Review : Wake the Tiger – Bristol

If you are looking for something completely different to do with the family, then I highly recommend a visit to Wake the Tiger in Bristol.

This is the first “amazement park” in the UK, has nothing at all to do with tigers. The best way of trying to describe this attraction is it’s a multi-layered journey (a clever mix between a maze and an escape room) with some of the best visual effects that you will encounter at an attraction anywhere in the country.

Wake the Tiger is located in an old warehouse on a Bristol industrial estate, next to a concrete factory and what lies inside certainly belies its exterior.

An advertisement hoarding promoting a new housing development on the exterior of the building and a strange sunken car in the car park is the only reference you have of what you can expect before you step inside.

The Wake the Tiger Experience

You enter the building which is staged as a marketing suite for show apartments at a fictious housing development called Meridia Luxury Homes, but this was far from an ordinary housing development.

After an introduction from the Meridia Luxury Homes sales staff, we walked through the development site and things started going wrong which is all part of this adventure.
We were led into a room, housing a secret portal which took us on our journey into another world – the magical and mythical world of Meridia.

The first area you walk into is the Dream Factory and we were instantly immersed into the storyline – the theming and attention to detail here is spectacular, it’s like walking around a film set and had a Harry Potter vibe.

The storyline goes that this area used to be home to alchemists, scientists and guilds that were experimenting with ways to find solutions for the world crisis.

I could have spent all day in just this area alone, it’s so well designed, from the detail of the storefronts to the subtle hidden clues dotted around that gives a sense of the story you embark on as you step through the ‘sorting office’ door.

Although you loosely follow a story within the attraction, there is no set path, so each experience is unique – we found secret pathways and doorways through metal filing cabinets and bookcases. It really is a magical place to experience – we felt like we were in an alternate universe.

Inside we encountered a world of glowing psilocybin mushrooms, biospheres, transportation rooms, ice caves, psychedelic forests, temples and more.

With so many photo opportunities here for the girls it was a dream location for their TikTok and Instagram accounts.

There are 27 different rooms to explore in this interactive self-guided attraction and because of its maze like experience lots of people miss out on seeing everything and its easily done as we nearly did the same.

It’s not just gorgeous to look at, in nearly every section there were interactive elements so it was really engaging for both kids and adults with lots of mini puzzles to complete.

I loved the fact that there are so many hidden things to find so investigate everything – there are switches to press, books to open, secret doors to find but that’s all I will share as I don’t want to give too much away, because not knowing what’s next is what makes this place so engaging.

The experience ends in the temple with some really impressive visuals, and you get a chance to enrol into a guild, representing Earth, Air, Water and Fire.

You are given the opportunity at the end of your adventure to re-enter the world of Meridia which we did to ensure that we didn’t miss anything and as each journey being different depending on the path you take, we found new secret rooms that we missed on our first journey.

After two trips around Merida which took us around 2 hours to complete, we exited into the Guildhall Café for drinks and snacks. This is just as quirky as the main attraction, with giant balloons and a little train travelling running around the ceiling and serves really nice hot drinks and fresh cakes too!

Overall

We were looking for something fun and different for the girls to do during the summer holidays and this fitted the bill perfectly as it’s been high on our to-do list since it opened last year.

This is a brilliant and immersive experience in Bristol, an interactive playground that all the family will enjoy. Wake the Tiger certainly lives up to its title as an ‘Amazement Park’ we had such a great time here, the attention to detail was astonishing and would highly recommend.

Cost and Booking

Tickets are £19.50 for adults and £13.50 for children (5-12) so at £72.00 for a family of four it is a little expensive for a 1-2 hour visit but it was really good fun. You can book tickets here.

Location

Wake the Tiger is located at 127 Albert Road, Bristol, BS2 0YA a 15 minute drive from city centre with a small on-site car park but there was plenty of free spaces when we arrived in the morning, although when we left just after midday there were limited spaces left. Parking is free for up to 3 hours.