I find myself with an odd viewpoint with this park. I think it's a nice park, and it's one of the most popular parks in the country, (last year it even had more visitors than Thorpe Park) but for some reason it's not one I'd be quick to recommend to a friend. This isn't for the obvious reason, that it's a kids park. I'd happily recommend Paulton's Park, Littlehampton, and even a visit to Plopsaland (about 1 hours drive from Calais) to my family and friends. One big issue is the admission price, it is at a lot of Merlin/Tussauds attractions, but especially so here. In most of them I'd try to make sure I have a money off voucher before visiting, but would pay full price if it was a choice between paying full price or changing my plans. Here though I'm as good as unwilling to pay full price, and would rather change my plans than pay full price.

So what do you get for your considerable amount of money. The parks biggest feature has to be the theming. The biggest strength of which is the novelty of all the models made out of Lego, and some of the intricate details in the models. Where the theming falls a little short is a sense of immersion. Your unlikely to spend that long in a particular area, as most aren't that big and only have one or two rides. It's a shame the park wasn't designed with fewer worlds, but the worlds made larger, as I feel this would make the impact of the theming more substantial. Still the theming is still of a good quality, and goes a long way to enhancing the rides on offer.

One ride which draws particular attention is the Jungle Coaster, which I think has become a bit of a problem for the park. They've had to put covers on the cars, due to noise issues, from the riders screaming. I can sympathise with these complaints, given the Jungle  Coaster is a recent addition, (2004)  and having been along the road outside the park, I can say it's only a very short distance from some people's houses. It's not like some of the ridiculous Alton Towers ones, that boil down to; I expect the UK's number one theme park, that's been there over 30 years and gets over 2 million visitors every year, to stop expanding and change it's methods of operation, just because I've moved in near it. I'm told the changes to the Jungle Coaster have affected ride quality, but I haven't had the chance to find out due to the fact capacity has been affected. I've read this ride is fast pass only on busy days, I've only been on quieter days, when the queue is still longer than I'm willing to wait.

One problem here is Legoland is a big enough family park (especially with the recent lack of new rides at Chessington) to attract a large range of visitors, including those at the more daring end of the family market. The trouble is there aren't many more attractions other than the Jungle Coaster for this market at the park. The park desperately needs a few more family thrill rides at the level of a pirate ship or large chair swing to take the pressure off the Jungle Coaster and to cater better for a market it's now attracting.

After the Jungle Coaster there are still a good number of family rides on offer, including The Dragon, some good water rides and some good scenic rides. The trouble here is there's a lot of a good standard, but nothing of a great standard. There are plenty of rides worth one or two goes, but nothing I would go out of the way for, and perhaps more importantly nothing I would recommend visiting the park for. The park is in need of a stand out signature ride.

One good point I do want to mention is the food. The range and quality on offer is great, and isn't even that bad value wise. We've even sometimes struggled to decide where to eat, thanks to the number of good  choices on offer. It ranks as one of the best parks for food in the U.K.

So now I've written this review, and thought about it a little more: Is this a park I'd recommend? Well I would say it doesn't quite match the hype it gets, or provide everything you should reasonably expect for the price they're charging. If you do have one of the many money off vouchers they distribute it's a very well themed and pleasant park, with a respectable number of good rides on offer. I think one of the main problems, I have in particular is it's not a very revisitable park. I live within easy day trip distance from the park, and have visited quite a few times to try the various new rides. This means the parks biggest strength, the theming, has lost a lot of it's impact on repeat viewings, plus a lot of the good rides aren't as fresh and appealing to me. In conclusion if your catering for anyone over the age of five (who will get more out of the park due to the large number of kiddie rides) this is a park best only visited once every four or five years to get the best out of it. I don't think this would be that difficult given the number of other family parks nearby, unless Legoland opens up a major World class attraction in the near future. If you do that, and do your best to avoid busy days it is a very good family park.