James

Hello! A visit this week was the first time I've been to Thorpe for four years which is my longest gap between visits since I started going in 2005 (I lean more towards Alton now) so a few thoughts from me. Some good and bad. Arrival: The absolute state of the security queueing arrangements on the forecourt. Being herded into a cattle pen before you've made it it through the gates is such an unwelcoming to the park. I get why it's needed (sadly) but my god. Park Music: I'm no sound engineer so I don't know how "good" the new set up is from a quality point of view but I thought the new speakers around the park were a welcome additional. I haven't heard WWTP sound so good in the Stealth queue for years. Inferno's queue line sounded decent too. I know a lot of people prefer it but I was so happy to hear the original soundtracks (even stretching back to the 2002 voiceovers on Vortex) instead of the IMA soundtracks. I just wish they'd get Inferno's proper dispatch music back. Park Presentation: The basement in the Dome is quite the glow up from my last visit! Looked really nice, just hope they can keep it that way. The rest of the park seemed in fairly good nick but I really wish they'd put Zodiac out of its misery. If it's staying long term (which I hope it is) please paint it and theme it to how the previous model was! It looks dreadful now. I wish they'd do some proper landscaping on Flying Fish too. Rides: My biggest gripe through is Angry Birds Land. When does the sponsorship end? I can't wait to (hopefully) see Detonator returned to its former self and the clash of themes around the pathway between Tidal Wave and Stealth. Rumba Rapids is such a dull rapids ride, you come off it bone dry and there's no just excitement to it. No theming elements, decoration or even music. I'd like to see revamped with either a volcanic or jungle theme. Just another ride that seems to be sitting in the corner of the park waiting to die. I enjoyed Vortex a lot more than I have previously, I don't know if it's had a proper mechanical overhaul since 2019 or I've just forgotten how it ride but it seemed a lot faster than previously. Probably enough rambling from me. Looking forward to going again and not leaving it as long!

Okay I'm glad you're awake!! 😂

Interesting.

Slammer was an excellent flat ride. There I said it(!).

Not good at all; certainly not a nice thing for everyone to have to witness the aftermath so publically either. I'm sure I'm not the only questioning the effectiveness of Thorpe's security this evening, I can't say I've ever thought their searching was particularly stringent but its not for us to speculate on the circumstances. Wishing whoever's been injured a full and speedy recovery.

Would be nice if they could do something with its down time to make it a ride actually worth its existence but alas.

What are they meant to be playing? I just assumed it was anything goes these days!

We the children are in control, we promise not to play with mind and soul. Our souls belong to our haunted past and with us you will learn promises never last. I think? The mind and soul bit might be wrong. Campaign to have it reinstated? Ohh yus!

Stealth sounded better than I've heard it in years, it was the first time I've been since they fixed the pitch! There were still some dead speakers around the queue line but that wasn't a massive issue. Saying that I nearly died when I saw the queue line TV's actually working?!

It's a shame Colossus was closed for most of the day, it's what I was hoping to get on the most really. (I'm not mad, I just haven't been on it for years!) My experience with the bad weather guarantee wasn't great unfortunately. We only became aware of this by chance when I was scrolling through Twitter on the way out. I was fully prepared to be told no (I'm a MAP holder) but we thought we'd try anyway so off we went to the ticket portacabin in the car park. We were told no as expected but in a not so expected manner - "well people who have paid to come in have had their day ruined." Firstly my annual pass wasn't free, secondly I haven't been for years and the place is a pain to get to for me now so my day has also been slightly ruined by most of the park being shut from 3 onwards. The person serving on the adjacent till piped up and then announced "you're getting nothing". I tweeted the park and they said MAP holders were being issued one free Fastrack ticket for their next visit, pop in and see them next time round (as if they're going to believe me when I reel off this story to them next time I go?). How difficult would it have been for the staff in the ticket portacabin to have told us about the free fastrack? We were let back through the turnstiles to go to guest services under the Dome and they sorted it out immediately having then told us "the people in the ticket office probably aren't aware". Given the park didn't appear to be capable of communicating with a ticket outlet about tickets, I'm not surprised they weren't capable of communicating with guests about the existence of the Bad Weather Guarantee. They've got all these customisable screens everywhere showing Pepperami adverts and the ability to make a park-wide PA announcement, how hard would it have been?

Today was my first visit to Thorpe since the IMA Score audio was introduced. I have to say, having heard it on the CD I'm actually quite disappointed with how it sounded at the park. A lot of the equipment around the park sounded worse for wear but whether or not that's faulty amplifiers or cabling rather than phsyical speakers I don't know. The quality and coverage is all over the place. The Nemesis Inferno station track (which I hadn't heard until today) sounded absolutely fantastic and that was what I was most impressed with. What has happened to all the sound systems on the flat rides though? Rush, Vortex and Detonator had their soundtracks but they were barely audible; Samurai was the complete opposite with the music being so loud it distorts the speakers. Quantum and the Swarm's station just had nothing at all. In terms of park-wide audio it doesn't seem to create a real ambience, for example around the Lost City flats it's not a continuous ambience but more just two speakers which are extremely loud if you're standing right next to them and nothing else. The same for Dome, absolutely booming in the toilets but gentle ambience upstairs. No consistency. Anyone who's ridden Helix at Liseberg should have an appreciation of how much of a difference the audio can have with proper continuous coverage rather than what Thorpe have got. A shame really. Not much point having all these specially composed soundtracks if you've not got a decent sound system to play it on.

I can't help but feel like the CD is a bit of a con / rip-off then. Doesn't particularly fill me with hope for if they ever get round to an Alton Towers CD then seeing as most of their tracks appear to be somewhere between 30 and 70 minutes long.

I've seen on Facebook and Twitter today that people who pre-ordered the IMA CD have received them now. What do people think of it? Is it worth buying? (Asking as someone who's yet to actually hear the tracks on park!)

Have you got a link? I can't see it.

Tequila.

Very pleased to see Stealth is now flying the American flag rather than a Union Jack. Only small detail but nice to see it back the way it should be!

What was the point in Stealth having 3 trains if they're running it 1 when there's a problem with one?

Ah yes, the Beetlejuice theme. I'm sure it was like that most of last season too but I'm rather keen on it so no complaints!

It was playing on Saturday though it was significantly quieter than last year, and was continually being interrupted by the standard Merlin procedure of 'make inaudible live announcements with the microphone in your mouth instead of the perfectly good pre-recorded ones'

Whilst I chose not to ride it having seen the speed of loading / offloading (will wait until later in the year), I did think that from a spectator point of view it looked like a huge improvement on the previous seasons offering for quite some time now.

Apologies if it's already been mentioned but out of curiosity; what's happened to the second train on Colossus? Not sure if I'm imagining it but it doesn't appear to be in the shed (or if it is they've hidden it well). The queue hit 75 minutes on Saturday so it'd surprise me if they voluntarily let it run up a 75 minute queue if there was a second train available. Is it just a case of it not being ready yet?

Really? I don't visit very often now but it still sounds just as high pitched as it did from when they first screwed it up. Lots of dead speakers too.

I had my first ride on X yesterday since the changes this year and despite my love for X:/NWO, I really like the new X. It was fun and it feels a lot more up-to-date now than still trying to flog that old 90's computer-going-mad theme (a bit outdated in 2013). My only issues revolved around the queue line rather the actual ride itself. Would it have really cost much more to have put the arrow shaped LED lighting on the ceiling along the whole corridor rather than just half of it and filling the rest with mirrors? Secondly, one person in the baggage store is not sufficient. Yesterday was a fairly quiet day but we still had to wait 3 or 4 minutes to hand my bag over, the poor lad on his own looked so stressed and rushed trying to do onload and offload with just a 5-10 minute queue so what's it like in summer? Two trains were dispatched empty from the station while we were waiting to hand our bag over too. On top of this, there was 6 people in the Depth Charge information kiosk doing nothing so if they can afford to pay 6 people to do that, then surely they can afford to pay someone to help with baggage claim?

That's what Stealth's queueline TV's originally had playing in 2006. I'm sure it was old footage of Thunder Road Grease-style racing, and drag racing but I'm not sure this lasted beyond the end of the 2006 season. The original queueline video loop must still be knocking around somewhere. I do wish they'd sort WWTP out though because it sounds absolutely atrocious. Am I the only person who's incredibly bothered by the Union Jack being flown on the photo booth's roof?

You can see the lack of restraints quite visibly from the Colossus lift hill. There's a rather large skip next to Slammer now and that's where I'm hoping it'll end up. They could always replace it with Slammer shaped hedges.