The Revo-rama checks out Efteling’s Symbolica attraction and the Loonsche Land village! (video)

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1 minute to discover #Efteling and its innovations: the #Symbolica attraction and #LoonscheLand village? It’s possible with The Revo-Rama minute! (????) @Efteling pic.twitter.com/ADAqZ1Yyh3

— Le Revo-Rama (@LeRevoRama) 29 novembre 2017

With the family to celebrate Efteling’s 65th anniversary.

A year ago we discovered the Dutch theme park, Efteling and it was an immediate favorite.

We were delighted to come back this summer for the opening of the Symbolica attraction. This time we came for a weekend to make the most of the summer nights, and we stayed at the new holiday village: Loonsche Land.

We were pleasantly surprised to see some 65th anniversary decorations and a special exhibition showing some of the park’s treasures. But it was quite discrete, unlike some other destinations that make a lot of this type of celebration.

In this special episode of the Revo-Rama, you can see the most beautiful images of our stay in the park, which is definitely up there with the best parks in Europe.

Revorama-Efteling-65-Symbolica-LoonscheLand-Droomvlucht-VillaVolta-2017

Leopoldine, Aliénor and Efteling’s Symbolica Palace

Symbolica – The attraction (with a nod to the Polles Keuken pancake restaurant)

Efteling by night – Aquanura

Village Loonsche Land – “Our house”

65 years of Efteling in one exhibition (interactive map)

65 years of Efteling in one exhibition (Villa Volta)

Symbolica. Not just a standard attraction for Efteling.

One might think that Symbolica would simply be an additional attraction. But in fact, it is first and foremost a palace sitting in the center of the park, at the end of “Pardoes Promenade”.

It also provides an area for the park mascots, Pardoes and Pardijn who now have the Promenade, the Polles Keuken restaurant, the palace and its attraction. The only thing needed to complete the scene would be a show with 3D mapping.

The characters can often be seen out and about, greeting the visitors and the beautiful Symbolica music is everywhere. It was composed by René Merkelbach who works regularly on Efteling productions (and I’m not surprised to see the name of the group Within Temptation on his Wikipedia page).

It’s a whole experience for the visitors, and the attraction is interactive: firstly with coded messages in the waiting line, and then with the Fantasy ships.

For 35 million Euros (as opposed to 150 million for Ratatouille: The Adventure at Disneyland Paris, it would make you dizzy) Efteling has created a jewel that provides some lessons and good practices: first of all the adventure is interactive, and changes with its three different routes, but also children are invited to sit IN FRONT of the vehicles and the back row is raised. We’ve been asking for this for so long because on some two-row attractions, children can’t see anything when they’re at the back. Which goes to show that the designers don’t put themselves in the kids’ shoes.

Of course we can still hope for some improvements, such as the possibility of hearing Pardoes’ explanations in French by choosing the language on the screen, but that’s maybe just us being a bit chauvinistic. We would also like to see more products in the shop which was too small, the story book in French or at least in English, as well as the CD of the soundtrack.

All there is to know about Symbolica in this video episode of Revo-Rama!

The Kid’s Box (child menu with Symbolica gift and guide to decipher the messages hidden in the queue)

The Symbolica Palace

Efteling by night – Symbolica

Efteling by night – Symbolica bird’s eye view from the Pagoda!

Symbolica – The Pre-show

Symbolica – The attraction (explanations)

Symbolica – The attraction (the different pathways)

Symbolica – The interactive attraction

Symbolica – The attraction

Symbolica – The shop and the book … in Dutch

Loonsche Land. The new holiday village taking you back to nature.

In the same spirit as the Village Bosrijk where we stayed last summer, Loosche Land Village includes a main building as well as many different types of houses.

This time it is the association with nature that is at the forefront. Fruit in the restaurant, walks and activities in the surrounding forest. We had a great time.

To be honest, as we love hotels that extend the park experience, we would probably prefer the Efteling Hotel. Having said that, for a stay of several days, with visits to the park and other activities, if you love nature, it’s great, especially as the house and in particular the kitchen, are really well equipped.

It all depends on the type of stay and change of scenery that you’re looking for.

Leopoldine and Aliénor guide you through Loonsche Land Village in this video episode of Revo-Rama!

On the way to Loonsche Land Village from Efteling Park!

Village Loonsche Land – The hotel, the restaurant and the reception

Village Loonsche Land – Several types of houses

Village Loonsche Land – Fruit breakfast

We’re looking forward to coming back to experience Winter Efteling, but in the meantime let’s check out the St. Nicholas Square and Aquanura!

We still have to try out the Efteling Hotel and Winter Efteling (and any upcoming innovations) when we come back for the end of year celebrations. We’re looking forward to that.

But this visit would not have been complete without the many attractions we saw, especially in Saint Nicholas Square. It houses our favorite attraction Villa Volta, but also the Raveleijn show, and the magical Droomvlucht ride that we had surprisingly (and unjustly) missed last year.

There is no show on Villa Volta at this time of the year, but you can check out the park at night with things to see everywhere and lovely lighting, and especially Aquanura the fountain show played to two different symphonies. It’s missing a bit of a real story line (like Disney Dreams) but is still very enjoyable to watch and a great way to end the day (or not there are several performances which is another great way to avoid frustrating spectators).

Our embedded images of Efteling and Aquanura attractions in this Revo-Rama!

Efteling by night – Aquanura

St Nicolaasplaets – Droomvlucht!

St Nicolaasplaets – Villa Volta!

To sum up, another excellent stay at Efteling. We were afraid we might be unimpressed after returning from Florida and the 9 parks we visited there, but it wasn’t the case. Why? Because Efteling has pulled out the stops with Symbolica and also has its own special charm and identity.

We hope that Efteling will continue to grow. We noticed that some of the texts and signs were in French, which is an important step forward and an indication that they wish to become more international (in addition to the generally perfect English of the staff). It might also be good to see alternative English names for certain areas or attractions whose names are very difficult for us to pronounce. There are also Efteling productions such as TV series that should be subtitled in French, on DVDs if it’s not possible to get them on French language channels, be they Belgian or French. We’re thinking of Pardoes and Raveleijn in particular. Only the “Sprookjesboom” (The Tree of Tales) is broadcast on French language TV in Belgium. We would also like to find official transcripts of the dialogues in the attractions, why not on a new souvenir DVD or on Youtube.

In other words the park is great and it will probably continue to develop, but these efforts would allow non Dutch speaking visitors to enjoy this magical world even better, and to spread the word to so many people who have never heard of the park in France (except those lucky people who read our blog and watch our videos). Go and see for yourselves, you’ll love Pardoes and Pardjin, who we’re hoping to see again soon.

All our tips and our full video review in this episode of Revo-Rama