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Coaster's Blog

A blog by Coaster in General

  • Entries

    17

  • Comments

    25

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    7748

About this blog

A blog by Coaster about coasters!

Entries in this blog

An ICON launches in Blackpool - My Review

A cryptic wheel cover and demolition of a bridge, followed by markings on the ground.  A pIt of concrete footers.  Then a coaster.  Even after watching the project for well over two years, it feels surreal standing next to the twisted metal track of Icon and seeing the trains swish around what was previously a lake.   Visible from many locations within the park, Icon makes its presence known simply by being there.  It may not be tall, but in terms of land covered it’s HUGE.  First impr

Launches, Freefalls and Airtime in Sweden - My Liseberg Review

Liseberg caught my attention in 2014 with the launch of Helix, and has since been very much on my agenda to visit.  With it being my first non-UK park, there were high expectations and I was extremely excited to visit.   Firstly, looking at the park itself, it’s absolutely beautiful.  The location in Gothenburg is amazing and I like the fact that many of the rides are built into the hillside, whilst also entwining between each other; it’s very Blackpool-on-a-hill ish.  Helix has a fant

Blackpool Pleasure Beach - October/November 2014 | Photo Trip Report

Wow, what a fantastic week! We spent 8 consecutive days in Blackpool Pleasure Beach, arriving at just after 10am and staying until park close every day. This equates to a total of 76 hours spent in the park! In fact, the only break we had from the park was one morning to visit the Tower and watch the Circus. Blackpool Pleasure Beach was nearly faultless all week, it was being run the best I have ever seen it with all coasters on maximum capacity every day (aside from Nash on two one day an

Why Wicker Man is the best UK coaster since 1996

Wicker Man.  I think it’s fair to say that I had very mixed feelings during the construction and build-up process for this ride.  Whilst I was happy to see a new wooden coaster finally grace the UK line-up, I had reservations about how good it would be; there weren’t any huge drops in the layout, so would it pick up enough speed to be thrilling?   On approaching the ride, the excitement builds from the moment you see the hugely impressive Wicker Man structure and entrance signage come

Blackpool Pleasure Beach: April 2015 PTR

Yet another brilliant week was spent in Blackpool, and as we have BPB season passes we spent most days in the park, which was great fun despite a few negatives which I will get to later in the trip report. BPB is still my favourite park, purely because it has my favourite rides, and the history and charm adds to it - my top three coasters are The Big One, Wild Mouse and Grand National as well as my overall favourite ride being Valhalla, so to have these and a fantastic collection of wooden

Efteling Review - October 2018

Day 1 of a three-day event with Pleasure Beach Experience took place at Efteling Theme Park in the Netherlands, where we had an hour’s ERT on Joris en de Draak before park opening as well as a full day at the park.  First and foremost, the park was very accommodating to us, and the staff were all excellent and friendly.   With it being my first visit to Efteling I wasn’t too sure what to expect, but I’d probably describe the park as very quirky and unusual.  There are a lot of nicely t

Phantasialand Review - October 2018

The third and final day of the Pleasure Beach Experience European park event took place at Phantasialand, where we were expecting a 30-minute ERT on Black Mamba and lunch included.   Before I review the park itself, can I just say what incredible treatment we had from their corporate/events team.  Having expected the above, we also got a night time ERT on Taron (joining the hotel guests) followed by 2 PBE group rides, early morning rides on Maus au Chocolat and Chiapas (before the park

Cedar Point - June 2019

We left Kennywood in high spirits and made the three-hour drive to Cedar Point, the most anticipated park of the trip and one that I’ve been waiting to visit for years.   Since I started enjoying coasters, Cedar Point has always stood out to me as the ultimate “bucket list” park and one that I never envisaged I’d actually get the chance to visit.  Yet here I was, in a car on the way to Cedar Point?  It just felt so surreal.   Driving into the park at night was an incredible e

Six Flags Great Adventure - 2nd June 2019

The second day of our USA trip took us to Six Flags Great Adventure in New Jersey, my first Six Flags park.  Having heard a lot about the park over the years I was expecting El Toro and Kingda Ka to be the stand-out rides, but wasn’t expecting too much in terms of overall park presentation and operations.   As it turns out, the park was presented very well for the most part with a nice plaza (past the entrance), lots of greenery with some moderate theming and there was a viewpoint look

Toverland Review - October 2018

The second day of the Pleasure Beach Experience European park trip took place at Toverland, where we had a full day at the park followed by 30 minutes ERT on Fenix, and then a behind the scenes tour of the ride.   Toverland is a lovely theme park located in the Netherlands with lots of nice theming/landscaping, an indoor area of the park and some really unique attractions mixed with a few exceptional coasters.  The park has lots of extra features such as the fountain show, assault cour

Kennywood - 3rd June 2019

After a gruelling 5-hour drive from Six Flags Great Adventure the night before, the third day of our USA trip was spent at Kennywood.   The park has appealed to me since seeing Phantom’s Revenge on an “extreme rides” TV program and with the promise of historic rides and coasters, plus an old-style hyper coaster I was already very excited for this park.  But would it deliver?   I am pleased to say that Kennywood is one of the most amazing parks I have ever visited.  The place

Kings Island - 5th June 2019

We left the Express hotel on Wednesday morning following our first day at Cedar Point to make the trip to Kings Island.  The day didn’t get off to the best of starts with bad traffic and road closures, but we finally made it to Kings Island to find that the park was rather quiet.   Past the ticket kiosks the park’s entrance area is stunning with the Eiffel tower structure in the distance, fountain and brass band music (The dam busters march was playing as we entered).  It’s one of the

The Coney Island Cyclone

Cyclone at Coney Island has been a bucket list ride for me since seeing it on a documentary called “The Ultimate Top 10 Thrill Rides” over 10 years ago.  At the time I had recently visited Blackpool for the first time(s) and with the memories of the coasters there fresh in my mind, it seemed so exciting that I could one day travel out to America and ride this famous coaster.   Arriving at Coney Island and seeing the ride in person was surreal, I never thought I’d actually get to be the

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