Well as I was down visiting old friends and relatives down in Kent, I thought I might as well make the most of my annual pass, and head over to Thorpe for its opening day, but what a disappointing day it was. I don’t usually do long written trip reports, unless it has been a very good, or in this case, bad day, so here goes. Got up early to catch a 6:50 train, with a few stops, got me in to Stains around 9:20, where a chav filled shuttle bus to Thorpe Park awaited. It is a pretty good service, as it only costs £3, and is very regular, but they truly couldn’t pack any more people on that bus. Got to Thorpe Park about 9.35, and realised just how busy it was, which was a surprise as I went this time last year to the park, and it was dead. I felt sorry for the people that had to buy or pick up tickets, because the queue was unbelievably big, as they only seemed to have the building for picking up tickets open, and no kiosks were open, so everyone, no mater if you had bought on-line, or were paying now, had to join this huge queue. Thank god I had a season pass, and could join the relatively small annual pass queue to get in to the park. Unlike most parks who let guest in around half an hour before the rides open, Thorpe park like to keep there guests waiting outside, until the park opens a few minutes late, but they did open with a cheesy start of 2008 season count down which put a smile on my face, but probably didn’t to the people who were standing in the mile long queue as they would probably not get in to the park for another 20, maybe even 40 minutes. I got first public ride of the season on one of my favourite flats, vortex, and then head over to Inferno. When I got to Inferno, I noticed that they were sending empties around. I went over to the entrance, and joined the back of the small queue waiting at the entrance. I asked the staff member why it wasn’t open, and he informed me that the ride couldn’t open, as it was too cold (has to be 5C to open), and this was the reason that Colossus also hadn’t opened, although, they managed to open stealth. Whether this was true or not, I am not sure, because they were sending empties with no problem, and even sending trains with staff members in. also, the fact that Colossus didn’t open until later in the day (probably about 2PM), and that they were sending the train around with test dummies in at about 11.30 suggested that they just didn’t have it ready in time for opening. When Inferno finally opened at about 10.45, I got on the first train of the season, and then went to meet 2 of the people I planed to meet up with. We then headed over to Stealth, which was advertised to have a 45 min queue, so we could do that, and still be in time for the meet up with TPM at 12. Sadly, the queue was actually about 1hr and 10 mins, so we missed the meet up time, and the one member of the forum I had a phone number for didn’t answer his phone, so the 3 of us just went round together. The fact that the queues were reaching 90 mins, and the park didn’t put 2 trains on the coasters, but continued to sell fast pass tickets I thought was disgusting. I went to Alton Towers on the Monday, and Pleasure Beach the Saturday before, and both managed to keep the queues to a minimum (under 10 minutes, or even walk on in a lot of cases) by putting the rides on high capacity. Because Thorpe Park continued to sell fast pass tickets at £3 a pop, it meant that people standing in the normal queue, only got about 10 – 15 people on each train! I actually ended up buying a fast pas for XNWO as it had an 80 min queue, and still had to queue 20 mins!!!! I am glad I did though; as the ride has improved a lot since the last time I rode it. This is the first time since about 03, 04 I have ridden Inferno and Colossus, and all the big coasters together, so I got to compeer them well. Inferno is a lot worse than I remember it, and was a bit of a let down, but it was still good. Colossus was way better than I remembered it, and I had a very good ride on that. Stealth was the same as last year, but I probably enjoyed Colossus more. One ride that scared me sh!tless was Slammer. I have done a sky swat before, back in 2005, but have never done this one before. The thing that made me seared was that the little shoulder bars wobbled quite a bit. I was also disappointed that the music for this ride wasn’t working properly. I left the park at 4, as all the queues were to long, and I couldn’t be bothered anymore. I also noticed that Inferno broke down at the end of the day, and Colossus closed early for no apparent reason. Ride count: Vortex 1Colossus 1Quantum 1Slammer 1Nemesis Inferno 1X:/ no way out 1Stealth 1Good pointes:Doing Slammer for the first timeRiding Inferno and Colossus again after a few years.The food was good in ranger country BBQ (I think it is called), although expensive. Meeting two new nice people.Pretty good staff. Bad points:Rides on low capacity, despite the park being extremely busy, and still selling fast passes. Not meeting up with the wrest of TPM.Being tolled the queue time was 30-45 mins on Colossus, when it was actually 90 mins, and being tolled it was 45 mins on Stealth, when it was actually 70 mins. Detonator not being open (although I knew it wouldn’t be)Having to stand outside the park for it to be opened slightly late. Paying £3 for a fast pass, and still having to wait 20 mins. 2 big coasters opening late.
