Children's amusement park featuring themes inspired by the Gulliver's Travels stories...
Children's amusement park featuring themes inspired by the Gulliver's Travels stories...
| Opened | 11 July 2020 |
|---|---|
| Season | February Half Term to December |
| Owner | The Phillips family |
| Website | www.gulliversvalleyresort.co.uk |
| Nearby | Gulliver's Kingdom (19 miles) Alton Towers (35 miles) Xtreme Scream Park (43 miles) Abbey Park Fun Fair (49 miles) Drayton Manor (54 miles) |
Gulliver's Valley
Gulliver's Valley is one of four parks in the Gulliver's chain of theme parks exclusively targeted at children between 2 and 13 years old, and sits in the Rother Valley near Sheffield in South Yorkshire.
The park opened in 2020, a few months later than originally planned due to construction delays caused by the Coronavirus pandemic. The site covers 300 acres with the initial phases of the project costing £37 million.
Many of the attractions on offer will be familiar to visitors to the other Gulliver's parks in Milton Keynes, Warrington and Matlock Bath, with common themes running between all of them. In fact, several rides at Gulliver's Valley have been moved to the new park from the other locations.
The entrance and front area of the park is housed inside a large two storey building. Alongside shops and facilities are a large restaurant and theatre, indoor play area, rock climbing walls, giant inflatable bouncy castle, haunted house walkthrough and a laser quest style attraction.
Beyond this building lies the main park, with the rest of the lands laid out to the left and right of a central castle which acts as the entrance to the resort's Voyagers Village static caravan and lodge overnight accommodation offerings.
The castle
Area highlights include the prehistoric themed Lost World with animatronic dinosaurs, the T-Rex Tower water slide and Gyrosaur which is by far Gulliver's Valley's most intense ride and the only one in the park to turn riders upside-down; the cowboy town in Western World with its Rocky Ridge Railway coaster, Tombstone Mine dark ride and soaking wet but hugely fun Apache Falls rapids ride; and the motor racing themed Gears area with Grand Prix Racers (the park's largest rollercoaster) and Dodge City dodgems.
Overall Gulliver's Valley is currently the weakest park in the chain, and feels a little too much like a theme park in the middle of a field. Planting will mature over time, but at the moment there is almost no shade at all aside from the indoor area. In places theming is not as detailed as at the other parks, and the Toy Land and Smuggler's Wharf areas especially merge into one. Much of this is probably to be expected and forgivable given the challenging circumstances surrounding trying to finish construction and open a park during a global pandemic. Gulliver's are already fixing many of the initial issues and adding more to the park such as the Gears area with Grand Prix Racers rollercoaster that opened in 2021.
Having said all that, the park is certainly worth a visit and will provide a wonderful day out packed full of fun for young families. Most of the rides seem perfect for the target age group, there is plenty to do, the facilities are well thought out and the staff are all friendly and seem genuinely eager to make sure visitors enjoy their trip.
Children's train ride
Set sail aboard the tug boat
Put out the raging inferno
Climbing wall
Bouncy castle
Crawl through the caves
Pedalos
Pedal powered go karts
Young children's pony ride
Classic cars on display
Pirate ship playground
Cowboy playground
A playground down on the farm
Climbing frame and slide
Park gift shop
Traditional sweets and confectionery
Hot & cold snacks and drinks
Offering ice creams and snacks
Main entrance
Toy Land
Gulliver
Entrance building
Show in front of the castle
Gully and friends
The long pathway between Western World and the rest of the park
Trumpet player
