Can I do Legoland/Sea Life in one day?

[kami808]

We're going to SoCal next month, but are spending the majority of the time at Disney/CA. We would like to go to Legoland and the Sea Life Aquarium, but can we do that all in one day? We'll drive there so ideally we'd like to only have to drive there one time. What do you think?

 

[sonnyjane]

We're going to SoCal next month, but are spending the majority of the time at Disney/CA. We would like to go to Legoland and the Sea Life Aquarium, but can we do that all in one day? We'll drive there so ideally we'd like to only have to drive there one time. What do you think?

I've never been to Legoland park, so I can't tell you how long touring there will be, but I DID go to the Sea Life Aquarium when it opened to check it out and can tell you that it took me about 20 minutes to do it all. If you have young kids that are slow movers and really into everything, it might take you 45 minutes to an hour. It's really not very big at all. Cute - but not big.

 

[longtimedisneylurker]

We have been to Legoland a number of times, and last year we did Legoland and SeaLife Aquarium in one day. My boys are a lot older than your kids, so we definitely move faster and skip a number of things. The skipping things might be balanced out though because with younger kids, you're not going to do the "thrill" ride coasters, Lego Mindstorms presentation, or probably spend as long just admiring the Lego creations throughout Miniland and the rest of the park. So I would say, yes, you can definitely get enough out of both experiences in one day, and I would agree that Legoland isn't worth making that Anaheim to Carlsbad drive twice in the same vacation. sonnyjane is definitely correct in saying that the SeaLife part, even with little ones, can easily be finished in an hour or less.

 

[kami808]

Great! Thank you both for the info!

 

[2plus2equalsus]

I haven't been to Sealife in awhile but I went with little kiddos and we spent half a day there. I'd go to Sealife first otherwise they will rush through to get back to the park.
We could spend all day at Legoland, I'd suggest skipping Sealife to get as much out of Legoland. Legoland is best for 3-8 year olds so there is not a lot of things to "skip." Devoting a whole day gives you time to explore and see all the details. Enjoy your trip

 

[longtimedisneylurker]

I haven't been to Sealife in awhile but I went with little kiddos and we spent half a day there. I'd go to Sealife first otherwise they will rush through to get back to the park.
We could spend all day at Legoland, I'd suggest skipping Sealife to get as much out of Legoland. Legoland is best for 3-8 year olds so there is not a lot of things to "skip." Devoting a whole day gives you time to explore and see all the details. Enjoy your trip

Just curious...did you visit the Sealife at Legoland in Carlsbad or a different Sealife? I have only been to the one at Legoland so don't know how it compares to others, but the Legoland one was definitely very small. I really felt it would be a stretch to spend more than an hour at it , and I don't think it's that we get bored by aquariums. We can easily spend three to four hours at the Monterey Bay Aquarium when we visit it.

Agree with you about being able to spend all day at Legoland; we have certainly done so a number of times over the years. Wasn't trying to imply there would be tons to skip at Legoland just that now with older kids our touring pattern is quite different than OP's is likely to be. Even when my boys were younger though, we could usually do the park from 10 AM - 3:30 or 4 PM and then be on the road back to Anaheim. We preferred to fight traffic and just get back since we couldn't feed older DS before car trips due to car sickness, so staying late and eating dinner never worked for us.

 

[GenGen22]

We went a couple of years ago and planned a day at Sealife and we were done with Sealife in like an hour. It's really small. Luckily we had another day pass for Legoland or we would have been bored... Our kids were 8, 10 & 13 at the time the 8 year old gets distracted and looks at stuff for a long time and we were still outtta there fast. It is a really neat aquarium but small.

 

[Lynne G]

3 years ago, I drove down from DL to Legoland, at the time, my kids were 9 and 12. Since it was my DD's bday, they gave her a Bday button. My kids thought it was funny that we got a $2 bill for change when paying the parking fee.

We went the end of August, and since the park did not open until 10am, I left DL around 8:30am, to avoid some traffic (it was a Tuesday) and we arrived before opening. We did the park all day, and then about 1/2 hour before closing, we spent the rest of our visit in the aquarium. It is a neat place. It is small, and somewhat dark, but everything is low for the kids to see. My favorite was sitting (ok laying on the benches) in the room with fish on all the walls and ceiling. So relaxing. I also, closed the place, as I wanted to stay until after the closing (which was 6pm) to again, help avoid traffic. It was about an hour down, and a little longer on the way back. My kids liked how wide the highway was, and the DL and Legoland exits are not far from the highway. We used the HOV lanes and even the HOV exit to get back to DL. I didn't mind the drive.