Day Out with Thomas

My almost 2 1/2 year old son simply adores Thomas the Train.  When I heard about Day Out with Thomas and that it was coming to our neck of the woods, I knew we had to go!  The event was about 45 minutes away in Parrish, Florida at the Florida Railroad Museum.  Tickets were $19/person (for ages 2 and up) and parking was free.

Entrance to Day Out with Thomas

There were several different times you could reserve to ride Thomas.  We booked a few days ahead and tried to book for Saturday, March 14, but most of the times had limited availability.  The website said that there were limited seats available at the event, but we didn't want to chance it.  We decided to book ahead for Sunday and were able to get the time we wanted.  They advised getting to the event an hour ahead of your scheduled time.

Thomas the Train

The event had several tents set up with a rather large gift shop, several food vendors (hot dogs, hamburgers, chicken fingers, etc), an Imagination Station, Temporary Tattoo station, area to take your picture with Sir Topham Hatt, a small train ride (in addition to riding the real train), a bounce house and slide.  There was stroller parking by the big train ride.

Imagination Station

The train ride had a few open gondolas at the front and one at the back with enclosed cars in the middle.  We weren't in line early enough for the front cars near Thomas, but did sit in the back open car.  If you want to sit in one of the open cars near the front, I suggest lining up early.  I'd also suggest trying to take a picture with the front of the train early if you can as the lines were quite long after our train ride and we missed getting "the money shot".  The train ride itself was nice.  We passed a few farms and saw some cows which my son enjoyed.  In all I'd say the day was worth it, as my son seemed to really enjoy himself.