Winter Wonderland in Manchester | Review

Last night we were invited to the Winter Wonderland in Manchester for some festive fun. This was our first visit and although I had heard all about it I still wasn’t sure how an indoor theme park would actually work. We hadn’t told the boys where we were going just that it was an adventure, so when we arrived and were welcomed by elves, a winter bear, a dance show and a wonderful performance from Chloe Rose, they actually thought that was their surprise. And although the dancing and singing was fantastic when the red curtain dropped and Winter Wonderland was revealed, their faces were a picture. I could see them just soaking in all the lights, rides, stalls and not to mention the fact they were suddenly covered in “snow”.  It was a truly magical moment.

winter wonderland

What is Winter Wonderland Manchester?

Imagine 22,000 sq meters of indoor space at Event city in Manchester filled with every fair ground ride you have ever seen, scatter in some bouncy castles and inflatable activities and add in a stage.  Now you are close to imaging what Winter Wonderland is. As you can imagine, it was a lot more than I had anticipated.

We decided to head to the back first but the boys got distracted by an inflatable house so we stopped off there for a quick play and then just hoped from one ride to another laughing the whole time.

winter wonderland

As well as the rides there were also regular shows including

Daisy and Ollie

The minion’s

Rainbow’s very own Zippy and George and

Jedi knight training

We watched the minion show and the Jedi show and both were brilliant in different ways. The minions had the boys up on their feet and dancing, whereas the Jedi’s had them sat solid unable to move for fear of missing a piece of vital information from the training session. I would recommend that you choose your shows at the start and then make a plan to return to the main stage area at a certain time because it is very easy to get distracted by the magic and before you know it you have lost all sense of time and could miss a show by accident.

With more than 50 rides and 5 shows it is impossible to do everything in the 4 hours, trust me we tried our best, but we could easily return and watch new shows and ride new rides, there really is that much going on. There is also a good mix of rides from the nice timid ones for the tiddlers to the family fun dogems and rollercoaster types to the faster waltzers for the bigger adrenaline  junkies in your group. No one will be bored or left out. There is even food and drink a plenty if you are willing to pay a little extra to refuel and I must say  the mulled wine is delicious

winter wonderland

Tickets vary in price but a family ticket for two adults and two children is £70 for 4 hours. Now personally this price would have put me off especially as it is so close to Christmas but if you consider that fair ground rides are normally £2 per person and if your children are small you might need to go on with them, you’re looking at £8 for each ride for the family, which very quickly adds up. Here the entrance fee gets the whole family unlimited access to all the rides and because the numbers are limited in each slot there are no long queues. In fact on some rides our boys just stayed on a coupe of times because no one else was waiting. On top of this you can factor in that there is a beach, a number of interactive shows, circus school and numerous bouncy castle type activities also included , not to mention santa himself, so you certainly do get your moneys worth.

If you are looking for some fun filled festive activities this Christmas then Winter Wonderland covers it all and I would recommend you book tickets and check it out for yourselves.

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