Ahhhhh... it had been ages since I had been to a theme park when I visited Warner Bros Movieworld on the Gold Coast. We were here for the birthday of our relatives (the younger sort...) and our family had just stepped off the plane from Europe the day before. Now, this is the sort of place that I normally avoid like the plague... not because of some sort of commercial aversion or anything high minded like that... but because I'm terrified if the roller-coaster rides!
However, this was a family event (all of about 20 of us!)... so here I was! My kids and my wife were pretty keen (well, not terrified like me...) to have a go at some rides.... and I was pretty keen to look after the babies, strollers and bags!
Like most places in Australia, you will need a car to get to Warner Bros Movieworld. Although it is nominally on the tourist area of the Gold Coast (near Brisbane), I didn't see any public transport close by and it is just situated (with a few other theme parks) off a motorway. Perhaps there are shuttle buses from the hotel areas, but we were coming in from a different direction and so we didn't see how everyone was getting into the area.
So, already from the parking lot... you can see what you are in for! The Joker ride, I understand that it is one of the more "thrilling" (read: stupidly fearsome...) rides in Australia.... and everyone in our party was talking about how they were definitely going to ride it at least once! In the end, only the younger members of the party managed... although one of the older nieces come off it sobbing uncontrollably! Why do people pay to do this to themselves?
There are quite a few of the more "adult" rides around the place, near the entrance of the park. You can hear screaming everywhere... and a bit unlike the computer game Theme Park, there is no puddles of spew from people coming off the rides. Although, there were a few people looking a little unsteady and a bit off colour sometimes!
If you are like me and more of the less daring variety of human... there are still attractions to see. There was pretty cool 3D LEGO movie where the theatre was movie around on actuators... that was probably the limit of what I would want to ride on! Plus, it was my introduction to the LEGO movie... and I ended up watching as many LEGO movies on the plane back to Europe as possible!
Coming down this avenue is the end of day parade with lots of the Warner Brother franchises and trademarks... like Batman and Joker and various others. My oldest girl fell in love with Poison Ivy!
There is a little kids section for primary school kids and toddlers who don't make the age and height limit for the older rides. This was the BEST section of the theme park... and I ended up spending a bit of time here shepherding the toddlers in the family around whilst the others had their freedom to do the death-defying rides. I love riding the little cars in the back seat trying to help with the steering and pedals!
There was also a haunted house with good old Scooby Doo! What a blast from the past... my oldest ended up going on this one with her cousins... although, I think it was a bit too scary for her. Ah well, still she had fun with her cousins... even if we ended up having to field nightmares for the next couple of nights!
The passes for the theme park are for the whole day... so, make sure you make the most of the fairly expensive tickets! It will be a whole day trip, and it is best to bring your own snacks and water so that you can cut down on how much you will need to buy from the overpriced restaurants and kiosks.
The relatives LOVED this theme park... so I will highly recommend it if you are into this sort of thing. On the other hand, you can probably get the same thrills by cutting your brake lines on your car and rolling down a hill...
Personally, I would have preferred the Australian Outdoor Spectacular or the Wet 'n Wild parks that are next door.... but we all have different tastes!