Easter Fun at Butlin’s Bognor Regis

With Easter almost on us anyone heading to Butlin’s will no doubt have lots of fun in store. I’m actually trying to work my way across all themes/breaks at Butlin’s (other than adult weekends – my daughter would never forgive me if I went without her!). We went to Butlin’s Bognor Regis at Easter 2023 and obviously quite a few things have changed since then, but at the same time, plenty stays the same! I can also now answer these questions: Do you need to buy VIP passes for Butlin’s or can you still get in to see the shows? What’s itlike staying in an apartment at Butlin’s Bognor Regis? What does Butlin’s do at Easter? What’s Butlin’s Bognor Regis like in bad weather? And what happens when your child’s favourite Skyline Gang member is played by an understudy? (Luckily – she didn’t notice!)

Easter activities at Butlin’s

There wasn’t a huge amount of Easter theming at Butlin’s apart from some decorations in the Skyline tent, but there was an Easter trail for children to take part in. You had to find groups of eggs around the skyline tent – large decal stickers on the walls and pillars – and fill in a sheet with how many there were. It was pretty easy but fun for my daughter and niece, and once handed in they were rewarded with a giant chocolate lolly.

Some of our favourite things to do at Butlin’s

The fairground – the indoor tots fairground with four rides to choose from and the outdoor fairground, where my then five-year old daughter was too young to want to go on some of the rides but still found plenty to do, and loved the atmosphere of being at a fairground
The soft play – the soft play is moving to a new indoor location from Easter 2025 with a new area themed around the Skyline Gang, which I am excited for – when we went at Easter 2023 and again in May last year it was still the tall structure inside the Skyline Pavilion. I have to admit I like it being there as my daughter could pop in while we were passing or in between using the tots rides, or while we were waiting for a show to start at the Skyline stage.
Bungee trampolines- you do have to pay (I think it was £5 a go, and they have a new token system now) – it sometimes had quite long queues and we found it quietest when we arrived on site on the first day.
The playgrounds – Billy Bear’s playground by the Shoreline hotel is my daughter’s favourite with its large sandpit, though according to photos I have seen this week, it is currently closed and being redeveloped.
The shows -see below for the ones we saw at Easter 2023.

The Masked Singer

The Masked Singer has been at Butlin’s for a couple of years now but it was new in 2023. It was very similar to the TV show with costumed characters, some of whom were more like background performers, and two who were the main mystery stars. Hosted by Mark Rhodes, who I have to admit I’d never heard of (he’s a singer and TV presenter) there were a panel of judges consisting of Redcoats and two people chosen from the audience. Mark also took guesses as to the identity of the two singers from the audience, and I won’t reveal who they were – though as it was two years ago you can probably find out easily enough by looking online. They ask the audience not to take photos or videos during the show but you can have your photo taken with a couple of the costumed characters (the backing singer/dancer ones, not the celebrities). My daughter loved shouting ‘take it off, take it off’ as the singers were revealed and it was quite fun to hear all the guesses and see who they actually turned out to be! This show was one of our favourites on our break and it’s good all-round family entertainment.

Summer Night City

This is Butlin’s own Abba tribute show, and it was really good fun – a high quality production with great singers and dancers and a must for Abba fans. My daughter loves the songs from Mamma Mia and was dancing right at the front by the stage, though she did have to wear ear defenders!

I’m Every Whitney

A Whitney Houston tribute act who was an absolutely fantastic singer. Unfortunately we didn’t stay for the whole thing as the girls (age 5 and 6) didn’t know any of the songs and were a bit bored. Hopefully I’ll get to see this act again in the next few years!

Skyline Gang In A Frozen Adventure

Nothing to do with Elsa, this show sees the gang head to the coldest part of the planet and meet some new friends including dancing penguins and a friendly yeti, and watch the northern lights. As always the Skyline Gang were a firm favourite of my daughter; the show had some fun songs, lots of funny moments and the animal characters in costume. We waited to the side of the stage to meet the gang as they came out afterwards as well – they will sign autographs and interact with the children which is always a real highlight for my daughter. This time around Misty was played by an understudy; I noticed straight away and was a bit worried what my daughter might say but she didn’t mention it, so either the character is so iconic that it doesn’t matter who is wearing the dungarees and black wig, (and the same goes for the other characters – there’s always at least one different each time we go) or she did notice, but just embraced the moment for what it was.

Skyline Gang on Safari

We’d already seen this show the year before but my daughter still enjoyed it, as she loves everything the Skyline Gang does. Their shows are high energy, fun and effervescent with some catchy songs, and in this case life-size animal characters too. A firm favourite with the kids.

Animal Guyz: Animals vs Dinosaurs

A unique show that is visually stunning. The Animal Guyz aim to educate their audience about animals through facts, humour, and huge animatronic animal puppets and special effects that dominate the stage. They were really impressive and really brought the show to live – the huge dinosaur at the end was especially good. It’s a must for dinosaur fans and also something very different – the Animal Guyz have been back to Butlin’s in subsequent years and in 2025 their show is about mythical beasts rather than dinosaurs, which I’m looking forward to seeing.

Billy and Bonnie Bear in Once Upon a Time

Billy and Bonnie are the Butlin’s mascots and their shows tend to be aimed at younger children; my daughter who was five at the time enjoyed the Once Upon a Time show, which was on the Skyline stage so didn’t need booking in advance. The story is a fairytale mashup featuring characters from several of the famous stories where they are trying to make sure there is a happy ever after.

Accommodation

Comfort apartments – review

This was the first time I had stayed in an apartment though I have been in them before when my sister was staying in one and we had a hotel room. We were in a silver plus apartments (now called Comfort apartments) and overall I was quite pleased.

The apartment area consists of several ‘streets’ and we were on the end of a row about half way down, so it was a little walk if you were coming all the way from the pool (on the far side of the site) but Bognor isn’t actually a particlarly big site (Minehead is larger apparently) and we were quite close to the Skyline pavilion.

We had a living room with sofa and armchair, dining table and chairs and television and small kitchen area; the bathroom was fairly basic but fine (our heated towel rail wasn’t working but we alerted staff and it was replaced with a new one later the same day). There were two bedrooms – a double and twin – and the double is larger, most likely as the expectation is parents will be sharing with children, but my daughter and I had the double room while my sister and her daughter had the twin.