Where are there dinosaurs near Orlando? In Dinosaur World, of course.
At Dinosaur World, outside the gate and everywhere inside, there are dinosaurs. Everywhere. Many!
Is someone in your family a dinosaur nut?
Well, then you won’t want to miss trekking out to, and through, the Dinosaur World, just off the I-4, about 66 miles west of downtown Orlando Florida.
If the I-4 expressway is actually “expressing” on the day you go, you can get to see dinosaurs near Orlando in about an hour from right downtown. If you are staying near Kissimmee it will be a faster drive, and correspondingly longer if you are staying in the east, south or north of the Orlando area.
Dinosaur World is part museum, part theme park, all entertainment and good value for the dinosaur enthusiasts in your family.
After you check in and get your wrist bands – and a after a visit to the washrooms which are clean, large, well lighted and well decorated – you may want to take let the kids blow off some steam before plunging on and into the park and the dinosaur jungle.
Dinosaur World Playgrounds
One of the first things you will come to inside Dinosaur World are playgrounds for children. Two of them. One for really young kids, and one for the older group.
If you are inclined to include a picnic lunch to enjoy with the dinosaurs near Orlando, Dinosaur World has lots of picnic benches under cover near the playgrounds so parents can be sheltered from the hot Florida sun, or the occasional downpour.
Fossil Digs
The fossil digs are where children can sift sand and find their own real fossils. The fossils are imported from Brazil and Morocco and are sprinkled liberally throughout the “dig”. Each child is allowed to keep some of the fossils that they find, and all children find lots.
What will they find? Maybe some sharks teeth? Maybe some amber? Real fossils, all.
Inside the “dig” area the ground is raised enough so that the smaller children too can reach in and find their own fossils. A nice touch!
The fossil dig is a scheduled event, happening at regular intervals during the day. When you check in to see the dinosaurs near Orlando, you will be provided with a schedule of the fossil digs that day. You have to have the child back from the prehistoric jungle to the fossil dig area on time to enable them to take part.
Prehistoric Jungle at Dinosaur World
The designers and builders and landscapers have done a wonderful job in re-creating what a historic, dinosaur infested, prehistoric jungle might have looked like.
Well marked pathways and boardwalks invite you further and further into the “jungle”. Everywhere you look there are dinosaurs, some clearly in the fight of their lives just to survive. Others are nestled under trees, or towering as high as the palms. There are dinosaurs in the water too.
Here are a few of the many dinosaurs we saw. You will see many, many more dinosaurs when you visit.
An education too?
Dinosaur World can give the children and the parents a bit of an education about dinosaurs.
As you trek past each dinosaur grouping or herd on the pathway, somewhere near there will be a sign identifying the beasts and providing information about that dinosaur. Maybe get the kids to read it out loud for the parents?
Also on the grounds is an actual museum of dinosaur artifacts, and a diorama – part of which is shown in the first photo on this page – complete with sound effects and moving dinosaurs. That’s very well done and very entertaining.
How much time is needed?
For purposes of creating this page we did a whirlwind tour of the park. You wouldn’t want to hurry like we did.
Making enough time for playing, fossil digging, uncovering the old dinosaur bones, comfort stops, maybe a snack on the picnic tables, more playing in the playgrounds, we would be surprised if you could enjoy the park completely in two hours, and we suspect that you could easily spend three-four hours to enjoy it thoroughly.
Dinosaur World Amenities
- We already mentioned the large, clean, brightly lit and painted washrooms.
- There are lots of areas that are set up for photo shoots with the kids.
- Picnic areas are found near the start of and about midway in the grounds themselves.
- Wheelchairs can be rented if desired.
- While it is typical for Orlando area attractions to have a gift or souvenir shop, and Dinosaur World does as well, the variety of dinosaur related goods is very good, and you can find a dinosaur trinket for almost any budget group in the bright, sparkling clean store.
What we would add or do.
If this were our park, there would be a few things that we would change or upgrade.
- We wouldn’t close more than one venue in the park for upgrade at one time. There were 2-3 displays closed for upgrade while we were there, and that’s too many to be closed at one time as far as we are concerned.
- Being close to I-4 is convenient for ON/OFF access to the interstate. The downside of this is that there is traffic noise all the time throughout the jungle. It jars the senses a bit, and makes it – for us – a mood breaker when enjoying the marvelous dinosaur displays in the park. We would put speakers throughout the park and have jungle sounds playing. We so liked the soundtrack of the storm in the museum, we would use that track and some jungle animal sounds and have that running throughout the park all the time to help mute the traffic noise and enhance the experience for all.
- For an adult, the museum is wonderful. For a child, the first few rows would, we feel, tend to become tedious. We would have something moving or speaking in each aisle in the museum to help younger visitors enjoy the experience, as we expect all will when they reach the diorama at the end.
- If we could add just a bit more in the way of movement in the jungle, we would. Maybe have a fountain pouring water over the water dinosaurs. Maybe one or two of the monster dinosaurs could, every 2-3 minutes, move their head and neck (way above where persons might be affected), and, as mentioned, sound would add a wonderful element, in our opinion.
More information about Dinosaur World?
It turns out that there is more than one Dinosaur World in the U.S. For information about all of them, please visit: http://www.dinosaurworld.com/