While we were down south, we thought we’d visit Funland Hayling Island to see what this park had to offer, and to meet up with some friends for a day out.
First thing to note is this isn’t an all day park. You can spend a lot of time here, but to ride each ride once would only take an hour or two, but when we went, there were two rollercoasters and plenty of flat rides to make it worth the trip!
Parking was easy enough, with there being two seafront car parks right next to Funland, with one offering a free cup of tea with your ticket and the other offered a few tokens for the rides.
Park entry is free but each ride has a token value but wristbands are an option. As we’d visited with a couple of friends, we opted for tokens and split the cost between us. We spent £40 on 72 tokens, which was ample for everything we wanted to do.
As for the park itself, it’s your standard seafront attraction, but does feel quite run down in places. There isn’t much theming around the place, and what theming there is could use some maintenance and a spruce up.
Some of the rides have themes attached and it just feels a little out of place, such as the Flying Elephants ride, where others loosely fit together such as Spinosaurus, Dino Falls and Jurassic Safari. Not overly themed by all means, but grouped together with small elements here and there. It wouldn’t take away from the experience if all theming was removed, but it doesn’t really add much either.
Interestingly, the aforementioned Flying Elephants was once at home in Liseberg in Sweden, which will probably explain the theming. Dragon’s Breath and the Carousel were also at Liseberg until moving to the park. I like seeing bigger parks attractions moved to smaller parks as they’ll make good use of them rather than scrapping them altogether!
The parks biggest attraction is Runaway Mine Train, an L & T systems Wild Mouse that once stood at Gulliver’s World. Not much to say really, it’s in a very similar vein to Rattlesnake at Chessington, but without the theming and I don’t feel is quite as good to ride.
The other rollercoaster is Spinosaurus, an EOS spinning coaster relocated from Gulliver’s Land this time. Of the two coasters here, this one is slightly more memorable for its name alone as its quite clever, being both the name of a dinosaur and an indication of what the ride does. Fairly standard ride, not very fast or too spinny, but still fun nonetheless!
Other notable attractions include Soarin’ Seagulls, a Zamperla Magic Bikes ride, Extreme, a standard Miami ride and The Flume of Doom, which is a log flume. The Flume wasn’t operating when we were there but it does look to be uniquely themed to a dangerous radioactive waste site.
Other than the bigger rides, there are a few smaller rides and attractions, as well as an arcade with penny pushers and fruit machines. There does seem to be a fair few food outlets too but when we went, most of them were closed as it was slightly out of season.
Overall I personally enjoyed Funland, but I won’t head back there all too often. I think I prefer Clarence Pier of the two as its ride selection and overall aesthetic are a bit nicer, but I can still recommend Funland, but only for a visit every year or so!
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