Magic City Tashkent – All You Need to Know Before Your Visit

About Magic City Tashkent

Magic City Tashkent (“Tashkent Disneyland”) is a modern amusement park in Tashkent that was opened several years ago. Both adults and children will find the visit to this park interesting and enjoyable. You can easily spend half a day, or even a full day, there without getting bored.

The park opens at 10 am and closes at 10 pm. In the morning, there are usually very few visitors, but more and more people come around lunchtime and later. If you want to see things without crowds, it’s advisable to come in the morning.

You can visit Magic City all year round, even when it’s very hot or cold. There are plenty of indoor activities to keep you busy. We’ve been there both during the wintertime and the hot summer. The experience is great regardless of the season.

Magic City Tashkent is spread across a large 21-hectare area, so expect to do a lot of walking. You can also take a train ride around the park if you wish.

The park offers various rides and games for kids, Magic Cinema, which shows the latest movies, Magic Museum featuring interesting artifacts, and Magic Aquarium (the first aquarium built in Central Asia).

There are also numerous restaurants offering local and international cuisine, snack bars, and ice-cream shops. In addition, you will find plenty of stores where you can buy things from clothes to local arts and crafts.

Pricing

Unlike some other amusement parks (e.g., Disney), at Magic City, you do not pay an entrance fee; you pay for each activity separately.

On the one hand, this is an advantage because you can play only one or two games, enjoy walking in the park, and pay next to nothing. On the other hand, it’s a disadvantage when you come with a family for the whole day and want to do a lot of activities. They add up quickly, and you need to buy tickets every time, which is a bit annoying, especially when there is a line. In addition, for some games you’ll need to pay cash, so you’d better have some with you. But overall, prices are quite affordable, and it’s unlikely you will spend much even if you do many activities.

Example of my last trip to Magic City with my daughter (we stayed for half a day):

Games (5-6): UZS 150,000

Bowling: UZS 75,000

Magic museum: UZS 25,000

Magic aquarium: UZS 175,000

Upside down room: UZS 50,000

Labyrinth: UZS 50,000

Total for 1 parent and 1 child: 525,000 ($45)

Magic Aquarium

The aquarium is one of the pricier attractions at Magic City, but it’s still quite low by Western standards. You’ll pay UZS 100,000 ($8) for an adult ticket and UZS 75,000 for a child. The aquarium is usually not very crowded (definitely not till 12 pm).

I like sea creatures, and I’ve been lucky to visit many aquariums around the world (most recently in Abu Dhabi). To put it nicely, the aquarium here in Tashkent is not the most impressive I’ve seen, but it’s definitely worth visiting. Especially, it will appeal to kids. You can expect to spend 30-40 minutes walking around.

Check out a short video about the aquarium, so you know what to expect! My favorite sea creatures at the aquarium are sting rays and a shark. There are also some interesting snakes.

As you enter the aquarium, you will be introduced to the sad story of the Aral Sea disaster. The Aral Sea (meaning “the sea of islands”) is a lake located between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. It was once the fourth-largest lake in the world. However, in the 1950’s, the Soviets diverted rivers flowing into the Aral Sea into the desert to supply cotton farms. As a result, the lake began to shrink and eventually largely dried up. The UN Secretary Ban Ki-Moon had called the Aral Sea disaster one of the planet’s worst environmental disasters.

As you move through the aquarium, you will see exhibits featuring fish, snakes, and lizards. Some of the fish you can expect to see include giant gourami, sazan catfish, piranhas, giant arapaima, golden grouper, leopard and yellow head moray eels, small stingrays, angelfish, and others.

A downside of this aquarium is the limited information about the exhibits. Some screens flash pictures of fish and other creatures, but they are hard to follow in some places. Luckily, most of the creatures are relatively well known, so you might be able to figure out what they are without much help. Not everyone does, though. During our last visit, we saw a lady with a small child. He pointed at a lizard and asked who this was. She answered crocodile. So, go figure.

Kids will appreciate the opportunity to measure their height against various cartoon characters. My daughter keeps measuring herself every time we visit (which happens every other month), hoping she has reached the height of the penguin. But she still has ways to go.

Magic Museum

This is one of my daughter’s favorite attractions in the park. The museum has a collection of many interesting exhibits. To be honest, I find some of them a bit creepy, but others are quite cool. It’s not a large museum, and you will be able to get through most of the rooms in 30 minutes max.

As you explore the museum, you will move through various rooms. Each has a different theme. You can see things like the shoes and suit belonging to the tallest man in the world (Robert Wadlow, whose height was 2.72 m), the artwork made out of thread, which took 3 months of work, the spacesuit of an astronaut named Valerij Bykovsky, a skeleton of a small dinosaur found in Central Asia, and other interesting objects.

My favorite exhibit is a collection of artwork that creates illusions. We always spend a lot of time there.

For example, the picture here appears pulsating when you look at it. But of course, this is only an illusion.

Another illusion: if you look at the lines in the picture below, do you think they are of different lengths? Well, turns out, they are absolutely identical. But our brain is tricking us into thinking that the left one is shorter.

The Labyrinth

This is a fun game that will greatly appeal to kids. Essentially, they’ll have to enter a labyrinth with a lot of mirrors and try to find their way out. If the kids are small, you’ll definitely have to go with them. The administrator provides disposable gloves for walking around the mirrors, as you will have to touch a lot. I must say, getting out of the labyrinth is not easy! You will definitely spend some time getting to the other side.

The Upside Down Apartment

This place will be interesting for the youngest family members. It features several rooms set up upside down- kitchen, bathroom, bedroom. It’s going to be a short visit, as thereis not much to see except a couple of rooms, but the kids seem to enjoy it.

Carnival Games

Visitors can play different carnival games at Magic City. Most of these are geared towards kids (for example, throwing a ball into the bucket, the duck pond game), but some might be of interest to adults as well. There is also a shooting gallery, which would appeal to adults.

There are usually no lines at any of these games. The price is UZS 20,000 ($2) for 3 attempts and UZS 30,000 ($3) for 5 attempts. You can win a prize if you manage to win the game (a big or small toy).

Bowling

If you enjoy bowling, Magic City is a great place to play. It seems that very few people go bowling here. Every time we come, we are the only ones.

I think the facility is very nice and not expensive. The game will cost you about $6. Adults get free rental bowling shoes. There are no children’s sizes, so they won’t be getting the shoes.

Milliy Taomlar (“National cuisine”)

While there are plenty of places to eat at the Magic City Tashkent, we usually go to Millij Taomlar. I like the quick service and a wide variety of local cuisine. The menu comes with pictures, so you can easily see what you want to eat, even if you don’t know the name. Personally, I greatly enjoy the rice pilaf (“plov”) and vegetable salad (“achuchok”) they serve there.

Prices are rather low by foreign standards, and portions are generous.

Examples of dishes/ prices: chicken kebab ($5), French fries ($1.5), round bread ($1), different varieties of salad ($1.5-$3), soup ($2-$3), plov ($3).

The Final Word

Both locals and expats love visiting Magic City in Tashkent. As a result, the park welcomes many visitors on both weekdays and weekends.

If you are visiting Tashkent for the first time, make sure to include Magic City in your itinerary. You won’t be disappointed.