morphius909

Read many conflicting reports about Legoland.

We have a 5 year old son and 10 month old daughter.

BearX220

Wasted on your daughter. Probably excellent for your son if he has any Lego consciousness. He's just old enough. It's a fine day out if your kids are in the six-to-ten zone. When mine was in that range he regarded Legoland as pilgrims regard Lourdes. We spent several open-to-close marathon days there. The rides are suited to young children / tweens but will bore any kid older than eleven or so. The Lego scale models of all the world's cities are fun to visit.

bakedpatato

as a SAN local and a huge lego fanatic...I like legoland(the models are awesome!). Yes, the rides are childish so Junior will love the rides
Yeah, tis a waste on the daughter.
(Try the apple fries...I love them to death!)

Diplomatico

If you are expecting something like Disneyland you'll be disappointed. Otherwise it will be a fun (but expensive) day for your five year old.

morphius909

Figured as much!

I can't believe the fee to get in, even though I found a 8 dollar off/ticket coupon.

I'd rather do Disneyland again (been there last 2 years out of 3) but the 10 month old probably won't hold out.

I am looking at a much more relaxing pace for our trip next week, so maybe Legoland in January for a day or several several hours is just what the doctor ordered.

BearX220

OK, interviewed my wife and (now 16-year-old) son and have some more feedback for you:

** Son feels Legoland is best suited for kids 7 to 11. Any younger and you can't take advantage of everything on offer. Any older and it's boring.

** There are basically four categories of things to do: rides, shows, hands-on Lego building opportunities, and tours of scale models of things built out of Legos. There is a recently added water park but it's not open in January.
Also, the place adds up to an intense whack of stimulus with so much noise, color, physical sensation, walking everywhere, Bionicles coming up to shake hands... By mid-afternoon Legoland resounds with the squalls of small children at the ends of their ropes and melting down. With tickets at $69 to $89 each plus parking fee and expensive food, you will perhaps not be happy if your 5-year-old son fades and wants out after just a few hours. When my son was 8, 9, 10 we'd line up before the gates opened, take the place for all it was worth, eat those apple fries by the barrelful, and get thrown out at the closing bell. He remembers Legoland with great affection but won't be going back until he's taking his own kids.

Alumino

Anyone have a comparison with the Legoland in Billund, Denmark (the first Legoland) by any chance? Sounds much the same, expect that the Denmark location is totally in the middle of nowhere... other than Legoland, the city is sleepy. Cozy, but sleepy.

mrpickles

Costo is across the street and you can fill up on cheap hot dogs and pizza before going to legoland. Get your discount admission inside the Costco. Major outlet mall is one block away as is the beach. Have fun.

morphius909

Update:

Legoland was a blast...for my 5 year old.

It was pretty dead the day we went (Though sunny and warm). Zero Lineups, Zero Waits. We even went on rides over and over again because my 5 year old couldn't get enough.

It was almost creepy and sad just how vacant the park was. Im sure on a weekend or summer it;s jammed packed.

All in all, if you have kids 4-7 or 8, they'll love it. Adults-Meh, but when you see the joy in your kids face it doesn't matter.

All in all, we got their by 9:30, and by 2:00 we had hit every ride (sometimes 2-3 times) and it was a pretty relaxing day.

CAlex

Bringing an older topic back to life:

We plan to go to Legoland 2 days with our 5yr old and 2 yr old sons. Is it better to plan to go 26-27 Nov (2 days before Thanksgiving), or on 29-30 Nov (Friday and Saturday after Thanksgiving), also first days of Winter Snow Days? Should I expect extra crowds Fri+Sat, or people typically stay home for the family holidays?

Is there a better destination in this time period for that age combination?

wrxmom

It'll be crowded because it's the holidays.

You'll have the out of town visitors, like yourself, plus everyone who has a year pass since the schools are out. Not to mention the cheap passes you can buy at Costco...

Any theme park in Southern California is going to be crowded during the holidays.

Ancien Maestro

How much are the cheap passes from Costco?

We've visited the Lego Land in Windsor, UK last year and liked it much.. although we thought Disneyland Paris was more of a show stopper for the region. Anyone visit both Windsor and San Diego? I heard the Lego Land near Orlando is a park conversion renovation, but the one near San Diego is supposed to be pretty good.

CAlex

I decided to stick to Universal Studios and Disneyland Adventure Park for this week. Kids loved it, and it was not so crowded as we would have expected. Disneyland California was so much better than Disneyland Paris, with better access options and better food.

We'll leave Legoland for some other time, when kids are older....

Need

Not too much older... 4 to 7 is probably the optimal ages for Legoland unless you are really into Legos.

pseudoswede

We went two years ago, and my kids (4 and 6 at the time) loved it. When we asked last week, what they wanted to see if we went back to Southern California (they don't know we've already bought the plane tickets), they both yelled "Legoland!" I was going to skip Legoland this year and get a 3-day Park Hopper, but now my plans have changed.

If you do some searching on the internet, you can find BOGO codes, which makes tickets pretty cheap.

Edited to add...

Picked up two adult and two children tickets for $166 ($41.50/person). Had to make two separate orders using the Home Depot and Wendy's links on this web page.