We heard about the “Nowa Holandia” (“New Netherlands”) Family Theme Park located in Elbląg a few weeks before arrival. We decided to include this place in our expedition plan through eastern Poland. We started our journey in the north of the country, first visiting Malbork, and even spent one day at the sea. Now, our route was going in an easterly direction. So Elblag was on the way.
Children love to play, and the Family Amusement Park, which was built in Elbląg was a great place to get some entertainment for the whole day. The park is accessible from two sides – the main gate is in front of the S7 expressway near Shell gas station and the second one is on the opposite side. There is also a restaurant with the same name “New Netherlands”. The second entrance is less well-marked, located on the back of the park – it’s more for local people who are not using the S7 road. As there are two entrances and two ticket offices, there are of course also two gates. What is unusual, to get to some of the park’s attractions we needed to go outside to the public road for a while and walk to the other side of the park.
The park has some strange rules. It prohibits bringing your own food inside. It is rare and strange — we hadn’t experienced that kind of restriction in any previously visited theme parks. Fortunately, you can pass through the entrance multiple times a day, so we could go outside to the car for some snacks. As a result of this rule, people were generally eating sandwiches in the parking lot. It looked strange. Maybe the reason was to force people to buy food at the catering point inside the park. However, it shouldn’t be done this way.
Tickets were wristbands attached by the park service at the ticket office. It was possible to buy a family ticket, and Large Family card members also got a 10% discount. We used it! Regular price at the entrance to the park for a family of 5 was PLN 98. At the entrance we got a map with all the attractions.
The theme park is located in an area covered by artificial channels, which are common around Elbląg. The land sections are connected to each other by small bridges. There is an option to rent a pedalo and take a cruise through the connected channels (requires additional fee).
A few words about the sanitary conditions of this park. It was dirty and unpleasant. The first area near the entrance had only mobile toilets (not in a building) and also mobile water tanks. The toilets had not been emptied for a long time and smelled bad. Additionally, the water tanks were empty so there was no water at all to wash our hands. It was literally a drama. Fortunately, after this first unpleasant surprise at the beginning, things got better further on.
There are a lot of attractions in the park. We were welcomed by a lion and took a photo with it.
The first set of attractions was inspired by illusions, and there we found:
– Enchanted faucet which pours water, but was not connected to the pipe,
– Mad tunnel,
– Crooked house (a bit too small)
– The illusion of great furniture – huge chair,
– Head on a plate,
– Cabinet of mirrors,
– land of laughter with “pasta” commonly used at the pool playground
We went further. After a while, in the distance, the Giant Lion slide appeared. It was the largest inflatable in Poland – 28 meter high slide nominated for entry into the Guinness Book of Records. The children were overjoyed!
Here a small note from the park service: younger kids could use only small parts of the inflatable – the steeper slide was dedicated to older children. The inflatable is also accessible to adults. We just needed to take off our shoes to get on. From the top of the Giant Lion there was a great view of the surrounding area. We could select one of two slides. A large dose of excitement for the kids (and parents as well). Next to the slide we had a restaurant and ice cream parlor, benches and tables with umbrellas. Here parents could take a rest when they didn’t have any more energy to play.
It was hard to take the kids away to the next attraction, we promised to come back here again when we went back to the car.
Nearby was another set of attractions, this time King Arthur’s manor – Camelot. Here kids could pull the sword from the rock and make some tiny fight. Knight’s clothing was also available to wear; however, it was very warm in a knight’s helmet. We made some knight fight there.
Next, there was a playground with a few small inflatables, a ball pool and a trampoline. We decided to play here at the return. By now there was a maze that we wanted to visit first. It was very easy to get through this labyrinth because the main route was heavily trodden. Idea was cool, unfortunately the walk-through took less than 3 minutes.
When we were at the exit of the maze there was a ring where we could take a pony ride. The girls had to do that.
The next point was a cruise by small ferry (water tram) that took us for a while along the artificial channel. During the cruise we could see Stonehenge replica and Moai Island monuments. It was nice to have such break in walking. Our legs could rest for a while.
When the cruise had ended we went to Monster Island. It was the best attraction in the theme park. It is rare to feel fear in a theme park. During the walk, small sensors were activating monster sounds and turning on mechanical constructions that were lying in the water. A few monsters, including a Yeti, were hidden in the forest. The girls believed that they were real. You can watch their reactions in our video. Only one place had an uncovered speaker; all others were nicely hidden. Justine was so afraid that she didn’t want to cross the bridge while a monster lay underneath. Fortunately, with her parents she is not afraid of anything so we could continue our walk.
Next, we reached the mini zoo. Here we discovered very tired animals that were hiding from the sun. One pony was lying on the ground and looked dead. We reported that to the park staff and they didn’t react at all. It was terrible.
From the mini zoo we went to the Viking village. It was nicely named, but in reality it was only one shed that was not accessible at all.
Finally, we were going back to the parking lot. On the way back we stopped for a while at the Gold Mine. Here Kris was trying to find real gold in the sand. There were some special small pieces colored with gold paint that looked like real gold. Kids could separate them in the sieves.
The last attraction was the Giant Lion again, as we had promised. That’s all. The kids were almost asleep (completely out of energy). Mostly because of the sweltering heat and the number of attractions. The park service on such a hot day put out some water sprinklers where kids were able to soak a bit.
Conclusion: Family Theme Park “New Holland” (“Nowa Holandia”) is good place for active rest for whole family. Everyone has their own preferences and it is hard to prepare something universal for everybody. The number of attractions is so big that sometimes we thought there were too many of them. Some of them were not related to each other. We think it would be better to choose one theme and try to be the best in this niche. If there is the biggest inflatable Giant Lion, why are there no other big inflatables? While walking in this park we felt a bit lost what the main theme of the park is.
It is a young theme park and we think it will change in the future. We hope that it will be a change for the better.