Rani Y.
Yelp
I grew up at Magic Mountain (known controversially as the pile of poo).
Many years ago it received a major overhaul and was relaunched as The Beachouse. It's a modern, two-storey rectangular building with mainly glass exterior.
You'll still find the water slides, ferris wheel (although it's now a modern, enclosed wheel), the original merry-go-round, bumper boats and mini golf, however all have been relocated.
A new addition and a highlight for smaller children is the two-storey play area ($8 for 2 hours). Children can climb, slide and tunnel to their hearts content while parents watch sometimes nervously from below at the limited tables and chairs. It doesn't happen often, but can be quite comical if you hear a call from high up, "Mum!! I'm stuck." To which a parent quickly responds by clambering up the kid-sized ropes and tunnels in search of their youngster. (I'll giggle until the day it happens to me...)
Most of the Beachouse floor space over two levels is taken up with gaming machines. Each machine accepts a card which you recharge to a dollar value. Fun cards cost $2 each and the average game costs 1.5 to 3 credits at a $1 a credit. Limited tickets spurt out after each game and these can be exchanged for cheap plastic toys once you acquired the correct number of tickets. Don't be conned into thinking the number of tickets received are a reflection of the cost of the game. You might get 4 for avariation of ten pin bowling, but you'll need 20-30 to get a plastic toy you could pick up from The Reject Shop. It can be good fun though and when the toy inevitably breaks after 10 minutes, you can duck to the Reject Shop on Jetty Road and you're sure to find a similar toy for a few dollars.
The Beachouse does an okay trade through the other seasons, but summer is understandably booming. It's most popular on weekends and does a great trade in birthday parties. The cafe offers the sort of food you can expect - chips, hot dogs, ice-creams and is expectedly disappointing. Birthday parties packages include food served by the cafe.
As at the summer of 2011/12, management have acknowledged that the ferris wheel has been underwhelmingly received and the one lap of eight minutes is being sped up and will soon be completed in four minutes. It's still eerie being inside an enclosed plastic bubble. I much prefer the old fashioned caged wheels. But, I'm also afraid of heights so take my comments with that in mind.
The Beachouse is not cheap, but it is a fun activity, especially in the summer.