Ok so I'm talking Chessington World Of Adventures! As a family we like to visit CWoA once a year to spend "quality" time together. CWoA is a theme park and zoo based in Chessington, Surrey and is a great fun day out for the family. There are rides and attractions for all from toddlers to teens, Adults and even seniors. I'm going to take you through a review of "my Chessington day out".

This year we went by car, we got onto the M25 which is not to far from us and it took about 30 minutes until we made our exit at junction 9, from there it was about another 10 minute drive to the park. Once you have left the M25 (which is has a marked exit for CWoA) the roads are marked up with signs so it's pretty easy to find! More so easy for us to find as we had the sat nav, you can get their postcode for your settings from their website.
Normally we would go by bus, we live in West Ealing, London we would take the local 207 bus to Ealing Broadway. Outside Ealing Broadway train station you can take the number 65 bus and go to the end of the line, which is Kingston bus station. From there you can stay at the same bus stop (there are toilets at this bus stop) and wait for the number 71 bus. Again you go to the end of the line, which is inside CWoA. A very simple route that takes you right inside the park, only downside is it took us more or less 2 hours from home by bus and only 45 minutes by car.

The ticket prices are a bit steep! But considering once you're in, you can stay the whole day and all rides are free it's not so bad. We were lucky we found an offer going on soft drinks. Bottles of Fanta and Oasis (probably more) were printing a buy one ticket get one free promotion, it saved us a considerable amount of money as there were 6 of us. I have also seen that local drugstore Superdrug are giving these vouchers out in books when you spend £10 or more. Ticket prices are as follows, you can save more if you buy them online.

Express pass - for pre-allocated times on their top 6 rides £6.00.

Remember Dennis The Menace & pals? I love Beanoland though it's mainly for the little ones. At certain points through the day Dennis will put on a little show on top of the gift shop roof or up the tree house which is in the middle of Beanoland and yes! He has his sidekick Gnasher with him (these shows are people dressed in costumes) and on a good day he will catapult t-shirts into the crowd for the kids to catch I managed to catch one for my little sister last year.
The rides in Beanoland are: *Billy's Whizzer* I love this ride, its like a carousel but instead it has swings hanging from the top. The top will then rise when everyone is seated and strapped and swing you around whilst squirting water at you.
* Dennis's Madhouse* I have taken my sister into the mad house on one occasion. Inside there are three floors in a self explanatory warehouse looking building, on each floor there are air powered guns and the kids have to run about collecting the foam balls and shoot them through the guns at each other...I loved it in there.
Other rides in Beanoland are: *Bash Street Bus* (for the little ones) *Roger The Dodger's Dodgems* (bumper cars) and *The Glade* (for private events). There is also the Beanoland gift shop and the Fizz & Burp cafe.

I haven't really spent much time in Land Of The Dragons though I have rode *Dragons Fury* A rollercoaster ride with 4 seats to a car (2 seats back to back) the ride is very "up, down and nearly upside down" and the 4 seats spin round on the car too. I found this ride very nauseating but fun! Then at the end you can buy that all important embarrassing ride photo for £4.50 I have to have those and compare them year after year.
Other rides in Land Of The Dragons are: *Canopy Capers* *Griffins Galleon* and *Dragons Playhouse* I haven't been on any of these rides as they are targeted for the small kids. There is also a Café Nero in Land Of Dragons, so the "grown ups" can grab a cup of coffee and the children can have a soft drink.

Oh dear... Toytown it's mayhem trying to get the little ones out of here! The main ride in Toytown would probably be *The Flying Jumbos*. A spider like frame with an Elephant car on the end of each leg. Inside each jumbo are 2 seats; one for Mum or Dad and one for the child, there is a button on the dashboard that the kids can push to make the elephant raise up and down! Not much fun for the adult but the kids seem to really enjoy it. Other rides include: *Toadies Crazy Cars* *Ribena Berry Bouncers* *Tiny Truckers* and the *Carousel* boy have I had many an embarrassing time on the carousel.
Another gift shop... the Toybox Shop this time and for you chocoholics there is the Cadbury Castle selling nothing but Cadburys chocolate and there is another Café Nero for a well deserved pit stop.

There are only 2 rides in Pirates Cove. Firstly there is the *Black Buccaneer* A giant swinging boat. There are about 10 rows of seats which sit about 6 people a row and the whole boat swings backwards and forwards so at one side when your in the air you have direct vision to the ground and when your the other end you see the sky and everyone on the rows in front screaming as the look down to the floor... don't eat before riding the Black Buccaneer as you will only bring it back ;).
The second ride is *Seastorm* a circular motion boat ride for the kids that starts off slow, and then speeds up. The boats also spin round to the opposite direction half way through. The only other thing in Pirates Cove apart from those silly fairground games where you can win a giant teddy bear but rarely ever do is the lovely greasy Chips Ahoy restaurant. Chips Ahoy serve up the typical "chippy" food i.e. fish and chips, battered sausage's, saveloys and mushy pea's... but remember to ride the Black Buccaneer First!

Home of the *Vampire* and my guilty pleasure, Imperial Leather's *Bubbleworks* The day I don't have a small kid to take in Bubbleworks will be a very sad one. I love Bubbleworks but as it is a kid's ride an adult can only get in if they are accompanying a child. Bubbleworks is a little circle boat that floats along a River along the way are little moving displays of Professor Bubleworks, his ducks, soap and bubbles. There is a small hill the boat climbs and then falls down to a splash to amuse the kids and at the end there are arches of water spraying over the boats track (kind of like a tunnel of water) with flashing lights and loud music that I think looks spectacular though I have found on the first couple of occasions my little sister found it a bit scary. Not forgetting the *Vampire* ride, due to my dramatic teenage growth I went from being not tall enough to being too tall so I have never had the privilege of riding. It's an overhead rollercoaster where the seats leave your feet dangling and does look fantastic! I would definitely have a go if I were not too tall.
There is a Mc Donald's in Transylvania "yuk" though it is very nicely decorated like an indoor forest at night. The ceiling is dark blue with stars and there are fake trees all over the place there is also a hotdog stand and Refresh where you can buy fresh sandwiches at an expensive price.

My favourite section of Chessington as I adore animals. I love the Sea Lion Shows "I never miss feeding time" and the Trail of the kings which Features Gorillas and Big cats. They also have Creepy Caves which is a cave like building filled with tanks of creepy crawlies, Monkey and Bird Garden, Education Centre, Squirrel Monkey walkthrough and the Children's Zoo are also favourites of mine. Not forgetting that all this wildlife fun and education is also included in you ticket and shows and feeding times carry on throughout the day. Oh I forgot the Capybara! The largest rodent in the world, ewwwww...but I like it.

Dragon Falls! my favourite ride is located in Mystic East. You may have heard of it being (I think) the most popular ride in Chessington for many years! Its a log boat that flows through a watered pipe and climbs a high hill only to throw you back down again and take a very embarrassing picture mid drop...Love it!!

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Forbidden Kingdom
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Forbidden Kingdom hosts the Casbah Cafe where you can get your self a fresh salad or a yummy sub sandwich.

There are 2 rides in Mexicana, The first is the *Runaway Train*, I consider it to be a timid rollercoaster as it's not very scary! It's probably more adrenalin pumping for the younger riders.
*The Rattle Snake* is the second ride which feature's a 4 seated car that moves very quickly on its tracks, it's called the rattlesnake because it takes twists and turns rather quick and unrepentantly. For me, I found The Rattlesnake more painful than exciting but I think once again it comes down to me being too tall and having to ram my legs in really tight.

*Western Portrait Studio* is situated in Mexicana, last time I checked you could pay £19.99 to dress up in western style cowboy like clothing and have your portrait painted, not something of interest for me though probably for others as it seemed quite popular.
There's also the *Paw Prints* Studio, much the same but instead you can have yourself painted into a wild encounter... nice! And finally the *Virtual Reality Theatre* featuring virtual reality arcade games... I love the skiing one though I am dreadful at it.

• Hocus Pocus Hall* I found hilarious, It's a hall with a lot of mirror's that makes it confusing to know which way to go with little scares like faces lighting up through the mirrors and shock noises. I found it funny watching it fright my little sister though its not too daunting! A must with the little kiddies.
• Safari Skyway* it excellent, although the kids want to run off and throw up straight away I like to pop on here first before the queues build up. Its a little train that runs slowly above the park and it takes you over all the animals so that you can get a birds eye view. It's brilliant when you're above the Sea lions as you can see the gliding beneath the clear blue water.

There are quite a few gift shops, eateries and food stands on Market Square including: KFC, Pizza Hut, Waffles & ice cream and a fresh hot doughnut stand. Gift shops include: Sweet Shop, Smiffy's Joke Shop and the main Chessington Shop.

Unfortunately the parks restaurants are not something I can really review as I have always taken a packet lunch! I know it sounds weird but I like to know what I am eating. I can say that to my naked eye all eating services look clean but the food is something you would have to try, saying that I think we can all review KFC, Pizza Hut & McDonalds ourselves.

Fizz & Burp Cafe (hotdogs, nacho's)
Chips Ahoy (fish & Chips)
Oriental Express (Chinese noodles)
Casbah Cafe (salads and sub sandwiches)
Mexican Diner (Mexican food)
McDonalds (junk food)
KFC (chicken & chips)
Pizza Hut.

At most of the Hot Doughnut Stands you can buy a large 1 litre Coca Cola sports bottle with straw and filled with any soft drink for £5.99, there after as you have purchased the bottle you can get a free refill as many times as you like all day for free, you can get your refill at any drinks stand, doughnut stand and "Chessington" eatery (i.e. Chips Ahoy) I think that's very good value though probably not a great idea to pump so much fizzy drink into the kids on one day.

As with every attraction there are over-priced gift shops. At CWoA there are 6 gift shops allocated around the park with the large "main" shop located in market square. The usual can be bought like: T-shirts, teddy bears, key rings, mug's, stationary, toys, ice creams, sweets and disposable camera's. You would expect such shops to be overpriced but to be fair some prices are quite reasonable and some even run 2 for one offers. I bought a t-shirt for my little sister and got a free teddy bear - that sorted my girlfriend;). The other 5 shops are spread about the park including one in Beanoland, Toytown, Transylvania, Animal land and Mystic east. Also positioned in Marker Square is the "Sweet Shop", I love this shop as you can buy the weirdest sweets including giant gob stopper, dummies, toffee, fudge, rock, pic 'n' mix and much more.