Legoland Deutschland

This past week, we got to experience Legoland to celebrate a birthday.  It was a blast.

Tickets for the theme park are ~45€ each, but coupons are easy to find.  Kids get in free on their birthday (bring a passport to prove it), and we had a back-of-cereal-box coupon for half off the entire family, so we ended up paying 99€ for the five of us to get in; not bad.

As it's in Bavaria, Legoland offered beer, schnitzel, wurstsalat (with Pretzel bread), and other regional delights- all reasonably priced.  I was shocked they didn't gouge you inside the park, and you're allowed to carry in backpacks with whatever food you like.  They even had water fountains to refill for free . . . a rarity in Europe.

Legoland is geared towards children, so the rides are pretty tame (they're about the level of Dutch Wonderland, for those familiar with the Lancaster park).  Three roller coasters, a log flume, a pirate water ride, big playground, and other standard fare dot the park.  There's also a Lego factory, where you can build your own minifigure or buy parts in bulk (paying by the ounce).

Of course, with Lego as the theme, there are plenty of dioramas, and they're amazing.  The two major themes were Star Wars (one diorama for each Episode) and European cities; the pictures below show the scope of these things.  I could have spent the day just enjoying them.  Recognize any castles recently covered on this blog?

We stayed for about 5 hours and had our fill- the youngest couldn't take any more.  We did a handful of rides (the average wait was 20 minutes), and enjoyed the Lego store at the end.  It's a great day out.