Boasting the title of Australia’s biggest theme park, with a good balance of both ride and animal attractions, I knew my husband and I were in for quite a bit of walking if we wanted to see everything the theme park had to offer.
A ticket to Dreamworld also grants you access to WhiteWater World, a water park with its own set of rides and slides, which was a great way for us to cool off after a long day of walking. We bought our tickets from Klook (click on my link to sign up so we both can get $5 credit) for a lot cheaper than they were going on Dreamworld’s website, so there’s a money-saving tip (:
Visiting on a Monday meant a smaller crowd and shorter queues, so that was a yay. Sadly though, there were many Dreamworld rides we wanted to go on that were closed, making it a nay. Amongst all the rides that potentially fell within my spectrum of risk tolerance, the only three open were Pandamonium, Sky Voyager and Shockwave, which I sat on many times because the queues were so short. But on the bright side, it shifted our focus of this visit to the animals and learning about the park’s conservation efforts.
We were able to get up close and personal with a whole bunch of animals around the theme park. My favourite one was the koala, and we somehow managed to witness one cranky koala taking a few swipes at another one probably because its personal space was being invaded. That was a hilarious moment captured!
The highlight of the afternoon for me was the Tiger Presentation at Tiger Island. It was super cool to see the tigers doing their thing – climbing trees, leaping through the air and diving into water – and to learn about what’s happening to tigers around the world. One tiger was being all cuddly with its trainer, which was such an “aww” moment to watch. It kept wrapping its paw around the trainer’s leg while rubbing its face against him during the presentation, either it really loves its trainer or it was trying to rebel and get out of having to do tricks!
Next stop, WhiteWater World! Unfortunately due to some construction work, the linkway to WhiteWater World within the Dreamworld compound was sealed off and we had to make a detour to enter WhiteWater World from the main entrance. Thankfully, the rides were mostly open and we got to try almost every one of them.
There was a huge pool called the Cave of Waves in the centre of the theme park where we dipped ourselves in to get used to the water. The water was really cold and I could feel the chill once I stepped out, but the sun and wind helped to dry me off in a jiffy, so I just needed to endure those few agonizing minutes and it was all good again. Didn’t take photos of the rest of the slides because we kept our belongings in a locker and I didn’t want to risk the camera getting wet. But safe to say, the slides we went on (Triple Vortex, The Green Room, The Rip and The Bro) were mighty thrilling, involving steep drops from tall heights, and my heart could only take so much on most of them.
Getting to the slides entailed climbing many, and I mean many, flights of stairs, sometimes with a huge float or mat in tow, so get fit y’all. By the time we were next in line for the Super Tubes Hydrocoaster, they told us they were closed for the day on the dot at 4pm (they really take their timings seriously), so we had to climb all the way back down in disappointment. Nonetheless, I’m just glad I made it out of the theme park in one piece (:
My overall rating of the experience: 4 out of 5 stars. I loved how the park was big on animal conservation efforts and educating the public on how to do our part to help these animals. It gave me a glimpse of how Eden might have looked like, with humans and animals living in harmony with one another (: The bummer was not being able to try all the other rides that were closed, which really took a large chunk out from the expected theme park experience. Also, the food was pretty darn horrible (especially the nuggets) and we had to use lots of ketchup to finish up our lunch. The slides at WhiteWater World, however, made up for it, so we managed to get our fair share of thrills and screams. At the end of the day, the whole experience was definitely worth the aching feet and muscles!
Dania Experiences 