Dismaland Bemusement Park opened on the 21st August and is scheduled to run until 27th September 2015. On the first day of the tickets going online I was one of the estimated 6 million people that tried to purchase tickets – the website crashed, to be honest I thought the possibility of visiting Dismaland was remote, in fact non-existent, downright dismal.
I thought I would give some tips on how to get those unobtainable Dismaland Tickets – I have visited Dismaland twice this past week without having a pre-booked ticket.
Last Monday (31st August) I passed Weston-super-Mare on my way to Cornwall, we turned off the motorway and thought we would give it a try. We arrived at Dismaland at 2.30pm. The daytime entry is at 11am or 2pm, after the 2pm pre-booked ticket holders have gone in the ones that queue in the non ticket holders queue are then allowed to purchase tickets – this queue is long around 300 people but on both the days I did this everybody got in (an image above of a street artist entertaining the queue).
The secret is to arrive at Dismaland between 1 and 1.30pm and join the non ticket holders queue and when the ticket office opens at around 2.30pm they will do their best to issues tickets to all those waiting. On my 2nd visit yesterday the 4th September I was on assignment for the Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat and we did the same and were given tickets at around 3pm (they have stopped answering media requests for passes). Worth noting is that when we left the park at around 5pm there was no queue at all and it was just to turn up to get in – the park on that day was open to 6pm as there was another event in the evening.
Obviously this is not a guarantee to get tickets – good luck!
Dismaland – a fantastic experience
I really enjoyed Dismaland, not only is there the amazing work of some 61 artists to view it was the ‘people watching’ that I also enjoyed. There were images to be seen and to photograph everywhere, it reminded me in a way of my first experience of visiting India – an assault on all the senses. Some of the parks drab, dismal background music – Hawaiian? you can hear in my video above, what you cannot smell is the ‘Dismaland smell’ which was the whiff of Falafel being fried (put in wraps) that drifted throughout the park. I ate one. Very tasty.
Update I have now visited Dismaland for a third time – on assignment for Dagens Nyheter. We would have got in via the non-ticket holders queue (as above) but a very kind person came up to us and gave us tickets as her friends could not make it, in fact we saw the same thing happen to a few people in front of us as well. Some kind people out there.
