Chessington for the under 5s (Chessington World of Adventures)

Member Name: brownp1

Product:	Chessington World of Adventures
Date:	20/09/01 (415 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: fun for all ages

Disadvantages: can be expensive

Most of the current ops on Chessington focus on the major rides, but this op is based upon the user - friendliness and suitability of the park to those with young families.

To set my stall out I have 2 boys the eldest is 3½ and the youngest is 1½, and my wife and myself took them to Chessington last week. I will mainly be reviewing how it was for them, since, as anyone with young children knows, if they’re happy and not whingy then the parents can have an enjoyable day too.

Few basics about Chessington 1st –

Location
It’s located in Surrey near Junctions 9 and 10 on the M25, and can also be reached by direct trains from either Clapham or Wimbledon so is convenient for most of the Southeast and possibly even further afield.

Opening Times
The Park is open from the beginning of April to the end of October although near the end of the season it is open at Fridays and weekends only. Opening hours vary throughout the year but the core times are 10am to 6.30pm and it does stay open later at various times in the year.

Prices
Prices at the gate are £19.95 for an adult; £16 for a child (4-12 years), £12 OAP or disabled, and a family pass costs £63. The good thing for me was that both my children being under 4 they got in for free. If you book on-line at www.chessington.com you will get discounts from these prices the level of discount depending on whether you specify a particular day or not.

What rides are there –

The 2 main rides are Rameses Revenge and Samurai. Both are high in sick inducing factor but if you’re there with small children they’re not the kind of rides you go on so I’ll disappointingly skip past them. The only thing I will say is that apparently during school hols and weekends queues can be well over 45 minutes but go in term time during the week and you can stroll straight onto all the rides including these two.

For the kids the ride
s all have height restriction information detailing whether they’re allowed on accompanied, unaccompanied or not at all. My youngest was under 0.9m high so had a limited selection of rides whilst my oldest at 1m had a wider choice.

The park is broken down into zones so by zone the complete list of is as follows: -

In the young children’s Toytown area there was –
Toadies Crazy Cars – Cars follow a track through a landscape based on Wind in the Willows. Kids rating 7/10
Flying Jumbos – a fairground ride with pink elephants which go up and down 8/10
Tiny Truckers – basically as it says small trucks which follow a track which kids can pretend to drive, a firm favourite 9/10
Carousel – an old fashioned merry go round, went slowly but the kids loved it 8/10
Adventure House – An indoor soft play area 7/10
Berry’s Bouncers – Get bounced slowly up to 30 feet into the air, but have to be 0.9m tall so only half votes 5/10
Action Man Training HQ – an obstacle course which would have entertained them for hours 8½/10

In Beanoland there are
Roger the Dodger dodgems – fun fairground ride but have to be 0.9m tall so only 6/10
Beano Bus – The bus goes into the air and round on its arm whilst remaining level, again for children over 0.9m so again only 6/10

In Mexicana
Runaway train – wasn’t running on the day we went so I can’t comment

In Pirates Cove
Seastorm – basically a tarted up waltzer, a bit fast for my kids so 5/10

In Transylvania
The bubbleworks – Meant to be a journey through a fizzy pop factory but not a bubble in site, the ride was also dark and noisy and both my kids were petrified 0/10.

In the Mystic East
Dragon Falls – this looks a good log flume ride for kids over 0.9m tall but after coming from the bubbleworks we weren’t going to scare
them again.

So there are actually a good number of rides they could both go on, and with the park being empty they could stay on the rides for several goes in a row so they both enjoyed the rides.

What else to do?
From my memories Chessington started off as a zoo with a few rides, the zoo area has shrunk but they’ve still got Lions, Tigers, Gorillas, Monkeys, Penguins, Sealions, creepy crawlies and an aviary. Young children love this and mine are no exception and could have spent hours gazing at the animals that all have large cages and seem contented enough. There were several animal feeding displays but a particular thrill was the birdshow where a barn owl jumps along the benches and its wingtips brush your hair

What Food is there?
There’s a huge variety of foods, all reasonably (for a theme park) priced. As well as the chains McDs, KFC, Pizza Hut there is a chippy, a mexican, and a chinese plus a pub, cafes and Donut stalls so everyone should be able to find something to please them.

Overall this was a good day out for all the family, we stayed all day and everyone enjoyed themselves. At £40 plus food its not cheap but you can’t call it expensive either and since there was no queuing we definitely got value for money.

Most importantly there wasn’t a whine all day, even on leaving as they were both exhausted so definitely a success, and we would go again.

Summary: