Happy Hollow Park & Zoo
add photosHappy Hollow Park and Zoo has recently re-opened after an extensive $72 million renovation. This is a whimsical wonderland with wonderful playgrounds, rides, petting zoo and a small zoo with a few unusual animals like a foosa.
16 Reviews for Happy Hollow Park & Zoo
1
00 families found this helpful
"Charming, fun and great value for money"
This place is spot on. Animals, rides and space to run around. There is a fresh clean look to the place and all the animals seem happy and healthy and the rides are well maintained. Both my 2 year old and 6 month old love it here. It is incredible value for money, especially if you get a membership which is good for half off at many other places too.
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0 families found this helpful
"Cute, but not the San Diego Zoo"
This was a cute little zoo. I never heard of it the first (and last) time I went, so I was extremely disappointed when the "zoo" turned out basically to be a petting zoo. It was cute for the little ones, but there weren't any zebras, elephants, giraffes, camels, lions, etc. that you would normally expect when you hear the word "Zoo". We picnicked, petted, and left.
0 families found this helpful
"Yes! for locals"
This place is a great place for locals with kids. We are about 45 minutes away, and will definitely make the drive for it. Recently refurbished, it's a great place to spend an afternoon with our 2 and 5 year olds. Kids will love the rides and animals, lots of fun. The price has gone up since refurbishment but it's still worth it. Parties are fun here too, but pricey.
0 families found this helpful
"Great place to spend the day"
On arrival we had to wait for some other friends, the kids had a great time playing on the little animal statues and running around. There were tons of activities for little children as well as over 5 years of age.
Bring a lunch or snacks for the kids, they have plenty of grass and seating areas.
Check the schedule when arriving for what rides are open.
0 families found this helpful
"Newly Re-Done Better than ever!"
Happy Hollow has been re done and is bigger and better than ever. Lots of great reviews and we agree.. LOVE it too...but a few complaints- hope they bring in more animals...we miss the pygmy hippos,snakes,tarantulas etc etc. Happy Hollow is aimed at the very young. Yet,no play stucture for them. Playgrounds are designed for 5-12 and your little pre-schooler will get trampled by the bigger kids. I'd love to see HH add a play structure just for the 1-4 set.
Enough fussing. Puppet shows are still a little quirky and fun, Consider a membership if you live in the area. Now that school is back in session,the hour before closing it's practically empty.
Oh,parking is $10!! (or park at History Park for $6.)You can get an year pass for parking ,too AND it's good for unlimited parking at a few other sites such as Almaden Lake Park. With the parking that pricey,seems to be no security. Street parking not recommended. Do use caution. Food needs improving,however they do allow you to bring a lunch and there is plenting of seating to eat. Restrooms have always been clean when we go.
0 families found this helpful
"Happy toddlers at Happy Hollow"
This is a great park and zoo for toddlers. I went when school re-opened for the Fall on a weekday so the park was virtually empty which meant no lines. If you have toddlers that are not in school or that go only a few times a week I would recommend going at this time. The puppet show was not available and we had to form a group to ride alot of the rides because there weren't enough people. Atleast we didn't have to wait around which is tough for a toddler. My 3.5 year absolutely loved the park as did my 1.5 year old.
The park offers tons of rides, including a roller coaster, merry-go-ride, a cars ride, a flying bug ride, kiddie swings ride, and even a dragon train. In addition to the rides, there is a barnyard with all kinds of farm animals including lambs, sheep, goats, ponies, donkeys and more that the kids can feed for just 25 cents. The zoo showcases many unique and unusual animals such as a variety of lemurs, a jaguar, porcupines, meerkats and more.
Overall, the park is great and the only reason I didn't give it a 5 star rating is because the parking is out of control. It is $10 in cash only. The walk to the park from the parking lot is really long too especially for little ones!
0 families found this helpful
"family tradition"
HH was one of my favorite growing up. i was so anxious for it to re-open and it couldnt have been a better time. my dauther is the perfect age to beging enjoying all the park has to offer. my sister and i have season pass's so we bring the whole gang. the petting zoo is sweet, all he kids enjoy the steps through the water, and the rides are perfect simple but still exciting. im still bummed about he crooked house but the rest of the park is perfect for small cildren.
1 family found this helpful
"Happy Hollow"
The newly reopened HH is a huge improvement on the previous tired and dilapidated park that it was. It's definitely still targeted at younger kids as the rides are all fairly tame. It is small and compact enough just to spend a couple of hours on the rides, petting area and fabulous new play structure... or if you have a bit more time, it's worth wandering down to the old zoo section as there are still a few animals worth seeing (mr jaguar is still there) and the old petting area is now a really fun and relaxing archeology themed sand pit. I applied for my membership back in March when it opened and am still waiting for the cards to be sent out...
0 families found this helpful
"Happy Hollow = Happy Kids"
Update - Went this morning (6/16/2010) and considering school's out, it wasn't busy at all. Not empty by any stretch of the mind, but no endless waiting. 5 minutes to park. No ticket lines. The only bummer was that all the cute little metal figurines in the entrance area are fenced off. Too many kids fried themselves on the metal after it had baked in the sun.
We went on a Thursday during spring break (3rd week of April) and we all had a blast. We were there for 3 hours and we hadn't even gotten to the zoo part of the park. My son's favorites were all centered around his current fireman obsession: ringing the bell of his firetruck in the cops and firemen ride, climbing the nets on the Redwood Playground, and pumping water by hand in the goat area.
Parking is a bit of a challenge (got there at 10:05 and the line-up for parking was about 35 cars long), but because the zoo is so large, you don't really feel like it's too crowded. The only time you really feel the crowds are when waiting in line for the rides especially the firetruck/police car one because there are only 12-14 cars available for the kids.
Tips:
- Get there early for the weekends and holidays. On busy days, the parking lots are full by 11am. We got there at 10:05am and it took us about 15 minutes waiting in line to south lot and another 10 minutes to walk to the park (mind you I have a toddler who has a mind of his own). They're working on another parking lot which will improve this dramatically, but that's not expected to be complete until the fall.
- Bring cash. Parking is cash only and costs $6 for the south lot and $10 in the main lot
- Get in the line for the rides first. The lines only get longer as the day goes on. Start with the rides that only seat a few kids like the firetruck one first. Danny the Dragon fits about 30 plus so not as big of a deal.
- Pack your lunch and snacks. The food in the cafeteria is standard, but the lines are quite long. Even at 2pm, we waited about 10 minutes to buy 5 ice creams for the kids.
- Bring a camera because you're sure to get lots of shots with some very happy kids.
1 family found this helpful
"Fantastic time for kids!"
The new Happy Hollow is beautiful and our kids had an absolutely fantastic time. The $12 entrance fee was a bargain if you compare it to an amusement park, especially since you get a zoo and some really phenomenal play areas in the bargain.
There are two reasons I didn't give it five stars. One is that the lines for the rides moved very slowly and there was no shade over the waiting areas. In July in San Jose, that's going to be very uncomfortable. The other is the parking--maybe after a few months it'll calm down, but we arrived at 11am (it opens at 10), the main parking lot was full, and the walk from the satellite lot with kids was kind of long and not well marked.
1 family found this helpful
"HH March visit"
We visited HH during the members only preview week on a friday afternoon.
We arrived around 12:30p and the park was only open until 2p that day. It was just enough time to see our favorite animals, see what was new in the zoo area and then off to the playgrounds and rides. My daughters favorite was the frog hopper and roller coaster which were new additions from the previous time we visited. I rode the coaster with her and found it to be pretty fast. The Redwood Lookout play area was impressive and we will definitely be spending more time there on our next visit. I heard that they were selling parking passes like 10 for $ ? Need to look into that. I'll definitely be editing this review in April, since we plan to return during the week.
0 families found this helpful
"Loved Happy Hollow!"
We went yesterday with my 3 yr. old boy. We had a blast. My parents took me when I was small. The perfect place for little ones to get exhausted. So much to do. We plan to head back next week. We did go on a Friday and was busy but the lines were small. :) Would highly recommend it!
I would suggest buying a family pass.
2 families found this helpful
"Amusement park for young children that has animals, rides and more!"
Happy Hollow Park and Zoo is a great amusement park for young children! This was our first time there and we went during their members “preview” day on a Sunday. We could tell it was a much anticipated re-opening as there were lots of people at Happy Hollow. The park and zoo are newly renovated and look modern, clean and fun.
We had an enjoyable time with our 17 month old daughter. She enjoyed seeing the animals, people watching and riding around the park in her stroller. She was too young to experience everything Happy Hollow had to offer, but we still had a great time.
We were interested in what animals we would see so we checked out the website the day before. http://www.hhpz.org/ We found out that they have lemurs, a jaguar, parrots, wallabies, goats and other animals. There is also a new fossa exhibit. (A fossa is a large mongoose that is an endangered species and only a few zoos exhibit them.) The Happy Hollow zoo isn’t very large, but it is a nice size for children. Learning about the animals beforehand would definitely make seeing the animals a richer experience.
Our daughter’s favorite animals were the goats. The goat pen was right at her eye level. When she saw the mommy and baby goats, she pointed at them excitedly and laughed! She was enthralled by the goats running around for quite some time. You can also feed and pet some of the animals and there are convenient hand-washing stations around the area.
There are also really fun playgrounds in the park. The main playground called Redwood Lookout looked amazing and many kids were playing happily on the climbing structures. It was very crowded on the day we went, but I imagine that on a weekday, it would be much less so. When our daughter is older, I know she’ll love to play on the impressive structures!
Happy Hollow also has rides. All the rides are included in the price of admission. The rides looked fun and we look forward to riding them in the future with our little one! There are two rides that even young children can go on as long as they are able to sit on their own and are with an adult. These are the Keep Around Carousel and Danny the Dragon. These two rides along with a few others are considered low thrill rides which are gentle and calm. Happy Hollow also has some mild thrill rides that looked like they would be really great for preschool-aged kids. Check out their rides page for more info and minimum height requirements so that you can plan which rides your family would like to try! http://www.hhpz.org/index.cfm/id/33/Rides/
There is a restaurant in the park. But if you want to pack a picnic lunch, you can leave a cooler in your car (coolers are not allowed in the park), get your hand stamped for re-entry and eat in your car or at some picnic tables that are outside the park. We saw a family that sat in the trunk of their SUV enjoying some snacks and we thought that would be a great idea for next time!
Things to bring are hats, sunglasses, sunscreen, a stroller (for young children), good shoes for walking, and a camera!
Overall, Happy Hollow is a fun place that has enjoyable activities for younger children as well as older children. Definitely check out their website for more of what to expect. They have a printable map as well as lots of other good info!
*This review is based on a complimentary visit to Happy Hollow Park and Zoo I received no other compensation and the business owner did not state any requirements that I express a particular point of view.
0 families found this helpful
"Remodeled Park is All About Rides"
Happy Hollow is renovated and open for business! The new entrance opens unto a tidy garden dotted with rides and attractions perfect for kids from 3-10 years. Highlights include the new giant tree-house/slide combo, and the Frog Hopper.
The zoo portion of Happy Hollow did not get much of a make-over, which makes for sort of a ho-hum visit compared to the rest of the park. On the other hand, the laid-back zoo is a quiet respite from the hoardes of screaming preschoolers clambering to ride Danny the Dragon for the 10th time.
All in all, definitely a great place to spend an entire weekday. Plan to get there right at 10 am to avoid the crowds, and snag a parking spot under a shady tree.
0 families found this helpful
"Good Family Fun, A Mix between Zoo and Amusement Park"
My daughter and I went to Happy Hollow Park and Zoo on this past Sunday for the Member’s Preview Day. Happy Hollow is located within another park, Kelley Park, which is nice because my daughter and I walked thru the Japanese Friendship Garden before entering Happy Hollow. There are nice trails leading to Happy Hollow with clean benches. So even if the kids get tired and want to take a break from the park you can walk the trails or walk into the Japanese Friendship Garden unlike other park/zoo’s where you would normally only have a parking lot to escape to.
My daughter who is 21 months old was very excited as I kept mentioning to her that we were going to the zoo. I was expecting a zoo/park like grounds similar to the Oakland Zoo based on the description on the website and the map of the park that can also be found on the website. However, as soon as I walked through the admission gates I was pleasantly surprised. The park itself is a good size and there seemed to be plenty of activities to keep kids busy and entertained. There is a petting zoo, where kids can get close to the farm animals and feed them. The farm animal area was well stocked with food and was very clean. The farm animal food was 50 cents and could be purchased at nearby dispensers. There are two different playground areas; I really liked the fact that both playground areas had equipment that toddlers and older kids can play on. I would say that in general, most activities would be best for kids 18 months and older. There are two rides that do not have a height requirement but the rest do, one of them being the Granny Bug ride which my daughter was able to ride and loved! . I would definitely say that the highlight of our day at Happy Hollow was watching my daughter's face light up as she rode the carousel.
My daughter was all smiles as were other kids on the ride. My daughter enjoyed running and laughing her way through the park. The zoo portion of the park didn't have as many animals as I had expected but after all the running around in the park I don't think my daughter would have enjoyed a bigger zoo, it seemed to be just the right size in proportion to the rest of the park. The entrance of the lower zoo had a shallow stepping stone pond area that had kids laughing and splashing in to cool off since it was a hot day
The staff was very friendly and had a lot of patience with all the kids. They were very helpful and also seemed to be very knowledgeable about the park and the animals. Since the park is in San Jose I found that I did not need to have as many layers on as I would normally in San Francisco. I would suggest bringing a stroller to Happy Hollow because it’s pretty stroller-friendly but should you happen to forgetto bring one, the park offers stroller rentals. A single stroller was $7 and a double stroller was $10. I would recommend families who come here have plenty of snacks and water handy or in a cooler in your car. On the day I went the park didn’t feel particularly busy day and still many parents had to stand in line for lunch or snacks for about 30 to 40 minutes. That really seemed too long to wait to get something to eat. The Picnic Basket is the only place to get hot food or snacks other than vending machines, so expect lines out the door. Parking at the main lot costs $10 but the other two overflow lots cost only $6. I parked in overflow parking and would definitely try to avoid it next time because it was a pain to walk so far with my daughter in the stroller. There are shuttles that will take you to the front of the park but some families found these to be difficult to take if they had bulky strollers.
The entrance fee for Happy Hollow is $12 for anyone 2 and older which seemed fair considering my daughter was never bored and once inside the rides are included in the entrance fee. They did offer a lower Seniors entrance fee.
I would recommend coming to Happy Hollow if you are planning a trip to the San Jose area but also for people that live in the surrounding Bay Area.
*This review is based on a complimentary visit to Happy Hollow Park and Zoo. I received no other
compensation and the business owner did not state any requirements that I express a particular point of
view.
0 families found this helpful
"Most amazing playgrounds"
After a $72 million renovation, Happy Hollow opens it's doors this week and I was so excited to be one of the first people to see the park. I was blown away!. Walking through the new entrance and laying eyes on the colorful trees, carousel, and playgrounds took my breath away. Happy Hollow is a young child's fantasy - a whimsical wonderland of happy rides, colorful characters, playgrounds like you've never seen before, and friendly animals.
I was particularly impressed with the redwood grove playground that is a maze of slides and ropes that must rise at least 2 stories high. My 4 and 6 year old were so excited to explore the entire maze of tunnels, slides, and ropes. I could barely keep up with them, but fortunately, the structure is built such that mom and dad can follow their kids through the structure. Maybe not quite as easily as your child can, but none the less you can make your way through all the spaces. When I got tired of chasing a very quick 6 year old around, I was able to hang out on the rocks at the center of the Redwood Lookout and see my kids duck in and out of the climbing structure. It's pretty open so you can usually keep track of your older child from a distance. Redwood playground also has a separate structure for younger kids if the large 2 story wood structure is too much for them. Nice shaded benches right next to the little kid area is such a thoughtful detail for the tired mom or dad.
There is another playground right next to the goat pen and lemurs filled with structures that encourage children to mimic the playful antics of their furry friends. There is a long trail that mimics a lemurs tail and tricky balancing platforms perfect for building large motor skills.
If you grew up going to Happy Hollow, you'll appreciate that some old favorites like Danny the Dragon, the crooked house and the lower zoo are all still in tact although they've received a face lift. So is the 2nd longest running puppet theater which plays original performances written by Happy Hollow's very own in house puppeteer. You'll be grateful that the seating for the puppet theatre has some new canopies that provide much needed shade on hot days. This is a great place to just chill for a 15-20 minutes when everyone is exhausted from running around.
The one roller coaster ride was very popular. The wait on opening day was pretty long (at least 20 minutes from the first gate). Of course the ride was over in 30 seconds. But it was a surprisingly thrilling 30 seconds. Just enough to put a priceless expression on our 4 year old's face, but not too scary. He felt like such a big kid to be able to go on this ride.
What has changed however, has changed for the good. Happy Hollow is now fully ADA approved. That means that even the maze which has ever changing configurations can be accessed by a ramp and fits a wheel chair or stroller easily. Even some slides can be accessed by a wheel chair. Happy Hollow has also gone green with hay bale construction for some buildings and rain water catchment technology. In fact, Happy Hollow hopes to receive it's Silver LEED certification. The cafateria is also brand new with traditional carnival fare, but also includes healthier options at a reasonable price.
It is clear that great care and thoughtfulness was poured into making Happy Hollow a wonderful place for young children to explore, learn, and imagine for years and years to come.
*This review is based on a complimentary visit to Happy Hollow Park and Zoo. I received no other compensation and the business owner did not state any requirements that I express a particular point of
view.
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