LEGOLAND® Florida Resort — Attraction in Winter Haven

I went with my wife and an adult friend (no kids) and was shocked at how fun Legoland actually is. There is a LOT to do, including some really fun rides and excellent theming. There's also a HUGE section of Lego cityscapes with realistic 5-6 ft tall buildings depicting the Vegas Strip, Florida cities, San Francisco, DC, and more. I spent about an hour just looking at all of that... Almost like a Lego museum. There are also fun Lego building options like the new Ferrari build-and-race where you build your own Lego car from scratch and literally race it like a soapbox derby. For the coasters... The wild mouse (Great Lego Race) was maybe the best wild mouse model I've been on. Dragon is extremely well-themed with tons of Lego animatronics and a decent family coaster at the end. Coastersaurus is bad. Rough and forceless with TINY cars very difficult for adults to fit in. Non-Coasters... Ninjago was disappointing. It was the first ride (I think) with the AR hand-motion shooting but the sensors were not calibrated well and there were no physical sets at all. Just screens, screens, and more screens without an interesting story. So if the only point is shooting for points it would be much more fun if it was properly upkept. The queue was very cool though. (In general I LOVE the idea of putting places to build Legos IN the queues so kids can handle longer wait times.)

Lost Kingdom Adventure was good in concept but again, not calibrated well. I like that when you shoot targets it activates effects. I feel like this one would be better without the guns at all. Just let us go through the "not-Indiana Jones" story with all of the effects happening for everyone.

The LEGO Movie Masters of Flight was a cute concept for a ride and is basically a better version of Disney 's Soarin' ride (but not close to as good as Avatar: Flight of Passage). I liked that the ride had a story as well as most and scent effects.

Pirate River Quest was disappointing. The wait times were outrageous for not that many people in line (a general problem at this park) especially because they were only running 3 boats on a 20-minute ride. And they only hold up to 8 guests each. So ~70 passengers per hour. And for most of the ride I wished I wasn't on it. It's mostly just a pirate telling you to count gems then giving you the answer before you even pass by all of the gems. And most of the figures are not made of Lego and are stagnant. Not nearly enough animatronics for a "pirate battle." The parrot talking got really old really quick too. I did like the last part sailing on the open water but I'd rather just walk through the Gardens next time. Because I chose to do the ride I didn't have time to walk through Cypress Gardens which is included with admission.

Mia's Riding Adventure was the only true thrill ride in the park, being a big disco-style spinner ride. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Coast Guard academy was basically go-karts but in boats. Super fun but the wait was ridiculously long because they weren't using over half of the boats.

NFPA Rescue academy was a super-fun competion to put the fire out the fastest. A slight workout!

Most of the rest of the rides are kiddy flat rides. I think you need a lot of kiddy rides in Legoland BUT too many of them are just the same flat track with different ride vehicles and scenery. Would be nice to have a really solid kids' dark ride along the lines of Ratatouille at EPCOT or Small World at Disneyland/MK.

The park was clean enough though the bathrooms weren't great. The rides and experiences were a lot of fun. The only negative is that the operations on the rides are TERRIBLE and it's mostly not the employees' fault. It's because the ride's capacities are akin to fair rides but the park is built to attract thousands per day, causing lines with literally 20 people to take 20+ minutes. Most theme parks have ride capacities around 600+ per hour per ride and this one is about 15% of that. Also know that AAA Gives good discounts if...

Im visiting the Lego Land Florida Resort to celebrate my Baby first birthday. I just arrived yesterday and Im extremely disappointed in the careless and negligent act that was taken place. I visited the Sandy's Castle Restaurant at the Beach Retreat for dinner as my family and I drove 6 hours to the resort and finally were able to get a bite to eat.

We arrived at the restaurant and there were on 4 families present and we were seated right away. Alex our waiter. We were greeted and told we will be attended to shortly. As we waited a couple mins Alex approached us to take our order and wanted to be informed of any allergies for our party. We advised him that our 1 year old son was allergic to shrimp and he advised us a chef would be to discuss the allergy accommodation and other concerns while taking our orders. In less than 10 mins another server came to our table with a full order of SHRIMP which my baby almost grabbed( We NEVER ordered shrimp at the table as his allergies are severe) we advised the server it was not for us . The Chef never came out. After we waited 35 to 40 mins after placing order and still have not received our food. As others partied were receiving reassurance and were checked up on we were not. When the waiter finally returned he let us know he will check on the food and bring it out right away.

He returned with only my baby food which included chicken tenders and fries which was fine as long as the baby eat we were okay. The food came out extremely hot so i sat it to the side before feeding my baby THANK GOD. Alex than returned again and asked did the baby eat the food yet we let him know he have not and says “great because there was a mistake in the kitchen and the food was not cooked separately but instead in the same oil as the shrimp” . He then asked if we would like it remade and a supervisor approached apologizing and offering to 0 out the bill. This could have went really bad and been a nightmare to what supposed to be a vacation . Im so thankful i decided to not give my baby the food because it was hot. This act was extremely careless from this establishment and the chef still never came out to speak with us. This is a young baby who could have been harmed.

As the only BLACK guest in the restaurant who was mistreated and neglected it was hurtful after spending 2,000 dollars or more for this vacation. While others were able to enjoy their food and time there. I returned to my hotel at the Pirate Island hotel and notified the supervisor and food and beverage manager of this negligence. I was treated with empathy and was told a director would reach out to me (Which i have not received a call or email yet from the director) and they cannot guarantee any money returned. Which was insulting because i never once asked or insinuated wanted money off . Although it would be the right thing to do. At this point I'm not comfortable with eating anything here.

Overall, i do not recommend this hotel if you hate children with allergic reactions. As this night could have resulted to my baby being hospitalized.

Please do better ! Also please treat ALL guest as if they...

We've been to Legoland previously and bought the Elite pass over Black Friday. I have to say, our return trip was a very mixed bag.

The park itself is very nice, but we encountered a few issues during our day at the park.

First, there was a lot of stuff closed, from stores to the pizza buffet, with signs on the locked doors pointing you to other locations. This was not a huge deal, but noticeable.

Second, there was a general uninspired feeling from the employees. For example, the newer Pirate River Quest attraction closes at 4:00pm and they say that they might close the line a bit early if it's busy. We showed up about 3:05pm and they had the line closed off for the day saying that they were at capacity. We went into the Cypress Gardens area and noticed that the boats weren't even filled half way. The park wasn't very busy for a holiday weekend either, so I'm curious as to why the line was at capacity an hour early? How early do they close it on a busy day? Seems kind of lazy to me. They definitely can do better for their guests.

That's my biggest complaint: the staff couldn't care less about your experience. They simply don't seem to care about you. They're in the park for a paycheck, not to give you a good experience. I'm sure there's exceptions, but the vibe I got was not good. No one seemed to care if you left disappointed or not. We did (leave a bit disappointed), by the way.

For the money, it was just OK for the day. As an Elite passholder, we're supposed to get a discount on dining, but our pizza from Pepper & Roni's Pizza Stop did not let us get the discount. The pizza was about the size of a personal pan pizza at Pizza Hut and priced at nearly $13. For the parents reading, food at Walt Disney World is cheaper than this. Doesn't that say a lot? It was just OK, nothing that I will get again. I felt stupid for having paid for it, to be honest.

Will kids like Legoland? Absolutely, our child did. Kids also probably like visiting Disney Springs and that has no admission. So, that's a low bar really. For the money, it needs to be better. There's a lot to do, but the satisfaction is the problem.

When there's a train with six cars that hold two people and two cars aren't working, why? All ride seats need to be used and operational. If there's a reason a ride isn't fully loaded, management needs to take steps and figure out how to make it fully operational. For that reason, I question the maintenance standards. Why weren't they fully loading rides when there was a line a present? This is not just about the River Quest ride either, we noticed this on multiple attractions. I'm sure there are reasons, but if they're not being corrected, it's more like "excuses for poor service".

Overall, the park is a nice park in many areas. We've been here before, so we knew what to expect. It's a shame though that it's not better, because really, it wouldn't take much effort. Everything was not awesome, and that's a true shame for a park with so much potential.

We'll be back and I'll update this review if I see...