LegoLand!
After two days of sightseeing in Kyoto, everybody was ready for some more relaxed kind of fun. For this, we made reservations at Legoland, which is located in Nagoya. From Kyoto, this meant we had a brisk 25 minute Shinkansen ride to our destination.
When we arrived, I was immediately reminded of Celebration, FL. Outside of Legoland is a cute little shopping area that is pristine and brand new, presumably built so that Legoland visitors would have places to eat, drink, and shop once the park closes. This is actually more important than you might think because the park closes at 5PM!!
Anyway, the first order of business was checking-in to the official LegoLand hotel. I have to admit, and this might be quite shocking, but this was actually by far the coolest hotel I've ever stayed at. Entering the lobby, there was a giant pool of Legos that the kids ran off to as we handled the administration of our stay.
With room keys in hand, we entered the elevators to head to the Ninjago-themed floor (other options included Pirates, Knights, or Friends based on the Lego series currently in market). We were not expecting what went down when we entered and selected our floor...
Inside the room, the excitement only grew. Everything from the floor to the ceiling was Lego/Ninjago themed. Describing it won't do much good, so here's a bunch of photos to give you an idea of how awesome it was.
Perhaps the coolest feature of the room was the treasure chest. The chest is locked, and in order to get the combination a simple treasure hunt must be completed. We completed our puzzle and obtained the secret code. Inside the chest were three small Lego sets.
Alright, enough about the hotel, let's get to Legoland.
The park itself is broken up into smaller themed sections. There is a pirate themed area, an adventure area, a medieval area, a police and fire area (Lego City), MiniCity, and finally an area for smaller kids (based on the Lego Duplo series). Each area is similar in structure; a few small rides that kids of most ages can ride, a food area, and a playground. By far the favorite of our kids was this jet ski like ride where you zoom around in a tight circle and can make your small vessel swing in and out at pretty great speeds. Since we were there on a Thursday and Friday, the crowds were minimal and we were able to ride whatever we wanted as much as we wanted.
Outside of rides, the coolest area of the park was Lego MiniCity. The sole attraction in this zone is miniature scenes from around Japan all created using Legos. The area is pretty expansive, and there are so many things you miss the first time through. I could have spent an entire day just roaming through Lego MiniCity. It really was that cool. Even the kids asked to go back multiple times to check out more areas in detail. Here is an absurd amount of photos of this area. Hopefully it gives a good sense of how awesome it was.
The park is designed for children and therefore closes early, at 5pm. As I mentioned previously, the hotel is pretty sweet and on the second floor there is a giant indoor playground that the kids were able to spend considerable amount of time in. Right next to this playground is a bar and restaurant where the parents can drink some sanity-replenishers. This is pretty genius. There was even a playground attendant who came and organized games of hide-and-seek, and head-shoulders-knees-and-toes with the kids so parents could relax a little.
We did two days (one night) at the park and easily could have done more. They recently opened a new section that hosts an aquarium and other sea related exhibits. Our 2-day passes included admission to this area, but we couldn't get the kids to stop going on rides for long enough to go check it out. (The weather was also beautiful, so it was hard to convince anyone to go check out anything indoors.) I can't same I blame them too much.
All in all, a great little theme park for kids. Immaculately clean, and the kids were the PERFECT age. We would definitely go back to the park stay at the Legoland Hotel again. (We aren't, but SHOULD, get paid for this review...)
