A seven year age gap between kids is a bit of a tricky one. It’s great when the youngest is about a year old and your eight year old loves playing with adorable babies, but when that adorable baby turns into an annoying six year old, the now teenager isn’t always quite so keen.
One thing we find it really hard to do is to find activities and days out that both Bee and Belle, now 17 and 10, both enjoy. It is getting easier as they get older but funnily enough Bee doesn’t always leap at the chance to do things like spend a weekend with me and Belle in a caravan building sandcastles and playing on 2p arcade machines.
Funny that.
A couple of weeks ago though I discovered something that I reckoned would appeal to everyone, even Boyfriend, who doesn’t get hugely excited about any sort of family day out – Thorpe Park. Sure, I’m not a massive fan of rollercoasters, (you wait for ages, get banged about uncomfortably for a bit and then it’s over before you realise…), but I can tolerate them for the sake of that apparently much-sought after quality family time.
Yee ha!
Here are some of the things we liked and disliked about Thorpe Park:
Parking was easy, there were no queues actually getting in to the park, and everything seemed to be laid out well, so there wasn’t masses of walking involved.
They offer a refillable drink cup for £6, which is great value for families who don’t mind sharing a straw. Unfortunately, the queues to get your cup refilled were long, and food and drink stands seemed generally understaffed. We spent over an hour altogether over the course of the day queuing just for drinks. Not cool.
We really enjoyed the log flume ride we went on – Loggers Leap – although the queue for the Tidal Wave was a bit too long to justify – over an hour and a half when we went to have a look. However, one of my personal best bits of the day was standing in the ‘splash zone’ for the Tidal Wave – as each car came down the main loop and splashed into the water onlookers could, depending on where they were standing, get completely soaked. I got completely soaked. It was a lot of fun, but probably best not done whilst wearing jeans as I was quite soggy for the rest of the day.
I found a video on YouTube to show you what I mean:
We didn’t get to go on Stealth – one of the big five – as it was shut for pretty much the whole day. This was very disappointing as this was the one we really wanted to go on. I also didn’t get to go on The Saw, as this was shut for the afternoon, and Colossus was also closed when we went back for a second ride. With just the five really big rollercoasters it can really impact on your day when one or more breaks down.
The Saw
We liked the atmosphere that had been created with the set around the Swarm. This ride felt much more Disneyland-esque, where it’s telling a story and you can get a bit involved in the build-up as well as the ride itself. Having something to look at while you’re queuing does help make it feel not quite so tedious. Make the most of the build-up though, the ride itself was over very quickly.
The best bit though? Apparently it was the Rocky Express. Turns out you don’t have to do as much as you might think to please certain people…
I remember my brother being obsessed with the log flume at Thorpe park (this coming from the person who once did 21 teacup rides there in one day) but I refused to go on – so every time he went on it I was given a battered sausage on a stick to keep me amused. Its a good job there was a long queue or I might have died from a heart attack aged 8.
I loved theme parks growing up. We had one near us called Adventure Land. It wasn’t huge. There were a couple of smaller roller coasters, one big one, and lots of other rides. I remember loving one that looked like a giant barrel and one would stand in it with about 8 other people. It would start to spin and when it got up to speed, the floor would drop out and we would all be stuck to the walls.
Physics makes for a good ride.
Plus, they always had good shows, too.
You actually make it appear really easy together with your presentation but I in finding this topic to be really something that I think I’d by no means understand. It kind of feels too complicated and extremely huge for me. I am looking forward to your next put up, I’ll attempt to get the dangle of it!
I love theme parks – forget the kids I want to go! Never been to Thorpe though :(
Your post is looking great due to the snapshots of that water park. Everyone love to go to water parks for their vacation. By playing those water games we can get more relaxation. After going through your blog I’ve a plan to visit this place very soon. Thanks for sharing such an informative post for us.
I really love to have fun and enjoy in amusement parks. Kids are always ready to go to Thorpe Park as it is full of enjoyment for children of all age groups. Another thing that I want to discuss is huge age gap between children in a family. If you have two kids having 6 to 10 year age gap between them then it become very important to note that how your elder child is treat your younger kid. Many a times, age gap between children make huge difference between their behaviour and thinking towards each other. So, always try to reduce this gap by making them to understand each other feelings.
Great post!
I am wondering where to go to have fun recently and you just give me the answer!
Wow! The Thorpe Park is really a fun place to have a great trip! :)
Thanks for your great share!