Lightopia At Heaton Park, Manchester Review
THIS EXPERIENCE WAS GIFTED TO THE REVIEWER FOR THE PURPOSES OF WRITING THE REVIEW.
Reviewed by Lucy Gwilliam
I love Christmas and everything about the lead up to Christmas. The whole Christmas experience is my favourite time of year and I love to cram in as many pantos, Santa visits and light trails as I can each Christmas to make it as magical as possible. One light trail that I had yet to experience however, was Lightopia at Heaton Park, Manchester. We had originally booked it in November 2020 but that evidently turned into a month long lockdown and the experience was cancelled. I was therefore made up to be invited to review the official launch of Lightopia with my family last night. It is the one light show that I have been eager to visit for some time.
We set off for the event in good time, aiming to arrive for around 6pm. The carpark for the event was signposted clearly and easy to navigate to. Parking is £5 and can be booked on the website when you buy your tickets. The carpark attendants will scan the code on entrance and the carpark is literally next to the entrance to the light show. There are other payable car parks but these are a bit of a walk so it’s worth booking the parking with your tickets. We have disabled badges for our children and found there was amble amount of disabled spaces and the staff quickly showed us where to go to park.
Once inside the park, it is easily to follow the one way system around the large paths and take in the spectacular light show. What I really liked was that there were rides spread out evenly and carefully placed into the light show. This is something that I’ve not experienced in a light show before. We did have a go on the big wheel, something which the children really enjoyed. This was priced at £4 per person. There are smaller rides for the little ones and then thrill seeking larger rides for teens and adult. We didn’t go on any of the other rides but we did let the children have a go of one of the shooting games where you can win a prize. This cost £5 for 10 corks, which you load into the gun and you shoot the sweets on the back wall. What you knock off you win. My children hit sweets a few times and they did not budge, this led me to believe they were glued down. This was quite disappointing but my son was happy enough just getting to shoot the gun.
The light display was very beautiful with different mythical and actual animals displayed throughout the trail along with stunning flowers and a wonderful water display on the boating lake. It was truly the magical experience I was expecting and really got me in the Christmas spirit. So much so that I’ve been and bought my Christmas decorations today.
Throughout the park there were a variety of different food and drink stalls for you to purchase snacks and drinks such as Baileys hot chocolates. We didn’t purchase any food at these, but we did have a hot chocolate each and the adults had Baileys in ours.
I really liked the layout of the trail as it didn’t get too busy in certain areas like I’ve found at other light trails. It has been very well planned out to ensure that there is a natural flow to the movement of people. It works very well.
Rating: Overall, we had such an amazing experience. My children had a lovely experience and told me how much they enjoyed it. I would rate it 5/5.
Tickets for Lightopia start at £14.50 for a child and £22.50 for an adult. Family tickets for 2 adults and 2 children cost £69. Parking costs £5.
Lightopia is running from 24th November 2022-2nd January 2023