Despite our best efforts, our youngest boy (and 3rd born child) has decided to turn 4 and we wanted to celebrate with something big. Something…awesome. We decided to take him to the LEGO Discovery Center in Atlanta, Georgia.
LEGO Discovery Center is located inside the Phipps Plaza shopping center at the very top of the mall. When you walk in you are instantly transported into a completely different world. Everything is made of Lego!
There are multiple Lego theme parks located around the U.S. and they are all very different. The Atlanta location has a ride called Kingdom Quest and this is our family’s favorite! Up to 4 people can ride at a time (so our family of 6 split into two carts). You journey on a quest to save the princess, fighting orcs and dragons along the way. It’s a fun family competition to see who can defeat the most bad guys. I’d like to say I crushed the kids but sadly, that’s not how it played out. To be fair, I was also helping our 1 year old daughter, so I blame the baby.
I highly suggest going on a weekday, or at the very least getting there early, because this place does fill up fast. We went early so we were able to ride Kingdom Quest multiple times, which was a lot of fun. This ride is also not in the main part of the park, where most of the other activities are located. We knew once we entered the main portion of the Discovery Center, we likely wouldn’t come back to it (which we didn’t) so it was nice to enjoy it a few times.
The next area you’ll walk through is Mini-land! It is almost the entire city of Atlanta (well…the main landmarks, at least) in Lego form. It’s interactive and the most unique way you’ll ever see the city.
Once’s you’ve finally pulled yourself away from Mini-land, you’ll walk into the main room. There you’ll find yourself in the middle of a true Lego… well… land. One of these lands is DUPLO Park. DUPLO Park is a safe place for toddlers to play and build. There’s also a toddler sized merry-go-round in the center of the park.
Once you journey more into the park, you’ll find a quick-style dining cafeteria with a unique QR code menu.
There are so many games, interactive experiences and stations to build your creations and bring them to life. There are multiple race tracks where you can build any kind of LEGO vehicle you can imagine, and test them on the different tracks. Or, you can build a spaceship, place it on the virtual reality platform and watch it actually fly in outer space on the big screen.
There are no shortages of photo opportunities, either. Whether it’s with the multiple minifig statues throughout the park, the various characters that will come around during the day, or our personal favorite, the huge, pirate ship themed playground!
It’s not all behind the lens though, as you can also get a front seat to the action in the 4D theater. There are several short films that play in the theater, so you can catch as many as you want and enjoy a different experience each time.
If all of this isn’t enough to wear out those kids, there is still plenty to do in the mall itself. AMC theater, Build-A-Bear, the Disney Store, and plenty more places are available to shop and dine. We ended the day by taking our birthday boy to Build-A-Bear Workshop to get his birthday bear (which you pay whatever age you’re turning, so his was $4).
If he must turn 4, I’d say this was a pretty great way to do it! He had a great time, and we all made some great memories.
