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Benin's Bits & Bobs

A blog by Benin in General

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About this blog

Assorted What-Nots

Entries in this blog

Only Teardrops in Denmark PTR - Day 1 - Copenhagen

A trip designed to visit one of the lesser countries in Europe known for its parks, even if it has 6 big parks, including one of the most visited in the continent, not much ever seems to come out of Denmark, so as such, this trip was created, organised and visited. Day 1 - Arrival and Copenhagen We arrived in the afternoon to a warm and humid Denmark, a certain surprise to the 4 of us who were travelling along, and it wasn't long until we realised the Danish way of life was completely differen
  • Benin

Only Teardrops in Denmark - Day 8 - Farup Sommerland

Day 8 – Farup Sommerland And so the final day, we packed up and departed Aarhus northwards. We eventually arrived after more venturing through country roads and paid upon arrival in the car (which took us all by surprise, fortunately we were prepared for this) and ended up in the car park, which strangely sits in the middle of the park, allowing for some good views of the two main coasters. Our first destination was Lynet, the Gerstlauer launched, to which I was excited for because Anu
  • Benin

Only Teardrops in Denmark - Day 7 - Legoland Billund

Day 7 – Legoland Billund Now here was an interesting one, the Merlin park of the group, a park that is usually a burden to visit in the UK, how would the original fare? Would it be smothered in adverts? Would it be full of low throughput rides? Would we hate it for being part of a massive corporate entity? Answers are found and more… After once again navigating the emptiness of Denmark and a surprise car park appearing out of nowhere (next door to Billund’s own airport) we had arrived and awai
  • Benin

Only Teardrops in Denmark - Day 6 - Djurs Sommerland

Day 6 - Djurs Sommerland After a long rainy drive to Aarhus the day after was nice and sunny for our next venture into the middle of nowhere for a theme park. Djurs seemed to be a 'true' theme park in comparison to the parks so far, so I was intrigued to see how they would go with it. We arrived into the rather empty car park and ventured to the gates. The park opened, and we ventured to the nearest coaster, and a highly rated one to boot, that of Piraten. Apparently the worst Mega-
  • Benin

Only Teardrops in Denmark - Day 4b - Bakken

Day 4b – Bakken After a morning of alcohol we returned to the car and ventured off to Bakken, the world’s oldest amusement park. Set within an old hunting ground the woodland setting is quite nice, although the layout of the car park is little to be desired. We went in, purchased our wristbands and found a place to eat whilst we waited for Tornado to open at 2. It did, and we were ready to experience the World’s first (and only) Intamin Spinning Coaster. Tornado is a very fast spinning
  • Benin

Only Teardrops in Denmark - Day 4a - Carlsberg Brewery

Day 4a – Carlsberg Brewery Today was a day split between culture (or as cultured as you can get when visiting a Brewery) and coasters. As Bakken didn’t open until 2pm (closing at 11pm), during my research of things to do in Copenhagen I came across the Carlsberg Brewery Tour, and needless to say it didn’t take much convincing of people to partake in the 70DKK tour. In order to get there however, we had to brave the local transport. As we right by the train station this was simple, and we walke
  • Benin

Only Teardrops in Denmark - Day 3 - Bon Bon Land

Day 3 – Bon Bon Land A park that is relatively infamous and well known from a certain American coaster site, Bon Bon Land is essentially famous for being silly. With farting dogs, defecating seagulls and various other creatures doing random stuff; it’s a park I’ve been interested to visit to see what the hype is all about. So we hopped into the Nissan of Narcissism and directed by Cassandra the Sat-Nav and were taken off the motorway into the middle of nowhere, a theme certainly to be followed
  • Benin

Only Teardrops in Denmark - Day 2 - Tivoli Gardens

Day 2 - Tivoli Gardens After an afternoon of lovely sunshine and warmth, the Sunday morning was the complete opposite, with rain pelting down as we prepared to venture into our first park of the trip. As we waited outside the park, the Gumball 500 decided to venture forth, so we had some entertainment building up to the park opening. The park opened at 11, but the majority of rides opened at 11:30, so we hid under a building and awaited our first ride and coaster to open Daemonen. Th
  • Benin

Must be getting creds in Madrid - Day 2 - Parque Warner

Day 2 – Parque Warner Here was a park I was rather excited about, with 2 B&Ms, a Vekoma GIB and some gorgeously themed areas, how could I not be? The journey to the park was slightly longer than the other, purely because it’s seemingly in the middle of absolutely nowhere, so first step was get the Metro: Then the RENFE train to Pinto: Then a bus straight to the park entrance: Rather simple in the end, who needs to spend lots on hire cars? My excitement also truly got the better o
  • Benin

Must be getting creds in Madrid - Day 1 - Parque de Attractiones

Day 1 – Parque de Attractiones After a late evening flight and a taxi to a hotel, Madrid’s parks beckoned. This trip was mainly done as a “Benin wants to get all open European B&Ms this year” trip, and it also combined with a birthday. So it happened. After a morning of searching for a McDonalds that became sadly fruitless (and McMuffin-less), we hopped upon the Metro (of which a 3 day unlimited pass on all transit options costs €35) towards Batan station, where Parque de Attractiones live
  • Benin

Mon voiture c'est penne! - Petits Parks of France - Day 3

Day 3 – Walygator Parc So the final day led us to Walygator, more known for its financial issues and random 2nd hand B&M than for being any good, and we were heading there for their first operational day of the season! However, the day certainly started poorly as the tickets you pre-book online through the website CANNOT be picked up on park. You have two options, pick it up at random shops dotted about the country (none near where we were though), or delivered to home. But NOT at the p
  • Benin

Mon voiture c'est penne! - Petits Parks of France - Day 2

Day 2 – Nigloland To say that Nigloland is in the middle of nowhere would be quite the understatement, with the signs telling you the park is Xkm away, and no visible sign of it until you are literally on the local village’s doorstep. The village itself is on the park’s doorstep itself, with some front gardens literally a road and hill away from the actual entrance building. The way the park is accessed feels slightly Towers like, with country roads, a small village and a descent into a giant
  • Benin

Mon voiture c'est penne! - Petits Parks of France - Day 1

Day 1 – Parc Saint Paul A rather early morning of 3am was the choice made to venture to a selection of rather un-known French parks, and after a McDonald’s service station breakfast and a quick jaunt on the Eurotunnel we were firing down the French motorway with not a care in the world. Unfortunately, disaster would strike us. We began to hear noises from the car, and decided to pull over on the hard shoulder to investigate. After some initial checks, we agreed to move the car forward slightly
  • Benin

It's like a fairytale or something... In Bruges - Day 3 - Bagatelle

Day 3 – Parc Bagatelle A very early morning led to the 2 hour drive across half of two separate countries towards the seaside of France towards Bagatelle. This is rather a small park, but recently nabbed a Vekoma Invertigo last year, and was once infamous for having a scary as hell Lion show which is now gone. We arrived at the park to be greeted by a long queue, as out of the 4 cashier desks they had 1 open. And the queue barely moved due to large groups and numerous vouchers. This annoyed
  • Benin

It's like a fairytale or something... In Bruges - Day 2 - Bellewaerde

Day 2 – Bellewaerde Park Time for coasters! And with a brand new one it was time to head along to Belle, via several country roads and an awful diversion, we eventually arrived at the destination (N.B. There is an easier route to take to get to the park we discovered on our way back, blergh)… Formerly a safari park, this place certainly shares similarities with both Chessington and Flamingoland, but let’s not set our hopes too low, and go and ride the first coaster of the day (in order t
  • Benin

It's like a fairytale or something... In Bruges - Day 1 - Bruges

Day 1 – Bruges An early Friday morning greeted us as my car was packed and we set off for the Channel Tunnel, before long however we had reached Calais and the drive to Bruges through 20 million sets of road-works began. About 2 hours after our arrival in Calais, we had arrived at our hotel, on the outskirts of the ‘Old Town’ of Bruges. A quick note about the hotel, it is pretty fab… Not in the way of being amazing, it’s just extremely nice, with great people running it who are very helpful an
  • Benin
Trip Report

It's been a long, long time...

2 years. A lot can happen in that time, and for me that has involved a baby. So that has also meant 2 years without theme park trips (unfortunately a 2021/22 New Years Trip to Europa Park got spited by Covid rules changing) and it's been a interesting time.   So behold a trip report to Chessie. My first theme park many a year ago, felt only right to continue such a rite of passage to my own spawn who will be forced to endure terrible football (already done) and varying quality theme pa

Helix - The Review

Helix, Liseberg and Mack’s 2014 project has been at the forefront of many an enthusiast’s mind during the past year or so. With Blue Fire being reasonably rated by the community, hopes were high for Helix when it was announced. Two launches, multiple inversions, a terrain based layout and the odd airtime hill meant that this ride was ticking all the right boxes for enthusiasts around the world. The real proof though, was in the pudding of actually riding it. And this is a more detailed review o
  • Benin

Germany Road(works) Trip - Days 13&14 – Return of the Macks

Day 13 – Return of the Macks Part 1 A bright and early morning led us down to a nice breakfast before the 8:30 ERT on Blue Fire. Afterwards we decided to hang around and wait for Arthur to open, however when we did get to the entrance it was having issues and was playing the closed game. As a result we went back to Austria and did Alpenexpress and the Wildwasserbahn for the Cave of fantastic smells before a quick whirl on the Chairswings Heading back and Arthur was o
  • Benin

Germany Road(works) Trip - Day 9 - Bit Klotten’d Up

Another day, another park, but this park was more of a stop-over to break up the monotony of driving all the way to Stuttgart. The original plan was to actually hit up the Nurburgring, however once Ring Racer was confirmed as spited, Klotten was chosen as the park of cred run. Whilst it is in the middle of nowhere, it cannot be argued that the location on the mountainside with valleys all around is pretty amazing. The first port of call was Heisse Fahrt, the Gerstlauer Bobsled. I’ve alwa
  • Benin

Germany Road(works) Trip - Day 8 - PHANtastic! Part 2

The second day at Phantasialand started similarly to the first, parking in the China car park and straight off to Black Mamba. A front row ride was in order since it was unlikely another chance would raise its head, front rows are very useful wake-up calls. Over to Wuze Town, and as Fear was having the morning off, Winjas Force was ridden, followed by another go on Tittle Tattle Tree. We then rode lots of the new Wuze Town stuff that has been added over the years, starting with the Monora
  • Benin

Germany Road(works) Trip - Day 7 - PHANtastic!

Day 7 – Phantastic Part 1 My last visit to Phantasialand was 6 years ago, which in some cases doesn’t tend to mean a whole lot has changed. However, here, pretty much every single area had something different about it, be it from an addition of some flat rides in Wuze Town, to replacing some tatty old Flumes, or in several cases, the rides simply don’t exist anymore. Lots of change, but would I still like the park? We parked in the China car park (due to limited space, there are several car pa
  • Benin

Germany Road(works) Trip - Day 6 - Express Pass Interest

Movie Park Germany was the park of the day, having been a stone’s throw from it the day before, so it was a bit weird to drive to it for a second day in a row. Upon arrival I grew frustrated by the park not opening up the turnstiles prior to the official opening, mostly due to the lack of space available to the large crowd building up outside and the low number of actual turnstiles available. Does annoy me greatly when they could instead let people into the park, get some early sales from a c
  • Benin

Germany Road(works) Trip - Day 5 - Driving at the Beck and call

We were done with Hamburg, so today was a day of driving as we headed to our next base of operations in Dortmund. We decided that because there wasn’t much option of things to do in Dortmund as we were staying in a soulless industrial estate and Dortmund isn’t known for having much in the way of touristy stuff (Football stadium aside, but it had a game on that if I’d known about I would’ve gone to), we would visit Schloss Beck instead to pass a few hours. Schloss Beck is a tiny little park a st
  • Benin

Germany Road(works) Trip - Day 4 - Serengetting Creds

Another day and this time it was off to the first random small park of the trip in Serengeti Park, which is Germany’s version of West Midlands Safari Park. But this one had two fantastic attractions which were worth the entrance fee alone. Unlike everyone else visiting, we weren’t doing the safari portion of the park, as a hire car and an animal safari would probably not combine well in my mind, so we walked into the ride area to find absolutely nothing open. Presumably because they assume th
  • Benin

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