FREE Instructions PDF https://www.mattelder.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Chopper-C1-10P-Droid-Star-Wars-Rebels-Instructions-mattelder.com-.pdf Rebrickable Parts list: https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-161380/TribalNobody/chopper-c1-10p-droid-from-star-wars-rebels/#parts G’day, LEGO enthusiasts! Welcome back to the Family Bricks channel. I’m Matt Elder, and today we have something truly exciting for all you Star Wars fans …
G’day Everyone, Matt Elder of Family Bricks here and in this video we are going to look at this London AFOLs collobarative white castle build that I was apart of. The castle is otherwise …
In this video we are going to review FunWhole FH 9001 Wood Cabin Retro House with delight lighting kit. We will start off with an unboxing and see what the set contains. From here …
Let there be light! In this video we are going to look at adding this Lightailing LED Lighting Kit into this UCS LEGO Star Wars X-Wing Starfighter set 75355. We will unbox the light …
In this video we are going to compare the old Pab Jugs / cups to the new LEGO cardboard boxes from the Pick and Build walls (aka Pick a brick) – which is better …
Is this fan made LEGO Sonic the Hedgehog Green Hill Zone alternative/expansion MoC any good?! In this video we are going to look at an alternative build to the official release of Sonic the …
How special is the church entrance when getting married? Here is a recent Wedding Painting that I did live and some media around it. Wedding Painting bookings can be made by getting in contact: …
In this video we are going to review JMBricklayer 30001 3 In 1 Medieval Weapon Kit. This consists of the Catapult, Ballista and Bombard. We will start with an unboxing of the set and …
Done as a prize for @Planet TEK 24 hour charity livestream raising money for “Children with Cancer UK”. Tek raised a staggering £3.7k – Congrats mate! Acrylic Painting on Canvas Board 4×6 inches (10x15cm) …
In this video, we are going to have an extensive look over this Super Malio / Mario LEGO Compatible Peach’s Castle by Lepin / LQS 67601. We will look at the features of the …
In this video we review Alton Towers Scarefest 2020 – 3 Mazes and Darkest Depths Maze. The 3 mazes are:
Toxic Junkyard The Attic Altonville Mine Tours
Is the 3 Mazes Ticket worth it? We will have a look at this given the ticket is £22.00 on top of your entry ticket. Darkest Depths is another £6.40 as well.
We also give a rough indication as to where the attractions are located in the park as they are the most easily signposted on the website / app (they are in and around the actual Castle itself). Darkest Depths we had to come back to the following day as one of the actors apparently had a medical emergency so the whole attraction was closed down to deal with it.
What is the British Museum London UK like now it has reopened with Covid 19 measures in place? Is it worth going, what has changed, what is the experience like etc.? We will cover this in the video and give our thoughts and firsthand experience as a family. We will do a quick overview full tour of British Museum London UK in about 5 minutes, as a bit of a virtual tour.
Time codes to the Video: 0:00 Introduction 0:36 Entrance & 1 Way System 2:33 Parthenon 4:27 Is the British Museum worth a visit and what is it like? 5:00 Summing Up
G’day Everyone, Matt Elder of Family Bricks here, today we are going to have a quick look at the British Museum October 5th, 2020 and see what it is like with the covid restriction in place on a glorious sunny day in London as always. And we will do a quick walk through and tour of the museum that is currently open
The museum itself undergoing a few renovations with the main columns encased. When you come in you have to prebook your tickets and come at the right time as you cant come in early and you can’t come in after your time slot. So very controlled and rigorous in that respect.
So you come in the main entrance and some areas are closed, no real surprises there. Into the main ticketing and members area. The main entry lobby always an amazing space and looks like they are implementing a 1 way system throughout.
1 Way System
Some more information on the 1 way system and some information you can download.
First stop in is the Rosetta Stone which shows translations between ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. So all in the Egyptian section once you come through and wrap around.
And you have a statue during the old kingdom and they are taking a step forward. Its important as up until this time everything was generally shown as very static. As you take a step forward, it starts to put movement into the things and makes art and the like much more dynamic. Just over there you’ve got one where it is all feet together and static.
And then you come into which is asyrain which is modern day Iraq and you use to have these statues here, which is a pair of them and they use to guard the entrance to the hallway to the throne room.
Now coming along to minion and crete society
Into a section of the ancient romans and the ancient Greek.
Parthenon
Then into the Parthenon section which is in Athens, the main one which dominates the top of the scenery, and you’ve got part of the freeze with one part there and the other part down there, which is all pretty controversial to have.
This part is from the pediment, the top bit, the triangular part of the façade, and all the sculptures that were bought back from Athens.
And throughout the museum, tiny sections are closed off and there are quite a number like this, flipping around to the other side.
And the kids like to play a game called spot the naked butt, or something similar.
Gives you a better sense, still a reasonable number of people around for a Sunday. So a reasonable number of people but not ridiculously overcrowded. Still not completely vacant or empty either.
Then you have some stuff on King Rameses II who built a lot of monuments and things to himself. He was king and by the sheer fact he lived for such a long time, he was able to do so many building projects glorifying himself, and one of the last real kings to do that before society crumbled.
Go through to an exhibit on living and dying which is about how people live and die throughout all different cultures. Downstairs is a section on Africa.
In the section downstairs on Africa, all the various tribal arts and the like. Through to the collection of North America and this is Mexico.
Then you come through to the enlightenment room which is looking at the time period when the collection was first put together and broken up into 7 sections. That whole thing of learning and putting collections together.
So is the British Museum worth a visit and what is it like?
Think definitely a bit different experience as now they have the one way path so through. So it is good in the regard that it can quickly take you through the museum and you can quickly hit all the major spots. If you are looking to do some detailed research and want to get up close to some of the artifacts you might have a bit more of an issue as some of the rooms are closed off and everything like that.
As for little kids, will depend upon what they are into. Ours were more just running around trying to look at all the naked sculptures and things like that, so they got some stuff out of it.
Summing Up
So that’s it from us at Family Bricks, if you enjoyed the video or got something out of it, please hit the thumbs up button, and have you been, or what did you think or are you tempted to go. Leave us a comment down below. Would be interested to hear what others think and if they have been, what their experience has been.
We’ve been about lately checking out a lot of London attractions in a post Covid world. The castles at the moment are relatively deserted so would highly recommend checking out Tower of London and Hampton Court Palace. Check those videos out here. London Eye at the moment is also really good. Places like LEGOLAND and Chessington World of Adventures, you wouldn’t even know there is a pandemic on.
Thanks for watching. That’s it from us here at Family Bricks. Until next time when we talk about all things lifestyle.
What is The London Eye UK like with Covid-19 guidelines in place now that the attraction has recently reopened? Is it worth going? We look to answer these questions following our recent family visit in September 2020 and August 2020. To do so, we will look at what has changed, what is new, what is closed and what the queue times are like.
We will have a look at ticket prices pre and post covid, and surprisingly, there isn’t much difference. What about if you have an annual Merlin pass, what sort of value is there and should we be thinking of renewing them (or not)?
Time codes to the Video:
0:00 Introduction 0:36 Recent Visits and Coronavirus guidelines 1:12 Get there & Public Transport 1:30 Coming Out at Westminister Train Station & Local Landmarks 2:26 Pointing out Landmarks visible from the London Eye Capsule 3:28 Is London Eye UK Worth It?! 4:39 Summing Up
G’day Everyone, Matt Elder of Family Bricks here. What is the London Eye UK like now it has reopened with covid 19 measures in place? Is it worth going, what has changed, what is the experience like etc.? We will cover this in the video and give our thoughts and firsthand experience as a family. We will do a full tour experience on the London Eye in about 5 minutes.
This video is bought to you by Macatsim Holiday Homes in Margate and Broadstairs. Great for a week’s holiday or a weekend escape, being just over an hour east of London, UK. Treat yourself to amazing sunsets, a LEGO wall or great food. Visit www.macatsim.com and mention this Youtube video, we’ll will look after you.
Introduction
We’ve actually been to the London Eye UK twice in the last month. The first time was on at the London Eye UK was August 23rd, 2020 – 6 weeks after it reopened. So it has had some time to bed in the new corona virus safety guidelines. This was interesting as during peak school holidays, they were only allowing 2 family groups in the capsule at the same time.
When we went on Sunday 20th September 2020, they were allowing 4 family groups in the capsule at a time, even after the stricter 6 people max had been bought in a week or so previously. We’ll give you a sense of if London Eye UK is worth visiting, and what it is like now.
Getting There – Public Transport
To get to The London Eye UK you’ll most likely have to take public transport of some form. We took the overground and underground/tube so now you have to have face mask and the trains and train stations are signposted everywhere about this. We caught a 9am train on a Sunday morning so relatively empty and these shots give you a sense of that.
We came out at Westminster train station and you can see Big Ben there just off to the right and so it is a quick trip over the bridge here. And you have the London Eye there on the left and the Sea Life Aquarium London is there on the right a little bit. So a nice leisurely walk across the bridge here. Its really nice to come out and you can see all the iconic landmarks.
In the Area
So you walk along The Queen’s Walk and coming up you have London Sea Life right there , then Shrek’s Adventures and past that is going to be the London Dungeons. We have Merlin Passes premium passes so that means you can get into the fast track queue here, which means you can jump the queue and does make a huge amount of difference, so you don’t have to wait that long.
Even with the Merlin Passes at the time you had to pay a £1.00 each person but they have removed that now and pay nothing. But you do have to prebook online . So this part of the footage is when we only had two family groups in the capsule and that was brilliant.
Pointing out Some of the Local Sites
Here you’ve got Waterloo train station, the Shard is just there, just off slightly is the Tower of London, Tower Bridge. Then you’ve got St Paul’s Cathedral over there, Royal Festival Hall, trains leading into Charing Cross Station, Cleopatra’s Needle.
So from Charing Cross Station you come around a little bit and you have Nelson’s Column, and the National Art Gallery. Come a little bit further along and down there you’ve got Buckingham Palace. The flag is up so the Queen is in today. And then you come al little bit further around here and you have Big Ben, which is the actual Bell. The Tower is there and then the Houses of Parliament and obviously at the moment it is undergoing some renovation. Bit further around to the rest of the Thames River.
Is London Eye worth it?
Given that we have been twice within a month, I guess you can pretty much tell absolutely it is worth it. When we went during the school holidays it was fantastic as you only had 2 family groups. Literally it was the 4 of us and 2 other people in this capsule. It was brilliant as normally they have 25-30 people in each capsule. And just being able to have that capsule you could basically walk around the whole thing and you didn’t really get in each others way, you had unobstructed views. That was a big reason why we went back the second time as if would could experience that again, then take advantage of it while you can.
Even with the 4 families groups it was still much better than what it is usually like. Pre covid with so many people in there. Particularly on warm days when there is lots of people in there, its really hot and sweaty and the sun comes in. So even just having further people you are not tripping over each other as much and you are really able to take it in and enjoy it.
Hidden Steakhouse
This is the London Marriot Hotel County Hall and in there is a Gillray Steakhouse and bar. It is a bit of a faff to get into cause you have to come around the side entrance. Totally recommend it as at the moment because it is really quite and difficult to get into and has really good views looking back over The Thames River.
Summing Up
So that was our trip around and takes about half an hour once you get into the capsule. At the moment if you can get along to see it, totally recommend it as the numbers are really way down and it so great an experience once you are in there.
They must be losing money with this so it can’t be sustainable in the long term so get onto it while you can.
If you’ve enjoyed and / or gotten something out of this video, then hit that thumbs up button and or consider subscribing. Would you go? If you’ve been, what did you think? Sound off in the comments below.
Thanks very much for watching.
At the moment with generally no foreign tourists in London, visiting the castles and other attractions are fantastic days out (particularly if you get annual passes that let you into multiple attractions, cause the places are virtually deserted or serious restrictions on numbers with letting people in).
Check out this one on the Tower of London which has 10% of its normal tourist numbers as there are no foreign tourists. Here is a playlist of other Merlin Entertainment attractions and what they are like at the moment. Alternatively, here are other videos you might enjoy.
That’s it from us here at Family Bricks, until next time when we talk about all things lifestyle.
In this video we will show you how to mount and frame a drawing at home for about £10, Like this one. We will go from a basic A4 illustration drawing and put it into an A3 frame. It really makes it have a presence and be ready to hang on a wall. This can generally be done for about £10 and you get great results. In this example we’ll be using some Iron Man marker sketches I’ve created.
Affiliate Links FRAMES BY POST 25 mm Wide H7 Picture Photo Frame with Black Mount A3 Picture Size A4 https://amzn.to/35PPhli
We use a couple of Iron Man marker illustration drawings I did as samples. If you’d like to commission a drawing or painting, please email matt@mattelder.com for further details.
Iron Man Livestream Sketch Creation
Time codes to the Video: 0:00 Introduction 0:36 Overview – Here is one I prepared earlier 1:04 Picture Frame and Mounting Board Considerations 2:00 Tips for Starting 2:42 Taking off the Back of the Picture Frame 3:52 Mounting Artwork & Fixing Down 7:14 Placing Mount & Artwork into Frame – Get the Orientation right 8:32 The Big Reveal
Transcipt from the Show
G’day Everyone, Matt Elder of Family Bricks here and in this video we will show you how to mount and frame a drawing at home for about £10, Like this one. We will go from a basic A4 illustration drawing and put it into an A3 frame, like this one, with mount to really make it have a presence and be ready to hang on a wall.
This video is bought to you bay Macatsim Holiday Homes in Margate and Broadstairs. Great for a week’s holiday or a weekend escape, being just over an hour east of London, UK. Treat yourself to amazing sunsets, a LEGO wall or great food. Visit www.macatsim.com and mention this Youtube video, we’ll will look after you.
What Are We Doing?
So here is one I prepared earlier and put into a frame with a generic black mount and we are going to take this one and do something similar to it. In the description around the video I will have affiliate links so you can get most of this stuff pretty readily and not for much money.
I also readily use these sorts of frames for my oil paintings as well. So it is something that I use pretty regularly.
Checking Out the Frame and Mount
So we normally get this A3 frame which comes in plastic wrap and then also too, this is a black mount. Which generally recommend using when want to focus the eye in on things and because the subject matter that we have here is quite masculine in terms of Iron Man, it works out well.
But if you had something like flowers or something a bit lighter, you might just want a white mount, cause then it will make it feel like it is breathing a bit more. So if you got to the point where you can see with this one its black with a little bit of white inset there. If you did get the black by mistake and think “ah well, I want to use a white”, you could kind of use the back and have it in showing through but you will see these little corners and things. No ideal but if you are looking to do something, quick, cheap and get it framed, that’s away of doing it.
Preparing the Surface
So the first thing you do is just go through and whatever table surface you are using, ensure that it is clean, cause if it has any dust or dirt, its really going to pick up here. Flip it over, so when you are opening it if you do happen to scour it or anything, it will be on the back. So not the front Perspex or whatever it is.
These just first of all check to see if it is too badly beat up or anything like that. You might have to send it back. Seems ok. We’ll flip it over and you are going to have a whole bunch of these metal things holding the cardboard / MDF in there. So you usually just take a standard butter knife and just get in under there and life them up and be careful when you are doing that. Just go around and do them all.
Now the thing is when you take it out from here, you want the surfaces to remain clean. So certainly when you get it out of here, you are going to be placing it this side down. Cause if you place the other side down, potentially you are introducing a whole bunch of dirt into it.
Even sometimes these have a little bit of dirt on it so just give it a quick bit of a wipe down. You can even feel just a little bit of grit and stuff coming off.
Cleaning up the Glass / Perspex
And the same sort of thing. Usually and you probably can’t see it but there is a bit of dirt and dust in there so just take a lightly damp rag and just go over it as we want to pick all that stuff up. There is nothing worse than going to all this trouble and once it is mounted, seeing dirt under the glass and the only way to get it is to come back in and get it all out again.
Mounting the Artwork
So while that is letting itself dry, we will take our actual image , or document or whatever it is you want to frame and we’ll stick it on the mount. So again just check the mount itself , its all pretty clean, and nothing is too beat up.
So place it down and then we will place whatever the document is, in this case it is this artwork. So what you are going to find is, there is going to be 1,2,3mm overlap between the artwork and that. So you just want to try and center it , little tiny nudges. Unless it gets stuck in their like that , in which case just lift it up and do it again. Theres not much tolerance in it, so it might be a little on the fiddly side. So that is why you get it mostly where you want it and you are just slowly taping it around.
That’s whats nice when you are using a dark countertop, when you are looking through at it, where the paper and the overlap is there , you aren’t really guessing as you have the black surface underneath it.
So pretty close to that there. Then just to fix it down, you can use, you want a low tack tape. Basically what that means is once you put the tape down, after a few years if you want to take it out and redo it, or do something else, maybe put it in a nicer frame or what have you, then if you are using sticky tape or scotch tape or whatever, when you go to lift it up, it is going to peel and rip the paper.
Artist Low Tack Tape
Whereas this is like an artist low tack tape, so it will enable it to come of much easier or you can also use this painters tape that they use for cutting in edges and things. So that put it up on the wall, they paint over it and when they take it off, it leaves a nice crisp line. So whatever you have around.
I’m going to use the artist tape, then just little corners. Now I’m going to try to keep it on the diagonal like that and do all 4 the same. You will notice it when you flip it over if you really look for it, you’ll see the difference there in the corner. Alternatively you could just run tape the whole length all the way around.
But again just looking at something that in the future if you want to go through and reuse the drawing or the mount it is easy enough to come off. You are just looking for something to more or less just hold it there in place.
So we’ve got that and well just lift that up and that is it there. So you just want any little bits of flecks to get off, particularly on the black it is really going to show up.
Placing the Mount in the Frame
And then get our frame from earlier on, you can just see there is a few little bits of fluff and stuff in there which I’m not happy about and want to get out. Not really a deal break but just how OCD you might be with things. We’ll just leave that there for a minute or so to dry.
And that has been left to dry so now we’l just come along with our picture, we will just need to remember which way is up. It won’t be too hard or much of an issue here because we can see through, but when we go to hang it, we just need to make sure we know which way it is.
Keeping Track of the Orientation
So pop that in there, just come back to our backing mount, and again the reason we want to know which way is up so we know which way to put these, cause this is where it is going to hang off. So for this one because it is going to be there, we put this one here so when you hang it can go like that.
So then if you had it more in the orientation where you might have a portrait or something , you’d do it like that so that was at the top so the head is in there. So with these little metal pins that are here, you might have to gently massage it past the point.
Or in the case of this one over here, it has come a little too far unstuck, too far down so just bend that back a little bit. Make sure that is all in there and it is all good. Now it is just a quick matter of going through and flattening these down.
Flatten Down Metal Tabs
Ok so we’ve gone through and flattened all these down so now the big reveal when we flip it over and there we have it. And now that is on there you can just see a few little areas that have a bit of dust and flex , from this side so we’ll go through and give that a quick little wipe down.
Other Illustrations from a Livestream
These were some illustrations I did on a livestream, so if you click around the video you’ll be able to see how it was created. And here was the other one so I’ve got a couple there and my son is really into Iron Man at the moment, so I’ve done a couple of these and he just wanted them so figured I’d do some quick frames like this , won’t break the bank but will give a lot of punch and effect.
Then he also did this Iron Man LEGO mosaic for his birthday so there will be a link around the video where you can see his review on that as well.
If you’d like to commission a sketch or painting, please get in contact with me at matt@mattelder.com
Summing Up
If you found this video useful, give that thumbs up button a press, always love getting those. If you want to be super awesome, then consider subscribing to the channel.
If you’d like to see a quick overview and time lapse of how I created one of these pet portraits, click here.
To see the livestream video where these Iron Man pieces were created, click here.
Alternatively, here are some other videos you might enjoy.
Thanks for watching and that’s it from us here a Family Bricks. Until next time when we talk about all things lifestyle.
In this video we review LEGO Mosaic Iron Man Hulk buster and have a time lapse speed build of it. What do kids think of it? How does it get put together?
In this video I’m going to give a quick time-lapse overview of how I created this pet portrait … or as I like to call them “Pawtraits”. I’ll also show how I paint animal fur.
If you’d like to commission a pet pawtrait of your best friend, drop me a line at matt@mattelder.com . A watercolor A3 (12×16 inches) one like this at time of recording would be around the £199.00 mark.
G’day Everyone, Matt Elder here and in this video I’m going to give a quick time-lapse overview of how I created this pet portrait … or as I like to call them “Pawtraits”. If you’d like to commission a pet pawtrait of your best friend, drop me a line at matt@mattelder.com . A watercolor A3 (12×16 inches) one like this at time of recording would be around the £199.00 mark.
I start out with a drawing and then block in the background, it’s the quickest way to get the shape of the dog to read well. As this dog is largely oranges and warm colours, I’m going cool and complimentary in the background with blues and greens.
I randomly squirt masking fluid using an old toothbrush as this will help give some texture and love having a randon, incomplete feeling.
I start laying down some base colours and like to build the colours up in several layers. This helps to keep your dancing across the colours. For the shadow colours I like to push into the cool purples and keeps life, rather than going for dull blacks and the like.
I’ll spot in some of the darkest blacks in key features of the eyes, nose and lower jaw. It helps to set the darkest points of the image so when building up the other colours, I tonally know where my range can get to.
Continue to layer in colours to give variety. Then I start in on some individual fur hairs to really give the pet its individual characteristic the owner would recognize.
Then it is just a matter to continue drawing out these individual hair strands and adding in fine detail as you go along. Then working around the muzzle and more individual hair strands.
From here I really want to separate out the side of the head into shadow and get the form reading better, so adding in some darker colours.
I want to have the far side of the head more suggested, particularly around the eye with the long hairs, so never really touch this area of the painting. I remove the masking fluid from below the jaw and lightly knock back the white of the paper so the bottom jaw is more clearly defined. Noodle out a few more details and call it done.
Here we have the finalized image. If you’d like to commission a pet pawtrait of your best friend, drop an email to matt@mattelder.com . Also works great as a gift to your significant other or family member. Here are some other videos you might be interested in.
Most Saturday nights at 8pm UK time I have a “You Say I Draw “ livestream on Youtube. You come along in the chat and tell me what to draw, and I do some quick sketches. Be sure to pop by and say G’day.
If you enjoyed this video, hit that thumbs up. Until next time when we talk about all things lifestyle.
What is Sea Life London Aquarium UK like now it has reopened with covid 19 measures in place? Is it worth going, what has changed, what is the experience like etc.? We will cover this in the video and give our thoughts and firsthand experience as a family. We will do a full time lapse tour of Sea Life London Aquarium UK in about 10 minutes.
Further information on the Holiday Homes / Airbnb / Short Term Lets can be found at http://www.macatsim.com/
Both flats, Broadstairs and Margate are about 75-90 minutes east of London UK. Margate has a LEGO themed Holiday Lets / Airbnb Short Term Stay awith a LEGO Wall. Broadstairs has an iconic red London bus bunk bed (at time of recording).
Time codes to the Video:
0:00 Introduction – Sea Life London Aquarium
1:00 Public Transport to Sea Life London Aquarium
1:45 Walk Over Sharks
2:31 What is Social Distancing at Sea Life London Aquarium Like?
3:55 What is closed?
4:25 Sea Life London Aquarium Penguins
4:59 Jellyfish Area
5:35 Is Sea Life London Aquarium Worth it?
6:45 Summing Up
8:00 Relaxing Shots
Transcript from the Show
G’day Everyone, Matt Elder of Family Bricks here. What is Sea Life London Aquarium UK like now it has reopened with covid 19 measures in place? Is it worth going, what has changed, what is the experience like etc.? We will cover this in the video and give our thoughts and firsthand experience as a family. We will do a full time lapse tour of Sea Life London Aquarium UK in about 10 minutes.
This video is bought to you bay Macatsim Holiday Homes in Margate and Broadstairs. Great for a week’s holiday or a weekend escape, being just over an hour east of London, UK. Treat yourself to amazing sunsets, a LEGO wall or great food. Visit www.macatsim.com and mention this Youtube video, we’ll will look after you.
We spent the day at Sea Life London Aquarium UK August 23rd, 2020 – 6 weeks after it reopened. So it has had some time to bed in the new corona virus safety guidelines and we’ll give you a sense of if Sea Life London Aquarium is worth visiting, and what it is like now.
To get to Sea Life London Aquarium you’ll most likely have to take public transport of some form. We took the overground and underground/tube so now you have to have face mask and the trains and train stations are signposted everywhere about this. We caught a 9am train on a Sunday morning so relatively empty and these shots give you a sense of that.
Is Sea Life London Aquarium worth it?
Absolutely! It seems that with lockdown and pretty much no tourists, numbers are limited and it’s a super nice experience. For the most part you don’t have people climbing all over you, social distancing is generally adhered to and staff do try to ensure it happens. LEGOLAND and Chessington World of Adventures, which Merlin Entertainment also owns, are the complete opposite of this, you wouldn’t even know social distancing is a thing – click link around the video to see what LEGOLAND is like
Pretty much most of the attraction is there, including the interactive ability to touch some of the sea creatures. Again other Merlin Entertainment attractions have these closed. That is the thing with this, you have a parent organization but each attraction seems to have their own intrepreation and implementation of covid – click link around the video to see Chessington World of Adventures and how their hands on interactive touch is closed.
We are Merlin Premium Annual Pass holders (standard ones don’t give access usually during school holidays). We are definitely going to try to come back in the next month or so – who knows how good it will last like this so take advantage while you can. Kids always remember the penguins and probably their favourite part of the day.
If you’ve enjoyed and / or gotten something out of this video, then hit that thumbs up button and or consider subscribing. Would you go? If you’ve been, what did you think? Sound off in the comments below.
Thanks very much for watching. We are just going to let the video run with some other relaxing shots from Sea Life London Aquarium. At the moment with generally no tourists in London, visiting the castles and other attractions are fantastic days out (particularly if you get annual passes that let you into multiple attractions).
Like this one of Tower of London which houses the Crown Jewels. Normally during peak season you’d get 13,000 visitors a day, they are struggling to get 1,000 a day now, the place feels almost deserted.
Click the link around the video for more information.
We’ll put links to other London based attractions we’ve been to recently so you can consider going, or if you aren’t local, can watch the time lapse portion of the video and do a full tour of these attractions you might not otherwise see in less than 10 minutes.
That’s it from us here at Family Bricks, until next time when we talk about all things lifestyle.
What is Chessington World of Adventures Resort UK like now it has reopened with covid 19 measures in place? Is it worth going, what has changed, what is the experience like etc.? We will cover this in the video and give our thoughts and first hand experience as a family, after our visit on 16th August 2020. We will do a whole time-lapse walk through of the park and key attractions in about 10 minutes.
Time codes to the Video: 0:00 Introduction 0:44 Carpark & Entry – Bottlenecks and Stupidity 1:47 No Shows at All but LEGOLAND do shows – Merlin Entertainments Own Both 2:25 Kids Playgrounds – Some Closed, Some Open 3:20 Chessington World of Adventures Resort vs LEGOLAND Windsor UK 3:47 Sea Life 4:50 Smokehouse Restaurant Issues 5:30 Lion Enclosures 6:20 Gorilla Enclosure 7:10 Zufair 8:13 Is Chessington World of Adventures Worth Visiting? Chessington World of Queuing. 9:40 Summing up and closing
The LEGO House of DOTs is going on a world tour. In this video we will cover what this means and go behind the scenes to have a look at how it starts to come together. Back in January 2020 we worked on the House of DOTs that was the promotional vehicle for the launch of the then new LEGO DOTs theme. Check out this video to a walk through of the House of DOTs I did back then so you can get a sense of what it was like
After it was finished being on display at the Coal Drops Yard in Kings Cross in the center of London. It went into storage and got damaged. Coronavirus then came along and everything changed. Subsequently LEGO has decided to rejig the House of DOTs from 8 shipping containers, into about 2 and make them readily transportable so can travel the world and have more people experience them.
Thus new pieces have to be created, damage ones addressed and a chance to take what was learnt the first time around, and improve upon the original designs. Only one tiny little restriction, as now in a covid world, all the work has to be done remotely.
So in this video, I’ll show the unboxing of the packages we have received from LEGO, the pieces, instructions and the like … So much LEGO!
Time codes to the Video: 0:00 Introduction 0:26 House of DOTS History 1:35 Package Delivery, Unboxing and Design 1 3:58 Unboxing and Design 2 7:10 Unboxing and Design 3 9:56 Summing Up and Closing
What is LEGOLAND Windsor UK like with Covid-19 guidelines in place now that the theme park has recently reopened? Is it worth going? We look to answer these questions following another recent family visit in August 2020. To do so, we will look at what has changed, what is new, what is closed and what the queue times are like. This is an update to our video from almost a month back and the differences are fairly significant.
We will have a look at ticket prices pre and post covid, and surprisingly, there isn’t much difference. What about if you have an annual Merlin pass, what sort of value is there and should we be thinking of renewing them (or not)?
We’ve noticed Merlin Passes have become a little like frequent flyers – actually using and redeeming is becoming difficult / no slots available. But if you want to pay, no problem. Castles around London also having the same issue – very few slots for annual passes. Think annual passes might become the next scam / pointless to have *
Further information on the Holiday Homes / Airbnb / Short Term Lets can be found at http://www.macatsim.com/ Both flats, Broadstairs and Margate are about 75-90 minutes east of London UK. Margate has a LEGO themed Holiday Lets / Airbnb Short Term Stay awith a LEGO Wall. Broadstairs has an iconic red London bus bunk bed (at time of recording).
Time codes to the Video: 0:00 Introduction 0:51 Car Park and Entrance – Social Distancing Collapsed with People Everywhere?! 1:21 Laser Raiders – First Ride 1:50 Monster Party Haunted House 2:20 Queue Lengths at 11am 3:10 LEGOLAND Express Train 3:50 Duplo Water Park – don’t forget to pre-book 4:10 Sky Riders 5:15 4D Cinema Studios 6:00 Miniland and New Details 7:35 LEGO Stores Reopening 7:58 Refueling Drink Stations Issues 8:32 Kids Favourite things of the day 9:20 Car park … why can’t they sort this out, it’s a dead simple fix 9:40 Final Thoughts – LEGOLAND – Is the value there in visiting? 13:08 Summing up and closing
Transcript from the Show
G’day Everyone, Matt Elder of Family Bricks here and today out in LEGOLAND Windsor UK. Just thought we’d come out here and see what it is like now. We were here a couple of weeks ago and did a video on what it was like post covid with all the changes and things like that. Its been a couple of weeks now and there has been a couple more changes and a bit more relaxing, easing and opening of things. So we will go through and see what’s changed, what is different, what is the same. Maybe some other bits and pieces of what’s going on and see if it is still good value, it is worth coming out?
This video is bought to you bay Macatsim Holiday Homes in Margate and Broadstairs. Great for a week’s holiday or a weekend escape, being just over an hour east of London, UK. Treat yourself to amazing sunsets, a LEGO wall or great food. Visit www.macatsim.com and mention this YouTube video, we’ll will look after you.
Car Park and Entrance – Social Distancing Collapsed with People Everywhere?!
Feels like it is a lot more busy than when we came here a couple of weeks ago. So maybe everybody is getting back into it. Lots more people everywhere. Bag check, security screens, social distancing seems like it has collapsed.
We’re in LEGOLAND. Yeah LEGOLAND!!
Even more people everywhere.
Laser Raiders – First Ride
In early first to Laser Raiders and if you are over 11, you need a mask and heavy on the hand sanitizer.
PlayStation games themselves are closed which makes sense. At least the other drop ride is open.
Daddy, do not make me watch this video, I will get motion sickness.
Monster Party Haunted House
And the Haunted House has reduced capacity. At least they put some new shades up though. In the Haunted House, you have socially distant spots to dance on. So in the Haunted House you don’t have the front two rows and spaces in between groups… and its nice and air conditioned.
It spins around a lot. And we had a dance party. Yeah, we had a dance party.
Queue Lengths at 11am
Now its just after 11am and some of the ride times getting crazy. 90minutes there, an hour for the Coast Guard, 90 minutes for Deep Sea Adventure. Place has been really busy!
Not too bad, Laser Raiders half an hour. Some of the smaller kiddie ones only 5 minutes. At least the shows are running.
Going back, an hour there, 45 minutes there, an hour there.
Shows are back on.
LEGOLAND Express Train
Going through and giving it a clean, giving it a good spray down. Do that about every 3rd or 4th train ride. So with the train, you have every second aisle isn’t used. So while we all got separate seats and things, the lines are all bunched together. Clever Coronavirus.
Huge queues to get into those refill drinks. There are queues here and queues over at the LEGO City area. Just lots of people in general
Duplo Water Park – don’t forget to pre-book
I love the water park. Now Duplo water park, you have to book in advance. What they don’t tell you is that you have to do it a day or two before you arrive, as they only open slots them and it fills up really quick.
Sky Riders
What can you see down there in Miniland? New York, Sydney Opera House, ISS thingya ma jiggy. The NASA Space Station, rocket bits.
So Sky Riders has been working and not much of a queue, which is good as really hot during the middle of the day now.
OK, so what can you see? Well, I can see almost the whole of Miniland, bit like a map spread out in front of us.
Don’t be afraid to go on this ride, by the way it is a slow rollercoaster, it goes quite slowly , enjoy the view, at first it goes a bit quickly like the start of a rollercoaster speed but then it kinda slows down. Its really fun.
4D Cinema Studios
OK , with reduced capacity, you couldn’t even get into the show, the queue wasn’t even very big. We came back towards the end of the day and we were able to get in then. In the 4D cinema and they are doing every other row, spacing people out.
We just did the 4D dimension cinema with the Ninjago show. It didn’t have a lot of the effects of the 4th dimension so it did feel a little flat compared with normal. It was ok but it really does make a difference and you do loose a fair but out of it.
LEGO reef and Minifigures & More, The Ultimate Brick Store are still closed.
This is typical of a spray that gets done on most of the rides and I’m guessing it takes place every half hour or so, so it isn’t after each ride.
Miniland and New Details
Down here in Miniland and have a quick look around and see what details we can see and if anything has really changed. Lets go and have a look.
So we have the NHS thank you rainbow right next to the marching soldiers right in London area of Miniland.
Here we have a nice little detail of Major Tom being knighted by the Queen who the money raise for charity with the Zimmer frame in his back garden right outside the Windsor Castle.
And here we have the Tower of London and Tower Bridge which we were at yesterday so interesting now to see it in LEGO form and made some videos about that so you can click around to find out full walk through Tours in about 10 minutes.
And here is Leeds Castle in Miniland form, also great to see and we’ve done a full walkthrough of the grounds. Check out the video around.
Down here in Miniland and there use to be a Ninjago stage there. So that looks like it is completely gone and they have actually put down some AstroTurf and some picnic tables there. That would tend to suggest that it is not going to be coming back.
Daddy is a monster who wants to capture us. He’s an alien. Daddy, can you be an alien? Raaagh!
So it is 5:10pm in the afternoon and numbers are begin to thin out quite significantly but that could be because its 34 degrees Celsius and still hot and everybody’s just tired and over it and just want to get home. Its been a really, really warm day.
LEGO Stores Reopening
Seems like most of the LEGO stores have reopened. The Duplo one is open, Big and Little LEGO shops up the top, the ones over in Heartlake city, pretty much all the ones we’ve seen have been open, so more places to go and spend money.
The Duplo Valley Theater is now open and doing shows of Little Red Riding Hood. Whereas last time we were here it was completely closed until further notice. So that’s good to see that.
Refueling Drink Stations Issues
So these refueling stations are a great idea in principle but all over the park they have been breaking down all day. So you get times when there is only 1 in operation and massive queues to get a drink so does make you wonder what the value is of it.
Boats operating pretty much as normal so always a nice thing to be out on the water when it is a stinking hot day.
While its great that there is hand sanitizer all over the park, we found there have been some in some places where it has run out and doesn’t look like it gets restocked throughout the course of the day, so probably something that needs a bit of attention.
Kids Favourite things of the day
What was the best thing you liked today? Haunted House. What was good about that? Because we went up and down.
What did you like best? Seeing Dracula. The character yeah?! Any reason why? Because he is a vampire.
I liked the rides. I liked the Ninjago ride cause the park was about to close and it was funny because I was like “oh no, we are going to be stuck on the ride”, but then we weren’t.
We got the second highest score of the day on the Ninjago ride of 369,000 points, which was only 3,000 off the top score…maybe we have been here a few too many times.
The queue at the end of the day at the LEGO shop to get out, allow some time.
Car park … why can’t they sort this out, it’s a dead simple fix
And they still don’t have the exiting from the car park sorted out. They funnel everyone into one single lane to go through an open barrier. Just open one or two of the other barriers, it isn’t rocket science! It means it would take a 10th of the time to get out of this carpark. Why are they so determined to make people miserable and frustrated to get out of a carpark when it is something so easy to fix?
Final Thoughts – LEGOLAND – Is the value there in visiting?
So we have been here today and what are our final thoughts on what LEGOLAND, whether it is worthwhile coming and all that sort of stuff? Certainly since last time we were here, much, much more of the park has reopened. Most things have reopened in some description.
Big challenge with it thought is that it felt that numbers where way up, its only a perception thing but feels like the numbers are 80% to 90% what they would normally be at peak season so if they are restricting the numbers, not seeing it in a great deal.
So you have full numbers, full price , a lot of the rides are closed in terms of every other row you’ve got something. So rides are running at effectively half capacity. Queue times after the first hour of the day get ridiculously long. So if you are going to come, make sure you are here at 10am when gates open, and come straight in and pick off the big rides . Even then that’s challenging as we wanted to do the Ninjago ride and we came down and it was just closed – wasn’t open yet.
Saw the Viking Splash on the way down, ridiculous queues and wasn’t even open yet. And with queue times on some of the rides blowing out to 90 minutes or over an hour with half capacity and all the rest of it, it really does make you wonder in terms if you really do need the Ride and Reserve, or the Q-bot, see a video around here for how it works and what it was last time. Which is going to become ridiculously expensive as well.
Compared with last time, the social distancing aspect seems to be really, really token, a lot of people really don’t pay attention to it what so ever. And then there is just stupidity and nonsense with it. Like when you are waiting for the train, you are there, we were there in the queue for 45 minutes and the way it snakes back onto itself you are basically standing next to each other anyhow. But then when you go to get on the train, which only lasts for 10 minutes, they then have every other aisle not vacant , so you can’t get into it. But it just seems like there is inconsistencies like that all over the place.
So you will pretty much get the LEGOLAND experience as you would normally, you’re just going to be paying for it, you are still going to have ridiculous queue times and on a day like today where it is really, really hot, kids get irritable in the lines and sun and all that.
So I think now you’ve got to treat it as if it is a peak summer day , that you are going to be paying full prices for, but then you have Covid restrictions in on top of that. So it may make you wonder if it is value there.
If you love LEGOLAND and you can understand that and you are happy deal with that or to put up with that, or the long queues and things like that, then by all means come along.
There is just little things they don’t tell you and you find out the hard way. Like getting into the Duplo Valley for the swim and things like that and you’ve got to book a day or two in advance. And unlike other theme parks when you’ve booked in advance, a couple of days before you go they usually send out an email going like “Hey here are all the different things you can do and make sure you do this and book this” and all that sort of stuff.
They are not doing that here which is really frustrating cause on a day when its like 34 , 35 degrees Celsius, and you have no chance of getting into that swimming area when you just want to cool down and things , not happy about that.
A lot of the shows have opened up now so they are in the background and you can do and see some of those things.
So yeah I’d just be considering it as LEGOLAND as normal, just slightly off peak times but everything else is still going to be long queues and expensive and get here early and try to do a few things, and then take the rest of the day easy and wonder around and do things that you’d normally like to do and see.
And if you really want to jump queues and things like that, you are probably going to have to deal with the Reserve and Ride or what they use to call Q-bot.
Summing up and closing
So that’s it from us here at Family Bricks in LEGOLAND Windsor UK today. Had a good day overall, kids have really enjoyed themselves. Be sure to hit that thumbs up button if you’ve gotten value out of this or gotten some entertainment or learned something. And if it has helped you to make a decision to come or not to come, we’d love to know about it, or any comments you have, put them down in the comments below.
Alternatively for some other days out in London really recommend some of the castles cause they are completely deserted at the moment so you can get in and see all sorts of things really easily. There will be links around the videos for that.
