Going to Busch Gardens Europe this weekend. Haven't been in many years. Any suggestions on what to do and when to do it. Thanks.
Just went for Labor Day. I would recommend if you are interested in riding the new roller coaster, Gryphon, that you do it first thing, as the lines will typically get longer during the day. I didn't feel the crowds were too bad, but my experience there has been that the last day of the weekend is the lowest crowd day. Saturdays are typically much busier. Don't know about know that the peak season is over. One thing to note is that although the park opening is advertised as 10:00 am, they actually start letting people into the park at 9:30am. Up until 10:00, nothing much is open (except shops), but you can walk toward the right and get over to the bridge to Ireland (or toward the left toward Italy), where they hold you until 10:00. That way you can get to the rides earlier. I enjoyed the new roller coaster, but actually prefer Apollo's Chariot. In my opinion, it's worth the extra wait to sit in the front. I also enjoyed Curse of DarKastle, but it might be too scary for younger ones. I did NOT enjoy Corkscrew Hill - it's a motion simulator ride which I generally like, but I found it way too jerky. I only saw 1 show this time (trip was for my 12yo daughter's birthday and she just wanted to ride), but I generally like the shows. We did get to watch most of the Italian show while we ate lunch (very good - lunch and the show). We also enjoyed Big Bad Wolf and the log flume ride (which was a near walk-on everytime we went). Hope you have lots of fun.
We went this year around Fourth of July. We took the ferry across James River in Surry County so that we wouldn't to take the freeway all the way there. Which I have a four year old and that was worth the time. We didn't ride any roller coaster, but the shows are excellent if you like watching them. The ones I like best was the Emerald Point and Pirates. The Pirate show is a 4-d film. It is funny. If you stay late go to the Kinetix show. We ate at Trappers Smokehouse which I think was the most food for your money and good too. Make time to go to Jack Hannas Wild Reserve it is pretty cool. One day is not enough time to see everything at Busch Gardens. I would buy a two day pass. You can take your own water inside too if you don't want to spend alot money on drinks.
If you have kids or love animals, they have a great little trained animal show with rats, rescued shelter dogs, and birds. I think it is near the Reserve.
