12th August 2024: Pleasurewood Hills

We had our second park day today, visiting the final new park of the trip; Pleasurewood Hills in Lowestoft, Suffolk! I was interested to get into this park and try out attractions such as Cannonball Express, the unique Schwarzkopf, and Wipeout, my first ever Vekoma Boomerang, amongst others!

With our hotel being less than a mile down the road from Pleasurewood Hills, we left at a bit after 9:30am, and after stopping at the nearby Tesco superstore to get some meal deals for lunch, we ended up arriving on Pleasurewood Hills property at around 10am. After quite a few minutes of faff trying to sort out Pleasurewood Hills’ new parking charge app, we ended up entering the park at around 10:15am:

After entering the park, we decided to initially head to a coaster…

Cannonball Express

I’d been advised to knock out Cannonball Express early, so we decided to head there first. This turned out to be prudent advice! We joined a very short-looking queue of only a few people, but due to a rather low throughput of only around 160pph, this ended up taking about 15-20 minutes, and by the time we got off, the queue was almost stretching out of the allocated queue line. I think we dodged a bullet joining that queue as early as we did! But how was the ride? Well, I was interested to ride Cannonball Express, as I’d heard some very good things about it. I was also interested to ride because it was my first non-looping Schwarzkopf coaster, and while I didn’t really rate either of the other two Schwarzkopfs I’ve ridden, I wondered whether I’d like one of their non-looping coasters more. I was seated in the front row, and I’m afraid to say that the answer was not really. Cannonball Express is a rough old beast, isn’t it? Most of the ride seemed to consist of getting bashed around from side to side, and some of the turns and brakes, particularly the brake at the end, were just horribly harsh for me. The layout had some fun turns and helixes, and kind of reminded me of the Pinfari RC40 layout if it had better restraints, but I didn’t think it was anything especially groundbreaking even putting aside the roughness. I think my parents summed it up quite nicely; my mum turned to me and my dad and said “They didn’t build smooth things in the 80s, did they?”, and my dad said to me “I hope you’re not going to call that glass smooth in the trip report”… Overall, then, I’m sorry to say that I wasn’t a huge fan of Cannonball Express, and it reinforced my controversial view that I personally find Schwarzkopf coasters to be wildly overrated, for lack of a better term. I apologise if I sound insensitive to an iconic and unique Schwarzkopf, but I have to be completely honest about these things:

After Cannonball Express, I decided to go on the attraction directly next to it…

Jolly Roger

Jolly Roger was on a practically walk-on queue, so I decided to give it a go. I didn’t wait long at all, and I was on the next cycle, which I can never complain about! So, how was the ride? Well, I’m a fan of a good drop tower, and Jolly Roger was an excellent one! The drop was so fast and punchy, and there was cracking airtime all the way down! I’m a big fan of these Fabbri towers, with Detonator and Venom also sitting highly in my estimations, and I have to say that overall, it’s right up there with them in contention for the title of my favourite UK drop tower. Jolly Roger was excellent, and I thoroughly enjoyed my lap on there:

After Jolly Roger, we steadily ambled over to the other side of the park, and on our way over, we took a detour to ride…

Rootin’ Tootin’ Target Trail

Rootin’ Tootin’ Target Trail was along our route to the other side of Pleasurewood Hills, so we decided to give it a whirl on our way by. The queue was short here, at only around 5 minutes, so we got onto the ride promptly. So, how was it? Well, I have to say that I thought it was quite good fun; for what it was, I thought it was a perfectly fun little dark ride! There was some nice theming in there, and despite me not being very good at interactive dark rides in general, I found the shooting system easy to use and very self-explanatory! One marginally disappointing aspect, however, is that you didn’t seem to be able to view your score at any point. There was no way of viewing it during the ride, and we couldn’t find how to view our score at the end after getting off, so for the competitive among us (which my dad certainly is!), you’re unable to get the payoff of finding out what you scored at the end. Nonetheless, this didn’t really matter ultimately, and it was still a fun dark ride:

After getting off Rootin’ Tootin’ Target Trail, we headed over to the next coaster…

Wipeout

Wipeout was practically walk on, so me and my mum decided to give it a go. I was interested to try Wipeout, as somehow, I’d made it 121 coasters into the hobby without ever encountering a traditional Vekoma Boomerang. So “the tallest and fastest coaster in East Anglia” was an interesting introduction to this ubiquitous ride model! But how was my first ever Boomerang? Well, I’m afraid to say that while an impressive ride for the space it takes up, I wasn’t really a fan of Wipeout, and my mum seemed to agree. It was just very rough for me, with the backwards portion being particularly awkward and uncomfortable, and I came off with a banging headache and shoulders. Shuttle coasters aren’t an absolute favourite ride style of mine to begin with, and when you combine that with the roughness, I’m sorry to say that I didn’t really rate Wipeout:

After Wipeout, we decided to head around to the final coaster of the day…

Egg-Spress

Egg-Spress was walk-on, so we waltzed onto the ride swiftly and took our seats on the very back row. So, how was the ride? Well, my dad said to me before we dispatched “With what we all thought of Cannonball and what you and mum said about Wipeout, I think this could well end up being the best coaster here”. And you know, I honestly think my dad was right! As family coasters go, I have a little soft spot for these Zierer Tivoli coasters, and as per usual for the ride type, Egg-Spress was quite good fun, with some fun helixes and some surprising whip towards the back of the train! There were also some nice near misses with the trees! However, I must admit that it definitely seemed a little rougher than usual for one of these coasters, and with me and my dad crammed in a car together, it did get a bit fierce at times! Nonetheless, Egg-Spress was still a pleasant enough coaster for what it was, and probably the most enjoyable of the day for me:

After Egg-Spress, my parents sat down briefly while I went for another lap on there while it was still walk on. As with the first, it was fun enough, but I slid around a lot more, as I was sat on my own!

After my second ride on Egg-Spress, me and my parents headed over to do something slightly different…

Sea Lion Splash

It was coming up to the 12pm showing of Sea Lion Splash, so we decided to head down to the theatre for a watch. By this point in the day, the sun was really beating down, so it got quite hot while we were sat watching the show! In terms of the show itself; I thought it was quite good fun, with lots of informative information about sea lions and seals, and the sea lions looked happy on stage. However, I must confess that while the sea lions were never forced to participate and looked happy, I felt that the ethics of them doing tricks with balls and such in this day and age was questionable. I’m aware that animals performing for entertainment is a contentious topic, so I’ll leave it there:

After watching Sea Lion Splash, we went to find some shade and eat our packed lunch. Despite it only being around 12:30pm at this point, we quickly realised that we’d sort of run out of things to do at Pleasurewood, so I closed out my time there by taking two final back-to-back rides on Jolly Roger. Once again, both were excellent; the airtime and speed were sublime, the forces were wonderful, and it was overall a top-drawer drop tower! It was without question the highlight of the park for me:

After my back-to-back rides on Jolly Roger, we left Pleasurewood Hills for the day, content with our time in the park despite it only being around 1pm:

With us having exited the park at 1pm and spent less time in there than we’d expected, we found ourselves at somewhat of a loose end for the afternoon, so we decided to head into the town of Lowestoft itself.

We firstly visited Ness Point, the easternmost point of the UK. It was cool to come here, stand in the easternmost part of the country and see the sea views, but I must admit that I’m surprised it wasn’t more of an “attraction” so to speak; it was very hidden, in the back of an industrial estate, with nothing of note around it:

After our brief visit to Ness Point, we decided to head down to Lowestoft South Beach and have a stroll along the seafront of Lowestoft, getting an ice cream while we were there. I tried the Honeycomb Caramel Swirl flavour of Kelly’s ice cream today after having the Salted Caramel flavour in Great Yarmouth yesterday, and it was very tasty:

After that, we got back in the car and headed back to the hotel, thus ending our day.

So, that wraps up my day at Pleasurewood Hills, as well as the detour we took to Lowestoft afterwards! I had an  enjoyable day; I enjoyed seeing Pleasurewood Hills and what it had to offer for the first time, and I enjoyed getting on some new rides! My highlight was definitely Jolly Roger; I love a good drop tower, and Jolly Roger was an excellent one!

In terms of Pleasurewood Hills itself; it’s an odd one to review, and I’d say I was slightly underwhelmed overall, if I’m being honest. My expectations were calibrated to something along the lines of an East Coast equivalent of Oakwood Theme Park in Wales, and after visiting, it kind of matched that expectation in some ways, exceeded it in some and fell short in others.

In all fairness, it’s not a badly kept park in places; parts of it look really nice and colourful and clean, and they’re clearly making an ongoing effort to spruce parts of it up. Areas such as the bit by the log flume, the sea lion show and the shooting dark ride look quite nice, my first impression upon entering was quite positive, and some of the other rides like the safari and the horse ride looked quite new and well maintained. There seems to be a bit more of this effort than there is at Oakwood, and if it continues, I can see the whole park beginning to look really nice in the years to come.

However, what I would say is that other significant parts of Pleasurewood Hills, possibly more so than any other park I’ve ever visited including Oakwood, looked quite decrepit and frankly abandoned. I could see notable areas with old, decaying husks of rides stood crumbling away, there was a massive castle theatre that looked completely abandoned, there was some amphitheatre that looked completely abandoned and overgrown, the bird show theatre looked shuttered and like it hadn’t operated in some time, and there were also quite a few shops and food outlets closed. The feeling of decrepitude in portions is very similar to the last time I went to Oakwood, but even Oakwood didn’t seem to have quite so many blatantly abandoned areas. Hopefully the ongoing efforts in aesthetics from the Looping Group will see this rectified in time, and I’m sure it will, but right now, the abandoned areas don’t give off the greatest impression.

The other critique I would raise is that for our demographic, we didn’t think there was a huge amount to do at Pleasurewood, and there was nothing there that would really make us want to make specific effort to return, if I’m being honest. One significant strong area of Oakwood, for comparison, is its roller coaster hardware, and for me, both Megafobia and Speed are leaps and bounds ahead of any individual coaster at Pleasurewood Hills and comfortably beat Cannonball Express and Wipeout as a duo of headline coasters. Jolly Roger was an excellent drop tower for me, as someone who likes a good drop tower, but I’m quite a big coaster person in terms of what draws me to parks. And coasters-wise, I think Pleasurewood lacked a real headline draw that would make me want to specifically return there, if I’m being finicky. Nothing there held a candle to Megafobia or even Speed, in my view. With that being said, I would say that we may not have been the ideal demographic to visit; it seemed like the sort of park that you might get more out of if you were visiting with young children, so do bear that in mind.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed my time at Pleasurewood Hills and I’m glad I came to see it, but if I’m being honest, it’s not a park I think I’d make specific effort to return to any time soon in the absence of new major investment, particularly given how far away from the park I live. I may not have given it a fair chance, I may have been overly finicky, and I apologise if it comes across that way, but that’s how I honestly felt.

Thanks for reading; I hope you enjoyed this report, and the reports from this wider trip! I think we’re just going to be heading straight home tomorrow, so the chances of me writing a report are pretty slim, but if we do stop anywhere interesting on the way home, I’ll write about it! Chances are, though, that my next trip report will be coming on Sunday, when I head back to Thorpe Park for my first ever ride on Hyperia! I can’t wait to get on that coaster; I’ve heard insanely good things about it!