FOR thrill-seekers, the worst part of a day out at a theme park is having to stand in line behind all the other people wanting to go on the best rides.
However, Chessington World of Adventures has come up with an initiative for theme park fans to get the resort to themselves, cutting out the long queues and having to deal with other guests.
From just £20 per person, visitors are able to book the park in the evenings for them, their friends and families – provided they’re able to find enough people to meet the park’s requirements.
The package includes hire of and entry to the whole resort, theme park and zoo for three hours, from 6pm until 9pm.
There will also be access to selected food, drink and retail outlets, as well as free parking.
However, if three hours isn’t enough, the whole park can be booked from 10am – 5pm for a more expensive price, which is available on request.
There are of course some rules that have to be met in order for Chessington to agree to host you and your friends exclusively.
Firstly, your party has to be no smaller than 2,000 people, each paying for the evening park hire.
The park is therefore marketing the option as one for companies looking for a unique way to reward their staff with a day out.
The Chessington website reads: “Celebrate a company achievement, milestone, anniversary or simply treat your team and their families by hiring the whole theme park.
“There are over 40 rides and attractions and 1000 animals in the Zoo and SEA LIFE centre for you to experience together.
“It’s the perfect venue to host a WILD event for your employees or customers and their family & friends to enjoy a day out.”
It may sound a lot to have 2,000 people at the park, but given Chessington’s capacity is closer to 15,000, it can hugely reduce the number of people clogging up the queues for the best rides.
Previous companies who have hired out the park include phone network o2, who booked it for their priority members.
They said: “Being able to give our priority members exclusive access to Chessington World of Adventures made them feel like stars.
“An experience with no queues – what better way to create special memories.”
For those who don’t have 1,999 friends and want to dodge the queues anyway, there are some ways in which they can cut back their waiting time on their days out.
Oliver Brendon, CEO of AttractionTickets.com explained that the best way to get on the rides without queueing is to turn up as early as possible.
He said: “It may sound obvious, the quietest times to avoid ride queues are the first 60 to 90 minutes of the day.
“If you buy your tickets online and get there early, you’ll benefit from the extra time when the gates open.”
Oliver also recommends downloading the park’s app, as many of them have queue trackers, showing how busy each ride is at any given moment.
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