Christmas Vacation Legoland (1)

On Sunday morning, we packed up the van and left Orlando behind. 

Winter Haven was our destination - Legoland to be exact. 

This was built in the old Cypress Gardens park.

Built last year - it's the 5th of 6 Legolands in the world - with the others in California, Denmark, 

England, Germany and Malaysia.

To say the boys were excited was an understatement. 

This is a theme park with LEGOS - which is one of their favorite things in the world. 

Our first ride - Driving School. 

Yes that is a real lifesize car made out of Legos. 

The boys both got to drive cars.

There are no tracks.....they were really driving.

And had to follow the stoplights and stop signs. 

Next up was the first roller coaster of the morning - Flying School. 

Then it was time to learn how to be firefighters and run the pump tank.

Boating School. Again no tracks - you steered and did the pedal all yourself.

From there we hit the Technic Test Track. 

Then the Aquazone Wave Racers

Technicycle and Test Track again.

Then we caught a show called "The Big Test"

And headed to catch the Legoland Pirate Ski Show. 

It was in the old ski show area from Cypress Gardens. 

I have to say that we all really enjoyed this; both Daryl and I were remembering the ski shows from Cypress Gardens and Sea World when we were kids.

Lunch was BBQ pitas from the BBQ Pit. Yum! 

And Wesley found a ladybug crawling on him while we ate.

Safari Jungle Trek was next. Every queue for lines had a Lego play area for kids. 

Of course there were no real animals, but great Lego animals. 

Here's some of the highlights.

Then we went to Miniland. That's a whole other post tomorrow, 

but suffice to say here's a view starting with the Daytona Speedway in the front. 

We were running out of time for the day so we decided what we wanted to see the most. 

Parker voted for Pharoah's Lost Kingdom Adventures.

It's a dark ride where you can shoot the targets and score points as you go through the tombs. 

Wesley voted to go jousting next. 

We doubled back to the other side of the park and passed by this great waterfall 

on our way to a preserved section of Cypress Gardens.

They even had Lego representations of the old southern belles who 

used to wander through the gardens. 

We wandered through the Imagination Station and then did a little shopping

in the bargain store where most everything was 50%. 

We headed back to the front of the park and did another blast from the past - 

Island in the Sky from the Cypress Gardens days.

It had great views of all the action in the park.

Daryl and I stood in line for snacks - Grannie's Apple Fries -

while the boys rode the carousel.

These were simply delicious! 

Two very happy boys with their stash of stuff; 

nice to have Christmas money to spend at the bargain Lego store!

 

We left Legoland about 5:30pm and headed for Seffner for Uncle Daniel's birthday party. 

About 10 minutes into the ride, this was the scene in the backseat.

 

I think that means it was an awesome day, right?