Do you remember that Homebase ad where they build a house out of containers?
I always thought it looked pretty cool. It reminded me of playing Sylvanian Families when I was little* and spending ages organising the furniture in the little box shaped houses. I never imagined that one day I would get to sleep in a real actual container.
Well, you know what’s coming don’t you?
A couple of weeks ago Belle and I did spend the night in a container, and not because we were trying to sneak across any borders, but as part of a visit to Thorpe Park and the new Shark Hotel.
“The hotel is made of containers,” I told everyone.
“Seriously though,” they said, “what was it like?”
“Like sleeping in a container,” I said, and showed them the pictures:
For extra thrills, the container rooms were accessed through the mouth of a shark.
Once you were inside it was pretty hard to tell you were in a container, and we had all the standard facilities you’d expect from a hotel room, including very comfy beds and bedding, a good sized, clean bathroom, TV and funky lighting. It was a little disconcerting not to have any windows, other than the small port hole on the door, and I was sad not to have tea and coffee making facilities, but to be honest the Shark Hotel is designed more for rollercoaster fans than hotel buffs.
When you check in you are given a wristband to show that you are a hotel guest. Prices start from £52 per person and for this you get:
- Two whole days at the park
- A cooked breakfast (always the best bit in my mind)
- Free parking
- After hours park access in the evenings and early morning, including fast track access to all the big rides for the first couple of hours of the day
These perks are well worth it if you’re a proper thrill seeker. We stayed on a weekday night in the summer holidays and by about 7pm the park was really quiet. We got straight on to most of the rides without having to queue at all and even got to go on Stealth twice in a row with no waiting.
And what mummy wouldn’t want to go from 0 to 80mph in two seconds??
*And by little I mean about 13 years old. Sshhh…
Disclosure: We are Thorpe Park ambassadors. We have received Merlin annual passes in return for sharing our news and views but all opinions are my own.
Love the opener – great review
Sounds really interesting – wouldn’t mind trying it! But why no kettle, seems strange!