up the park. We went to the right this day since it feels like we always miss a big part of this side of the park always going left first. First stop was going to be Lego Build and Test, you get a car base to build on and then race it against other cars. DS really likes it, but unfortunately there was a Education Program going on and it wasn't open until 2 pm (we meant to go back but ran out of time). There is also Duplo Play, Hero Factory, and Mindstorm (age 9+, so DS couldn't go anyways), all of which had Education Programs in progress. It felt more crowded that day with school groups. We had to watch out a bit for groups of kids running. The Coast Cruise is close to here, but there was a bit of a line, so we waited until 5 pm and it was walk on. This is a big boat ride (fits maybe 20 people) around the Legoland lake. You get to see Lego Mount Rushmore and some world sites (Sydney Opera House, Taj Mahal, Eiffel Tower, etc). It's nice and relaxing. Next stop was the short 4D movies at Lego Show Place. We saw the Legends of Chima one first, then waited/wandered around the area for a bit (15 minutes?) and then saw the Clutch Powers one. There wasn't really a wait and they let people in maybe 10 minutes before show time. There are 3 doors on different levels. For some reason, they were directing people to the bottom door, but it wasn't necessary since the the top seats weren't full. We prefer the top door (don't like to sit too close to the screen). Near here is the Aquazone Wave Racer (it looks like an airboat that goes around over water), which we've never been on. DS won't go on it, but he likes pressing the button to make water shoot out at the riders. It seems that it's on a timer though, you can't just keep making the water shoot up, which is a good thing for the people on the ride. Next to this is the Bionicle Blaster, which is like a spinning tea cup ride. We tried it last time and felt a little nauseous afterwards. DS didn't want to go on again and I was perfectly fine with that! Further down is the Lego Technic Coaster, it's a cute 4-person Technic car on a roller coaster track. Looks fun, but I couldn't convince DS to go on. I would have gone by myself, but the line looked a little long.

Moving on to the next area is the Lost Kingdom Adventure. You sit in a 4-person car on a track and go along shooting laser guns at targets on mummies, bats, spiders, etc. When you hit the target, sometimes something will happen (like a snake coming out of a basket). The wait looked at little long, so we came back to it closer to the end of the day. It's fun, but for some reason it's not as immersive as a Disney ride, maybe it's the lighting. Next to this is Pharaoh's Revenge, which is a 2 level enclosure with lots of foam balls to shoot out of air cannons and air shoots. DS liked shooting people and DD like picking up the balls and putting them in the air shoots. Adults quickly become targets - don't stand in the middle (hug the sides)! Nearby is Beatle Bounce (4 person seat that goes up and down), which we've never been on. Across from that is Cargo Ace, a little 2 person plane that goes around. DD really liked this one and went on it I don't know how many times. There's a small bit of centrifugal force as it makes the turns. Adults only fit in the back seat and it's still cramped. In the same area is Dune Raiders, which is a 6 lane tall slide where the kids race down in sacks. There are also a couple of corkscrews slides next to it. DS enjoyed both.

Moving on to the next section, there is Knights' Tournament, which we've never been on. It's a 2 seater robotic arm that rotates around, even upside down. It looked too thrilling even for me. But now I'm reading the description on the Legoland website which says you can pick the intensity, so maybe it's actually not that bad and we just happened to see all the thrill seekers. Across from that is Royal Joust, which are Lego horses that kids sit on and can rock back and forth while it goes around on a track. It's really cute, but too bad there's an age requirement of 4+ in addition to the height requirement (DD is 3). DS went on, but thought it was just okay. I was able to convince DS to go on The Dragon for souvenir money. It's pretty tame for a roller coaster, but DS still thought it was too fast. There are castle themed Lego sculptures to see inside the ride (before the roller coaster part) and it felt more immersive, more similar to a Disney ride. There's panning for gold around here (for a fee) at King's Treasury. You pan for "gold" nuggets and then exchange it for a medallion. DS was going to use his souvenir money here, but then decided on the bag of semi-precious stones instead. The sign says the bag must close, but the employee there was very nice and told us that we could overstuff it. The kids had some chicken strips at Knights' Smokehouse Barbeque (DH and I were still full from breakfast at Bricks). We had the BBQ here last trip and it was good, we liked the variety of BBQ sauces. At the edge of this section is Hideaways, it's a large multi-level play structure. There are slides, rope ladders, and obstacles. The kids liked it, but I felt like I needed to follow DD around in the structure. I was worried about the bigger kids running into her or kids going down the rope ladder (only supposed to go up) and stepping on her as she's going up. There is a path at the edge of this play structure that leads to the private entrance for the Sheraton and MarBrisa resorts. Next to Hideaways, is Granny's Apple Fries. I think this is the only snack unique to Legoland. Fried pieces of apple, dusted with cinnamon sugar and topped with whipped cream - yum! Across from Granny's, is Enchanted Walk, a quiet little area with some Lego woodland creatures to see. Nearby is Wild Woods Golf, which is mini golf for an additional fee, we didn't try it (too much of a time investment).

Leaving this area, we come to a wet area on the left. There's Splash Battle (boat with water cannons) and Soak-N-Sail (water play area with slides). We've never gone to this area since we spend at day at the water park, so on a park day we don't really want to get wet. Looks fun though.

At the end of the day, we had 30 minutes left and went to Sea Life. It's a really small aquarium, so we were able to walk through and pretty much see everything without lingering in that amount of time. DD was asleep in the stroller by then, so we could move faster. DS enjoyed the quiz trail, which is a series of questions located on the walls throughout Sea Life. There's a sheet of scratch off answers (A, B, or C) next the maps. The prize is a sticker when you turn in the sheet to the gift shop (it doesn't matter if you get it right or wrong).


Day 2 (Tuesday) - to the water park!

Near the entrance are lockers, changing stalls, and restrooms. This was the first time I've rented a locker (normally, I would leave my wallet in the hotel room, but we were in between hotels this day). The small was $8 for the day with in and out privileges. I only had a purse, but you could probably fit a regular sized backpack in it. The kiosk prints out a wrist band with a bar code on it, you then pick a block of lockers and scan the wrist band, and one of the empty locker doors will pop open. Scan again and the same door will open. Convenient not to have to remember the exact locker and no key to lose. Also, near the entrance are whole body dryers for $5, which we didn't try.

Near the entrance is Imagination Station, which has foot pedals to pump water that will shoot out and move turn tables. DS enjoyed this. The lazy river (Build-A-Raft River) entrance is nearby. There are single and double tubes, some of them have a base for building with the foam Legos floating in the river. I wish there were more Legos in the river though, we usually only manage to grab a couple (this time we didn't manage to get any). There are Lego people around the river that spray water. DS doesn't like to get water in his eyes, so I maneuvered our double tube away from him (not so easy when sitting in the tube), but I got drenched instead, LOL. DD was with DH and she liked the river a lot, so they went around a few more times.

To the left of the lazy river is a path that leads to the 3 big slides. There's a shallow pool here with the Joker Soaker (platform in the pool) and water cannons, we didn't spend much time here. I convinced DS to go on Orange Rush, you go down in a huge tube (fits 4 people or up to 750 lbs). There was a group of 3-4 boys (they looked about 9 or 10 years old) behind us and the ride attendant asked if we minded going together (we didn't). It was really fun! It'll be nice when DD is tall enough (42 inches) and we can go on as a family. DS liked it enough to go on it a second time. We also went on Splash Out, the blue body slide. I was told that I couldn't catch DS at the bottom, but could wait for him a little further away from the exit of the slide. The water is shallow (maybe less than 3 feet?), so I didn't think it would be a problem, but DS didn't get good footing coming down so his head went underwater. The material on the bottom is more cushy than the rest of the pool. Not a big deal, but he wasn't happy about it, ha ha. There are also 2 enclosed tube slides, the Twin Chasers, but of course I couldn't convince DS to go on after he dunked his head. Just as well, I don't like enclosed slides that much anyways.

Leaving this area, to the left of the entrance and past the lockers, is Duplo Splash Safari. DD really liked this area and the small slides. The ramp slide was especially fun (fits 4) and we all went on as a family several times. She liked the single open slide too, but didn't go in the enclosed slide. The pools is zero entry, shallow, and has Duplo animals that sprout water (elephant, alligator, polar bear). There's a decent number of loungers here with most shaded by umbrellas. Past this area is the Splash Zoo, which is a splash pad with Duplo animals. The water is really cold, so DD didn't stay long.

To the right of the entrance, past the lazy river, is the newer Chima area. To the right, is Pirate Reef, which we've never been on. It's a boat ride with a drop and big splash. To the left is Cragger's Swamp with 3 types of slides. Cooler's Twist is a curved open medium-sized slide, Crug's Run is a medium enclosed slide, Cragger's Splash is a small open slide. DS went on the slides, but he didn't like how there's water splashing down in the slide structure. There are several water cannons in this shallow pools area with pretty big range. DS loved splashing other people, but he hated getting splashed - ironic, I know. We found that we could sit in the pool towards the side of the slide structure, closer to the back, that was out-of-range of the water cannons. There are chairs around this pool, but not much shade.

Past this area and up some stairs, is DS's favorite - Eglor's Build-A-Boat. You get a boat base (about a foot long), build on it, and then send it down a miniature Chima themed river. For some reason, the water on one side of the river wasn't on this time, so the boats didn't go down as well. There is another restrooms, changing stalls, and lockers area here. Nearby is the Lion Temple Wave Pool, which we didn't try. There is also the Speedorz Arena, which is a covered area with ramps to race Chima toy cars (or more like motorcyles). There is a lot of seating here.

That concludes my trip report! Thanks for reading!

Great report-thanks!

limace said:

Great report-thanks!

Click to expand...

Thanks for the compliment! It's nice to know someone is reading it.

We're checking into Grand Pacific Palisades later today. We're in Orange County but have only been to Legoland once. I thought I'd do a little brush up on it. I was bummed I got to the end and your report wasn't finished. Hopefully it was a great time in the park.

Thanks for sharing! We are planning a legoland trip at some point in the future, so I like hearing about how other people's trips went.

summerw said:

We're checking into Grand Pacific Palisades later today. We're in Orange County but have only been to Legoland once. I thought I'd do a little brush up on it. I was bummed I got to the end and your report wasn't finished. Hopefully it was a great time in the park.

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I just edited my post (#4) with the Legoland part. I haven't finished the water park part yet, wasn't sure if anybody was interested.

Have a great trip and stay at GPP!

wanderlust7 said:

I just edited my post (#4) with the Legoland part. I haven't finished the water park part yet, wasn't sure if anybody was interested.

Have a great trip and stay at GPP!

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Just finished it. Sound like you had a very similar time to us. Thanks for the refresher course. I'm definitely interested in the water park too. We will probably go Friday.

summerw said:

Just finished it. Sound like you had a very similar time to us. Thanks for the refresher course. I'm definitely interested in the water park too. We will probably go Friday.

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I just added the water park to post #4. Thanks for giving me motivation to finally finish this thing! Have fun at Legoland!

thanks! We did legoland last year & DD loved it. She pretty much wanted to move into the hotel!

Great Trip report!!! We are planning a visit in September and I have been on the fence about going. Love all the pictures you posted, helps visualize what the resort looks like.

Thanks so much for the trip report! We have been to LEGOLAND once last year in May but we only did two half days and we didn't even try the water park. This year we'll be going the end of August for two full days so we'll definitely spend an afternoon at the waterpark this time. There is surprisingly little info out there for LEGOLAND trip planning so your report is very helpful, especially the waterpark part.

I have some questions: I see that you put your stuff in the locker at the waterpark. Did you carry around your towels to the different areas or just left them in one spot? How crowded was it? Did you eat at the waterpark?

Unfortunately, we will be there on a weekend, so we do expect big crowds. My DS7 is like your DS, he doesn't like the bigger rides at all. I like your idea of bribing them with souvenir money

Angrose said:

I have some questions: I see that you put your stuff in the locker at the waterpark. Did you carry around your towels to the different areas or just left them in one spot? How crowded was it? Did you eat at the waterpark?

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We left our towels, stroller, beach bag with clothes in the same spot all day. I would check up on it occasionally, but wasn't too worried since there wasn't anything valuable. It wasn't crowded that day (weekday, early June before most schools are out). I remember it seemed more crowded when we went last year in late June (still a weekday though).

We ate near the Chima Wave pool this time. I had a chili dog and the kids had kids' meals (one with hamburger, one with chicken fingers). It's pretty typical theme park food. The kids' meal is not a bad deal - full-size hamburger, chips or fries, and a drink (the chocolate milk was a pretty big bottle of Nesquik). Last time we ate near the Duplo pool, they have pizza, burritos/wraps, and salads.

We bought the refillable cup ($8.99, then $0.99 refills) in the park and were able to use it in the water park. They actually refilled it this time, last year they gave us a bottled soda. They also have the charge by day unlimited refills cups (I think those can only be used in the water park), but you'd have to drink a lot of soda to make that worthwhile (I think it was $10-11/day).

The refund through Travelocity finally went through! This was for being comped the first night at Grand Pacific Palisades for being downgraded. It took several calls to GPP and looks like Travelocity invalidated the $75 off coupon, but I'm still reasonably happy with the result.

Excellent trip report! We are local so we will probably never stay in the hotel but it's really nice to see what the rooms look like and also I'm still new at going to Legoland so it doesn't feel "like home" like Disneyland does. I can go to Disneyland without a map but I'm still learning the lay of the land in Legoland and it's nice to see it all written up. I got myself a map and have been meaning to study it before our next trip so I won't do so much back tracking but never remember to look at it. It sounds from reading your report that I have the "going to the left" all sorted and just need to familiarize myself with the "going to the right" section of the park

Thanks for the great report, it makes me excited for our upcoming visit!

GromMom said:

Excellent trip report! We are local so we will probably never stay in the hotel but it's really nice to see what the rooms look like and also I'm still new at going to Legoland so it doesn't feel "like home" like Disneyland does. I can go to Disneyland without a map but I'm still learning the lay of the land in Legoland and it's nice to see it all written up. I got myself a map and have been meaning to study it before our next trip so I won't do so much back tracking but never remember to look at it. It sounds from reading your report that I have the "going to the left" all sorted and just need to familiarize myself with the "going to the right" section of the park

Thanks for the great report, it makes me excited for our upcoming visit!

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Thanks for the kind words. Hope you have a great visit!

Thanks for the trip report! We are trying to get a feel for Legoland before we go, hopefully in October, so it's nice to have some comments about some of the different areas and attractions!