Dream World - Bangkok

Welcome to Dream World

The lake with cable car hanging across

The ticketing office

On the 2nd day of our holiday to Bangkok recently, we went to Dream World. One among few famous amusement park in Thailand. We bought our tickets online from Hotel2Thailand which included the return shuttle (we found out that the place was quite difficult to reach using BTS or public transportation), entrance continuing ticket (all ride excludes the snow world) and all-you-can-eat luncheon. You could buy the ticket on the spot and there were non-continuing ticket as well (means you only buy the entrance ticket but you have to purchase another ticket for the rides inside the park). If you are going to try all of the rides, then continuing ticket is the most economic one. However, if you are bringing kids under 110cm, probably it would be best to buy ticket per ride (since some of the rides require the minimum height).

Sky coaster

Bumper boat

 

According to our voucher, we would be picked up at the hotel by 8.30am however the shuttle was late for almost an hour. I didn't know whether the delay happened due to the morning traffic (beats Jkt's traffic as well LOL) or because the other group wasn't ready during the pick-up time (there were a family of 4 from India who stayed at Holiday Inn - a 5mins drive from our hotel). Anyway, we started our trip on 9.15am and after an hour of drive (including a 10mins stop on the side of the road since the van suddenly encountered some mechanical problem), we arrived at the destination. We were told to be at the meeting point at 3.30pm for the shuttle to drive us back to the hotel. With entrance and lunch tickets on hand, we started to explore the park.

The haunted mansion

Rapter...just seeing made me dizzy

Flying carpet

At the very first sight, it reminded me of Shenzhen's Window of the World (while my hubby said - it reminded him of Cikupa World of Wonders which were basically the same). Playful colours on the shop galleries on both sides of the pathway leads us to the main open area with round water fountain in the middle of it. Another step showed a lovely garden with big round lake as the backdrop. Long-neck swans and heart shapes in pink were almost everywhere on the garden, it earns the name of Ŀ♡√Ɛ Garden. Surely it didn't feel strange seeing few couples were taking their pre-wed pics here...made me reminisced the lovey-dovey-moment with my hubby. After posed for the umptenth times, we moved forward to the rides area.

Grand canyon

Antique car

Speedy mouse

Started with bicycle boat on the lake with cute and pretty setting around it, we continued with the cable car. Seeing the whole park from atop sure gave different feeling than simply strolling by. Some areas were fascinating from the above, such as the Jack and Jill's giant which was buried halfbody. Then the fairy tales areas with its cute house. The cable ride itself was quite rough especially when turning around. The same happened when we rode the sightseeing train, mini roller coaster, space mountain ride and monorail too.

Dreamy garden

Topiary

 

For the space mountain ride, that was one scary spontaneous ride. We entered without knowing what kind of ride it was, until the train shot into a dark tunnel n hiked up slowly. Then we realized, this was a bad option. My oldest girl was trembling and looked down...I tried to calm her though I didn't feel calm at all (geez...I am no fan of extreme ride...even carrousel has me dizzy). Then the train lurched down and up, left and right until it was going on a very slope curve (felt like falling loosely). I felt I lost my balance (I felt being turned upside down) and my stomach felt funny then arrghhh...couldn't help myself from screaming. Before I managed to calm myself, the train halted. Even my fingers were still trembling when I was typing this part (we sit outside after the ride coz my girl was terribly terrified). I hate ride like this one ‎​=.=! pheω...‎​⊙﹏⊙ The haunted house was another scary attraction. We went inside...seeing only normal picture frames hang onto the mansion's wall. But when we trully stepped into the main lobby, the light was suddenly went off and my girls screamed. Since I am a sceredy cat, I guessed it would be better for my mental health to call a quit.

Love garden

Super splash

View from cable car

According to my hubby, it was quite scary, especially the mansion was pitch dark with only glow-in-the-dark-footstep guiding him along. Many sudden things were appeared or dropped from the ceiling during the tracing the footstep until he reached the shoulder-to-shoulder-small-alley (it was so spooky since he knew nobody was entering the alley with him yet he bumped with lots of (dead?) bodies. If you like Thai's horror movie then you will definitely love this. The screaming from inside the mansion was aired thru the loud speaker so we (me and the girls) who were waiting outside could hear the non-stop-throat-screaming). Definitely not the best way to spend my afternoon :-)

Inside the giant's castle

The sunflower garden...and those are real

The panorama of giant's house

Next was the 4D show (we loved the day we choose for this trip, a weekday with less queue line). The show was about an assistant to a scientist who broke the lab accidentally. Dangerous chemical mixed into one and turned the experiment animals into monster size ones. It was quite fun, with lots of water spray and fan blowing from the normal position across head and body, but also from the feet. My older girl was quite terrified, surprised to feel something was moving between her feet(geez...she is a lot like me 【ツ】ƗƗє²² ƗƗє²² ƗƗє²²【ツ】 ), she hid her face and rose her feet off the floor for the rest of the show. My youngest one only covered her eyes for several mins when the scary looking insects with huge eyes attacked the assistant. Pretty good and entertaining one.

Toddler' playhouse

Various house on fairy tales garden

 

Closing to 3.30pm, we went directly to the promised meeting point...however...again...the other family was late and had to be summoned using loudspeaker few times ‎​=.=! pheω...‎​⊙﹏⊙ . Geez...at this time I was pretty much ensured that they were the cause of us being picked up late earlier. It really wasted our time since we did have another plan in the afternoon. Anyway, if you are planning to visit the park, please bring your cap/hat, sunblock (though Dream World provides umbrella rental and canopied pathway but it was still sooo HOT), umbrella and raincoat (Thai does have shower occassionally, especially in the morning and dusk). Don't forget clothes for change too, especially if you are planning to ride the Super Splash and Grand
Canyon, both awesome rides that we didn't try it out coz we didn't wanna get wet. If lunch is included within your ticket, you could go to the Pavillion, a place reserved specifically for group. Don't expect a wide range of food like at the stars hotel but the dishes were pretty good. I was impressed seeing how effective and efficiently the waitress working together, cleaning up the table and refilling the dishes before it finished, despite the small number of them catering a large number of starving person.

On the most beautiful spot in dreamy garden

The restaurant

Some of the food

Though on some level, the attractions inside the park weren't as good as the ones that we visited before, but the service inside the park was absolutely top class. The restroom was big, clean with plenty tissue paper and running water. I thought Dream World indeed has earned its reputation of being the top amusement park in Bangkok. So, if you are here, sneak a day for the exhilarating rides.

Play port

Lines of shop

Snack corner

Address: 62 Rangsit - Ongkarak Rd (KM 7), Thanyaburi, Pathumthani 12130

How to get there: Bus no 188 Mochit - Ratchamongkol or Air Condition no 538 Victory Monument - Ratchamongkol or Air Condition no 559 - Suvarnabhumi Airport

One of 7 wonders of the world (in tiny size)

I loved the trashbin

Cute restroom sign

Chocolate Ville - Bangkok

Picturesque isn't it?

The information center

Windmill on the side of the street

From the name, I guessed it had something to do with chocolate, perhaps various choc dishes or even choc factory. However, I was totally wrong. I tried to browse and google bout it but couldn't find any significant info re to it except the facebook account and many pics on Google. It is actually a diner restaurant with a specific setting and theme of American suburb estate in 18th centuries. Its tag line is dining in the park. Curious aren't you?

The park map

Mini front white beach with props

The pier

That's why we went there right after we checked in at the hotel. Apparently, the place is quite new and some hotel staffs haven't heard of it. However, we weren't feeling down...we stopped a taxi and showed the map (which we saved earlier) to the driver. Lucky us, the driver seemed to know the area though not the place. We were stuck for 15mins in traffic due to office hour however traffic on the highway was scarced. It was a long way from our hotel at Chit Lom (Lang Suan) area that it took an hour to reach it. But we arrived at the perfect time when the sun was almost set yet we still had adequate light to take some pics.

Cute rubber duck setting

Romantic place isn't it?

Cycling in front of Sommerset Cottage

We were welcomed by 2storey-size of wooden windmill in front of the parking lot. One white information center and red gas station buildings, again in wood (every building here is wooden) serve as the lobby with mini beach park in between. Totally awesome! We were practically wowed (no jaw dropping though) and quickly reached our gadgets and started to take lots of pics. Too bad we arrived pretty late and the information center was closed just few mins before our arrival. So I didn't get any map nor brochures but I took the map pic inside the park (so you can check it out). There are lots of props on the mini beach, including sundecks, big parasols, even a red fire engine. Pretty tiny fake flowers beautify the red station gas with classic telephone on side. But the front view didn't prepare us for what was inside.

One of many beautiful bridges there

The setting inside the one of the houses

The menu book

At a glimpse, it looked like a place which I often saw on my old newly-invented-colour-tv (about 2-3decades ago). At that time, we didn't have many tv channels so the movie option was limited. One movie that I remembered though was Little Missy, a story about a white-skin-lady who falls in Ŀ♡√Ɛ with one of her black-skin-slave. Nah, Chocolate Ville looked a lot like the setting on that movie...so can you imagine, stepping into a place that transports you into 200years backward? Wonderful :-)

When the lights are on

The lighthouse

Awesome sky when the sunset

We walked up a small pathway leading us to the lake (wondered whether it was natural or human-made lake). Shaded by willowing widow trees, we saw the back of big (house-size) yellow rubber duck on the lake. An eye-catching since the colour around the place is mostly pale shades of pastel. There are small pier, a medium size terrace and beautiful canopied bungalow surround the lake. Some beautiful bridges were connecting one 'island' to another. Down onto our side of pier, a small speadboat and wind-surfing-boat are docking...another perfect place to pose :-) We circled the lake, taking various poses on various spots. There are few houses with lovely cute setting such as the white house, sommerset cottage, lighthouse, florist, bakery, bell house and many more.

Another pretty spot

View from the lighthouse

An hour passed so quickly...we felt tired and hungry and we were directly shown to our outdoor seat by the lake. Few swans were enjoying the sunset, swimming elegantly around the mini water fountain. Scanning the menus, we were confused seeing the number and variety of it...so many to choose, from Italian pasta, western type of fastfood, asian signature dishes and comprehensive selection of Thai culinary. I asked for the recommended ones and with minimum English, the waitress explained and took our order. Cheesy baked potato skin for our appetizer came. It was quite good, with bacon strip sandwiched between the potato skin and mozarella cheese. Too bad, it was quite spicy for my girls with chili powder and chopped spring onion as the topping. Next came my girls's dinner, fish and chips with green salad and coleslaw. The portion was quite big, each fish cutlet was longer than my streching palm. We started to talk bout how different thing was here, compared to Jkt. In Jkt, the picture on menu book is normally bigger than the real dish. However, here, the real dishes didn't compliment what we saw on the menu book. Perhaps, they should put the information about the portion on the menu in English (they probably have it now but since we can't read any curling Thai's language - we didn't know for sure). But nothing surprised us more when me and my hubby's dishes were served. I was definitely jaw-dropped...seeing how huge the size of my pork ribs. Lucky I only ordered for the half portion of 5 pieces of ribs...I wondered what would happen if I were to choose the full portion one (arrgghhh...I don't even want to imagine it). The bbq marinated pork ribs were tasty and I finished it all (just fyi, I am no fan of pork). My hubby ordered german something (the dish's name - we totally forgot) which looked like a fried huge part of a pork's tight (as big as my girl's head - so go ahead and try to picture it out). He was started to think...how many laps he had to swim to burn it off "̮˚°◦♡ώκωķ(∩_∩)◦°˚"̮ . But, he successfully managed to finish the dinner as well...hurray for us ‎​Ħǎː̗(^▽^)ː̖Ħǎː̗(^▽^)ː̖Ħǎ. For beverages, we went for the normal chrysantenum iced tea, iced milo for my girl and iced coffee for my hubby. The total bill for our dinner was about B1500 (they don't put service tax on the bill so we add another 10% on top of it) and it was quite cheap, again if we compared with the same dishes and the same portion in Jkt.

My pork ribs...see the size comparison with my mobile

My husband's meal...scary isn't it?

Baked potato skin

Fish and chips

With full belly, we walked around for a bit, trying to help our body to digest the eaten food. Beautiful sunset sky and the just-turned-on lights created another perfect setting for our pic. Then we climbed our way on the lighthouse. The view from the top was spectacular but definitely not doing anything good on my tummy. I was wondering whether I was afraid of high places...what they call it for? I forgot the bla-bla-phobia term. Anyway, we retraced our way backward, taking another set of pic with nite view. It gave a different vibe between day and nite and I prefered nite better :-) More romantic (swoon). Satisfied ourselves with pic, then we headed to the parking lot trying to figure it out how we were going back. Seemed no problem at all, lots of standby taxi were available. But these taxies didn't go by meter, so if you would like to use it, you would better know the rough distance and fare required (sharpen your bargaining skill first pls). Lucky for us, there was a taxi which dropped its guest and we quickly snatched it up and rode smoothly back to the hotel уααу!└(^o^)┘ \^o^/ └(^o^)┘уααу!

Oh-so-romantic gazebo

 

Spacious restroom

The place is beautiful. The diner was awesomely classy with friendly vibe. Though limited English capability, the waitress was doing their best in servicing us. Reservation during weekend is recommended, especially for dinner but on weekday, walk-in guest is welcomed. I liked their restroom, big spacious toilet cubicles are meticulously clean and smell good too (lemongrass). I recalled most of the restroom in Jkt with only enough space to do the toilet business, and bumped your shoulder or elbow on the partition if you manuver too much. Free un-passworded wifi was available around the place, enabling you to directly upload the pics taken onto your Instagram or FB accounts *grinning* To wrap it out, it was a perfect place for unwind and dine in style.