We had tickets for the Nickelodeon Universe and DreamWorks water park theme parks. Both of these are located directly in the mall, which is so cool, literally. Well, the Nickelodeon Park was cool - the DreamWorks Park was a comfortable 81 degrees since you were out of the water walking around from slide to slide and pool to pool. We spent one afternoon walking around the whole mall getting to know the setup and seeing what stores and attractions are there.
It's home to the first Toys 'R Us store since they closed, which has a slide that you can take to get from the second floor down to the first floor. Adults can go down the slide and have fun just like the kids! They also have a store called It's SUGAR which has three floors of any candy you can think of, even a whole kosher candy section. On the top floor, there is also the OREO cafe where you can order OREO-based desserts.
You want to be sure to set aside at least a day for each theme park as there are a lot of attractions to check out. Some of the rides that we liked were the Dora Sky Pass and the Adventure Bay Paw Patrol experience. The Sky Pass was like a people mover experience that is nice and slow that will show a sky-high view of the indoor theme park.
The kids also enjoyed meeting their favorite characters as there were meet and greets on the half-hour where you got to meet the characters and take pictures with them. It was great to meet the pups from Paw Patrol, SpongeBob, Dora and others!
The kids really enjoyed going on the Legends of the Hidden Temple Ropes Course challenge and even ventured up the 9 level ropes course, which had us a little squeamish from the ground - ah, to be young again!
The other fun rides that the kids liked were more like roller coasters but those aren't much my speed. We enjoyed going on Dora's Sky Railway which gave scenic views of the park from tracks that are above the attractions!
The water park opens at 10 am and there is a line that forms starting at 9:30 and if you're lucky they will let folks start going down to start registering at 9:45. We arrived at 9:45 and promptly went down to check in. Check-in was easy and we walked in and waited for the park to open.
It was a steamy 81 degrees inside, and we quickly found chairs to put our items down on. There were lots of places to relax and enjoy the water! Every so often, they would have some of the Nickelodeon characters appear and you could take photos with them! The kids were so excited to go swimming and enjoy the water slides that they only were able to take a few photos with their TV favorites.
We enjoyed taking in the entire experience from one of the private Skybox suites and had a nice place to go to so we could relax on a comfortable sofa, watch TV and had exclusive access to a VIP hot tub. If we were hungry, they had food delivery and pickup, complimentary Coca-Cola and snacks. They also gave two beach towels so we could dry off.
We look forward to visiting American Dream in years to come any time we go through NYC and nearby New Jersey!
NOTE: We were provided with complimentary passes to Nickelodeon Universe, DreamWorks Water Park and other attractions at American Dream. No other compensation was provided, and all opinions are our own.
