Marc

Good to see it get some recognition - personally, when the whole thing works from start to finish I do genuinely enjoy it. As time goes on its reliability will get better, hopefully we will start to see it offering a more consistent experience throughout the season - and maybe a few more plaudits among enthusiasts!

Short clip of the music which played at closing time on last day of season - as said same as the start of day track, sounded good!

Meet is Saturday 16th!

Wouldnt get your hopes up about CCR ever returning, im pretty sure all of the 90% of track has been taken up now, along with that the trains which have sat there for 4 years or so now would probably take a lot of work to get going again.

Just to point out this change only affects passes purchased on or after November 28th. Passes purchased before then are not affected.

I think a big problem merlin have with passes is they are actually probably too cheap for what they offer, especially the standard one, they need to add more value to the Premium Pass over the standard one and unfortunately this is one of the ways to do so.

I Agree on X if closing it, retheme on the other hand I wouldn't be against. I doubt Loggers reopening is in anyway affected by the AMC deals, Fright Nights will have totally separate budgets than money to work on loggers leap. As for TWD being permanent, I hear a lot of people say Saw alive / Sub Terra failed, but these attractions didn't close due to them being unpopular, they closed in periods of the respective parks having to save money, NST was just one of 5 closures last year?

Out of interest what on that list would you be against? Not saying it’s true, but... Slammer removal would be good, it’s not reopening. X seeing some sort of retheme, again not a bad thing, depending on the quality of course. Loggers reopening / Work starting, would you be against that? Walking dead open all year round - no issue with that, on busy days the park needs all the capacity it can get. Only bad thing on there id say was Swarm VR.

It don’t think it will - just like travelodges in Chertsey / staines / egham don’t affect Shark. The hotels around the area charge a significant amount more during the season because of Thorpe, Premier inn won’t do any different. Shark also has a tonne of advantages, especially to those who don’t have an annual pass, you can get som me real good value deals, being on site and the hour fastrack really help too. I’d quite like them to get a full scale hotel, and keep Shark making it the budget option, think would work quite well.

I think the hotel investments fall outside of the standard theme park 4 year cycle, so its still possible we could see one at Thorpe at some point, it is abit of a strange one why Thorpe is the only one left without a full size hotel, Towers obviously got their new hotel this year but then we saw Splash Landings hotel closed for most of the year and only open in the peak times, I guess the reason being is the other hotels are more profitable - is a odd one when Shark hotel seems to at least do pretty well for the park.

Thorpe : no idea - loads Chessington: 3 Legoland 3 Alton Towers: 2 Adventure Island: 1 Portaventura:4

^Surely its depends on what the worlds first is?? I think people do forget that it was only last year Thorpe opened Ghost train - regardless of how successful/ how much you like it, its still a significant investment for the park, and by going by Merlins usual 4 yearly cycle it won't be till 2019 we start to see plans for the next big thing opening at the park.

The point I was making is more that we know loggers won’t be opening next season, any work it needs hasn’t started (visibly atleast) - that’s what I meant by being realistic - but as I said it woud be nice if we heard something more concrete on what ever future it has. I don’t agree Slammer should reopen - I enjoyed the ride, it was unique and quite fun, but it was unreliable, unpopular and had a low throughput, if the money pot was unlimited yeah sure reopen it, but IMO it’s not worth them throwing money at, id like to see it removed as soon as possible so the area can be ready for its replacement what ever that may be.

Agree the entrance needs work - it’s unfortunate how extra / higher level security checks were forced on them with such little notice but understandable after events across the U.K. - I can’t see the entrance being totally flattened, especially not this closed season I’ve always seen this be done as part of the hotel, but improvements to the security queue system to make sure it’s quick and efficient are needed. As Mark says, loggers won’t be open next year we have to be realistic, but some firmer idea or what’s going to happen to it will be nice, same with slammer , Cant see that returning would be nice for it to be removed over closed season but we will see. Some parts of the park need some TLC, the path between Detonator and Stealth is looking pretty worn and needs some paint / repair work, and in general where queue lines have been damaged etc would be good to see them looking nicer. Following on with the audio / queue line tv improvements we’ve seen over the year will be good too, getting some more of the quieter areas of the park fixed etc.

It was open last year but the head in the jar photos were not ready, mid way through this season picsolve seemed to have jars what the photo could fit into, maybe we will see it return next year!

They also had a special "end of season" music loop which played at 4PM yesterday, made up of the track above, the entrance music and X music! Similar for the end of Fright Nights - that Big Top music sounds great played across the whole park!

For all of Ghost Trains issues, i wouldn’t say it’s unpopular. To be fair I don’t think Saw Alive was un-popular either - I think that closed mid way in 2012 when visitor numbers took a bit of a dip, rather than a result of Saw alive being unpopular.

Land behind Swarm I guess would be the most obvious, the area next to it too where sanctum is is surprisingly big too actually - not sure if they could build on it though.

Parks hit capacity tonight - they are also strongly recommending you pre book for Monday and Tuesday if you plan to visit!

No - but i know Thorpe had a number of rides closing / reopening throughout the day due to the high winds, not sure on towers. I know its not an excuse but haven't Blackpool been doing this closing earlier than advertised business for a quite a while now?

Security has changed since I last went, today everyone now had to go through, regardless if you have a bag or not - everyone then goes through a large metal detector in the middle.

They have extra security for Fright Nights, unfortunately theres not a great deak they can do about troublemakers until they actually cause trouble - and only then can they deal with those causing the disruption. Also comparing to Tulleys, whilst i see your point, Thorpes mazes have significantly more people going through them, thus more change of them potentially causing issues.

Nice pictures - quite looking forward to this actually - as you say it’s not going to be incredible but it’s a solid addition to the line up!

I maybe wrong but capex should only in theory affect new investments, budgets for staffing etc wouldn’t come under that 100 million I would guess although that’s not to say there won’t be cuts there. Would be interesting to know the budgets for Capex projects without the 100 million overall.

I agree it seems weird... but then no company would waste money on a very expensive asset if it didn’t feel it could gain maximum revenue from it. It will be interesting to see where these new hotels go, im sure I read they want one at Warwick Castle, Thorpe would be another obvious choice then I guess it would be in Europe as the rest of the parks here seem to have a good amount of accommodation.