LEGOLAND Florida
Winter Haven, Florida
Merlin Entertainment / Blackstone
 Park News - (11/6/22) In an odd bit of news, a local news report has confirmed that Legoland Florida is “eliminating 519” jobs as part of a program to outsource the park’s food and beverage operations to Aramark Corp starting on Jan. 15th, 2023. The positive part of the story is that all of the affected Legoland employees will be taken on by Aramark and keep their current positions, pay and benefits.
Legoland Florida says the move is being done “to provide resort guests a custom culinary experience” but they were not willing to comment at all about what kind of cost savings they would incur by outsourcing the entire park department to Aramark. Aramark is known for being a company that provides not only this kind of service to locations far and wide, but are also a provider of employee uniforms as well. While I don’t know if this is still currently the case, I believe Walt Disney World would outsource many (of not all) their various employee cafeterias across the resort property to Aramark. I always thought it odd that Disney would hire their own staff to serve food to their guests, but outsource the job of feeding their own employees.
(7/21/22) Legoland Florida is opened a new Space Exploration area on Wednesday called Rocket to the Moon with LEGO City Space. Located inside the Imagination Zone, the new immersive experience allows guests to create their own lunar adventure. Arriving guests to the Lunar Base will watch a mission briefly before going through an airlock and out onto the surface of the moon. “Once on the moon, families can choose between two key missions – to build a rover or create a rocket – and then complete a series of tests to finish the mission. Families can capture the excitement with a zero-gravity photo op giving the illusion they are floating in space.”
2023 - Pirate River Quest - (1/15/2023) Pirate River Quest has opened at LEGOLAND Florida at last. You can catch a video below showing off the queue and ride experience below. Well… technically this is a real boat journey you will be going on, complete with a human captain at the wheel, and not a boat ride on a guide rail. Keeping that in mind, guests will climb aboard and head off on a long river adventure experience with audio narration that looks to take about 20+ minutes from start to finish.
(11/2/22) While Legoland Florida has pushed back the opening of Pirate River Quest until 2023, you won't have to wait as long as you think. According to a press release from Legoland Florida the new attraction will open on Jan. 12, 2023.
The popular Pirate Fest Weekends event will start soon after, for five consecutive weekends starting on Jan. 21st. The park is also launching new 2023 annual passes that guests can purchase with a monthly payment plan as low as $13 a month. Visit the official website for all the details.
(10/24/22) According to the Orlando Sentinel, Legoland Florida has now officially pushed back the opening of their new Pirate River Quest attraction until 2023. Originally the attraction was announced as if it was to open in peak 2022, only to be pushed back to late 2002 and now to 2023. According to Legoland the water levels around the park have risen too high in the area, impacting the water levels in the park’s canal system. I’d suspect that this has a lot to do with all the water that fell in the area during Hurricane Ian
(7/3/22) Legoland Florida has finally set an opening date for their new Pirate River Quest attraction, it will just be a little later than expected. According to Legoland Florida the park’s newest attraction will not open until Nov. 2, 2022.
(10/17/21) We’ll have look at the Legoland 10th Birthday celebration a little later, but at the event a new attraction was announced for the park, coming in 2022, called the Pirate River Quest.
“Set sail with a rowdy crew of LEGO® pirates on Captain’s orders to explore the murky waters and retrieve the lost treasure, stolen by a troop of mischievous monkeys. Journey through the uncharted waters of the legendary Cypress Gardens and discover the secrets protecting its canals, as this all-new story unfolds brick by brick into a family-friendly treasure hunt. Adventure awaits you at LEGOLAND® on the Pirate River Quest, coming in 2022.”
Way back in Cypress Gardens days of the property, the park offered boat rides through the garden canals (you can see an old postcard image of the boats here) and it is thought that those old canals that have been unused for years will be brought back to life for the new Pirate River Quest attraction.
2023 - Nothing is known at this time... but with Pirate River Quest set to open just before the end of 2022, this may be an off year.
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