Like a seasonal special of a magazine, welcome to my bumper edition of all thing Halloween!
So this year, it started late September (we'll be doing it in August soon don't you worry, watch you backs Mickey's not so scary thing)
As per most seasons, it began with the press night at Thorpe
This is a fab way to try out the new rubbish
Before these metal fences get full of people
The two new Walking Dead mazes; Nightmare was lovely to look at, but far too
It was the end of July, time for another trip
Norwegian was really cool to fly with, comfy seats, free wifi and cheap. Gatwick to Landvetter, easy.
After a very easy bus journey and dropping our stuff in the hostel, we were on park queueing for Balder
This is possibly the smoothest Intamin I've been on. Made some pretty cool noises over the airtime hills too and the tunnels were fun especially at night
Eh
Liseberg banana train! This was really fu
I have intention of writing a bumper Halloween blog post with all the scare events I'm visiting. But to do this I should really catch up. So from a good 3 months ago, here is Efteling and their 13 hour day celebrating summer nights or something.
We were staying in the very nice Loonscheland Hotel. Our room was suitable for up to 5 people, not sure how comfy that would have been but for the 3 of us it was fine. Very nice bathroom, comfy beds. All good. We had a view of the service yard.
Welcome to Movie Park! A place I had very little expectation or care for and honestly had it not been for the Mack, we wouldn't have gone. This meant we had a fab day
We started with Star Trek as there were loads of school kids arriving. We thought it was by the entrance. The coaster is, the attraction plaza and queue is not.
The ride itself is very average, decent for the park but not a great product example. The music was cool though and the transfer table. And if you lik
Purely for time saving purposes and the fact I've done a Plopsaland blog two years running I'm combining it with Plopsa Coo! Woo!
After being spited by Heidi last year, and Bat and Rox Flyer on both visits, would this year be any better?
For Heidi, yes! Cred 199. This great little coaster is fast, twisty and has good pops of air. In a lovely themed little area it is perfect for the park
Lovely little area
And this, the most random carousel ever
U
It's been a while since I've done a trip report but here we go. Another road trip which for me meant I would hit 200 creds! WOO.
Where do we start? A French park with an inverted Vekoma boomerang cos why not.
We left Dover on a meh British weather Saturday arriving in Dunkirk the Sunday morning. Before heading to the park we went into Calais for a meander as this is where we were staying. Apparently asking for a pain au chocolat is difficult even though it's how we b
Welcome indeed!
Now with added chocolate! Just in case I wasn't happy enough at this place
And a Hard Rock. And boats!
Let's start with the original
It's still an ugly entrance street.
And has the worst positioned ride ever. Not going to lie. This area needs work.
Do still like this ride
Woosh
And Optimus is still warning us of something I'm sure
They'll keep us safe though!
The M.I.B will save us
As its been a long time and I have some time over Christmas I thought I'd finally do this one, only got back like 4 months ago...
This to me is a homing beacon. See this and boom, happiness!
We had a lovely view of Hollywood Studios fireworks too. And as that's basically the only thing there, woo first park done.
SeaWorld is a gorgeous park
I love just walking around it
Woosh
A wanna be Manta
I still love Kraken. Love the way
This year it was decided we'd upgrade our trips in October and visit a foreign scare event. Europa was chosen having won the Scar award for the best international event the past 2 years.
Tth
But it wasn't just for their scare event, it was also for the entire park!
There are pumpkins everywhere, it feels like a different park
Pumpkin cake
Halloween special parade
Special musical for the season based on Ghost Castle. Rides ha
Can I have your attention please, due to some people climbing the lift hill the ride is currently unavailable.
We have E-Stopped the ride, padlocked it and thrown away the key!
And left the trains stranded.
On Colossus, each wheel unit is inspected heavily every seven days. Fact
Colossus is dirty, also fact
GEEK SHOT!
And up we went! Trying to be all artsy but the ride was sinking which made it hard (fact! They blast air into the gr
That's none of the above. But we're at Paultons! This bird is happy because of this.
Paultons is lovely
With some great landscapers!
And a volcano!
Want a really cool retheme of a section? Look no further!
Simple, yet great
Really wacky
And fun which is perfect for families
Themed staff area too
And a little aquarium type thing
Just really fun!
Rest of the park is standard. The modern en
As we know, Walibi Belgium and Holland got new Mack's this year. Both new types of Mack's.
This is what Belgium asked for.
It's really grand.
Has a spectacular splash
It's really cool
And there's a cool turntable to improve throughputs and just be cool! Queue was cool too!
So that's what Walibi get when they ask for a ride (and Mack are the company that choose to do it).
Don't know what you want? Then roll up, today
Phantasialand is a stunning park. Up there was one of my favourites, and definitely my favourite non Disney/Uni park.
Look at the stunningness. Everything is just so well done. Immersion is great. Rides are fab. Like Maus Au Chocolat. It just has so much magic going for it! Midway Mania sounds tacky compared to this. The fun house down Berlin street is odd for a theme park but great.
Destroyed Josh on our second go as well
It's a beautiful park.
And th
Paris! Because mini breaks are awesome!
With ghostly looking lighting
This is the church in Madeline. Although the outside doesn't look as spectacular as St Augustin or Notre Dame, it is much grander on the inside
View to the Concorde
St Augustin
With a mini version of the tower roof inside the tower roof. ROOFCEPTION
Arc De Triomphe
Was a long way to the top
Worth it for the views though! And, like many things in P
Been a long time! But a busy few months lie ahead for me and theme parks so time to revive this blog!
Europa Park is one me and Jack had talked about for a few years, the place of dreams almost. Finally, it happened! This is one of those trips worthy of a realistic report, not some sarcastic attack at the park like I usually do.
We arrived in Basel to get a 100+mph train into Freiburg, followed by a double decker train to Ringsheim and a short "bus" (was a coach) ride to the park
October is behind us, taking with it potentially the biggest time of the year for events all over the country! Each year I have slowly been doing more trips relating to Halloween events and this year was no different.
Like previously, it's great to start off at Tulleys on the first Saturday of the month. Tulleys is a great, well established Halloween event and really shows where you can end up from starting with selling pumpkins (this seems to be a recurring story, more on that later!). Providi
Although we were at Efteling for 2 days and the evening of Baron's opening I didn't take that many photos of the park. And of Bobbejaanland I took like 5 in total, so this report will have a Bob ending. Random fact, the name works because Efteling has a ride called Bob.
We arrived at the village, checked in a walked to the park for one reason. It was 7pm, park closed at 8. Let's ride Baron I guess.
First impressions, it is gorgeous. It's not a ride, it's a piece of architectural art! It lo
Tadah! It's Toverland!
Ticket booths (note these were taken at the end of the day, it wasn't quite this quiet)
Chairswing with no chairs. Kinda closed
CRED
best Boomerang of the trip
It's very pretty
Like a mini indoor theme park
Great for kids (also the dark twisty dingy slide is sooo cool)
Teacups that tried chucking out Josh's bag
And out we went
Nothing to see here
Log flume
Lovely park
Inside part of flume. Nicely done rock work
Was very nice
La
For a park to stand out to me it has to be really special. Not many parks do that successfully, give such a great balance of fun, imersiveness, magic etc. But Phantasialand is right up there for me with the great parks of Florida (probably my 2nd or 3rd favourite park I've been too). My only tiny complaint, there didn't seem to be a like big impact entrance. But that might just be they only have one and it's at the Berlin park entrance, not the mystery one (so many entrances and car parks).
Welcome to Walabi. This isn't the entrance but it has the logo so it'll do. Plus it's a thrill ride on park, the dodgems.
Revenge of the Wallabies! Oh, no. My bad. Did have the classic Sally Corp gun noise which is annoying.
Zomg serious cred.
Wee! Thing even went backwards a bit
Urgh. Pointless waste of space.
Yeah... this thing spins... wasn't impressed.
It's a very colourful park!
And a good flume!
I-Spy: The Queue line experience!
Oh.
This should have been at
Welcome to the park down a road behind some houses on some grass where we parked next to a tree. Look who's in Jack's bag!
No temple not open yet.
Jack is unimpressed by lack of temple.
Correction- the temple thing that's now a mine shaft is open!
Correction- it's an awesome tomb!
See the awesomeness.
Temple of awesome mineshaft tomb with broken on board audio.
Well I'm glad I tried one.
Really doesn't feel like you tilt much at all on ride.
The excitement!
Look a
Much like a year of Britain, A Year of Europe looks to expand upon its predecessor by including some European parks (of which I already have gained 7). Aim is to end this around this time next year to start a further, worldwide one (one can dream). So, my first European park outside of DLP when I was 15, Plopsaland.
It was an early morning when we left Dover (5:15am).
To arrive before 9am at a park that opens at 10. Notice the oversized door, yeah we didn't understand why everything was so
