Legoland Florida

Lego have announced the opening of Legoland Florida on the site of Cypress Gardens in Central Florida.

It will be the largest Legoland to date and will create 1,000 jobs. It is expected to open in late 2011.

Universal U Select

Universal Orlando has announced a new ticket pricing structure called "U Select", in time for the opening of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter. It follows a similar idea introduced by Walt Disney World in 2005, the Disney "Magic Your Way" ticket system and the idea is to encourage guests to visit the Universal parks for more than just a couple of days.

Free Gift Card

Disney have announced a free Disney Gift Card with a value of up to $750 for selected 5-night/6-day non-discounted vacation packages booked by March 27, 2010 and used by June 3, 2010. There are different 'blackout' dates depending upon resort.

Florida Water Parks

If the beach is not enough, then there are also a number of water parks in Florida offering everything from wave pools, water slides and chutes to swimming with sharks or dolphins.

One of the earliest water parks is Wet 'n Wild in Orlando which opened in 1977. It has a number of traditional water slides and chutes.

Today, Florida has 5 of the 7 top spots for most visited water parks in North America (i.e. including Canada) according to TEA/ERA in their annual Theme Park Attendance Reports. Figures show estimated 2008 numbers (with 2007 numbers in brackets):

#1 Typhoon Lagoon, 2.1m million (-1.0%, down from 2.1 million)
#2 Blizzard Beach, 1.9 million (-1.0%, down from 1.9 million)
#3 Wet 'n Wild, 1.3 million (-5.1%, down from 1.4 million)
#4 Aquatica, 0.95 million (only opened in April 2008)
#5 Schlitterbaun, New Braunfels in Texas, 0.88 million (+2.0%, up from 0.87 million)
#6 Water Country USA at Williamsbury in Virginia, 0.76 million, (-1.9%, down from 0.77 million)
#7 Adventure Island in Tampa, 0.6 million (-2.0%, down from 0.62 million)

Discovery Cove waterfall

Disney have built two landscaped water parks in Orlando, firstly Typhoon Lagoon which is based around a tropical island lagoon and provides an enormous wave pool simulating the surf on a beach and also offers an opportunity to swim over a tropical reef inhabited by (harmless!) nurse sharks. They then created Blizzard Beach which is bizarrely modelled on a ski resort. This park is more for the thrill seeker with impressive water chutes.

Following on from the success of SeaWorld Orlando, Busch Entertainment then created an exclusive water park across the road called Discovery Cove where you can laze on an artificial beach, swim with tropical reef fish and stingrays or interact with dolphins.

They then built a second water park, Aquatica which opened in April 2008 and is similar to the two Disney water parks.

Bad Weather

For safety reasons, most water parks will close temporarily during bad weather, for example at the approach of a thunderstorm. You may also find them closed during the winter months because of the cooler temperatures or for renovations. Those water parks that normally stay open during the winter may still close if the temperatures dip too low.

In recent years, Cypress Gardens added a water park to their botanical gardens, zoo and theme park rides though it closed in 2009. It is possible it will re-open as part of the new Legoland Florida theme park.

Today there are a number of water parks in Florida (those marked with an asterisk are only open during the Spring/Summer months):

Adventure Island, next to Busch Gardens, Tampa Bay *
Adventure Landing Shipwreck Island, Jacksonville Beach *
Aquatica, SeaWorld's water park, Orlando
Big Kahuna's Water & Adventure Park, Destin *
Blizzard Beach, Disney World Orlando
Buccaneer Bay inside Weeki Wachee Springs *
Calypso Bay Waterpark, Royal Palm Beach
CoCo Key Water Resort, International Drive, Orlando (opens in March 2010)
Coconut Cove Waterpark, Boca Raton
Daytona Lagoon, Daytona Beach *
Discovery Cove, next to SeaWorld Orlando
Gator Gully Splash Park inside Gatorland, Kissimmee
Rapids Water Park, West Palm Beach *
Sam's Surf City Water Park, Pensacola *
Shipwreck Island, Panama City Beach *
Splash Island at Cypress Gardens, Winter Haven * - PERMANENTLY CLOSED
Sun Splash Family Waterpark, Cape Coral *
Typhoon Lagoon, Disney World Orlando
Wet 'n Wild, Orlando
Wild Waters at Silver Springs, Ocala *

Disney's Blizzard Beach and Typhoon Lagoon close for just a couple of months for maintenance during the winter though Disney stagger the closing times to ensure that one park remains open.

See also:- Buying Theme Park Tickets