Our pick of best new theme park rides & attractions coming this year from Harry Potter land to world-first rollercoaster
THRILLS and spills, magic and marvels are coming fast and furious at theme parks this year.
Harry Potter weaves his wizardry in a new park and Peter Pan dazzles in the sky.
There’s a world-first rollercoaster, a towering shot ride, sensational shows, fabulous festivals and much more.
Trisha Harbord brings you what’s new for 2025 in favourite parks at home and abroad.
PROMISES TO BE EPIC
EXCITEMENT is off the scale in Orlando as Universal’s new Epic park opens on May 22 with five lands.
Harry Potter fans will be in their element.
Epic Universe includes more Wizarding World wonders – a thrilling hi-tech ride called Battle Of The Ministry and a spectacular live Cirque du Soleil-style show.
Epic also has an adrenaline-rush, dual-launch coaster. Stardust Racers is 133ft high, has a 5,000ft-long track and hits speeds of 62mph.
How To Train Your Dragon – Isle of Berk is a more family-friendly 45mph coaster and Super Nintendo World sees characters help bring the Mario Kart video games to life.
Epic Universe will be the third theme park for Universal, and features three new hotels including one at the very heart of the new park.
GO: Seven nights room-only at the Universal Terra Luna Resort, including Gatwick flights in September, costs from £929pp. Tickets for three Universal parks from £449pp. See britishairways.com/orlando.
TAKE A SKY-HIGH SPIN
A NEW thrilling world-first ride opened yesterday at Alton Towers in Staffordshire.
Toxicator is the only top spin ride to be elevated above ground level, standing 78ft high on a 16ft platform, allowing visitors below to watch the screaming riders.
Visitors who love an adrenaline rush sit back-to-back with their legs suspended below the seats.
Then centrifugal forces and spin patterns begin above a bubbling pool of “toxic alien acid” with green-lit fountains.
You’ll find Toxicator, which accommodates more than 500 people an hour, among other heart-stopping rides in Forbidden Valley.
Alton Towers has also launched a behind-the-scenes VIP experience to get up close to the Nemesis Reborn rollercoaster, with access to the control cabin. Costs £90.
GO: Tickets from £29, free park entry for kids under 90cm. B&B at the Alton Towers Hotel for a family of four on April 2, tickets and nine-hole golf from £299. See altontowers.com.
SNOUT WITH THE SPOOKS
IT’S about to get spooky at the home of Peppa Pig.
Paulton’s Park in Hampshire is opening Dr Kinley’s haunted house, with chills, thrills and supernatural surprises.
After entering Ghostly Manor, families will board a ride to travel through twisting, turning chambers where mysterious artefacts spring into life and spirits lurk around every corner.
There’s also interactive gameplay to help Dr Kinley track down ghosts.
The manor opens on May 17 and there’s a chance to win free tickets in a ghost-catching game on its website.
Paulton’s has more than 80 rides and attractions in five themed areas including the first Peppa Pig World.
Peppa and her pals will be roaming the park for meet-and-greets during the Easter holidays.
GO: Tickets from £45 per person, free for kids under one metre. Easter breaks for a family of four including one night’s B&B and two-day tickets from £320. See paultonspark.co.uk.
ROCK AROUND THE BLOCK
GET the kids building and rockin’ at LEGOLAND Windsor’s first festival.
Five immersive zones – music, creativity, dance, gaming and chillout – are designed to help children enjoy playing in different ways.
They can make a “play pact” by visiting all of the zones and promising to build more, laugh louder, explore endlessly and always keep playing.
For every pact made, LEGO will arrange for less-fortunate children to visit the park.
The festival runs on selected dates from May 3 to June 8, but before then, there’s an Easter extravaganza from April 5 to 21, with a parade, egg hunts and build challenges.
LEGOLAND has more than 30 rides and attractions including the Minifigure Speedway coaster and the newly reopened underwater adventure, to see sharks, stingrays and hundreds of fabulous fish.
GO: Tickets from £37 per person. Kids under 90cm go free. B&B and ticket from £115pp. See legoland.co.uk.
STAND ON PARADE
SHOW-stopping Disney has new attractions in Orlando and Paris.
Disney Starlight: Dream the Night Away, a dazzling night-time parade featuring characters including Peter Pan and Frozen’s Anna and Elsa, opens in summer at Orlando’s Magic Kingdom.
Sister park Animal Kingdom debuts a 4D production, Zootopia: Better Zoogether!, a wild story based on the hit Disney movie.
Disneyland Paris is holding its first music festival with concerts and shows across the park from April 19 to September 7.
It has also launched the thrilling night-time show Disney Tales Of Magic, with lights, lasers, and drones creating 3D figures above Sleeping Beauty Castle.
GO: Four-night hotel and ticket package from July 23 for a family of four costs from £1,965. See disneylandparis.com.
Return car ferry from Dover to Calais from £150. See poferries.com. For Orlando packages, see virginatlantic.com/holidays.
WE HAVE BLAST OFF
SHOOT 200ft into the Blackpool sky on a stomach-churning new shot tower ride at the Pleasure Beach Resort.
Launch Pad replaces old favourite Ice Blast. But thanks to a complete overhaul, the space-themed ride has greater force and acceleration.
Eighteen riders at a time, strapped inside the blue and red tower, will be thrust at 80mph to a height of 20 storeys, before plunging to the bottom in just two seconds.
The park’s Karl Murphy said: “Riders will feel a huge difference, shooting up with more power than ever before.”
The ride, opening this spring, will add to thrill rides including the hypercoaster Big One, where your carriage careers down a 235ft drop.
GO: Adult ticket from £34, child £29. Book a night’s stay at the park’s Big Blue Hotel, with rooms costing from £75 and all occupants get free park tickets. See pleasurebeachresort.com.
CHARIOTS ON FIRE
CHOOSE a chariot and hit the racing track at Parc Asterix .
The French favourite, based on the Asterix comic book series, is launching Cetautomatix, a spinning rollercoaster in May.
Cetautomatix is named after the books’ famous Gaulish village blacksmith, who has designed the rocket-powered chariots.
Riders will sit face-to-face on the elevated wagons as they spin and race on the test track’s tight bends and steep inclines.
The park, 20 miles north of Paris in Plailly, opens for the season on April 5.
It has 50 attractions and shows, including a new Gaul musical, staged in six worlds and three hotels.
GO: Tickets from £43. Two nights B&B at Hotel Les Trois Hiboux and two-day tickets for two adults and two children under 12 from May 19, costs from £460. See parcasterix.fr.
LeShuttle from Folkestone to Calais, for a car and up to nine passengers, costs from £200 return. See leshuttle.com.
FAIRYTALE WINS HANS DOWN
THERE’S more wonder at Efteling, the largest theme park in the Netherlands, when it opens a new attraction in the Fairytale Forest this spring.
The Princess and the Pea, based on the Hans Christian Andersen story with a message “not to judge people on their appearance”, is the park’s 31st fairytale.
It’s housed in a pavilion, with the new luxury Grand Hotel – Efteling’s first hotel in the park’s grounds – as a backdrop. The hotel opens on August 1.
In contrast, Danse Macabre – an extraordinary haunted dark ride inspired by the tale of dancing with death – has also just opened.
Efteling is an hour south of Amsterdam and public transfers are available.
GO: Tickets £46, under-fours go free. Two nights at Efteling Bosrijk for a family of four from April 1, including three-day park tickets, costs from £715. See efteling.com.