Things are hopping at the LEGOLAND California Resort. A new hotel just opened. New ODV and midway game stations are going in. The water park will (hopefully) open its new slide this summer (after being delayed from last year’s late June scheduled opening). And, coming this July, a new submarine ride for LEGOLAND Park.
After opening in LEGOLAND Windsor and Dubai, Merlin (the parent company of LEGOLAND) is bringing this hybrid aquarium/theme park ride to California. Guests will board a submarine and take a 4 minute round trip through an aquarium filled with over 2,000 sea animals. In addition to the sea life, an interactive touchscreen treasure hunt will have riders searching the ride path for gems, pearls, crowns, and other treasures. Find more treasure to increase your “explorer level” and gain bragging rights.
The aquarists from the attached Sea Life Aquarium (another Merlin brand) will be supervising the care of all the animal species in the attraction. Sharks, Stingrays, and other tropical species will inhabit the exhibit. The goal is to simulate an Australian reef-like environment.
It wouldn’t be a LEGOLAND attraction without LEGO models. Over a dozen large scale models will decorate the ride and give guests more to see than fish and treasure. The LEGO master builders have had to rethink their modeling practices to ensure the safety of the animals in the exhibit and the long-term maintenance of the models themselves. All the models will have fiberglass instead of metal frames. Support beams for the models will be fiberglass with plastic nuts and bolts for fastening. A new coating for the LEGO models improves on the existing coating used in Sea Life for better resistance to algae growth.
While this ride represents Merlin’s largest investment at LEGOLAND California, this is still LEGOLAND. This will not be a Disneyland-style sub ride. The ride time is only 4 minutes. The draw here is that you are diving through an actual working aquarium with fish and sharks and all sorts of stuff kids and adults alike will enjoy and learn from. The interactive touchscreen treasure hunt adds another element to encourage repeat visits.
That being said, this ride is quite ambitious for LEGOLAND. The marriage of the theme park ride and working aquarium should be very cool. We were told the ride should be open in late July. I’m excited to see how it turns out.
The MiceChat folks are thinking about organizing a Legoland meet-up this summer to check out the new ride and castle hotel. Would you be interested?
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