Legoland Deutschland

July 23, 2009

This was both my favorite day of Grandma's whole visit and the best July 23rd in six years. It felt so good to spend Zane's birthday doing something we knew he would have enjoyed, and that his brother and sister also enjoyed. I've just not felt so happy and good on the 23rd since he was born.

The day almost didn't happen, however. Georgia woke up with some sort of stomach-ache. She was fine until she started eating her breakfast and then she sort of withered. She spent a good hour or more lying on her stomach, or slouched on the couch. So although we meant to get an early 8am start, in the hopes of being at Legoland shortly after it opened, we didn't make it until closer to 10am, and we arrived around 11:30am in the glaringly hot sunshine.

It took both Georgia and Dean some time to realize just what Legoland was and what the point of it was. The first thing we saw, were boats and a huge long line to get on one. We steered Georgia away from them and onto an airplane ride.

::Georgia & Sven::

::in line with an excited Dean, before backing out on him, bad Mommy::

I was originally in line with Dean, but when I got up and saw the ride, I didn't think it was one he could do. I thought he needed to sit in my lap, and that wasn't going to work, so I backed out and he cried. Grandma took pity on him, said she was taking him and well, she did.

::Grandma & Dean::

Of course, Georgia wanted to go again when she saw Dean on the planes, so I took her in line and Grandma and Dean ran back again after their ride was over. Both kids got to go twice. Maybe we should have gone more than twice. There was not much of a line, and it was one of the few that Dean could do (although Mom had to fight to get him on, poor guy was old enough for the rides, just not big enough. So he'd be told he couldn't, and he'd get upset - can you blame him?).

::flying!::

::it may not look it, but Grandma insists he had a fabulous time::

Eventually, we moved on and on. We went into the Legoland Factory and watched how legos are made - but the kids found it boring and it was hard to maneuver the stroller in there. Then we had lunch and our birthday cupcakes before moving on.

::it takes some serious concentration to stick six candles in six cupcakes
- then again, it was a serious moment::

::it didn't take her long to figure out pulling the candles back out is fun::

::just one blueberry? why not cover the whole cupcake in them?::

At some point we went on the little train that runs all around Legoland and finally saw just what all we could do. From the train, we saw the lego horses and decided we needed to go to the land of knights. Here is where I have to tell you that Grandma and I took off and abandoned the kids and Sven because we saw that there was hardly any line for the Feuerdrache and we both wanted to do a fun roller coaster.

When we were up in line in the castle, we looked down and got Georgia's attention. She cried because we hadn't taken her with us and we had to explain to her that she wouldn't have wanted to go on that roller coaster, it was too fast and scary. So we convinced her that she wanted to ride on the lego horses.

And convincing is the key-word here, because she had to ride on it by herself. No parents aloud. It took some talking, but eventually she climbed on and went all the way around by herself. When she got off, she said that she was "scared of the peoples". Later we passed by the spot she meant. There was a lego man hanging from a sign, and when the horse and lance went by, he yelled: oh no! not again! and spun around in a circle. She pointed and said that that was the peoples she was scared of. Brave girl. I never imagined it could truly be scary to go around in a big circle on a slowly moving mechanical horse!

After the horse-ride, we found a roller coaster that Georgia could do with Daddy. They waited in a very long line:

::I was impressed that Georgia didn't back out and get scared,
especially considering how long she had to wait in line before she got to ride::

and then Sven sat on the outside of the car and so I have no shots of Georgia on her very first rollercoaster.

And poor Dean? He couldn't do the horse, he wasn't allowed to do the roller coaster and he was getting tired and upset. So he got an ice cream, that he refused to share with Grandma at all.

::bye-bye Nana!::

Georgia had to have an ice cream when she saw Dean's, so we spent a while slurping ice creams before we finally moved on. Not very far though. Sven got caught up in the hands on building area, and while he and Dean played with Duplos, Georgia discovered a water-spitting dinosaur. This might possibly have been her most favorite part of the day:

It basically went like this; when this guy started talking...

::are you ready....?::

then this guy squirted water in the air:

Even Grandma, who didn't know what was being said, knew that when the first guy started talking, that the water was on its way and so she'd say to Georgia: get ready...are you ready?

GOOOOOO!

::and Georgia ran!::

::laughing the whole way::

::so fast, her feet didn't even touch the ground!::

Later, we walked by the water-squirting dino again and Georgia waited and waited and waited, but no water came. He had been turned off, much to her disappointment.

We finally moved away from that dinosaur and headed to the Aussichtsturm, because everyone could do that together. We left the stroller behind, got in line and were off.

::Dean got to sit on the garbage while waiting...lucky him::

::the tower going up while we waited our turn::

While we were inside, going up, we saw even more of the park, like the huge water playground and the water roller coaster in adventure land. The minute we got off the tower, we steered everyone toward the water and then we told Sven that we were running off to the water roller coaster. He admitted that he didn't want to go because while we were in the tower-ride, the weather had started cooling off and he didn't want to get wet with a breeze - silly German!

So we left the kids and Sven to play while we went on to the water coaster. It started out nicely enough. We had a bit of a wait and watched while everyone came off soaking wet, and giggled. Then we got on the ride and it started up. It went in a very dark cave, up slowly with bats and spiders all around us and we thought: well Georgia would hate this! and then in the near pitch-black, the car stopped, turned around and we plunged down backwards, hit the water and got soaked! That was the biggest surprise. Then we floated around, seeing lost-world sights of dinosaurs who spit at us:

before getting to the base of the last hill climb when the whole ride stopped. Totally. no movement, nothing for about ten minutes due to some sort of emergency stop. It was a total bummer, all the build-up to the last big plunge was lost as we waited and waited, finalyl got going only to climb up and plunge down and it was over. Oh well.

While we were doing that, the kids were playing and getting wet as well:

::peek-a-boo!::

::not really excited to be in a lion::

::she much preferred the water::

::this one seems to have had much more fun in the lion::

::but AUTOS! are best::

::going down the stairs instead of sliding down the slide::

And then we came back, had a short break, watched the sky getting darker and decided to run back to Adventure Land for the rides there. In fact, I wish we'd started in this area, it had more rides for both kids and was just generally more fun.

Oh, but first the kids and Sven jumped on the kiddie train:

::Georgia lovin' it::

::Dean would eventually wave on his own::

In Adventure Land, Georgia and Dean got to do the canoe ride, both entirely by themselves!

::paddling her own canoe - too bad she was paddling the wrong way!::

::the sky...taken while the kids were on the canoe ride,
but of course we had to run to one more ride before dashing for cover::

::wasn't sure Dean was having fun, maybe he wasn't sure what was going on::

::and then Georgia was finished with her ride, hopped off,
found Dean and his whole face broke out in a smile -
she can always get him to smile!::

Yes, we did run on to the safari-car ride after that. It was so fast though, I had no time to take pictures while on it, and was too busy making sure Dean didn't fall out to take them anyway. Even the pictures Grandma took of us on the ride turned out blurred. It's a good thing though, that it went fast, it gave us time to ride it, and then jump out and dash for cover before the downpour hit us. We stayed dry:

::watching the rain and hail::

::crazy rain::

::twirling in the last insistent dribbles::

::on sissy's heels::

After the rain stopped, the sun did come out again and we thought we'd run and do the pedal cars. We had hardly a wait, but when we got ready to get in, the woman barked at us first, that Grandma couldn't come too, and then that Dean was too small and to get off. So Grandma took our place, and an upset Dean and an upset Mommy went back downstairs and played with Duplos. By the time they got back from the pedal cars (where Georgia was upset at our having not come with), the sky had once again darkened and the next downpour had started. This one did not let up, so we eventually stripped down and ran through the rain, which eventually let up enough for us to shiver our way through Miniland - but not enough for us to want to pull out the cameras, and then we headed home.