Day 2 in Blackpool and we were off to Blackpool Pleasure Beach. We’ve never been before and I definitely thought it was going to be nothing more than an overpriced funfair on a pier.. how wrong was I!?
We arrived just before 10am and it was pouring! Rain was forecast for the whole day – great!
You have to activate your tickets before arriving and upload your photos, which makes entry a lot quicker than at some of the other parks we visit. We scanned in and headed off to claim our photo pass and unlimited drinks that we pre booked. It was £20 for the photo pass and with this you get all your photos digitally to download, you get 2 wristbands per photo pass so choose who will wear them wisely to get the most photos! (More info further down)
Nickelodeon Land
We started off over in Nickelodeon land, over here you’ll find 12 family rides themed around Spongebob, Rugrats, Dora and the Wonder Pets to name a few. If you are planning on getting a photo pass it’s worth noting there are only 2 rides in this section with a ride photo available – Blue Flyer & Rugrats river ride.
We went on all of them except the water ride (we were soaked through as it was!) and other than the Nickelodeon Streak (The orange track coaster which was 45 mins) the queues were only 5-10 minutes at the most. You will also find lots of games stalls and food stands in this area.
Holly was also pretty excited when Skye, Chase and a Ninja Turtle came out to do meet and greets! Even Oscar could go on pretty much all the rides down here – although if you want your under 2 to ride, they do need their own pass, they must also be able to walk unaided and be wearing hard soled shoes. If you are visiting with a child under 2 then do have a good read of this section on the website
We did like though that if a child needs to be accompanied, they only need to be with someone over 12 years / 132cm rather than an over 18 like at some parks.
Food at Blackpool Pleasure Beach
We opted to just grab some quick food at the stalls opposite the Big Dipper – The girls had hotdogs and I had chips which came in this cute little bucket, complete with matching spade, which is now my new pen pot on my desk. Although they were £3.80 (!!) I did love the novelty factor and they were nice enough. There is an all you can eat Pizza and Pasta Buffet round the back of Nickelodeon Land if you would prefer to have a proper sit down meal.
We also couldn’t leave without grabbing some doughnuts – Sugar for me and Nutella Dip for the girls – they were the best doughnuts we had all weekend. As we had opted for the unlimited drinks deal we had both a hot and cold option (£10 each) and just refilled these throughout the day.
Lotties first upside down ride
When we arrived we quickly realised that the girls were tall enough for all the ‘big’ rides and I spent most of the morning convincing Lottie that she would like them.
She hasn’t long been tall enough even for Wickerman and Th13teen at Alton Towers so she hasn’t really been on anything remotely scary. But I really wanted her to try them!
So we started off with the Big Dipper – which she actually said other than being bumpy wasn’t too bad. We then moved onto The Big One, which I’m not going to lie even I was a little nervous watching it, but she did it and LOVED it. I knew once she was comfortable on that we could definitely have a try at one of the ones that goes upside down.
We loved that every ride had these really clear boards to show the height restrictions along with the opening and closing times. It made it a lot quicker to see what we could and couldn’t go on with Holly and Oscar.
We wandered round to some more rides all the while Lottie was checking out what the other rides did and deciding whether she wanted to go on them. Chloe point blank refused and as she cried a little after The Big Dipper we weren’t going to try and convince her to try anything else.
They loved the Steeplechase, but I thought it was pretty harsh and I wouldn’t be in a hurry to go on it again!
A bit later on when Oscar had had enough Gaz headed off with the smaller ones and left me and Lottie in the park to explore some more of the bigger rides.
Lottie decided she wanted to try Revolution first. This is a long straight ride with a loop in the middle, it launches off forwards, loops, and comes to a stop on a platform, before launching you backwards through the loop and back to the start. She was nervous but when we had done our front facing launch and it stopped, she didn’t even realise we had been upside down! She did say she felt it more when we went backwards. We queued for around 20 minutes for this one.
Adrenaline junkie in the making
And just like that, my mini me adrenaline junkie was born! We then did Infusion (half hour or so wait), before jumping in the Icon queue.
This was however going to be a long wait as the first time we queued it developed a technical fault and was stopped. So off we went to have a look around and hang about until it reopened.
About 90 mins later we spotted it had reopened and we RAN (I don’t run for much but I really didn’t want to be at the back of the queue!) and we managed to be in around the 5th cart after it restarted, however just as we were waiting to board, someone was sick on the cart they were unloading so we were stuck waiting for around half hour while all the poor staff cleaned it up!
Eventually it was our turn and we managed to end up on the front row! This was great for the views however, as it was raining again and its is pretty fast it was like someone was throwing stones in our faces. Icon was 100% worth the wait though and we both loved it.
Our last ride of the day was the Ice Blast drop tower, I do like these but I don’t think I have ever been on one quite so high! The queue for this was about 20 minutes long but it was around 7pm at this point.
The park was actually pretty empty from around 5ish even though it was open until 10pm so it would be worth going later in the day if you can stay until closing. You’d also have the bonus of riding the rides in the dark!
Tickets for Blackpool Pleasure Beach
We booked using our Tesco Club card Vouchers so if you use one of these it is worth checking what you have available at 50p of club card vouchers is worth £1.50 to spend at Blackpool Pleasure Beach.
Prices do seem to vary across the year but in August the prices are showing as
Monday – Friday
Adult 12+ : £35 in advance / £42 on the day
11 and Under : £30 in advance / £36 on the day
Saturday
Adult 12+ : £40 in advance / £42 on the day
11 and Under : £34
Sunday / Bank Holiday
Adult 12+ : £38 in advance / £42 on the day
11 and Under : £32
You can find up to date pricing here
Blackpool Pleasure Beach Extras – Parking, Speedy Pass Etc
If you have to drive I would recommend pre booking your parking. Parking in general in Blackpool is hard work so it is definitely worth paying £20 for the premium parking so you know you have a space for the day and won’t waste the beginning of your day driving round trying to find somewhere to park. Alternatively the tram stops right outside.
We chose not to get a Speedy pass and to be honest it wasn’t really needed on the day we visited as I think the rain may have put people off visiting so the queues weren’t too long. I think if you visited on a nice day it may be worth investing in. You have 2 choices for these passes Standard for £25 and VIP for £50 which says it will save you up to 90% of queue times.
It’s also worth noting that there isn’t any sort of parent swap pass available which is a shame as we always find that super useful.
Digital Ride Photo Pass £20 – We have one of these with our Merlin Passes and we do like having all the photos digitally, so I would recommend it however it is only available on the following rides; Icon, Wallace & Gromit’s Thrill-O-Matic, The Big One, Rugrats Lost River, Ice Blast, Blue Flyer, Revolution, Infusion and Avalanche. So do check those rides out and make sure you will get your moneys worth.
We put one of the bands on Holly and she only went on one of these rides so it wasn’t worth her having it. You also get 2 bands so choose wisely s to who will wear them as they have to be in the photo to claim it.
All you can drink £10 – This is available in both Hot and Cold – We actually love the reusable hot drink cup as the lid screws on unlike most ‘cup’ shaped reusables we have and we definitely got our moneys worth refilling these through the day. You can refill them with something different each time too, you aren’t restricted to the same drink all day. The cold drinks bottle has a flip top lid too so much better than the leaky straw bottle you get at Alton Towers!
Picento Photographers Booklet Package £20 – I don’t remember seeing this available when we booked last year which is a shame as Holly really wanted pictures but I didn’t want to pay £10 per photo! We definitely would have got one of these which gets you 4 printed images with characters or taken by the roaming photographers.
Games Tokens £20 – Get £30 worth of games tokens for £20, a great saving if you plan on playing on the games stalls during your visit.
You can also pre book Pasaje del Terror, Ripleys Believe it or not and the Hot Ice show but we didn’t do any of these so can’t comment on whether they are any good.
A great day out!
Overall we had a great day out at Blackpool Pleasure Beach and it was far better than I expected it to be. Next time I would print my QR codes off and laminate them though as having to give the girls my phone every time they wanted to go on a ride was a pain as I was scared they would lose it!
I did find when I was going back to Blackpool Pleasure Beach website that it does say you can get them printed at guest services too if you need too, wish we had seen that before we visited as it would have been a lot easier!
If you have any questions feel free to ask away! You can book Blackpool Pleasure Beach here
ChrissyJ xxx
Find out what we did on Friday here
Find out what we did on Sunday here
Here are some ride photos for your amusement!
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