Busch Gardens, Tampa Bay with a baby or infant
Busch Gardens is a fantastic park in Tampa Bay, less than an hour’s drive from Orlando. It makes a great day out in the middle of your holiday, providing a decidedly different atmosphere from Orlando with less hustle and bustle. The park combines high octane roller coaster rides with fabulous animal experiences. Even if you don’t ride the coasters (you can use the Baby Swap System if you can’t resist them), you can simply spend your day enjoying the adventure park and the ‘safari’ elements of the park – there’s plenty for your baby to see here, enjoying the sights, sounds, and smells from a stroller. Experience up-close encounters with amazing animals, take an unforgettable safari across the Serengeti Plain, and take in colourful live entertainment all year round. When you enter the park, you’re immersed in culture as you ‘travel’ through beautifully themed areas representing Africa, Australia and other adventures around the world.
Busch Gardens presents a wonderful environment for children and parents with lush landscaping and horticulture, colourful shows, a variety of animals, and memorable sights and sounds. Children two and younger are admitted free to Busch Gardens, and this world-class park has much to offer young children and their parents. Busch Gardens is the ultimate family adventure with a unique blend of thrilling rides, one of the country’s premier zoos, live shows, restaurants, shops and games. Here are some helpful suggestions to enjoy your day with some ideas and hints about different parts of the park:
With nearly 3,000 animals, Busch Gardens really is the ultimate adventure park for families and new for 2010 at Busch Gardens Tampa Bay is Sesame Street Safari of Fun®. This unique play land, featuring Elmo, Big Bird and all their friends, is filled with rides, shows and adventures celebrating the spirit of Africa.
Kids can try out Air Grover; a new junior coaster, Elmo’s Safari Go-Round; a tribal carousel, Oscar’s Swamp Stomp and Bert & Ernie’s Water Hole; wet adventures filled with bubblers, geysers, jets and dumping buckets, Zoe-Patra & the Hippos of the Nile; a splashy flume ride through the Nile river and Lights, Camera, Imagination! a 4D Sesame Street show.
‘Big Bird’s 123-Smile with Me’ photography studio gives kids the chance to share a hug and a smile with Sesame Street friends, and musical performances bring safari tales to life.
For a rainforest adventure, the 4-acre attraction Jungala invites guests to discover exotic creatures, explore a village hidden deep in the jungle and connect with the inhabitants of the lush landscape through up-close animal interactions, multi-storey family play areas, rides and live entertainment. The 3-storey family climbing area allows visitors to ascend through the tree canopy on rope bridges to explore the different layers of jungle life, and a children’s water-play area allows even the youngest explorers to interact with the environment. Next door at Timbuktu, guests will find rides specifically suited for smaller children.
Guests with younger children can now discover unique animals indigenous to the Land Down Under at Walkabout Way, an immersive new animal attraction that opened in 2010. Whilst the older kids (ages 5 and older) can hand feed kangaroos and free-roaming wallabies, little ones can laugh along with a kookaburra and meet other Australian animals.
There’s also an excellent train system which means you can get to the other side of the park whilst taking in some breathtaking aerial views at the same time. This is great especially when there are some tired legs in the camp (not necessarily just the kids’!) One good strategy is to take the Serengeti Express to the other side of the park and work your way back.
Best rides for young kids at Busch Gardens Tampa Bay
Look out for the ‘KIDsiderate’ signs dotted around Busch Gardens and on maps, these provide an ‘at-a-glance’ look run down of kid-friendly rides. Bear in mind, however, that the signs signify rides that are suitable for under nines, so this doesn’t necessarily mean they are suitable for babies and very small children. As mentioned, the Serengeti Express train is a great attraction for small children, because it is gentle but exhilarating. Here are some other great places to explore with the little ones:
Jungala
Have you ever been close enough to a Bengal tiger to feel the hair on the back of your neck rise? Or ridden a zip-line through a rainforest? Or looked an orangutan in the eye from a jungle outpost? Set in the lush Congo area, Jungala is four acres of fun filled with up-close animal interactions, a three-storey maze of rope bridges and nets for older kids to climb, two signature rides and live entertainment.
Edge of Africa
Embark on a walking safari through Edge of Africa and encounter exotic African animals in naturalistic habitats, including hippos, lions, hyenas, lemurs, meerkats, crocodiles and lappet-faced vultures.
Set your own pace as you explore this attraction themed around an abandoned African fishing village.
Myombe Reserve
Enter a lush forest habitat where gorillas and chimpanzees can be found enjoying life to the fullest as they live and play in a natural environment. Peer through the mists and fog of Myombe’s Great Ape Domain for a close-up look into the world of fascinating and majestic animals that most people see only in books and documentaries, and feel your world get at once larger and smaller.
Lory Landing
This interactive, free-flight habitat is home to some of the most brilliantly coloured birds you’ll meet. Step inside with a cup of fruit fresh nectar from our stand and you’ll have an instant arm-load of some newfound feathered friends. Your toddler will be delighted. Lorikeets are the first to greet you, while hornbills, pheasants and other members of the avian community roam through Lory Landing’s free-flight and observational environments, warmly welcoming you into their delightful world.
Serengeti Plain
Observe hundreds of exotic animals from a variety of perspectives. Enjoy a passing scene from the Serengeti Express Railway. Take a truck tour of the plains on a Serengeti Safari. Or go exploring along scenic walkways that feature rolling landscapes, high-ground vistas and lush vegetation all reflecting the natural beauty of the wide open African wilderness. This attraction is only available for ages 5 and older.
