Staying at Alton Towers? 5 Places I’d Eat Instead of The Secret Garden Restaurant

Let me start by saying we hadn’t actually planned to eat at The Secret Garden Restaurant at Alton Towers Hotel.

We were staying around the corner at Splash Landings Hotel and had every intention of eating at Flambo’s Jambo – a buffet restaurant we’d visited before and knew worked brilliantly with kids. Unfortunately, it was closed during our stay, so with a hungry seven-year-old in tow, we headed over to Alton Towers Hotel Secret Garden restaurant instead.

A beautiful space no question, but this turned out to be a mistake.

Our starters – olives and dough balls, not exactly a Michelin tasting menu – took over an hour to arrive. The service throughout was painfully slow, the food when it eventually arrived was incorrect, had to be sent back – and even when it returned is was distinctly disappointing. And for what we actually ate, the final bill was eye-watering.

Now, everyone can have a bad night and I’m not going to write an entire article telling you never to eat somewhere based on one experience. But I did spend a significant portion of that hour staring around the hotel contemplating all the considerably easier ways I could have fed us.

So, if you’re staying at an Alton Towers Resort hotel with kids, here are five things I’d personally do for dinner instead.

1. Book Flambo’s Jambo at Splash Landings

This would still be my first choice.

Flambo’s Jambo is the buffet restaurant inside Splash Landings Hotel and, having eaten there previously, it’s exactly the sort of setup I want after a day at Alton Towers.

There’s plenty of choice, everyone can choose something different and it’s particularly handy with younger or picky eaters who’d quite like three chips, half a bread roll and something inexplicably covered in gravy rather than an actual meal.

It’s also buffet-style, which means no sitting around waiting for courses while increasingly exhausted children lose the will to live.

Obviously it wasn’t an option during our stay, hence how we ended up here in the first place, but if it’s open when you visit, this is where I’d head.

Staying at Splash Landings? You can also read our full Splash Landings Hotel review for everything we loved – and the couple of things we didn’t.

2. Get pizza at the bar

This one particularly hurts in hindsight.

While we were waiting for our dinner, we could see other families casually eating pizza from the hotel bar.

No booking. No multiple courses. No waiting an hour for olives.

Just pizza.

After an entire day walking around Alton Towers, sometimes easy food is the correct food. If we’d known how the evening was going to pan out, I’d have happily ordered something casual, found ourselves a table and let our daughter enjoy the hotel entertainment while we ate.

Fine dining can wait until nobody at the table is wearing an Alton Towers wristband.

3. Bring something back with you

Another thing I’d do differently is think about dinner before heading back to the hotel.

If you’ve found somewhere during the day that everyone will reliably eat from, grab something before you leave rather than assuming you’ll sort dinner once you’re back.

This is particularly worth considering if you’re visiting with younger children. After an entire day of rides, queues and walking, ours was absolutely exhausted. By that point, nobody really needs a long restaurant experience – they need food, pyjamas and approximately eight hours less stimulation.

4. Pack an emergency hotel-room dinner

Is eating sandwiches in a hotel room the glamorous family break you envisioned when you booked Alton Towers?

Probably not.

Would I have chosen it over spending more than an hour waiting for olives with a tired seven-year-old?

Without hesitation.

If you’ve got particularly picky eaters, I’d seriously consider bringing a few reliable dinner options and snacks with you anyway.

Just one slight problem if you’re staying at Splash Landings: there wasn’t a fridge in our room, which limits your options somewhat. So think easy, shelf-stable backup food rather than arriving with a week’s worth of yoghurt.

You might never need it. But at 8pm after 20,000 steps around a theme park, an emergency Pot Noodle could start looking remarkably Michelin-starred.

5. See if you can get a takeaway delivered

And finally, something I genuinely wish I’d investigated before our stay: takeaway delivery.

Depending on what’s available when you visit and whether your chosen delivery service will come out to the resort, I’d absolutely check the apps before committing to a restaurant you’re not particularly excited about.

Pizza in your hotel room while the kids recover from the theme park might not sound like much of an occasion, but sometimes the easiest option is the one that saves the evening.

Just check delivery availability and where you’ll need to meet the driver before ordering – Alton Towers is a huge resort rather than your average residential address.

So, would I eat at The Secret Garden Restaurant again?

Based purely on our experience? Probably not.

That doesn’t mean everyone who eats there will have the same experience we did. Restaurants have bad nights, staffing problems happen and I’ve seen other people report perfectly enjoyable meals there.

But our dinner was expensive, the food was disappointing and waiting more than an hour for such incredibly simple starters with an exhausted child wasn’t how I’d choose to end another day at Alton Towers.

And that’s really the point of this article.

When you’re staying at Alton Towers with kids, dinner doesn’t need to be another event. Everyone has probably spent the day walking miles, queuing for rides and consuming enough stimulation to last them until Christmas.

Next time, I’m choosing the buffet.

Or the pizza.

Frankly, after the olives, I’d take the emergency Pot Noodle.