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JoshC.

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  1. JoshC.
    The introduction of Thorpe's new maze to Fright Nights this year has been quite a hot topic. Since 'The Passing' was announced, many were left fearing (or, depending on your views, hoping!) that their underwear would be stained brown after going through a maze which puts a bag over your head and simulates your death.
    However, reviews have been mixed, with some feeling as though it is not worth the additional charge, feeling as though there's many wasted opportunities, whilst some - like myself - like the attraction, but do appreciate that there's room for improvement. This entry is all about what exactly I think these improvements need to be, and how Thorpe could go about, realistically, doing this.
    Firstly, the maze's story isn't conveyed well at all I found. There's a brilliant section on the park's site (here: http://www.thorpepark.com/frightnights/?horror=the-passing) which outlines what 'The Passing' is all about, but I want to focus mainly on this section:
    We then couple this in with the maze's tagline, 'It begins with death', and it very well seems as though we are executed and die very early on in the maze.
    The first scene I do like, as you are pretty much read your rights and told that you will be executed. However, a couple of tweaks are needed I think. Firstly, we start the maze off already as guilty - there is no trying of us for our crimes. Perhaps a mention outside the maze during the safety talk could be given, such as "When you enter the maze, you'll be treated as a convicted criminal and have a bag put on your head." This way, it helps tie it all together a little better, and helps make the safety talks, which can sometimes be a bit boring, a bit more interesting (à la Experiment 10). Next off, get rid of the photo bit. Whilst they've tied it in with the maze story a bit, it's just not necessary, is silly penny-pinching in my eyes and just doesn't work. Also, it ruins the feel a bit at the end; after I die, I really hope I don't come across a photo booth selling a photo of my last moments... At a push, I would settle for a compromise in that the photo bit is done in smaller groups (2-3) and serves as a 'prison shot', in a way that would make it act as documentation for official purposes or something. This would not be ideal in my opinion, but if the park really wants it that bad, I think it would just work a bit better.
    Another gripe of mine is the walls in the first couple of scenes. They look very cheap, very quick and very rushed. In honesty, the morgue ones don't even look that realistic (something which I perhaps at first wasn't too concerned by, when the first picture was released, but hated it when I was in there. Moreover, there were others I heard commenting / laughing at it). The thing is, this can be quite easily remedied with a little bit of work. Considering what they're working with in that tunnel, the fake-ness of it really isn't that bad - there's no other alternatives really. However, they can add to it. Body parts stuck onto the wall to make it look like some bodies are 'sticking out' of their drawers, or perhaps even a bigger prop which is meant to represent a body, perhaps of a small child, on a table (meant to represent, in essence, a fully pulled out drawer). It would work well in setting the scene and just be a bit darker then it currently is. Perhaps the latter of these two is a bit unrealistic due to the logistics of the tunnel, but I just feel as though a fake body / body parts will work well there, and can be done quite easily.
    Now then, the actual bags. When I first found out about the maze, my thoughts were that it was going to be a bag that you could not see through at all, but it would only be on for a short period of time. However, I'm glad that this is not the case as I think what we have is more effective. With the darkness around, it is hard to see through the bags; restricting vision I found - for me - to a mere foot or two in front of me. For the entirety of the maze, this becomes disorientating and worrying. I think that the only thing which needs sorting with the bags is the speakers - I think I had troubles with mine in the sense that they moved out of place. I guess this is more just something which needs a bit of a think, so that they always stay in place when they are used. No doubt this is something being sorted out as they go along due to the whole idea being a new concept to the park.
    Now then, the actual simulating of death. First things first, here, I will work on the assumption that the tunnels in the maze signify your burial, the actual 'maze section' is the afterlife where we are tormented for our crimes whilst trying to signify redemption, and the scene post collection the certificate of death shows that no matter what, we will not rest in peace and be tormented for eternity. This seems to be what they are going for, so I'll stick with it. I quite like Maxy's idea that he blogged about, with a firing squad, though I had something much different in mind. I've always thought of being hung as the most gruesome way to be executed, and think there's a chance it could be played with here. As far as I remember, the bags on your head are quite large, and in one way or another, cover your throat to some degree. Personally, I think this could be taken advantage of to 'hang' each person. Unfortunately, my idea would quite probably have to cut the video scene which follows the bag being put on your head. As, for whatever reason, I missed that scene, I don't know significant that scene is, though people do speak about it as a form of highlight I guess, so at the moment, it's a case of leaving it down to those who have experienced it as to whether it would make the overall experience better, or whether the video scene could still be incorporated. Anyway, enough rambling on about that bit, here's my idea:
    The bags are put on our heads in the morgue section, and once everyone has had this done, they are ushered out. Actors then stop you and, put some rope around the bottom of your bag, where you throat is, putting pressure on it so that you know it's there. This would only have to be done for a couple of seconds and, if executed properly (pun not intended!) would not cause any injury and create a real shock.
    Assuming that there are ten people (maximum) in a group, two actors could quite easily do this, with one of them being the one who puts the bag on your head. Hopefully I've explained that the way I'm imagining it, but even if I have, no doubt there'll definitely be concerns about safety / H&S passing it. Whilst I have no knowledge on what H&S would or would not pass it, I would say that there would have to be a mention about it on the safety announcement about it (ie you will have a bag put on your head and be subject to a hanging simulation, but you will not be hurt). Also, the bags would have to cover the person's throat and have sufficient padding, which may require some form of modification to the bags. Whilst I may be dreaming in la-la land here, I do think it is possible to achieve this to some degree, but even if there's not, there needs to be a better way of simulating death, and as previously said, I do like Maxy's idea and that would work well (and be logistically easier, more realistic and quicker than my idea).
    Now then, the tunnels. These are an absolutely brilliant idea and executed very well. As they are, they a brilliant. My only small grumble would be that they perhaps go on for a little too long, which has meant the time in the actual maze section can feel a little short. As I say, only a small grumble, but that can easily be remedied in the maze section itself, and length doesn't have to be everything. Also, are there any smells in the tunnels? I had a cold at the time, which restricted my sense of smell, but I do think a smell in there would be very effective, whether it was of dirt (to signify being buried) or of sweat or something (sweat equating to fear, which is mentioned in the description, and not really being a pleasant smell in itself).
    As for the maze section, many have grumbled about the lack of theming / similarities to Hellgate. However, I don't think it's that bad. Though, I don't think the main maze reaches its full potential. With restricted vision, there's plenty of opportunity for a different type of scare, be it a bit more psychological or utilise your senses of touch / feel. I found myself regularly putting my hands in front of me / on the walls to help guide myself along the way. Now then, if they could in some way make so of the walls unpleasant to touch, or just make it feel 'un-wall-like', it could help create a sense of unease. Then the actors themselves need to take advantage of the fact people's peripheral vision is pretty much cut off. Hiding to the side, tapping people on the shoulder, only to disappear again - there's real opportunity to make people question their senses and make them feel really uneasy, which is when most people will be vulnerable to scares. Again, it's the idea of a psychological scare, making people fear what could happen, as opposed to what is happening - I find that to be the scariest thing. It would also stop scares being too samey, which was one problem I had; it was all too much of a similar scare with each actor. Varying it up a bit will help so much. Another thing which I think could work well in the maze is some an air effect or something similar. It would likely be completely unexpected due to the lack of sight and something which can target the body to make people feel vulnerable all over; after all, when you have a bag over your head, that's what you are most concerned about, as opposed to the rest of your body.
    Now then, the fake ending is great, and should be kept just as it is. As for the bit after it, I'm really not sure what is best for that bit. Personally, I think it needs to be a bit longer actually, in that you go past the UV lights, then go through a bit which is quite dark, then a corridor which gets darker and darker, before reaching a 'dead end'. This would be a great chance for an actor to create a scare, and perhaps even a lighting effect or something could be utilised. Personally, I think if the photos were scrapped, the maze / post-certificate section could be made slightly longer, which can only be a good thing.
    So, that's pretty much it. I did like 'The Passing' on my visit, though naturally, being a new venture for Thorpe, it was always going to need some work. Hopefully the maze continues to improve this Fright Nights, as by the sounds of it, it had improved from the first weekend to the second weekend, when I went, and that it becomes a regular addition to Fright Nights which improves and becomes a solid addition.
  2. JoshC.
    This is a blog entry that relates to the hot topic of Fastrack and Fastrack sales. So why's it in here, and not in that topic?
    The aim here is to illustrate how Fastrack sales affect the main queue of a ride, and demonstrate what many bring up - those who pay for the premium service (Fastrack) negatively affect the service of those who do not pay for such a service (those who use the main queue). Unfortunately, this will be quite mathematically thought out, will ramble on a bit, and uses many assumptions, but nonetheless, it will show just how bad Fastrack can affect the main queue.
    Example - The Swarm
    I've decided to use The Swarm as an example to demonstrate this point. Why? Simply put, I think there's enough information to be able to show the point.
    So, first thing first, where am I getting any information from? Well, the following photo from TTP was taken from the Swarm Behind the Scenes event in April:

    The main and Fastrack queues illustrated in this plan seem to resemble that of the real queue lines, so I'll assume that these are the same. As can be seen in the top right corner, there's a bit of rough information about the queues. The main queue is 450m long, and should take 90 mins, whilst the Fastrack queue is 75m long and should take 15 mins (these are presumably guestimates). Strangely, we can see that the Fastrack queue and the main queue have the same length-queue time ratio, in that 5m takes 1 minute to queue. Presumably this would mean the guestimates given don't include the main queue and Fastrack queue working co-currently; in other words, a full main queue would taken 90 mins with no Fastrack whatsoever. The theoretical throughput, again taken from TTP, is 1100pph.
    So then, by the guestimates the park has made, a full queue which takes 90 mins will hold 1650 people (in theory). If we divide this down, we find that 28 people, which is a full train, are in (84/11)m of a queue, to be quite precise.
    Okay, now this is where I have to make a perhaps strange or unrealistic, to a slight degree, assumption. However, for the ease of calculations, and the fact this is only a rough example, it will have to do. So, I will assume that, on average, at any given point, the Fastrack queue is 2/5 full. So, perhaps confusingly, this would according to above information, only be a 6 minute queue - IF there was no main queue. Yeah, sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?
    Anyways, being 2/5 full, this adds and extra 30m worth of queue, if we were to literally 'plonk' these people in the queue. So, being 2/5 full, there are (28)*(30)/(84/11)=110 people using the Fastrack queue. Again, unsure of the realism of this, as I don't particularly pay close attention to how many people are in the Fastrack queue, but I think this seems like a reasonable number in my opinion.
    Of course, we would not expect the park to send trains' worth of Fastrack guests round at any one go; it is ridiculous for that to happen. So then, we need to create a form of ratio for the number of main queue guests let in to Fastrack guests let in. Now, I don't know if this is how the park operates it - I'd hope it is something like this though - or what sort of ratio they would use, if they use it. This means I'd have to make a guess, but I'll work out two cases, which are a couple I've mentioned in the Fastrack topic.
    Say we work on the basis of 3:1 (main queue : Fastrack queue). In other words, a quarter of the train is made up of Fastrack guests. (NOTE: This would mean 7 people per train, which seems unrealistic, as most people will be going in even numbered groups, but bare with me). Assuming a linear correspondence to this and the throughput, the 'throughput' of the main queue will be 825pph (three-quarters of 1100). Again, I'll assume that we are in a full queue. So, in the space of 90 mins, a person would move 337.5m (which is three-quarters of the queue length). In another 30 mins, you'd move the remaining 112.5m. So then, if just a quarter of guests are Fastrack users, this adds an extra 30 minutes to a full queue. Following some additional calculations, which I can't be bothered to write up here, I can confirm that if a quarter of each ride is made up of Fastrack guests, the queue time of the main queue increases by a third.
    I'll cut this second case a bit short, but if we work on the basis of 4:1, a full queue would take 112.5 mins (again, to be quite precise). Again, a couple more calculations confirm that if a fifth of the train is made up of Fastrack guests, the main queue time will increase by a quarter.
    Personally, I've always felt that these two ratios are reasonable amounts to satisfy Thorpe's need for money, which is understandable, whilst creating a balance so Fastrack users get their premium service which they've paid for without creating too much hassle for guests. However, this is still quite a large inconvenience for ordinary guests, and it certainly surprised me. This does show how not only does Fastrack offer a premium service, it DOES give a negative effect to those who do not offer such a service.
    Overselling and Sales
    So, now time to see just how many tickets Thorpe could sell according to this. Let's take a 10-5 day, which would probably be expected to be a reasonably quiet day. Say that the Fastrack sales have time slots from 11am until 4:30pm (half an hour in each slot). This gives 5 and a half hours of the 7 hour day where Fastrack is available.
    Taking the first example of 1/4 of each Swarm train being for Fastrack guests, this would mean that a quarter of all guests who ride Swarm in an hour will be Fastrack guests - which is expected to be 275. Multiply that by 5.5 (number of hours in the day where Fastrack is used) and we get 1512.5, round to 1512 for simplicity. This would mean that there's 1512 Fastrack tickets up for sale in a 10-5 day. I don't really know about gate figures or the like, but if we say that there's between 8000 and 10000 guests on such a day, about 15-20% of guests will use Fastrack to get on The Swarm. Reasonable? Again, I'm really not sure, but I was expecting a figure around 10-20%, so I would say so.
    Now then, there are of course many issues with this, which I'll explain a bit more in a bit. However, there's the issue of implementing this is reality - it is unrealistic to assume you'll be able to shift the same number of tickets per hour all day, every day. I believe Fastrack works on a half-an-hour basis, so this means that there's about 137-138 tickets for each of these slots, (which is just over the above assumption that at any given time, on average, the Fastrack queue is 2/5 and has 110 guests waiting). No doubt it's possible to think that, time slots will be more popular and others less popular, which could possibly lead to there being more slots designated to the popular periods of the day, and less to the quieter periods. It does mean that we could easily see a queue time increase by 40% (which, to reiterate the long running point, would mean the main queue for Swarm would be nearly 130 mins - over 2 hours - when it would only be 90 mins with no Fastrack at all...). Another issue, which has been pointed out in the Fastrack topic, is time slots and how they are kept to, or rather how they are not. Say a 'popular' time slot is 1pm, and many people missed their half-12 slot because of eating lunch, waiting for their lunch to go down, had the intention of going at 1 anyway or whatever, a Fastrack queue which can increase a queue time by 40%, can easily increase it by even more. Okay, I'm belabouring on the point here,
    Ways to Solve?
    So, this is where the blog becomes rather similar to the post in the Fastrack topic. Before I carry on, I'd like to say that with the two ratios I looked at, 3:1 and 4:1 Main Queue-Fastrack Queue (ie, a quarter and a fifth of the train full of Fastrack guests), we're looking that on average, about 6 Fastrack guests per train for Swarm. In turn, this will increase the queue by about 3/10, such that a full queue line will approximately take nearly 2 hours, 117 mins to be precise, as opposed to 90 mins. The idea that 6 people per ride are Fastrack guests is a little on the conservative side in my mind in my opinion.
    One way to solve it would be to increase prices and decrease the availability of tickets. This way, the park still make money a plentiful with Fastrack, and will not lose out on cutting tickets. Again, using Swarm as my example, if instead of having 1512 tickets, it went to 1000 (again, to make life easy when doing calculations). So, this cuts the tickets available by a third, meaning we have about 92 tickets available for each slot. Cost-wise, at the moment, if everyone bought a Swarm Fastrack (again, to make life easy, let's just assume there's no front-row Fastrack and all tickets are £5), then 1512 tickets in a day would create just over £7560. If we cut tickets by a third, and raise the cost by £1 (a fifth), meaning people would pay £6 for one Fastrack, which no doubt people will willingly pay, they earn about £6000, losing £1560. Now, I guess one great thing for the parks is Fastrack will pretty much be all profit - ticket printing costs are low, and it won't require many, and in some cases, any, extra staff on rides. So, I'd assume that what is quite a large change in money earnt won't stop profits, just decrease them. However, I'd be quite confident in saying that if the park were to advertise 'Fastrack tickets are limited all day and certain time slots sell out quick!' or something, people will happily part with their money even if the cost has gone up and, dare I say, I think the same would happen if a Swarm Fastrack cost £7.
    A couple of other options would be to implement just one of these without the other; either just outright increase prices, or outright decrease availability. The former of these two options means more money for Merlin, but possibly less people willing to pay if it's not as premium as they expect (ie - having to pay a large-ish amount to queue for a period of time which they'd judge as not worth the additional cost). However, we have seen prices slowly creep up over the years, and I believe that this will continue and prices will naturally get a bit more expensive, especially with the packages. The latter of the two means a full out decrease in profits for Merlin, which in terms of a company, is a bad thing. Not to say that they would never do it, but I can't see it being considered, or considered to a degree such that it would be noticed.
    A different and, in my eyes, most sensible and realistic idea would be to be stricter with the time slots. I guess Fastrack tickets have half an hour time slots, and it states on the ticket 'To be used within 30 minutes of the time printed on this ticket'. Yet, by the sounds of it, as long as you arrive after your time, it's fine. Why not actually enforce such a thing? Well tickets are sold, tell the guests verbally 'You have to use it within 30 mins of the time printed or you can't use it' and print it on the ticket, along with 'no refunds'. That way, they still make their money, and people have been warned - surely unless there's a valid reason for missing it (stuck on a ride, breakdown extending queue length and so forth), it's not the park's fault, so why should they have to refund it? The issue is of course people aren't always great with time management, especially if they've never visited a park before, so this may be a bit harsh / need refining.
    Another thing I'll briefly mention is the Fastrack packages. How exactly do they work? Is there a specific time slot for them and how does that work? Maybe they can designed so that they're as strict to times as possible, whilst still giving enough lee-way? I really can't comment much on this, and can't think of much to say seeinghow I've never had any experience with the way the packages work.
    So, that is that. Fastrack has a negative effect on the main queue line - fact. However, there's an issue with everything that I've gone through. I've been concerned with the queue length, queue time, etc. of the main queue, but mentioned nothing about how long the Fastrack queue will actually take. This is something I won't actually try to work out at this stage, but may do it at a later date. However, if it turns out that this leads to the Fastrack queue being not-so-fast, then all of this is pretty much...complete twaddle and everything I've modelled would need refining. I'll also point out again that I've made many assumptions here for the sheer ease of calculating this, so there will be things such as 'Hey, that's unrealistic, that would never happen', but hey-ho, life carries on..
    Thanks for reading this and hope I haven't been babbling on about complete rubbish all the time. As said, if anyone sees any mistakes / problems with this, just say, as I may well have made a silly mistake somewhere. For now, that is well and truly that!
  3. JoshC.
    Whilst this entry may seem technically coaster related (and, in a way, is), the core idea about the blog isn't, so I'm giving this blog a bit more love...
    For my university course, one module I've had to take is Geometry and Motion, with the key element of the module being to learn about curves. Each week, we're given assignments (which count towards our final grade) which consists of multiple questions. In last week's assignment, the final question was this:

    Simply put, we were asked to sketch out a line representing a roller coaster, and give equations for the various segments. This had to be shown in 3D on the paper; basically show where the 'track' goes behind / in front of itself. There was no need for it to make mechanical sense / being realistic in any other way, as the point of the question was to have the roller coaster lines as an equation in terms of time (so that at any given time, it would show the 'coordinates' of where the track would be).
    Of course, this doesn't have to be wholly difficult. In theory, the question can be answered by giving the equation of a vertical loop (due to the need for the 'fun feature') and then a circle to join itself back to the beginning (which, in terms of what we have been taught, is straightforward). This wasn't the general case, with many that I spoke to going for the idea of a lift and drop, with a spiral or two, vertical loop and some general straight lines to join it all together. Others went for a much more basic layout, but instead focused on a variety of different 3D sketches.
    "But where's the fun in that?" I thought to myself, when I was thinking about the assignment. Being interested in coasters as I am, to be able to do something like this should be great fun. Only having a week to do this, along with the other questions on the assignment and general life, I didn't spend that a lengthy period of time in roller coaster terms (as in, you can spend multiple hours in creating coasters in RCT or No Limits), but I probably spent about 8-9 hours during the week on the question. In terms of how long I would spend on other questions (or even whole assignments!) that is extremely large.
    Like with any 'creative' project I would do, I jotted down ideas quickly as they came into my head. Rough layouts, fun features, anything where I thought 'Oh, that would be great', I would jot it down as quickly as possible, maybe even draw quick sketches of what I had in mind. When it came to actually doing it though, it seemed as though I had been hugely over-ambitious, with a lot of ideas I had thought out just being too difficult to achieve in the set time period. Many fun elements I had considered, such as a variety of different elements, 'beyond-vertical' drops and such were more complicated to create equations for than originally anticipated. One thing which was feasible, however, were interlocking loops, inspired by the roller coaster 'Loch Ness Monster' at Busch Gardens Williamsburg.

    However, I decided to put my own little twist on it, and instead combine a vertical loop with a helix (which, in this case, was basically a horizontal loop, to have different 'fun elements'). I don't know if a roller coaster(s) in the world features an element similar to that, but I wouldn't be surprised either way.
    So then, I had my fun element, which was pretty much the key feature to the ride and the design. Combine that with a lift hill (pretty standard), a vertical drop (because that's so much easier than anything else!), airtime hill / 'bunny hop' and a couple of other bits and bobs to connect it all together and I had my coaster...visualised in my head. A few sketches later and I worked out how exactly it would look, and when the track went in front / behind itself. Now came the fun part - actually working out the equations of the coaster.
    Following the hint from the question, I split the 'track' into several different sections, thirteen in fact, to make it easier to create equations. Owing to the need to plot it onto a '3D graph', I started the track at the origin, and went from there. The beginning was relatively straightforward, basically being combined of multiple straight lines / easy curves, and due to the easy numbers, it wasn't difficult to 'stick' the curves together so that they were continuous. The first real challenge came in the creation of the 'loop de loop', as it needed to be of suitable height and width to allow for the helix to easily go through it later on. After lots of thought, and playing about with the Maths program Matlab, I eventually got there.

    A screenshot of the 'vertical loop' produced using Matlab, including the equations of the curve and the 3D graph produced.
    One thing which may be worth noting here is how the loop is circular. Whenever you look at roller coasters, these loops are by no means circular - all such loop de loops are actually clothoid loops; basically meaning the radius increases as you get further to the top of the loop. Whilst I originally tried to recreate this, it was a bit too difficult to achieve in the time period (the usual reason..)
    After a bit more playing about with equations, it got to the stage of the helix. This was much more challenging than expected, due to the need for the track to be carefully positioned before it started to ensure the actual equation for the helix, which was already somewhat scary-looking, was not even more complicated. Generally, it took a lot of hard work and thought procedure, and when I ended up creating it, I realised that the helix was going upwards, not downwards, making it the most mechanically inaccurate section in my opinion. But, it was there, and the mechanical sense was not a necessity, so I decided to leave it. A long straight section follows, which in real terms would probably consist of a twist or something, but minute details such as that could be left out for the sake of the question, as it would have added extra complexity to the equations. Basically, what I just said is that it's a straight line, but pretend it isn't..
    This was then pretty much the end of the circuit. The numbers were getting more and more complicated, so a quick and simple finish was required really. Basically I wanted to scrap the evil-looking numbers and get it over with. Had I taken more care with the numbers earlier on and thought about the equations' knock on effects to later ones, I could have added in a spiral or something as a 'big finale', but alas, an easy finish it ended up being. So, a few straight lines to act as drops and curves, and we were done.

    So then, that's pretty much the roller coaster I designed. This isn't actually the final design, as the submitted one had markings for each section, to correspond to the given equation, and the section between the turnaround on the far right hand side and the helix should only be diagonal line (I drew it incorrectly in this sketch..). Hopefully once I get my assignment back sometime in the next week, I can scan up to finished sketch and the equations for anyone interested.
    As you have probably got from this, I had a real feel of designing something which was as mechanically accurate as possible, in the sense that if you were to build this, the train would make its way around the track. I think that the final design would be possible (though maybe with a bit of help from a quick launch mid-way through), so that's a positive. In second year, there is 'Second Year Essay' that needs to be done, which basically is a project around a section of Maths that is of interest to the person. If it is allowed, I would most certainly be interested in extending this idea further, to simply just use geometry and equations to design, or recreate, a roller coaster, which is mechanically accurate, safe to ride, and has equations / expressions to find things such as the speed, force, acceleration and so forth at any given point during the roller coaster.
    Any questions or comments would be greatly appreciated!
  4. JoshC.
    Better late than never ey? I've condensed down this entry so that it's easier for me to write / more people read it / I actually decide to write it...
    With Baron already ridden, and 2 full days (10-8) at Efteling left, we knew we'd be able to take our time with the park, and were in no rush to do anything straight away. We covered the whole park easily within those two days, and had plenty of time to reride our favourites too. So, to cut to the chase, I adored Efteling. I wasn't expecting to love it as much as I did, as usually the fairytale thing isn't always my 'thing', but I just loved the place. From the rides, to the ride themes, to just the general setting and atmosphere of the park - it's all just beautiful and brilliant. I won't go through both days extensively like I did with the other days, but just touch on some stand out attractions to me...
    Vogel Rok, the park's indoor coaster, was surprisingly fab, mixing a fun layout, with nice theming and effects, and pretty cool onboard audio too (and you don't realise just how loud it is until you get back into the station!). Solid ride.


    Whilst Vogel Rok was an instant hit for me, Droomvlucht left me a bit unsure after my first go. Droomvlucht is an awesomely themed dark ride with a great story and neat finale. But after my first go, I was left a bit unsure what to think of it; I could really appreciate the theming and everything, but the ride didn't leave me with as big a smile as everyone else in the group. I'm not too sure why; I think it might have been because it was one of the first rides we did on our first day there, and I still hadn't got into the proper fairytale mindset (if that makes sense). I enjoyed it more on the second day, but again, still not as much as everyone else. I can really appreciate it as a ride, and do think it is a great attraction, but I guess it's just not really my cup of tea..

    Had a mighty impressive entrance though!
    Sticking to the dark ride theme, Villa Volta - the park's madhouse - was a ride that left me a bit disappointed. The ride itself was actually great and I really enjoyed it, but one thing which really ruined the overall experience for me was the doors. You could easily see that there were two sets of doors to the ride area when they opened and closed, and it spoils the illusion completely for me. Maybe because this was my 4th madhouse in 5 days I was subconsciously looking for flaws, but it's just a shame really, as it did let the experience down for me a bit.

    To round off my noteworthy dark rides from Efteling, I'd have to mention Fata Morgana, the absolutely fab boat ride. The sets, theming and effects are just outstanding, and I really was blown away by the quality of it!
    The park's headline show, Raveleijn, has clearly had a pretty penny Euro spent on it. It's a good show, and it was easy enough to follow the plot despite the language barrier. Some real top quality effects used as well. But at times, it felt like there was just too much going on, and you just didn't know where to look. Maybe not necessarily a bad thing to some people, but it just felt like too much was being crammed in at times.

    Turning attentions to a couple of the more thrilling rides the park has to offer, the first ride we headed to was De Vliegende Hollander (aka Flying Dutchman). This water coaster was beautifully themed (naturally) and had a decent outdoor section to go with it. Unfortunately, much like Supersplash at Plopsaland, I found the actual coaster somewhat uncomfortable, which is a shame. The thoughts of the discomfort have stayed with me almost as much as the amazing effects, theming and atmosphere inside the attraction, so it's just a bit of a shame. I did really enjoy it, and did it a couple of times of course, but the discomfort just stops it from being a truly magnificent ride for me.




    The park's duelling GCI woodies, Joris en de Draak, were much more of an overall hit with me however. The layouts of both the coasters are brilliant fun with some good airtime moments. I do like how the coasters do actually 'race' as well, with the winner being announced and everything. Originally, we thought it was fixed to some degree (as we were seeing alternate sides winning), but it does seem to be a true race? Of the two sides - fire and water - I slightly preferred the fire side, just because it seemed to have slightly better airtime. I also enjoyed the theming for the ride, including a fully animatronic, fire-breathing dragon, though I guess it's a bit of a shame you don't really notice it on ride.
    (As a side note...After being treated to brilliant rides on Troy as well, it was hard to tell which woodie I preferred. I think if you had asked me after my first day at Efteling, I'd have said Troy. However, after my second day, I would have to say Joris; it's just got sheer fun and joy factor in its side!).


    The other attractions on park are a bit of a mixture. I enjoyed Piraña, the park's rapids, but then rides like Python (Vekoma looping coaster), Carnival Festival (carnival-themed dark ride) and Bob left no impression on me other than disappointment unfortunately. Some of the other filler rides are fun though. Worst attraction in the park goes to Spookslot, a completely random 'show' which was laughable for all the wrong reasons. The Fairytale Forest area, however, was absolutely fantastic - we spent a good couple of hours walking round on our second day! Also loved the Aquanura fountain show; fantastic way to end the day.

    The only good thing about Python is the signage.



    Fairytale Forest is full of characters.
    And, because I love it so much, just one final word about Baron. Despite the lengthy queues during our visit for it, I ended up riding it 5 times. I guess that it speaks volumes about how much I enjoyed it that I was happy to wait up to an hour for it when other rides on park had 10 minute queues, and even leave the rest of the group to join the single rider queue whilst they did other rides..



    Overall Efteling thoughts: Like I said at the beginning, I adored Efteling, perhaps more than I thought I would. Genuinely somewhere that I just love and can't wait to go back to.
    ---
    Leaving Efteling was a hard thing to do, and after having dinner at the Bosrijk restaurant, we left and set our sights back to Belgium. We arrived at our last hotel of the trip just before 11pm, and fortunately was only 10 minutes away from Bobbejaanland.. Though more on that park next time...
  5. JoshC.
    Yeah, I'm doing this thing again. It's my 5th season doing a 'season review', and it's interesting seeing not only how the park has changed, but also how my general views of the park have changed, in that time. Here's some links to 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014's reviews if you're interested. This entry will be a lot less photo-heavy than the rest, mostly because I've taken less pictures this season, so I'll try and keep the writing to a minimum too. With the boring points out of the way, "prepare for Detonation"...
    New for 2015 - I'm a Celebrity "Maze"
    At this stage last year, it seemed likely that nothing new would be added. But in February, the announcement of the IAC maze came about, and well, when I first heard about it, I'll admit, I laughed. I thought it was a joke. And even after it set in that it was actually happening, I was a bit sceptical. But at the same time, I had a lot of hope - I could see the potential there, and that it could be something quite different and fun; features which were desperately lacking at Thorpe.
    Throughout the season, IAC has been a mixed bag. Even though not all the effects were working (and some planned effects never came to fruition), it was good fun and had a smile on my face all the way through. One of the great things about it was how plenty of little tweaks could be done, keeping the attraction fresh for regulars, whilst still being fun for newcomers. However, towards the end of the season, it became a bit flat. Less effects, scenes skipped and less coherency. Maybe it's because of the numerous run-throughs that I feel like that, or maybe it really did go down in quality; it's hard for me to say.
    All in all, IAC isn't a bad investment. It fills a gap that Thorpe were missing, and has some great quality theming. It has a bad throughput (though one that isn't far off the demand it will have in future seasons I expect), and won't last more than a few seasons, and the money invested in it could have been better spent elsewhere. But for the time being, it's a neat little side attraction.

    Looks pretty at night.

    Minimalist queue line theming.

    A very unflattering photo of me as King of the Jungle.
    New for 2015 - Other Stuff
    In terms of general improvements, touch ups, etc., there isn't exactly much new to speak of. The refurb of Bar 360 to Fin's Bar and Grill was fantastic; with a nice general atmosphere and good food to go with it. It's nice to see things begin to link together, with the Shark Hotel, Fin's and the bits of island / shark theming in the Dome have created some consistency in the park's main hub - I'd just like to see more of it!
    Other than that, there wasn't much of note. A few bits and bobs got a bit of cleaning up (Depth Charge submarine, Stealth signage, Swarm billboard, etc), which is nice to see. A name change to the BBQ to try and push IAC a bit more, and a couple of new game stalls moved about, showing that on the whole, this season really was low key.


    What a difference a year makes (thanks Thorpe!).

    New Swarm billboard, which should hopefully last a lot longer too!
    Birthday Celebrations!
    The S&S duo turned 10 this season, a birthday I'm sure many of us thought at one point or another Slammer wouldn't reach. In fairness, Slammer did have a good 4 and a bit months of pretty much continuous, day-to-day, operation this season, which hasn't always been the case in recent seasons. And it did manage to make it to the last day of the season, even if it did have its Fright Nights rest. But still, we're talking about a ride which opened over 2 months late, had to close every day for engineering checks, isn't exactly very popular and can't be trusted as far as you could proverbially throw it. Thorpe must be commended for keeping it for so long and such, but surely it's almost time to give up the ghost.
    Rush, on the other hand, is still swinging all the time, but seems to still be troubled with out-of-time swings and short cycles. It feels like both of these things should be sorted, and shouldn't have been a trouble for so many seasons now. One can only hope that this is sorted...

    Still Slammin'...just.
    The Coasters
    Not much to say here on the whole, since my opinions on the coasters haven't changed that much really. I guess the long-standing issue of reduced operations should be mentioned, with specific mention to Colossus and X starting the season off on reduced capacity for quite a while now. I always feel like Thorpe shoot themselves in the foot when they say 1 train op is down to 'lack of demand', as it feels like a kick in the teeth to anyone waiting in those queues which can be up to 45 minutes in my experience.
    Saw's extended period of closure following the Smiler incident was also a big hit for the park too. From an operational standpoint, it didn't seem like queues were affected that much by it, but I guess the decrease in guest numbers would also explain that.

    Random summer stuff happening by Stealth.

    Colossus saw a lick of paint...in some places.
    Other Rides
    I'll keep this short and sweet, since there isn't really much to say. Samurai died again, but was resurrected (again). Rumba Rapids still needs a lot of TLC. Tidal Wave closed early, and whilst the ride itself isn't missed in the line up, the area feels distinctly lacking without the crashing of a wave every few minutes. Vortex also died for a what felt like a good couple of months.
    This seems to be a problem Thorpe will face in the very near future. Some of the filler rides are becoming less reliable, even less popular and lack the general appeal in the modern theme park environment Thorpe are trying to create. One does have to wonder how long it will be before we see some of the bigger name rides removed...

    Samurai just about existing.

    This nice themed bench appeared by Teacups. It lasted a couple of days before being removed due to damage. But it did return, fully fixed!

    Storm Surge makes a mess as usual.
    February Half Term
    For the first time since 2009, Thorpe opened its doors in February. With a very small ride line up, a large Brainiac show and some small Brainiac stalls set up around the park, it was an interesting idea, and perhaps a slightly risky one given how the previous events went down. I unfortunately didn't attend because of uni stuff, but on the whole, it sounded alright, but it was still a case of the park not being ready for such an event yet.
    For something like this to be successful, you need a show or two, a couple of indoor attractions and a mixture of rides, from major to minor ones. The event just didn't have enough of this. Hopefully, in a couple more years, the park will be ready to have another, more successful, shot at this. I'm not surprised that it's not returning for 2016 in all honesty.
    Easter?
    No Easter event this season was a disappointment. They seemed to be onto a winner with last season's event, and it would make sense to push Angry Birds every Easter in my opinion. But yet, we had nothing. Lack of budget, maybe? Who knows. A shame really, but let's hope they can do something for 2016...
    Island Beats / Summer Nights
    8 weeks of live music acts, including some big-ish names, at a theme park with interspersed with late-closings. It sounds like something which could really work at Thorpe. And with over 70 acts performing, including some established names and some up-and-comers (including Louisa Johnson, this year's X Factor winner!) it feels like something which had to work.
    However, it just didn't seem to do the trick. Maybe there wasn't enough marketing? Maybe there wasn't enough interest in visiting theme parks in general? Maybe it was just too confusing? Maybe the two just don't mix? I don't know. But Island Beats just didn't seem to work for the park, and it strikes me as a lot of time, money and effort for something which just ultimately wasn't worth it. It'll be very interesting to see what happens next summer.
    On the other hand, Summer Nights had a successful third season - let's hope that it not only continues, but also grows.


    Fright Nights
    I sometimes think people forget just how huge Fright Nights is, and how, theoretically, it is brilliant value for money if scare attractions are something that interest you. You get 5 free attractions (some of which are quite different to your run-of-the-mill scare attractions), with the option of a 6th one to pay for, along with roaming actors and general change in atmosphere. There's few places which offer the quantity that Thorpe offer, especially when you consider how little they raise their prices compared to non-FN days.
    This season saw a very clear shift away from the Lionsgate partnership, which is a shame. It could have been used so much more than it was. Instead, we had the clown-focus (which, in fairness, was good), along with Big Top, which was far too inconsistent. It was an ambitious maze for Thorpe, but ultimately they just couldn't find the sweet spot. Containment was also new, and was pretty good on the whole, but just marketed as way too scary for what it is.
    For me, Blair Witch was the best attraction all in all, and I do hope that we see Thorpe continue to use that route in the future. I also loved Face it Alone once again, and it's great to see Thorpe pushing boundaries even further. I was disappointed at the lack of overnight experience this year though - was planning on trying it out this season!
    It'll be interesting to see the direction taken next season, especially since the Lionsgate partnership is rumoured to be done. And with the overhaul Scarefest saw this season, Thorpe do need to consider upping their game once more.

    My post Face it Alone face...
    Reserve n Ride
    RnR happened again this year, with some much-needed improvements to previous years. On a personal level, I thought the system worked great and still believe that if properly implemented, could be the way forward for Thorpe.
    However, it might seem that Thorpe themselves disagree. Given that trials were planned to take place during the entirety of Fright Nights (and rumours of it even being trialled in September too), but didn't, would suggest some concerns internally. Whether they simply did not want to risk it after a bad season, wanted to change it, or had just lost faith in the system is anyone's guess. But after the plug being pulled, I am somewhat doubtful we will see the return of RnR next year..

    RnR advertising was subtle, meaning no one knew about it...
    (Please make sure the screen doesn't break again for so long Thorpe!)
    Food and Merchandise
    Not much to say on the food front, since essentially all my meals were eaten in the aforementioned Fin's Bar this season. Was nice to FINALLY see the Freestyle machines introduced on park, even if it is a shame that it is one unit, by the front of park, and only opened on peak days. Hopefully this can be the beginning of them being rolled out across park though..
    Merchandise was once again good this season, as seems to be the case with all the Merlin parks. A nice variety of things, and it was good to see them trial limited edition stock in Fright Nights and WC16 merch. Given how quickly some of the FN stuff sold out, I expect we'll see an even bigger range next season too.


    Fin's, as done by Scruffy Dog.

    Freestyle pricing.
    VIP Experiences
    This season, I did coaster climbs on both Colossus and Inferno. These are truly great experiences and something I would roughly recommend people looking into! They are on the pricey side, yes, but as with all things Merlin, there's always going to be an offer on them at one point or another; so jump on them if you see them.
    What I find a bit novel about my experiences were the different weather conditions - I did Colossus on a very cold, windy March day, and Inferno on a very wet August one (so both very different to be sunny Swarm experience in 2014). It made for all the experiences to be very different in more ways than one!


    These experiences are JoshC. approved.
    Loggers Leap - RIP?
    After many rumours circulating, Thorpe confirmed via Twitter that Loggers Leap wouldn't open in the 2016 season. However, it isn't clear if this closure is permanent or not. It's hard to know what to believe at the moment, but in any case, the closure of Loggers seriously dents the 'fun for all' ride quota at Thorpe. Fingers crossed that, whatever is happening, we're not left without a log flume for too long...
    A Look Ahead
    WC16. Simply put, WC16 has to be a success. It has to draw in the crowds and it has to be a well received attraction. If it's not, then I am genuinely worried how badly Thorpe could be affected in the future. What would be the point in throwing large amounts money at Thorpe if it doesn't pay off, especially when Merlin are trying to minimise the aftermath of the Smiler incident?
    Personally, I'm still not "excited" for the attraction, since I struggle to get excited over something I know nothing about. However, I'm intrigued by it all, and do really look forward to trying it out, whatever 'it' is.
    As for everything else... Well, I have no doubt we'll see the odd touch ups around the park, nothing special, just the standard little bits they've done in recent closed seasons. I'd really like to hope that this is the season they bring back themed areas too. But I would like to see it done right, rather than the park just slapping names to sections of the park, so I wonder if it's a bit too much to ask?
    A Personal Touch
    As some on here will know, last year I had a brother join me in this funny old world. So, back in March, at a mere 5 months old, my baby brother went on his first trip to Thorpe. Not quite as soon as me (Thorping since I was 6 weeks old, oh yeah), but still a good start...

    Just a shame the Carousel couldn't have stuck round a little while longer for his first Thorpe ride!
    And that's about it. Unsurprisingly, I said I'd keep things short and I haven't; oh well. Thanks for reading!
  6. JoshC.

    BelGerAnd2 - Holland

    By JoshC.,

    Walibi Holland was the only new-for-me park of the trip, and there were two obvious draws for visiting:  the new Mack coaster Lost Gravity, and Goliath, the Intamin mega coaster.  We seemed to get lucky with our visit, as the park was very quiet, and we didn't queue over 15 minutes for anything if memory serves me correctly.  Overall impressions of the park are quite mixed for me; there's some great attractions around the park (and of higher quality to Walibi Belgium's offerings), but there's still a fair amount of trash about that makes it difficult to praise the overall park too much.  Anyways...
     
    Xpress:  Platform 13
    Located by the main entrance to the park, but before the 'containment gates' into the main bulk of the park, this opened up at least 15 minutes before the park opened.  And my god, this was a massive gem, probably the biggest surprise of the whole trip.  The coaster itself is almost a clone of Rock n Roller Coaster (I haven't done RnRC myself, but that'll not doubt give some indication to the quality of the coaster to those who have done it).  But the reason for this standing out so much was because of the atmosphere in the queue line.  Themed around a mystery train disappearance, the queue line feels exactly like an abandoned train station, and features plenty of scares, a creepy atmosphere, surprises and excellently themed sets along the way.  Dare I say, the queue line is a better scare attraction than many scare mazes that the UK theme parks produce at Halloween!  
     

    An unassuming entrance
     
    Lost Gravity
    With surprise opening out of the way, we headed over the Lost Gravity, which opened shortly after the 10am opening.  Words cannot really describe this ride.  Whoever designed this must have been high on a cocktail of drugs, but they've managed to create a ride which chucks together loads of random, somewhat incoherent, ideas, and makes it work for a fun ride.  The queue is weird and features a couple of wtf moments, the theming is odd, the effects make no sense (including the huge flamethrower effect which makes even the staff jump as there's no rhythm to it going off).  The ride itself - first drop is fab, airtime hills are fab.  The top hat thing is weird.  The second half of the ride is really slow and killed by the MCBR, but at the same time, is still alright.  I definitely think the outer-left seat is going to give the best ride experience.  
     
    All in all, this attraction makes no sense at all, but is still a fun little thing.  It's nothing *special*, but definitely a great concept, and hopefully more parks invest in Mack BigDippers in the future...
     
     

    The top hat looks very square from this perspective...
     

    Escalator theming the queue because...reasons?
     
    Goliath
    The main thing I remember about Goliath is how painfully obvious this was a ride from the Six Flags era.  No theming, awful-looking queue, no audio in the surrounding around, unimaginative name, awkward location.  That's not to say it was a bad ride, but I guess because I always look for a more overall experience than *just* a coaster, the lack of overall experience will stand out to me.  The coaster is pretty fun, offering nice moments of airtime and intensity, and has a decent-ish layout on the whole.  We had a ride on it in the hail, which was both painful and awesome in equal measure.  We ended up riding this a few times during the day, so I guess that shows how loved it was by the group as a whole, but it's just a shame there wasn't more to go with it!
     


     
    From here, the park goes a bit downhill.  Robin Hood, the park's Vekoma woodie, is alright, and has a bit more airtime than it's sister Werewolf, and is good in its own right, but failed to leave much of a lasting impression on me.  Speed of Sound, a Vekoma Boomerang, is one of the better Boomerangs I've done in fairness, but the transition between the cobra roll and vertical loop is rather unpleasant.  The soundtrack is annoyingly catchy though.  Coaster-wise, we also did kiddie coaster Drako, which wasn't terrible.  
     



     
    El Condor
    The final coaster we did at the park was El Condor, a Vekoma SLC.  I heard bad things about it, so wasn't exactly looking forward to it.  But dear oh dear, this was dreadful.  The OTSR actually squished my ears due to the lack of room they provided.  The ride was rough, rattly and in general just uncomfortable and awful.  And this was in the front row too!  Honestly, I cannot think of a worst (notably) coaster I've done.  One can only hope this is on the chopping block for the park (hopefully for their 2019 coaster...)
     

    This is not BaronC. approved.
     
    Outside of the coasters, there's little of note really.  Merlin's Magic Castle was a largely forgettable Vekoma madhouse, though did feature a nice bit of misdirection in the main ride show.  Their rapids and log flume were fun and featured some quirky signs (though are clearly nothing to write home about as I've forgotten their names, and I'm too lazy to look them up...).  And aside from a couple of smaller rides, there's not really much else on park.  
     
    I'm probably selling the park a little short here, but time constraints, laziness and a general mediocre reaction to the park isn't really encouraging me to go much further.  It's evident that the park's recent investments have been very good for the park though, which is only a positive sign.  The lack of indoor rides was something that really stood out to me (especially given the pouring rain!), but hopefully next season's 'thrilling dark ride' will help with that.  
     
    One final point - the park's direction.  Walibi have made is obvious that they want Walibi Holland to be a thrill park, focusing on teenagers and young adults.  They pretty much said as much when they closed down their 4D cinema for next year's apparent new attraction.  And, much like Thorpe at the beginning of the decade, they've tailored their marketing and general park atmosphere to that market.  From "#HardGaan" ('#GoFast') plastered all across the park and live DJs playing music across the park (with many songs featuring plenty of swears), they know what they think this market wants.  Oh, and there's this charming t-shirt, which many staff wear, and is also on sale...
     

    Subtly, not Walibi Holland's strong point.
     
    I'm by no means a prude or anything, but this whole style seems very theme park unfriendly.  And it's nowhere near as clever, subtle or humorous as some of the stuff Thorpe did during their fathead phase (the 2011 fireworks event 'Thorpe Park BLOWS IT UP / BLOW S#!T UP' advertising was something which I genuinely found amusing and clever, and still brings a smile to my face thinking about it).  Part of me hopes it works for them, as I think turning Walibi Holland into a thrill-focused park would be great, as they have plenty of opportunities (much more so than Belgium and Rhone-Alpes) and a firm foundation already.  But at the same time, we've seen plenty of parks try this strategy, before realising alienating families is never a good thing.  So who knows.
     
     
    Anyways, enough rambling.  Platform 13, Lost Gravity and Goliath were all fab coasters in their own right, but everything else is a bit drab.  Hopefully we can see more fabness in the future.
     
    Next time - Germany, and Phantasialand of awesome-ness...
  7. JoshC.

    15 Years of Fear

    By JoshC.,

    Fright Nights might be over, and it might be closed season, but I'm doing a belated 15 Years of Fear Celebration!  I've been fortunate enough to visit every Fright Nights, and do all but one Fright Nights maze-style attraction, so I'm going to do a quick worst-to-best ranking (16 to 1) of all those mazes. 
    Naturally, mazes change year-on-year, and even one run through can be dramatically different to another on the same night, so I'm being nice and judging these off my best runthroughs.  And, of course, I was quite a bit younger 15 years ago, and scared very easily, so there might be some rose-tinted spectacles of some sort for the older mazes.  But oh well.  Also, there may be some spoilers of current attractions (and retired ones).  Enjoy...
     
    Freakshow 3D (2002-2004)
    Alas, I never got a chance to experience the Freakshow in all it's bizarre glory.  Biggest Thorpe regret right there.

    Image from Coaster Kingdom
    #16 - Dead End (2010)
    Years experienced:  2010
    I won't lie, I liked Dead End.  I had good runthroughs with actors interacting with me personally, which makes a change.  And I liked the idea of reusing loads of Thorpe stuff to create a graveyard idea.  But it should never really have been marketed as a "terror zone", or ran like an attraction.  Dead End would have made a fun 'scare zone' in the literal sense, but in the sense Thorpe tried, it just didn't work. 

     
     
    Image from TTP
    #15 - Asylum (2005-2013)
    Years experienced:  2009-2011, 2013
    Probably the most controversial one here, but as a few no doubt know, I really disliked Asylum.  The constant strobes for such a long period of time just made me feel headachey, which meant I was more focused on that rather than the maze itself.  And it could feel really repetitive if you didn't have a good run / the actors weren't on form.  The chainsaw ending wasn't as good as all the other mazes I've done with that sort of ending either.
    So yeah, I never really rated Asylum.  I think part of it is down to the fact I like a bit of a story with scare attractions, and Asylum was only ever 'There's scary people in there that will scare you!' to me.  I might be under-rating it a bit, but I honestly think that I enjoyed / was scared by all the other attractions more.

     
     
     
    #14 - My Bloody Valentine (2013-2015)
    Years experienced:  2013-2015
    MBV was a weird one.  The maze was very in-your-face, in terms of actors and the fact most of it involved very tight spaces.  But this does very little for me, and so I never got anything out of it.  It also meant there was little scope for the actors, resulting in jump scares from loud noises, or just generally trying to invade your personal space.  But it just never did it for me.  At least the theming was very good throughout, which is something.

    #13 - The Curse (2008-2012)
    Years experienced:  2009-2011
    I hear that 2012 was The Curse's best season, so it's a shame I never did it then.  However, in all the times I did do it, it never really got me.  It had nice theming and a nice atmosphere I suppose, but it wasn't scary really.  Maybe it's because it was the first scare attraction I tried in 4 years and I was expecting so much worse, but I just never got 'it'.

    Image from TTP
    #12 - Platform 15 (2016)
    Years experienced:  2016
    I'm really disappointed that this is so low down.  It has so much potential, with the theme, location and story all being spot on for a really good scare attraction.  But ultimately, it falls short in a major way:  it's trying to be something it's not.  Platform 15 would make an excellent, creepy attraction, that utilises atmosphere and tension more than impact scares.  Instead, it just goes for impact and jump scares continuously, which doesn't work when there's too much space for not enough actors.  If you're going to have a large open space, make sure there's actors to fill it!  In its current direction, Platform would need at least double the number of actors to have the payoff it promises. 
    The promising thing is that we have seen Thorpe learn their lessons in the past; notably with Big Top and Blair Witch.  Hopefully history repeats itself and we see big improvements to this next year, assuming it does return!

    #11 - Hellgate (2005-2010)
    Years experienced:  2005, 2010
    Looking back, Hellgate really shines through as a trial scare attraction for the park.  I know they had experience with Freezer and Freakshow 3D, and they did Asylum at the same time and many felt they got that right.  But Hellgate felt like it was a paint-by-numbers attractions - an easy to make, creepy-ish theme, vague story, couple of little effects, creepy audio with very standard, easily repeatable, scares.  Like someone Googled "What makes a good scare attraction?" and went from there.  All of these boxes were ticked, but none of them were brilliant.  It was a reliable, yet unremarkable, maze.

    Image from TTP
    #10 - The Passing (2012)
    Years experienced:  2012
    Going against a majority I think, but I enjoyed The Passing.  It was clearly a cheap attraction to make, and had a lot of ideas floating around it, but none of them really made the final cut.  I really enjoyed the tunnel section of the maze (certainly one of the few genuinely terrifying moments I've had in a scare attraction was when I bashed head-first into a wall, thinking I was at a dead end).  But the rest of it was very meh, and the false ending didn't really work; I was more confused than scared. 

    #9 - Blair Witch Project (2013-2016)
    Years experienced:  2013-2016
    I'll freely admit that in 2013 this was poor.  And 2016 hasn't been the best.  However, it improved a lot in 2014, and 2015 was a brilliant season for it!  2015 worked so well thanks to a narrow path that got tighter and tighter, whilst starting off with few actors before loads appearing from nowhere!  Loud noises, a subtle soundtrack and audio effects and a general, hard-to-describe, atmosphere made it a fun attraction, and exactly what it was marketing itself as!

    Image from Thorpe Park
    #8 - The Freezer (2002-2004)
    Years experienced:  2003
    This has been a difficult one to place, since I remember very little about it...mostly due to having my head buried in the back of the person in front of me.  With this being my first scare attraction, and with me only being 9, that reaction is perhaps understandable, and hence makes it unfair for me to judge too much on my experience.  However, the things I do remember are a really good atmosphere surrounding the maze, and entering it after the Freezer door opening and smoke flowing out from it.  It was probably the most 'theatrical' maze Thorpe have done. 
    Like I say, a difficult one for me to judge.  In some ways, it's probably not fair for me to judge it.  And the 2002 version was a lot better as well from what I gather.  But I think sitting in the middle of the rankings is probably fair!
    The Freezer cannot be talked about without mentioning this video, which still leaves me lost for words...
     
     
     
    The rest of the top half is coming soon...
  8. JoshC.
    It's been a while since I dedicated a whole blog post to a ride review, but this seems like a suitable time to do one.
     
    WARNING:  There will spoilers.  If you don't know what the ride system is, or want to completely avoid knowing what some of the effects used in the ride are, turn back now.
     
     
     
    For those completely unaware, it is a 3D-screen based shooter ride, where you use hand motion to 'fire'.  Sitting in rows of four, with your 3D glasses, a lap bar comes down with a motion sensor.  In the queue line, a short (and badly presented!) video explains you must swipe your arm forward to fire, keeping it at least 8 inches above the sensor, and to aim high, point your hand / arm higher.  Vague, but simple enough I suppose.
     
    The ride passes a variety of screens, some you stop at, some you don't, along with the odd bit of physical theming.  There is also some real theming in front of the screens that the animations did interact with which was awesome.  There was also a few special effect, include heat blasts, mist, wind and flashing lights (which cleverly disguises the ORP), all matching up with what's happening on screen.
     
    During the first scene, you quickly realise that the fire and aim idea isn't very simple.  It is difficult to really know where you ball of energy that you're firing is going to land.  So you just have to resort to the 'fire as many times as physically possible' tactic, hoping for the best.  Towards the end of the ride, I got the hang of it a bit more, but that is a bit too late in the ride.  It's a shame that there isn't a more involved / detailed explanation in the queue line as to how the system works, as it does take a while for most to adjust to it - and judging from the low scores from families, it does seem to be a difficult one for many to grasp.  
     
    There is a vague story to the ride, but it's difficult to follow.  You start off in training, before having to take down various bad guys, which leads to the big finale of the defeating the Great Devourer; a giant snake.  But things happen so quickly that it's easy to get lost.  You also battle alongside different ninjas during the ride, all of whom have their own special power.  When they appear, you hear them say 'Use *insert their power there*', and I must admit I was confused as to whether I should be making different hand movements or if this was generic talk.  However, the ride is very fast-paced, and it doesn't really need a story beyond 'Beat the bad guys', so it works well.
     
    After coming off, I was left surprised.  Most shooter rides I'm just keen to find out if I've got the best score, but this left with a big smile on my face, and actually wanting to talk about the ride itself.  It was a great ride, and I wanted to talk to others about how the cars moved, about the special effects, about what happened in terms of the story.  The score wasn't the forefront of my mind.  And the only other shooter to leave me feeling like that was Maus au Chocolat at Phantasialand.  
     
    And, I was also keen to do it again, so I could experience the ride again.  Not just so I could compete with people again, but so I could experience the fast-paced, crazy middle section, so I could get more interaction with the heat and wind effects.  So I could experience the ride again, and not just some game.
     
    After a second time, I did understand things a bit more.  The hand motion system was easier to use (though I ended up with a worse score...somehow).  The story made more sense (when a different ninja with a different power appears, the shape of the balls you fire changes for example).  Things seemed much clearer.  And again, I loved the ride, not just the competitive element.
     
    Ninjago really is a great investment for Windsor.  It feels very different to the rest of the park (in a good way), has a great throughput (full queue only takes about an hour!), themed uniforms, and offers something for the older end of the target market (and the adults!).  It's something that has major re-ride value, and feels like something which would only improve as you ride it more (since things make more sense / are easier to use).  
  9. JoshC.
    So I'm skipping Phantasialand because everyone knows I think it's the best and I'm behind on writing TRs and stuff.  So yeah, do excuse the delay and what will be rushed TRs, which will largely just be reviews of rides in no particular order of riding them...
     
    Movie Park was a park I had reasonably low expectations about.  There wasn't many raved about, and any reviews of the park I had read always mentioned long queues, that their Fastrack was a saviour and people always having a sour taste in their mouth at the end of the day.  In fact the only real positives I had heard about the park was about its Halloween event.  These fears weren't helped when park close was extended from 5pm to 6pm, suggesting the park would be quite busy.  But for late June, it wasn't that busy, everything was manageable and it was a decent day.
     
    Star Trek:  Operation Enterprise
    The new-for-2017, triple Mack launch coaster was the big draw for finally deciding to pay MPG a visit.  Figuring it would have long queues, we headed their first - annoyingly the ride is basically the first thing you see at the entrance, but the ride entrance is in the middle of the park.  Fortunately we were first in the queue.  There was a few minute delay as we waited for a couple more test runs, but no issue.
     
    The indoor queue line is nice, but a bit too clinical.  I get that this is the theme, but it just feels a bit uninteresting, even after a short while.  What follows are 2 pre-shows, with screens which give a back story from characters from the show (spoken in Germany, but with English subtitles), as well as a staff member guiding you through.  They are nice, and the rooms are nicely themed, but they do go on too long for my liking.  
     
    We got to the station and were on the second train (being first in the pre shows doesn't guarantee first in the station).  The ride itself is fun.  The traverser taking you to the launch track is in another very white room, which again feels quite boring.  The launches are nice and smooth; they're certainly not fast but that's not really the point I feel.  The inversions are taken quite slowly, giving a brilliant amount of hang time.  Towards the end of the course there's an amazing bit of airtime which really got me.  It's over quite quickly, but doesn't leave you feeling short changed fortunately.  You do seem to spend an age waiting on the break run though, which feels even longer as there's not much to look at.
     
    After our ride, we noticed there was no one in the station (people were being held up by pre show!), so we were able to get a re-ride immediately.  Though this didn't happen later in the day when we rode again, it makes me wonder how sustainable the pre shows are in their current format.  Staff seemed to have iPads showing where groups should be, radios to communicate to each other and god knows what else.  Seemed like a very faffy system for not a lot of pay off!
     



     
    Van Helsing's Factory
    This was perhaps the only ride I'd heard good things about before visiting.  And I can see why.  The theming is fantastic, the layout is fun and works well with the theming.  The general mood and atmosphere is brilliant.  Just everything about this ride works well together.  Even the queue line, exit and shop just feels so right and complete.  It's a fantastic example showing that a ride as a whole starts the moment you enter the queue (and even when you just see building!), and finishes the moment you leave the shop.  This was a true gem and possibly the biggest surprise of the trip.  The fact that our first ride we queued about 40-45 minutes (basically the longest queue of the trip) and I loved it right away shows its quality.  Plus things quietened as the day went on, meaning several re-rides.
     



     
    Bandit
    We did the park's wooden coaster in the afternoon, and the queue time was displayed as an hour.  Fortunately it was no where near that (15mins); seems Movie Park just update their queue times to the longest they get all day and leave them like that..  The ride looked like it had potential, but unfortunately fails to deliver.  Every time it looks like it can pick up speed, or produce a decent moment of airtime, it just...doesn't?  And that's the worst thing about this - excitement builds and builds, and it never delivers.
     
    It was so uninteresting, I didn't get any photos..
     
    MP Express
    This was a Vekoma SLC.  It was like any other Vekoma SLC - naff.  The first half of the ride was actually not awfully and shows why SLCs can get decent rides.  The second half was extremely painful, and right down there with the god awful El Condor at Walibi Holland.  
     

     
    The Lost Temple
    Tucked away near the front of the park, Lost Temple is an immersive tunnel themed around finding a lost temple - shock horror - and uncovering dinosaurs and stuff.  It features several burdenous pre shows (one of which was a real lift which we thought was fake!), and lots of faffing around between pre shows.  The 'experience' as a whole took about 30 minutes, so thank goodness the park wasn't too busy otherwise that would have been a huge chunk of the day gone.  The tunnel itself was meh; the Bobbejaanland one was a bit better really.  The exit pathway and queue to the ride is decent though.
     


     
    Bermuda Triangle
    Another ride tucked at the entrance to the park (and easily missed!).  This dark boat ride was literally walk on.  I really don't know how to describe this.  The ride starts off outside, before taking you into a volcano.  There were times inside when I didn't know if I was dropping, going up or what.  The theming inside is good, but obviously quite dated - along with the theme itself.  The finale is being taken up a lift in a very misty, very warm part of the volcano, before dropping outside and splashing down.  There's usually a huge amount of mist before a boat drops down, and there were occasional fire effects from the top of the volcano.  It's a really good, yet really bizarre, ride.  I'm gutted I didn't actually take any pictures of it.
     
    We tried to get a reride at about 5:20, but when we got to the entrance the entrance board said it closed at 5:15 (even though it definitely said 5:30 when we went there earlier).  There was no queue, and I'm pretty certain the ride has stopped running shortly afterwards.  A frustrating situation.
     
    Nick Land
    Nick land featured some randoms kiddie rides, some family rides and some coasters.  One coaster, the Jimmy Neutron themed Vekoma SFC, was closed all day.  Annoying spite.  One coaster was a Vekoma rollerskater "themed" to the Backyardians.  We more or less got straight on.  It was meh.  There was also a Spongebob "themed" Wild Mouse, which was alright.  We also did the Dora the Explorer "themed" log flume, which got me drenched to the bone.  
     
    I don't really have much else to say.  Nick Land looked quite out of place compared to large proportions of the park.  It felt very run down, the theming was minimal to non-existent, and I really feel like the park could do a lot better.
     

     
    Mystery River
    This Neverending Story esque rapids ride is tucked tight at the back of Nick Land, and turned out to be a neat little surprise.  I'd say it's in my top 3 rapids rides; it has a good length, decent amount of theming and an acceptable level of wetness.  It's also helped by the fact that you basically can't see the ride at all from anywhere on park, so you really have no idea what is coming.  The biggest disappoint is that you have to survive walking through Nick Land to get to it.
     

     
    Crazy Cops Stunt Show
    I love a good stunt show, and we wandered into this show not really knowing what to expect, aside from screeching tires and loud noises.  This ended up being really good, featuring a decent level of stunts featuring cars, bikes and falls, as well as some decent effects, slapstick comedy and an easy-to-follow 'story' of sorts.  It was just great fun to watch, and a great way to break up the day.  It's a shame things like this aren't as common in the UK any more..
     
    The High Fall
    A tall drop tower with nice views of the park, a bit of suspense and tilting seats.  Pretty good fun all in all.  
    Tip - if anyone ever visits and sees a long queue for this, just do a double check.  The indoor queue is a cattlepen where one wall is a mirror and makes the queue look double in length.  Caught us out first time..
     

     
    There was some other stuff around the park, including a simulator featuring massive sets and John Cleese, which was meh, a few nicely themed or styled flats that we didn't bother with (Top Spin, Disk'o, Rockin' Tug, etc).  But the final thing of note I want to mention...
     
    The Walking Dead - Breakout
    A year-round horror maze with a 5 euro upcharge, Walking Dead - Breakout felt like it had a lot to live up to, since the park was apparently good at Halloween and with its scare mazes.  Plus the fact Walking Dead is a huge brand and has mazes at several locations, it felt like it had to be good for Movie Park to be a deserving park to have it.  
     
    The maze is open 1-4pm, and we bought out tickets online and booked for 1pm.  Unfortunately the time slot system is non existent and you turn up whenever you want.  
     
    Even more unfortunate is the fact that the maze is terrible.  It's themed nicely, but there's no real scares, no opportunity for scares, not enough actors, no real scary atmosphere.  It's just terrible.  It terms of actual frights, I'd say it's comparable to Platform 15 (a maze notoriously known not to be able to offer many scares last year).  This really was a crying shame, a huge disappointment - possible my personal biggest disappoint at any park across Europe.
     
     
    And so that's that.  Movie Park Germany is perhaps a little underrated, though Star Trek definitely improves the line up.  They've got a couple of solid coasters, a decent dark and water ride collection and the odd sparkle across flats and live entertainment.  Certainly not a park I'd call a must-do, but definitely worth looking into at the very least.
     
     
    Next up (and hopefully before Christmas...) - Efteling!
     
  10. JoshC.

    FreBelGerAnd - Efteling

    By JoshC.,

    Only taken me 3 and a half months to finish this TR...
     
    We spent 2 and a half days at Efteling this year, and there was bucketloads of stuff going on during that time.  We stayed at the newly opened Loonsche Land Hotel, experienced Symbolica on it's opening day (along with all the pomp and faff to accompany it), and had a 14 hour day on park thanks to their summer festival event starting.  So I could probably pad this part of the trip into 2 or 3 blogs itself (and I kind of have already with my Symbolica review, but heyho...), but I'll just do photos and quick explanations so I can get it done...
     


    Symbolica's opening day (which was also the park's first Summer Festival day of the year) wasn't as busy as we expected.  The park opened at 9am, Symbolica opened at 10am.  During that time void, the park's mascot Pardoes was out and about, press were interviewing staff and guests - one Dutch news company tried to interview us, but funnily enough they wanted Dutch speakers.  There was a fun countdown when the ride opened, and we a mad rush occurred, put fortunately we were in first group of the day in.  Good thing too as I wouldn't have wanted to queue this...


     
    The park's summer festival they ran was incredible.  For no extra cost, the park opened till late (11pm), and held tonnes of extra side-shows, events, extra food stalls, and general fun stuff.  This was all from 6pm, which started off with a parade of all the acts:

    OJ Punctuel from Symbolica

    A living statue from Flying Dutchman
     
    In the 5 hours from when the parade started, we did a few rides (I can't remember what exactly off the top of my head, but fairly certain we did Joris a couple of times, Baron, Bob and maybe Flying Dutchman?), we saw a ton of the acts, including...

    Random singers

    Raveijlin fayre - the whole area was transformed into a mini Warwick Castle.  They had sword fights, random actors spinning yarn and goodness knows what else to create an atmosphere.

    Random singers / marching band.  They were a massive laugh - a lot of their sets can be found here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDSnv09tVMQ

    South American dancers

    Comedians

    1001 Nights area, include magic performances, 'snake charmers', sword swallowers, a guy giving away free ice cream if you can get it from him, and someone trying to sell rugs...

    3 different versions of Aquanura
     
    And much much more, including live music performances from plenty of other acts, randoms pianists, some kids radio station, loads more dancers and plenty of other things I've probably forgotten now and didn't get a chance to take a photo of it.  It was truly a fantastic atmosphere, and it was a wonderful day.  14 hours on park flew by, and though it felt long enough, a couple more hours would no doubt have helped us see even more the acts, and sneak in a couple more night rides.  Speaking of which, some Efteling at night photos...
     

    Dragon wasn't blowing fire during our trip unfortunately



     
     

    I got a photo with the wonderful OJ Punctuel.  I think I insulted him with my commonness and unshaven face.  Though serious note - I love how copious the costume characters are in numbers and appearances - always created such a good, fun atmosphere.
     
     
    In terms of rides...
     
    Baron 1898 left me disappointed this visit.  After riding it 2015, I truly adored it - it was fun, floaty and just really enjoyable from start to finish.  Unfortunately, it has aged liked B&Ms seem to do, becoming slightly more forceful and punchy.  This is normally a good thing, but in Baron's case, it means it loses the floatiness which made me love it so much, making it less enjoyable.  It really slid down my Top 10 as a result - if it wasn't for the amazing theme and surrounding, it certainly would have fallen out.  
     
    Joris en de Draak stood the test of time however, and I still really love it.  I still prefer Fire slightly over Water, but it definitely cemented itself as my favourite Efteling coaster.  Flying Dutchman remained fantastic, Python remained slightly painful and generally disappointing, whilst I enjoyed Bob significantly more this time!  My opinions on many of the park's other rides remained the same - I still don't quite get Dreamflight, I enjoy the park's other dark rides and their filler selection is nice.  I also got the chance to try the park's 3D cinema, Pandadroom, after it was down for technical difficulties in 2015.  I actually quite enjoyed the premise and the real effects it has, but the 3D itself was terrible, and the awkward wait before the show needs some serious attention.  I also enjoyed my time in the Fairytale Forest, with this new addition since my last visit being the highlight...

     
     
    All in all, I enjoyed Efteling again this year, for what was my second visit to the park.  After my original visit, I did class it as my favourite park.  However, since then, Phantasialand has grown on me all the more, and Efteling just misses the mark for me a bit now.  It's still a fantastic park and I really enjoyed my time there (even though 2 and a half days is a bit too much for the park), but it's not really a park for me I guess..
     
     
    And so that concluded FreBelGerAnd.  We left the park slightly earlier than planned so we could get allow plenty of time to drive back to Dunkirk for our evening ferry, and as per, travelling home posed no issues at all...
     
    Next up - my Liseberg review; it's only 2 months late fortunately!
     
     
     
     
     
  11. JoshC.

    Liseberg

    By JoshC.,

    So I visited Liseberg back in July, and I just wanted to share a few thoughts on the park...  Majority of my photos were like so bad so I'm just stealing photos from the park's website to break things up.
     
    Ultimately, I was left a bit...unfulfilled? by the park.  I don't know how to describe it.  The quality of some of the attractions at the park is really good, but the park itself just do 'it' for me.
     
    Helix
    Let's get this out the way.  Helix is truly fantastic.  It's got everything - a lengthy layout, inversions, speed, airtime, a nice style and good audio...everything.  And it all works, which is more important in some ways.  I really loved the style of the ride - the slightly futuristic / game feel just works SO WELL.  It's a bit of a shame that the queue is a bit worn - it needs a good clean and spruce up really.  But aside from that, I have no real flaws.  The ride is fantastic wherever you sit.  The back is fab.  The front gives you the force and speed.  And at night is great <3 It's just great!
     

     
    Balder
    Balder was a wonderful surprise.  So much airtime, a really decent layout, that's nicely concealed, and just really good fun.  It's glass smooth which makes it feel weird, but a good weird I s'pose.  It's easy to see why it's so highly rated, and it's high up on my list too - my favourite woodie for certain!
     

     
    Lisebergbanan
    This classic Schwarzkopf is perhaps a bit of a hidden gem in the park now.  Which sounds weird to say given it's not hidden at all.  But in a park with Helix, Balder and soon Valkyria screaming in your face, it's perhaps something which will slide out of view.  Lisebergbanan was the only coaster where staff didn't bother stapling me in on every go (the staff on Helix and Balder seemed determined to split me in half...), which resulted in some awesome airtime and being flung about in every direction.  We also had a couple of rides in the rain which really added to the experience.  Just a shame about that final brake...
     

     
    Rebalder & Stampbanan
    A couple of small creds finishes up the coaster line up.  Nothing special, but Rebalder ended up being my 100th cred - woohoo!
     
    AeroSpin
    I'd always wanted to try a Gerstlauer Sky Roller since I first saw them, so I was excited for this.  I rode is 3 times over the course of 2 days - I struggled on my first go to get any spins, but managed a solid 27 on my second go, which made me very queasy...  Goodness knows how people cope with 50+ spins...

     
    Uppswinget
    So this is basically Rush on a hill.  It has loads of potential, but it just didn't deliver.  The ride cycle was disappointing, and the location just didn't work - instead of making it more intimidating, it makes it less.  It meant the ride experience was rather lacking all in all.

     
    AtmosFear
    A really tall drop tower with Stealth-style restraints.  It was alright, gave nice views of Gothenburg, but that's about it.  I think after Detonator's forcefulness and brilliance, other drop towers feel lacking for me..

     
    FlumeRide & Kallerado 
    The park's log flume is a nice scenic tour really.  It's also gives a good pop as it starts down the drops.  Nothing special, but good fun!
    The rapids were great - they start quite slow, but gradually builds up and up and it just works really well!

     
    Liseberg Wheel
    Oh god.  This was blooming awful.  It's a ferris wheel, but the loading procedures were bad.  It got every pod emptied / filled (which naturally takes ages), and then cycles round 3 times, and then starts the unload/load process again.  It's just so boring.  It didn't help the views were poor because of rainy weather, but even with clear weather, there's not that much you'd see again a second. third or fourth time round...

     
    Loke & Mechanica
    The two newest rides at the park; unfortunately they didn't appeal to me.  Loke, an Intamin gyroswing, is a ride that makes me feel awful after riding these days, so I didn't fancy it.  And I didn't want to waste time with Mechanica when there was other stuff I could do..
     
    Majority of their other attractions are all standard stuff, and they weren't that great really.  A bit of a shame.  Their dark ride (which is closing soon / might already be closed?) was truly awful though.  However, one final noteworthy attraction...
     
    Gasten Ghost Hotel
    An upcharge scare attraction (priced £5/£7 depending on what ticket you have).  Themed around a spooky abandoned hotel which is over-run by spiders.  I hate spiders, which naturally put me on edge.  The maze was very good; a good length, VERY well themed, and some fantastic use of special effects (smell and feel were particular scents that were attacked!).  The only downside was that it lacked in actor numbers, which is a bit of a shame.  Nonetheless, a good scare attraction which did leave me cowering at some points...
     
     
    On a more general note, operations at the park were generally very good and quick.  I'm not a fan of their shutdown policy (Helix shutdown when we were near the station, and it resulted in a full queue evac.  It opened about 10 minutes later and must surely have only been a small problem), but I guess that's a small grumble.  I love all of the sideshows and games they have - so many of them were themed which was fantastic, and they just had such a good atmosphere about them (it was also good that staff weren't pressuring people to play).  
     
     
    So yeah, Liseberg was a weird one.  I enjoyed their 3 major coasters, and they have a couple of other good attractions.  But the park feels lacking in...something to me.  But I don't really know what.  Despite wanting to go back and ride Helix, Balder and Lisebergbanan, I don't really feel compelled to visit Liseberg as a park any time soon (even their new coaster isn't that tempting).  It's disappointing in some ways, as I want to like the park, but I just don't as much.  I think it's at least partially down to the fact it's more or less an amusement park, rather than a theme park, and I'm more of a theme park guy.
     
     
  12. JoshC.
    As we know, following a poor response to marketing of Swarm last year, Thorpe decided to "revisit" Swarm's image and increase the "'thrill factor' for visitors". This was despite very positive reviews for Swarm as it stood last year. So, along with the new billboard theming elements, the back two rows have been turned backwards.
    Now, in a way, it's very hard to do a comparison between the two. They are, essentially, the same ride - they follow the same layout, you more or less experience the same things, the off-ride experiences (queuing, ride interaction, etc.) are basically the same and so forth. More or less the only difference is the way you're facing. So, a comparison between the two is highly subjective - it boils down to what you're looking for when you ride Swarm.
    So, the best way I can think to compare the two experiences is to focus on individual aspects of the ride's layout and how they ride when going forwards and backwards. Then, any other things can just be dealt with afterwards...
    Inverted Drop
    One of the defining features of Swarm is the 'head first inverted drop'. When going forwards, you are either in the front row, so are left looking at the track ahead of you, unaware of how much of a spectacle the 180 degree turn really is. In any other row, you see the train twist slowly upside, which is one amazing sight. It shocks you, makes you realise what you're about to experience, and before you know it - there you are, spinning around yourself. It is truly great. Going backwards has little difference to the front row in my opinion, except you just don't know exactly when it will happen. It's still a great feeling, but it neither adds nor takes away from the experience. So, basically, either way, it's great!
    The Plane Wing
    The first of the near misses really does little for me when going forwards. It's there, but it is a generic 'close, but not too close' near miss. It's certainly there more for the spectacle of it all as opposed to being something that's genuinely too close for comfort. That said, when on the left hand side of the train, it can catch first-timers off guard. When going backwards, it's as you would expect - you don't see it. I personally don't really even realise it's there when going backwards - may as well be a mist box there as the plane wing adds absolutely nothing. So the plane wing is nice and all going forwards, and superfluous when going backwards. So, forwards > backwards.
    Zero-G Roll
    Now, I absolutely LOVE this when going forwards. It's an inversion you really, really feel - something which I think is lost on more modern inverting coasters. When you are nearer the back of the train, it's great being able to see the train twist through the inversion as well. Going backwards is good as well; again, you really feel the inversion. But I'm not as big a fan of it going backwards; I still enjoy it, but just not as much as going forwards. A part of me thinks that, because when you were at the back of the train (I.e. row 7) and going forwards, it added to the idea of seeing the train twist through even more, I'm thinking that 'well, the backwards rows lose this effect'. Thus, as a straight out comparison between the forwards and backwards rows, I think the forwards rows JUST edge it out over the backwards rows, but comparing the Swarm we have now to the Swarm we had last year, the Swarm we had last year was better. So, forwards > backwards.
    It is here I'd also compare the ways facing when the fire goes off from the fire engine, but as I've only been fortunate enough to experience it going forwards, it would be unfair of me to compare.
    The Billboard
    The all new near miss for 2013 is certainly a great addition. Many people's favourite near miss of the ride, it is certainly effective. Off ride, it is great to look at, and has a nice bit of quirkiness to it. On ride, when going forwards, just WOW. The way the train twists out of the zero-G roll means is it is genuinely an exciting feature and one where it seems like you may not 'twist enough in time'. The left hand side also provides a secondary near miss after the corkscrew, which is nice. Backwards though, you of course don't get the effect. You simply twist out of the zero-G roll and dive on through. Yeah sure, you see it afterwards (which is a nice advantage of the billboard compared to the other near misses, as it feels designed for backwards as well as forwards viewing, probably due to the fact it was built with the backwards rows in mind), but it's nothing special really. So, again, forwards > backwards.

    The back of the billboard.
    The inclined loop follows. It's nothing special either way - just a solid element that is paced well. Nothing more to say here other than forwards and backwards are equally solid.
    Turnaround / The Helicopter
    The turnaround is probably by favourite section of the ride when going forwards. It is surprisingly fast and forceful, and lasts a decent length of time. When on the right hand side of the train, it is just phenomenal, with the addition of the water spray and the subtle near miss of the spinning helicopter blades which can catch the unsuspecting off guard. One of the reasons why last season the back-right seat became my favourite was because of this part of the ride - you'd get a splash of water, force, speed and a near miss - what more could you want?! Backwards through this section is great as well; being able to see the water effect 'chase' you feels nice, and is something missed a bit when going forwards. But the subtle near miss from the helicopter is missed, which is a shame, as it is my favourite near miss of the ride.
    When it boils down to it, riding forwards or backwards through this section of the ride is equally good. However, I did prefer back-right going forwards to going backwards there.
    Corkscrew
    The entrance into this element is great, continuing the forcefulness of the turnaround. Going forwards, the corkscrew is another solid element, and I think it has been designed with the visual spectacle in mind - going through the inclined loop looks great off ride. However, going backwards, it is a real highlight. I can't explain it really, but I just love it. Maybe it's the novelty of doing a common inversion on coasters backwards, but it's just a great feeling and the one thing I think 'WOW' about the most after riding backwards. So, backwards > forwards.

    The corkscrew, beautifully cutting through the inclined loop!
    The Tower, Church and Inline Twist
    Near miss wise, I don't rate the tower or church highly. They're a very generic 'close, but not too close' near miss, and whilst nice, it doesn't impress me much. This doesn't mean they're bad in any way, and off ride it is simply stunning. The inline twist is, as with all the inversions, one you feel, and even if you don't get the near miss effect too much from the theming, it's still great being twisted upside down over it! Backwards you miss the near misses (same old story there then...), but the inline twist is fun, and as with going forwards, it's great seeing the station when you're hurled upside down. So, backwards and forwards are both equally good.

    The tower, where the brilliant 'Swarm noise' plays.
    And that basically ends the ride. The rest that follows is the worst part of the ride as it stands, going forwards or backwards.
    Other Bits and Bobs
    Just one final thing I want to say. I'm going to ignore the fact that I hate the way the queue system works and not use that in my judgement of which 'way' is better. However, the fact that the old Fastrack queue is now the backwards queue means there's less chance to see the ride in action, and it's harder to see the queue line TVs (and they are less frequent). I'm a big fan of having the experience of a ride start when you enter the queue, and finish when you're out of exit - a ride should never just be about the hardware. The backwards queue suffers from the fact that you can't get a decent 'feel' of the back story unless you've already seen it, which is a shame. It's only a little niggle, but it's a niggle nonetheless.
    And so, there we have it. So, if you haven't been counting, here's how each of the individual on-ride elements 'score up', if you will:
    Forwards 'wins' - 3
    Backwards 'wins' - 1
    Ties - 4
    The fact that there are equally many ties and 'wins' should tell one thing - The Swarm is an amazing ride. Whether you have the seats facing forwards, backwards, inwards, whatever-way-wards, you won't take that away. However, facing forwards is the way forward (if you'll pardon the pun...); as, simply put, it allows you to experience the theming and the near misses that Swarm has been designed to take advantage of. If you take them out the equation, the experience is lacking something. Now, me knocking the backwards rows all sounds very negative, but honestly, it is my third favourite coaster experience - only beaten by Swarm going forwards and Nemesis at Alton Towers. So, time for the final verdict:
    The Swarm (Forwards): 10/10 (In a way, I don't want to give it a perfect score, but I just can't justify not doing so).
    The Swarm (Backwards): 8.5/10
    (And comments and criticisms are welcome! )
  13. JoshC.
    With the 'new normal' in full swing and parks open again, I'd been itching for a European trip again. With my Heide/Hansa trip back in April cancelled, and my June Europa trip delayed before I booked, the Covid situation had dented some big plans for new parks for me.

    However, wanting to remain cautious, I didn't want to swing into big parks, and risk not visiting them in case something happened (having to self-isolate, a park randomly closing, etc). So something I bit smaller was needed. Back in 2017, I visited Bagatelle, and really enjoyed their two Soquet creds - Gaz Express (as I mentioned about here)and Spirale des Dunes, and had joked with my housemates in the past of doing a trip to hunt out more of their creds. And lo and behold, this trip was born!

    A few smaller French parks could be ticked off, boosting my cred count, and also a first visit to Parc Asterix, just to add some real quality to the trip too. And, if all worked out perfectly, I would end the trip on exactly 200 creds, becoming slightly less basic in the process.

    Keeping the costs down meant we stayed at Premier Class hotels whilst in France, and anyone who's visited one will know they're certainly not premiere in class (we fortunately knew that in advance)..More on that later though!

    Day 0
    We travelled over to Calais Thursday afternoon by ferry with P&O, which was sadly delayed by a couple of hours. As for their Covid measures, it was pretty simple: wear a mask on the ferry at all times (except if eating/drinking), and keep 2m distance from everyone. Keeping the distance was easy as the ferry was quiet, and I wore a mask all the time - little warm, but no issue. Lots of people did end up taking their masks off, but given how quiet it was, I wasn't surprised.
     
    To encourage social distancing, each table in the main seating area only had 1 seat, which made no sense when a group wanted to sit together...

    We arrived at our first Premiere Class, where we had upgraded to a room which gave us breakfast and a sea view for only a couple of Euros extra. We were intrigued, but the sea view was, well...
     
    A little lacking to say the least!

    Coincidentally, each Premiere Class we stayed at had a Buffalo Grill restaurant very nearby. An American-esque BBQ style place, we decided that Day 0 would be the perfect time to try it out, and it was pretty good! On the pricier side for a budget trip, but decent food, including amazing Mozzarella sticks with BBQ sauce!

    Day 1 - Parc du Bocasse
    Unsure of how Covid measures would affect park capacities and throughputs, we decided to give each park a day, and then do other stuff in the afternoon/evening if time allowed (spoilers: we regularly left parks early!). Parc du Bocasse was park number 1, we arrived a little before 10, with rides opening at half 10.

    Covid Measures
    The park had a variety of signs which said whether a ride/queue/building required masks or simply recommended them. The queues had social distancing markers, and there were hand sanitising points before going on a ride, and sometimes afterwards. There was no social distancing on rides. Masks weren't required in the park's walkways. Their 4D cinema was closed, but everything else remained open.

    Social distancing was largely respected in queue lines which was nice. I wore my mask everywhere except on water rides (where we always were in our own group anyway).
        A quick bag check and we were in, and wandered to the back of the park towards their pirate area.

    We ticked off the kiddie cred and some of the flats, along with their shooting ride - Pirate's Plunder. It's the first time I've done one of these types: where you are on a seat which tilts and moves and fire at a stationary screen. I quite enjoyed it, and liked the competitive nature it had throughout. We did it later in the day, and sadly it didn't cope when the room was almost full, with none of our guns registering properly.

    We worked through the park, ticking off their other family cred, and came up to arguably their major cred - Fort d'Odin, their Soquet. The ride looked fun from its rcdb entry, and it had been rethemed last year. However, I wasn't prepared for how extensive the retheme was:
     
    My photos don't do it enough justice - but it feels completely different compared to the rcdb photos!

    It was a fun ride. Whilst nothing special of course, it at least gave us some reassurance we hadn't planned a trip based entirely around a manufacturer which makes terrible rides, bar two at some random small park!

    We continued, doing their dark ride Apiland, which has a ton of animatronics, but goes on way too long, before arriving back to the front of the park, which is a Dinosaur / Jurassic themed land. I think a few years ago this was pretty unthemed and had a 'plonked in a car park' feel, but looks a lot better now. We did their Spinning Wild Mouse, which was vile due to us distributing the weight badly (I'm really not a fan of spinning).  
    We then moved to their log flume, which is also a Soquet, Splash-o-Saure. It features a backwards section and a vertical lift, and some nice theming. It was the right level of wet too. Little on the short side, but really enjoyed it to be honest.  

    This took us up the lunch time, and aside from the park's fountain show, which first showed at 2pm, we had done the park. After a spot of food and some rerides, we milled around and eventually queued up for Symphonie Aquatique, which was surprisingly hosted indoors. The show was about 10-15mins long, and featured a stage with some fountains which were just going off pretty consistently, whilst some lasers and music played. The concept is cool, but it misses the mark with the fountains being boring, and all the seats being on the same level, so being at the back meant we saw little.

    After milling around a bit more and a couple more re-rides, we called it a day just after 3pm. Parc du Bocasse was a surprisingly nice park, with some decent theming and a nice little selection of rides. It always seems like they're preparing to expand, with work going on next to their log flume. It'll be interesting to see what they do next!

    One annoying thing though - bugs! There were a ton around the park. I don't know what they were; tiny little fly-like things? I guess it's because of the park's location, but it was a little bit annoying after a while, especially since the colour of my shorts seemed to really attract them!


    We then headed into Rouen, which was en route to our next hotel. We popped into a Laser Quest, and the three of us played a game - just us three! Their Covid measures meant we still had to wear masks inside. And let's just say, if I can wear a mask for 20 minutes whilst running around indoors playing Laser Quest, I don't see why any normal person can't wear one!

    Our next Premiere Class would be our base for two nights, and didn't promise a sea view, being far away from the sea and all that, so we weren't disappointed. Fortunately there were lots of restaurants and shops nearby which meant we had plenty of options to keep ourselves entertained for the evening, before turning in for the night.

    Coming to a blog post near you: Day 2 - Festyland, and a surprise cred...   ---   Which, in fact, is right here!!
    Day 2 - Festyland...

    A quick mention of their Covid measures. There were social distancing markers in queue lines and a few signs about wearing masks.There didn't seem to be as many people wearing masks and social distancing in queue lines wasn't the best, but equally not the worst. Many of the operators at rides had unlabelled bottles of liquid, which they would spray onto your hands before going on rides. I can only hope it was hand sanitiser! Though I'm sure I could start a conspiracy theory somewhere on the internet saying it's some mind control liquid to stop us thinking about 5G or something....

    Anyways, onto the park. We arrived shortly after opening and headed straight to the back of the park, where the first of two Soquets awaited, 1066...
      The building looks cool, but the signage leaves a little to be desired!

    Unlike other Soquets, this ran two short trains, which was a little bit of a surprise. It's also nicely situated on the edge of the park towards a field, meaning it could make use of the terrain a bit more. The ride was a walk on so I went straight to the back for my first ride. And damn, this little cred packed a bit of a punch. Coming off the drop gave some solid ejector. The ride then turns around a bit before going into a helix which gave some really nice laterals. An airtime hill with a kicker wheel followed, which sadly meant not much airtime. Another helix and a jump up into the station followed, which again gave some nice laterals.
     
    So all in all, a really neat cred. It was the right level and mix of weird and fun that I had expected. The area still had no one else around, which meant another lap followed, with me heading to the front. The drop wasn't as good, but the laterals and side to side movement were still solid.

    Sticking to the back of the park, the next port of call was Kaskade, the park's rapids. It very much has a budget River Quest feel, with an elevator lift and intimidating (in context of the park) look. The drop lead to some of the craziest spinning I've ever had on a water ride, and the final splash gets you a good level of wet too. A solid ride, and a nice little gem in the park.   We moved over to the park's other cred, Drakkar Express. This is nothing more than a +1, but features a drop halfway through the layout where you somehow manage to slow down rather than speed up I swear. Oh Soquet...
     
    The park have a really neat, large and well themed Viking land, which features a few rides, including an Air Race-like ride, Rocking Tug and more. We ticked off these rides, as well as their standard dingy slide and drop tower rides, before a re-ride on 1066.
       

    Fun fact: I did get the standard photo of me holding this, etc. BUT this was shortly after Kaskade, and so I had a huge wet patch down half my body, which looked like a massive sweat mark, and so will never see the light of day...

    It was now midday and the park was filling up a fair bit (Kaskade had a full queue, which probably would have taken a good 30+minutes given the lack of boats). We did a ride on their bumper boats, which we didn't think adults would be allowed on, but they didn't seem to mind. One of our group fell into the water whilst getting out, much to the enjoyment of everyone in the queue!

    So after barely two hours, we called it a day at Festyland. It's a cute little park with some surprisingly well themed parts, and 1066 is a solid ride. But ultimately, it isn't much more than a stop on a cred run for us.

    Anticipating that this could well happen, we had made contingency plans the night prior, and thanks to leaflets at our hotel and coast2coaster, we found a couple of Alpine coasters near-ish to the park. Both were about a 40 minutes drive away, and 40 minutes away from each other. We ultimately opted to do just one, and so of we headed to the...

    Normandie-Luge
    Located in the valley of an old Viaduct designed in 1887 by Gustave Eiffel, this was a complex of activities. The Viaduc de la Souleuvre is the name of the wider, free-to-enter, complex, and has activities such as bungee jumping, giant swings and zip lining from the top of the viaduct, as well as the cred, a high ropes course and other things. Unsurprisingly the likes of bungee jumping were very expensive (149€!!), but the cred was just 4€..much more reasonable.
      After eating at the onsite restaurant, which was fantastic and well priced, we hit up the Luge, as they like to call the cred specifically. No need to wear masks, but you have to clean your hands before, as well as the 'car' being cleaned as well. The layout makes excellent use of the terrain, and features some decent sweeping turns and banked moments, as well as some pops of airtime. Fortunately was able to go full speed all the way down, and the ending was a particular highlight!
    The ending

    You can also buy a photo for 2€. Since it captured the exact moment a fly decided to try and get in my mouth, I couldn't refuse...

    After a little bit of milling around and watching people bungee jump, we moved on. Not a place I'd ever return to (as awesome as it would be to jump from a viaduct, I can't justify paying seven times what I paid for my bungee jump a few years back...even if it was off a crane in a pub car park). But I certainly would recommend heading down there for the alpine cred if you're nearby!   We left and headed to the commune of Deauville by the sea, which was only 15 or so minutes away from our hotel. It's a seaside place, but our only reason for going there was to play some mini golf, which seemed to be the only one anywhere vaguely nearby. It was a very open circuit, but had some decent courses.
    And that concludes Day 2. We eventually got back to our hotel at about 7 (how we dragged out an entire from Festyland, an alpine cred and mini golf I'm still not quiet sure..), before food and sleep.

    Day 3 to come in a new blog entry very soon, featuring the somewhat controversial Parc Saint Paul, and an unplanned park (or rather, an unplanned garden)...
  14. JoshC.

    10 Years of Afterburn

    By JoshC.,

    10 years ago, Thorpe Park were graced with the introduction of Nemesis Inferno. It was B&M's 22nd Inverted coaster, a type of roller coaster which had proven most popular over the previous ten years. Billed as 'the world's greatest roller coaster experience' and having a name that obviously was leading itself to be a successor to the extremely popular Nemesis, the ride had a lot to live up to.
    Unfortunately, Inferno didn't live up to hype. From what I can gather, it's not a particularly highly rated B&M Invert (it's hard for me to judge of course, having only been on two B&M Inverts, but this is based on what I've heard across various forums, and based on the, Mitch Hawker Poll, where it ranked 123rd, if you feel that has some validity) and is seen as a 'good, but not great' ride. It could also suffer from the criticism of it being a 'cookie cutter' B&M, to a degree. So, instead of being a successor to Nemesis, it ended up more being the runt of the two - not that that's a surprise to anyone really.
    However, when you wash away the hype, the expectation and the comparisons, Nemesis Inferno is, simply put, a solid, well-rounded ride. It's nothing special, but not everything has to be, and sometimes I think people expect everything to 'be special'. Inferno is easily the park's least-gimmicky major coaster (something which I think is indirectly highlighting on the park's website as well), which, in a way, makes it more appealing to the general public, especially as a 'starter big coaster'.
    My first ride came a year after it opened, and in honesty, I don't remember being particularly impressed. Okay, maybe impressed is the wrong word - I did enjoy it and that, but it felt somewhat lacking to me. For various reasons, I rated coasters such as Colossus, Dragon's Fury and Vampire as 'better'. However, as time has gone on, it has improved in leaps and bounds. I think it's safe to say that the ride has aged incredibly well. Like modern B&Ms, it is quite smooth, yet it has aged in such a way that there are a couple of intense moments; specifically the vertical loop. From about 2006 to 2011, it was my favourite coaster at Thorpe, and second favourite I'd been on, which I think does speak for itself. Last year, for some reason, it didn't rank as well with me; I can't quite explain why though. It just 'felt' as if it wasn't as good as I thought it was. It's tenth year, though, it has come into its own. Fast and intense, with the audio and effects really showing that it is a good ride.
    As said earlier, some could criticise the ride for being a bit of a 'cookie cutter' B&M, just sticking together some tried and tested elements and creating a decent ride without really doing anything innovative. The pre-lift section is fun, but feels wasted. Unfortunately, the tunnel which it goes through requires the effects (mist and lovely red lights) to be bursting onto you; this is very hit-and-miss. After the near-100ft climb follows the 'standard' drop to the left followed by a forceful vertical loop. A zero-g roll follows; these inversions are quite possibly my favourite inversion, and this one is quick, relentless and unforgiving.
    We get a surprisingly low, ground-hugging turn, which takes us into the first of two 'interlocking corkscrews'. Personally, I don't rate the corkscrews; I don't particular feel like they are a worthwhile part to the ride. They feel very bog-standard, and just thrown in because they work on other Inverts. Thing is, the whole 'interlocking corkscrew' thing doesn't exactly shout out to anyone 'Look at me, I'm an exciting ride', yet I almost feel it was designed to have it in mind, and took away from a potentially more interesting element.
    Anyway, enough of the negatives. Following the interlocking corkscrews, the ride meanders a little bit into the finale; a figure of eight helix. Whilst the meandering feels a bit unnatural and against the rhythm of the ride, the finale is fun. The best elements of the ride do come in the first half, which makes the second half feel somewhat lacking; a shame really, but I guess that happens in a lot of coasters to be fair.
    Theming-wise, the centre-piece volcano is visually striking and impressive. Okay, so what if the other side of it is just a tin-shed; it doesn't actually take away from the appearance, and it just generally is a pointless thing to worry about. There's so many ways money invested in finishing it off could be spent, most of which would be a much better idea. Other than a few bits of rockwork, and long-gone crocodiles hiding in the pools, there's not really any other bits of theming, which is a shame. However, I can't see how much else could effectively have been added to the ride / ride area. Along with the tunnel effects, there are the geysers which sometimes works; always good to watch them when off-ride. What really sells Inferno, though, is the scenery - all of the trees, foliage and so forth makes you feel like you're in some tropical area, and you actually are nearby a real volcano. It just works - perfectly.
    So, that's about it really. Inferno is probably Thorpe's most consistently rated coaster; very few people I know of 'dislike' or 'hate' the ride, and the general opinion of it seems quite positive. In a way, that's what's made this blog entry very difficult to write (4 months in the making, on and off), because it's hard to describe the quality of a coaster like Inferno when everyone more or less accepts that quality. However, being 10 years since it opened, I felt like I needed to do it, and had promised to do one following my Saw, well over a year ago...
    And I leave you with this:

    Feel the heat SNOW. (Taken on 4th April 2013; Inferno's 10th birthday!)
  15. JoshC.
    For the first in about 10 or 11 years, I visited a non-Merlin theme park. It's been a long time coming, and anywhere was a start. And that start was to be Drayton Manor.
    After such a beautiful week, Saturday decided to take a turn for the worst, and give us rain, thunder, lightning (though with a couple of breaks of sunshine during the day!). Adam picked me up and we arrived at Drayton around 9ish. Even though we were early, we could tell it was gonna be quiet day, and thank goodness, after some of the horror stories I'd heard about the park's operations.

    We arrived to some sun, though we could tell dark times were ahead.
    Half 9 came and the park opened. One of the first things which confuse me about the park is opening the park at 9:30, but not the rides until 10:30. There's not really enough to do for a whole hour, other than the small zoo, which we headed to straight away.

    Tigers are a'coming.

    A chimpanzee looks to Apocalypse in the distance.
    Rides were testing so we headed over to G Force (which apparently had been closed for a couple of days) and we were pretty much first in the queue. 10:30 came and it opened; yay. This was my first coaster with inversions that had lap bars, and I'd heard some pretty poor things about it, but kept an open mind. And yeah, I thought it was quite fun. My first ride didn't give me any problems with the restraints, and it was a fun, fast-paced ride. I did get a bit of air time as well, which is nice. It's an odd ride (especially with the "humpety bumpety" lift) and seems to do all the best bits at the beginning, giving a week end, but hey-ho, it's a fun enough ride.

    My G Force face.
    Next up was the big, new thing - Air Race. I wasn't quite sure how it'd ride, what with the continual spinning and moving and stuff, but it was actually really good. The rocking start is very good, and then it just keeps spinning, round and round and round. It doesn't get boring, and there's some nice moments where you're left hanging upside down for quite a while. Near the end of the ride, we started spinning in the opposite direction. Would be nice if it did it sooner, just to mix it up a little, but hey ho. On a ride later on in the day, we counted that we went upside 18 times (sorry Smiler! ).

    Air Race does have a nice entrance feature though.

    Air Race's queue line is a nice cattlepen - like many of Drayton's queue - and has a TV playing annoying things.
    Shockwave followed. Have to say, the station and theming in the queue line is quite nice actually. The seats and restraints on this thing though is very, erm, eurgh. Yeah, I'll go with eurgh. They're not comfortable and they just don't feel right. The ride itself has two highlights - a random little dip before going onto the lift, and the zero-g roll (which is actually incredible). The rest is uncomfortable, rattly or boring. There vertical loop was bleurgh, the double corkscrew is verging on painful and then the random straight bits are unimaginative (though, at least they don't try to castrate you). Now I see why so few stand ups have been built...

    Found in Shockwave's queueline - made me chuckle...
    Next up was Splash Canyon, the park's rapids. It was barely 11 o'clock, but we were already soaking wet, so water rides wouldn't make much difference. Fun little ride, not that wet really, though the indoor section did take me off guard.
    Another water ride followed, and this time it was in the famous Stormforce 10. I'd heard a lot of good things about this, so I was excited. Have to say, the queue - which we once again walked through - is nicely themed and works really well. Onto the ride itself. The first drop is nice, and the way it's done was unexpected by me. Then wandering through the random waterfall is cool. The second drop, the backwards one, was a shock. We were sat at the very back, which meant we got the full force of water. For a split second, I thought I was on Tidal Wave I was that wet. Brilliant water ride. Not-so brilliant for when the weather is already chucking it down. Final drop is quite nice too. So yeah, a great water ride all in all, but I'll try to avoid the back next time...
    A quick spin on Malestrom (nothing really to say about this, just a nice filler really) and drying off in one of the heater things (which was so worth it given how wet we were...), it was time to venture indoors for Pirate Adventure. It's an indoor boat ride which is basically a knock off of Pirates of the Caribbean. Have to say it's alright, though it seemed like a lot of the animatronics were broke. The ending was super anti-climatic too, which was a shame. For the record, this was probably our longest queue of the day at an amazingly long 15 minutes. Goes to show how quiet it was I guess. A go on the dodgems, sponsored by Free Radio, followed, and they were pretty decent.
    Food followed in the Safari Pizza & Pasta:

    Very nice indoors restaurant located by the zoo. Indoors there's loads of animal animatronics which move and stuff and it was quite a nice atmosphere in there. (By the way, unlike Merlin's Pizza / Pasta, this isn't all you can eat in case you're wondering. We just had a nice pizza and wedges meal).
    We headed over to Ben 10: Ultimate Mission, the world's first Vekoma Junior Boomerang. It looked surprisingly tall and quick for a junior coaster, and I have to admit, it was one coaster I was really looking forward to. Again, there was next to no queue, which was great. The majority of the queue is indoors, and is very well themed, with aliens, loads of 'high tech' stuff, noises, lights, etc., and a false corridor which tricked Adam and I. Very, very good.

    Aliens.
    First ride gifted us with front row. Being lifted up backwards was a nice sensation, though the stop is very harsh and judders you around a bit. Then you're dropped down and you pick up a lot of speed very quickly, meander around a bit, then up a random wiggle. You hear the laser fire and do backward to the station. It's a short ride of course, but it's great. It has a bit of everything and left both of us happy. No doubt kids love the ride as well. It's certainly Drayton's most complete ride and is fun for everyone. What's even more impressive is how it takes up so little room. Given the lack of queue, we went straight back round to do it again, which is a testament to the ride's quality.

    Look at that joy.
    Afterwards, we ventured to what I'll nickname 'dark ride row'. We started off with The Haunting, a Vekoma madhouse. Much like Hex, it has two pre-shows before the ride. The first pre-show is very nicely done, with some TVs giving you an introduction, and one or two nice effects used. The second pre-show isn't as good I found, going on for a bit too long, and that you couldn't always hear what was being said. The actual madhouse itself is good, with a nice ending I thought. So all in all it is a nice ride, but it also showed by just how good Hex is as well. Haunting is great in its own right, but Hex is in a different league.
    Next door was Golden Nugget - Wild West Shoot Out. As the name suggests, it's a gun-based ride where you shoot things for points. Other than the name and logo, there's no reference to the Golden Nugget cereal. It's a very cheap ride clearly, and to be honest, is quite laughable. It's nice that some things happen when you hit the target though. But still, not a great ride. We ended dark ride row with Drunken Barrels, the tilting teacups. They were good fun, and the plate actually tipped, but our cup was way too stiff to spin.
    It was now time for the last major ride (in my opinion), Apocalypse. Decided to go in at the deep end and do stand up first (though, unfortunately, the floorless seating wasn't available today). The seats are okay - more comfortable than Shockwave's at least! - and the tilt is a great twist; did get me a little bit. However, the drop itself is okay at best. Just doesn't really get me as much as I'd hoped. Though the suddenness of the drop is a nice touch. Sit down followed straight away, and I think I prefer that seating arrangement due to the added comfort. One thing which disappointed me with this (and a lot of Drayton in general actually) was the lack of audio, apart from the occasional siren. No atmosphere, very little tension and it just felt like the ride could have been so much more intimidating with some sort of background noise.
    We decided to get some other rides done, including Flying Dutchman - yet another odd Drayton ride - and Buffalo Coaster. Buffalo is quite possibly the weirdest coaster I've done, with an odd layout, monorail-like speeds, yet the occasional okay bit. It goes on forever as well. I feels like it's time should be nearly up, and the space and surrounding area would be great for a family coaster (hi there Mack!). Oh, one laughable thing about Buffalo - on our ride, the train overshot the station, meaning the people in the front row couldn't get out, and had to have another go (I feel for the poor souls).
    I would do a list of all the things which are more useful than Buffalo, but I think I'd be here for too long...

    Buffalo with Apocalypse in the background. The Buffalo should look a lot more sad though.
    We then went to the other side of the park to venture round Thomas Land. Looks nice, and I know that my younger self would have exploded with excitement to be there. Only ride we did round here was Troublesome Trucks Runaway Coaster. For a ride set in Thomas Land, it was actually alright, and the ending on it was a specific highlight. Great ride for the younger market.

    We saw Percy whilst queueing fro Troublesome Trucks.

    NEW FOR 2015. Funnily enough, when you're in the park, you don't really recognise the construction going on. When you're outside the park, by the entrance, you see the site, but have no idea what it's for.
    With basically everything done, it was time for rerides aplenty. Air Race, G Force and Shockwave were all done again, as was Ben 10. After a while, a storm came over, bringing more rain, thunder and lightning, bringing most rides to a close (as an interesting fact, Apocalypse was hit by lightning this past week ). One of the few rides which remained open was Polperro Express Train; a short train ride which goes round part of the park. It gave some nice views of Shockwave, Stormforce 10, G Force and the rapids, and it was a nice break from the rain.
    Some rides slowly began reopening, so we were able to get a few more rides in (including on the Golden Nugget ride since it was indoors, and just so we could laugh at it's awfulness some more). We ended up riding Ben 10 five times during the day, which I think shows how it is indeed a good ride for the park. The day ended off with a ride on G Force, and it was the only one where I had an uncomfortable experience. However, I still stand by my views that it is a fun ride; just a shame the restraints can cause it to be otherwise.
    Drayton Manor is a nice park all in all, and given it's a small park, it's done well for itself. But there's a few rides which are very cheap and laughable which need sorting out, I imagine on a busy day it's a bad place to be in (queue board times to some description would be nice for example), and there's some things lacking (audio on all rides for example). I don't want to end on a negative note, as I enjoyed the place and had a fabulous day out, and if you take it for what it is, it is good. I definitely would recommend people trying it out (especially if you have a voucher of some description), there are some good rides there which make it worth going there once.
    Visiting has given me the extra incentive to try out other parks as well. It's not that I haven't wanted to, but it's more that I've been a been a bit blasé about it all. However, after yesterday's experience, I now have an urge to try parks new and different (and who knows, might even crack Europe next year!)
    I'll leave with perhaps the best photo of the day; our last ride on Ben 10:

  16. JoshC.
    It's been a long while since I've done a proper blog post, but I've dusted off my keyboard to do one I'd been thinking about for a while..
     
    Over the past couple of years, there's some rides I've done which are a ton of fun, but don't really seem to get the attention they deserve. Mostly for reasons that they're rides in parks that aren't high up people's lists, or there's better rides at those parks. So I figured I'd just throw a little list out there.
     
    This isn't going to be a list of "under-hyped" rides; I'm not necessarily saying any of these are top-tier rides which everyone should ride. But these are just solid rides which deserve a bit of limelight cast of them...
     
    5. Gaz Express, Parc Bagatelle 
    Situated about an hour from Calais, Bagatelle's ease to get to doesn't compensate for the fact the park is quite meh. However, Gaz Express is a shining beacon of light.
     
    Manufactured by French company Soquet in 1987, Gaz Express is a really fun family-thrill coaster which is situated largely over water. It's not particularly high or fast, but features a couple of nice pops of airtime, some nice helices, whilst also diving in and out of buildings. And you get to go round twice too! To top it off, there's loads of water features around the ride, as well as a really cool fire effect, making it a really nice-looking ride for spectators too!
     



     
    4. Discovery Club, Avonturenpark Hellendoorn
    It's no secret that I look shooting dark rides, and this one is really quirky. Sitting in outward-facing circular cars, the idea is that you're basically exploring a house with loads of spooky stuff that could come alive. It's a classic storyline which works, and with a fun soundtrack and sound effects, good theming and the unpredictable, and sometimes wild, spinning of the cars, it makes for a great experience.
     
    Hellendoorn itself is a decent park, a little under-rated in my opinion, but this 21 year old Mack dark ride is probably the crowning jewel of the park!


     
    3. Kyöpelinvuoren Hotelli, Linnanmäki
    This ghost train has no right to be as good as it frankly. For a city park like Linnanmäki which doesn't really *do* theming, it stands out really well. And inside, it's just immaculately themed and styled - it's creepy from the word go.
     
    The ride itself is pretty fantastic. Good length, no dead spots, lots of turns and plenty of surprises and special effects. It just hits the nail on the head at every point. I believe it was refreshed a few years back, which, along with the likes of Taiga, shows that when the park sets itself a target, they hit it perfectly.

     
    2. Popcorn Revenge, Walibi Belgium
    I've talked about Popcorn Revenge a lot on here, so another paragraph or two won't hurt.
     
    Popcorn Revenge is genuinely bloody brilliant. Early I said this list wasn't necessarily going to be about top-tier rides. Popcorn Revenge is perhaps the exception here. For those who don't know, this is a trackless, screen-based shooting dark ride, which takes around a movie theatre where pieces of popcorn have come alive and have taken over the film. You have to shot the popcorn with different flavoured sauce guns to take back control. The ride is non-linear and where you go depends on what car you get in. 
     
    The scenes on the screens are brilliant. The real theming is great as well. This all just comes together for an absolutely brilliant ride experience.
     
    I truly hope I'm not over-stating this and setting anyone who eventually rides it up for a disappointing, but this is genuinely one of my favourite rides and it's a damn shame it's not talked about more frankly.


     
    1. K2, Karls Erlebnis-Dorf Elstal
    This is also something I've talked about a bit before in the past. 
     
    Karls is, primarily, a strawberry farm business. However, they have branched out over the years to have permanent farmer markets, which have also integrated 'amusement park' style sections. The one in Elstal, just outside Berlin, is the most developed, and by far the crowning jewel is K2.
     
    K2 is an abc tube coaster, which also has wooden cars. The ride is themed to potato farming, and features an underground dark ride section where you see potatoes being grown, amongst other surprises. The ride then goes up 80ft high - which feels a lot higher when you only have a seatbelt as your restraint in a wooden cart! - before going round twists, turns and mini airtime hills. The ride is killed a bit by a MCBR, but is still great fun, and a real surprise. 
     
    The quality of the theming is amazing too, and wouldn't look out of place at the likes of Phantasialand (indeed, the queue is of a similar style and standard to Maus au Chocolat). Just in general, this ride ticks every single box and it's an absolute joy and treasure to experience. If you ever head to Berlin and want a quick theme park-like fix, this really is the place to go (certainly much better than the nearby 'proper' parks!).


     
  17. JoshC.
    Day 2 of the trip got off to a slightly bad start, with no where around our French hotel seemingly being open for us to buy breakfast (despite the internet and shop signs saying they would be open..). After much wandering around, we found a nice little bakery where I couldn't resist getting anything other than a croissant. After food was sorted, and a nice 30 minute car journey was had, we arrived at our second park , Bellewaerde.
    Now, before I start, I should probably confess that I hadn't really heard of Bellewaerde at all until Adam suggested it be part of the trip in its early planning stages. I remember hearing about their signature coaster, Huracan, being built a couple of years ago (indeed, if you dig round on the forums, you'll probably find it being briefly because of its epic opening ceremony), but I didn't exactly think anything of it other than "Oh, that's an obscure park I've never heard of and probably won't visit any time soon". Fast-forward to now and I'm here, with said coaster right before my eyes.
    We were directed to park by the Mexico entrance rather than the main entrance, which straight away took us to the likes of Huracan and some of the other big rides on park. Huracan opened at half 10, so we decided to wait around a bit, and Jack and Peaj went on El Toro, the park's breakdance to pass the time...

    They weren't overly impressed with it.
    We joined the queue for Huracan, which was stated to be about 30 minutes. Given this was the park's headline ride, we decided to brave it expecting it to be longer later in the day. The entire queue is indoors and very nice, though slightly boring to wait in admittedly. This is saved by the epic station area, which is nicely themed, very atmospheric and has awesome lighting and sound effects.
    The coaster starts off with a dark ride section, taking you pass a waterfall and many large temple-like statues. I think the ride is meant to have on board audio, but unfortunately it wasn't working for us. Whilst the theming here was something special, the lack of audio obviously meant something felt like it was missing. The lift hill then takes you outside briefly, giving a lovely view of part of the park, and the warehouse the ride is held in, before dropping you back inside. There's some cool light effects in there, and the layout is fun, but again, without any audio, it feels like a lot is missing from the attraction. The ride ended and left me saying "Is that it?". As an overall attraction, it's probably great when everything is working, but it just didn't do enough for me on the day. A real shame.

    Entrance / outdoor section

    Atmospheric station is atmospheric.
    We then moved over the El Volador, a Topple Tower. Infamous rides really, and whilst I have wanted to try one out for ages, I was a bit unsure on whether the ride would be any good. The ride experience is weird, as it's not dull, not exciting, but it just happens. Very unremarkable in my opinion. I guess for me they're a lot like top spins in that they're fun rides to watch, but that's about it.


    It was time to move onto another coaster, with Boomerang just around the corner. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it's a Vekoma Boomerang. It's the first one I've done, and I wasn't exactly looking forward to it after hearing many bad reviews. Alas, even if the long-ish queue gave me plenty of time to hear the rattlyness of the ride, I went in with an open mind. Admittedly, I didn't find it as rough as I was expecting, but it wasn't a comfortable ride. Coupled in with the fact that it's an intense ride mean I didn't enjoy that much.


    To complete of Mexico, we watched a French showing of the park's new 4D film, Le Petite Prince (we could also have watched it in Dutch if we wanted, but chose against it. It's got a fair few special effects, and the fact we were told to keep our bags away from the seats should have been an indication of what to expect from the film. The seats move in all directions an awful, awful lot - the effect is a lot more over-used than any of Angry Birds' effects, for some perspective. The film itself was alright though.
    After about 2 hours in one area of the park, we finally moved along to the Far West to do River Splash, the park's log flume. It was a very warm day once again, so I was hoping for a reasonable splashing. Unfortunately, despite having a nice bit of theming and style to the ride, it was quite short, relatively dry and all in all, just a bit meh.

    Final drop

    Adam insisted I take a photo of the bin, because "no one would believe they have themed bins here if we didn't take a photo".
    After a spot of lunch and making priorities of what we should get done, we headed over to Jungle Mission. Bellewaerde is a theme park and zoo integrated into one another, and Jungle Mission is one of those rides that mixes theme park and zoo perfectly (sort of like what Zufari tries to do at Chessington). It's a boat ride that lets you see multiple animals exhibits, but also has a variety of special effects that make it feel like a fun boat ride. It was my favourite attraction of the day probably, with the effects being great, the theming being great, and decent views of the animals too.

    The station area had loads of these cobwebs on the ceiling - I'm still not sure if they're theming or real...





    Next up was Houdini, a Vekoma Madhouse. The pre-show was interesting with lots of good bits of theming, and I think we were able to be able to pick up the general gist of the story. The actual ride section was alright, but not to the standard of Hex, unsurprisingly. Still, a fun ride in its own right. This was followed by the Bengal Express - a train ride that takes you through lion and tiger enclosures. Again, another fun ride, but the heat meant that the (obviously enclosed) train carriages were quiet warm, and the animals themselves were more lounging around staying cool.


    With time ticking on, we went to the Canada area of the park, with a Shoot-the-Chute style ride, Niagara, on the cards. Now, I'm not someone who likes get drenched on water rides unless I'm in the right mood (for context, I haven't done Tidal Wave since 2009 or 2010, despite many opportunities to). So I gave this one a miss, but did queue with the group. Somehow we were lucky and skipped a good 60 minutes of the 80 minute queue when a staff member from the station shouted for a group to come forward to fill up a row (why they got a group from near the end of queue instead of the front I have no clue, but I guess we weren't going to complain...). After seeing everyone after the ride, they didn't look that wet and I kind of wished I done the ride now, but ah well...

    Looking pleasantly wet-ish.
    A go on Screaming Eagle, a Shot n Drop tower, followed. Once again, it's a type of ride I'd never done before, but had wanted to try. It was okay, but I think I prefer ordinary drop towers to be honest - they provide a better, and more comfortable, experience really.
    With 5pm approaching, we headed over the Gold Rush Stunt and Dive Show, new for this year. It was really good fun, with great special effects, a decent run time (25 minutes or so) and some good stunts of course. Being a stunt show meant it was very easy to follow as well, an added bonus for a park which is trying to cater for 2 different languages. It bought back some memories of Thorpe's stunt and dive show too; forgot how much I missed it!


    With the show over and the 6pm close looming, there was only really time for one more ride, and we opted to do Bengal Rapid River, unsurprisingly a rapids ride. It was a really fun ride, with it being quite 'rapidsy', a good level of wetness, with some nice bits of theming and scenery scattered around the course. Also slightly strange to see a rapids ride have its station on a slope (though, as we'd find out during the trip, not exactly uncommon!).

    First time I'd seen a rapids ride with the 'wedge seat' boat design too!
    Final Thoughts: Bellewaerde is an odd park in some ways. It's a mixed bag between having some quality attractions (Jungle Mission, Bengal Rapids), but then some attractions which feel like they have missed opportunities (Huracan, River Splash). Maybe on a different, slightly quieter, day, I'd feel different about the park. But even then, I still feel like the park needs a little bit more to feel complete. It's a park I'm not exactly desperate to go back to any time soon, but a park I'm glad I've done. One final thing I want to mention is how friendly and generally great the staff were - also an added bonus that many spoke English, which was much appreciated after some of my failed attempts at speaking French!
    We then set off to head to Brussels, which was meant to be a relatively nice journey. Unfortunately, roadworks on the motorway had other plans. A journey which should have taken us just over an hour ended up taking us 2 and a half hours, thanks to single file traffic and an accident. Joyous. Fortunately, when we arrived at the Meininger hotel in Brussels, we were greeted by great staff, a huge room and a Hard Rock Cafe a very short walk away! Would highly recommend this hotel for anyone planning to go to Brussels. There was also a fabulous atmosphere in the city centre with many celebrating the closure of roads happening in the area for an 8 month trial period (to help the atmosphere around that area or something; not too sure on the actual reason).

    A beautiful panoramic shot of the group in Brussels
  18. JoshC.
    *Once again, a long time between entries into this trip - sorry to anyone who is still reading this! Reports will probably be shorter from now on so I can finish this thing before Christmas...*
    After a nice sleep in Dusseldorf, we said out goodbyes to Germany and ventured into The Netherlands. Out first stop was Toverland, which, despite being a relatively small park, was one I was looking forward to a lot. The 10-6 opening time would surely give plenty of time to give everything a couple of rides, before heading off to try and get a sneaky ride in on Baron at Efteling for its opening day (yes, this report is all the way back from July 1st). We arrived to a very empty-looking car park at opening, and got in. We were told that the ropes course was closed for the day and that the park's signature coaster, Troy, would only be open 12-5.
    With half of the park basically being indoors, we decided to start off in there and do the big rides that there were. We started the day off with Boomerang, a Vekoma junior coaster. A neat little coaster which feels surprisingly high when at the top.

    After a quick ride on the Teacups - where my bag flew out of mine and Adam's cup despite minimal spinning! - we did the nearby waterslides, which were good fun. We then ventured outside and did the random hedge maze, before heading to the second half of the indoor part of the park. We had planned to get the bobsleigh ride done, but it has suffered a technical fault, so we instead did the adjacent funhouse and the nearby logflume, Backstroke. It was a nice flume, with it being partially indoors and outdoors, and has a nice bit of theming. It doesn't get you very wet, but has a nice backwards drop and a weird turntable mid lift to turn you forwards...


    Blitz Bahn, the redone bobsleigh ride, has opened by the time we were done with this. It had a nicely themed queue, which was good as this had the longest queue of the day at a staggering 15 minutes. The ride itself was fun, can't really add much more to it than that really!


    I was rather happy to see some maths on a 'chalkboard' in the queue...

    With the noteworthy things inside done, we ventured outside and headed over to the Magic Valley to ride the park's newest coaster, Dwervelwind, a Mack spinning coaster. Rather unsurprisingly, it was practically a walk on, so we made our way through the nicely themed queue and into the station building. I really loved the station; nicely styled and there's a neat little dispatch sequence with some lights when a train leaves. The ride itself was pretty fun with a nice layout that even could be enjoyed on a non-spinning coaster. We got some decent spinning on our first ride too.


    Temperatures we soaring, so we went and did Djengu River, the park's rapids. Again, not a particularly wet ride, but they were a fun set of rapids with some good spinning in the boats. Certainly a much more welcome rapids ride than River Quest to me! The queue line was themed beautifully as well, which was a bonus.



    We went back on ourselves to Booster Bike, a motorbike coaster, which was now open following a small closure. I've wanted to try one of these out for a while, for the obvious novelty factor of them, so was a bit excited. I was surprised at how comfortable the seating arrangement was, which was a bonus. The ride's layout was fun, but I just can't help but feel the ride would be much better if it just had a normal seating arrangement with lapbars. The novelty is alright, but I think I'd have enjoyed the ride so much more with just lap bars.



    12 o'clock was approaching, so we headed over to the Troy Area to get ready for Troy's opening. Before that, we did Scorpios, a pirate ship with some cool water effects. I wear I read somewhere a couple of years back that this was the tallest or the steepest pirate ship in Europe, so the whole group was really excited for this, but was understandably underwhelmed when we were greeted by a quaint little ride. Don't trust everything you read on the internet guys...

    It was now time for pretty much the main reason why we visited the park - Troy. The coaster really does dominate the park and the immediate surrounding area, and it really does look impressive. Again, the ride was basically a walk on, which was fab. Back row awaited us, and off we went. And wow. The ride is truly relentless, with a great first drop, awesome speedy moments, nice pops of airtime, and the out-of-control feeling woodies are known for it. The ride really is fab, and shot straight up to my favourite ride of the trip so far.




    *ORP to come here soon..*
    With no queue and everyone loving Troy, we went straight back on for another go, and all loved it again (I think I got front row this time and it was still fab). We then decided to retreat indoors and have some lunch; I had some form of spaghetti and it was nice and reasonably priced.
    It was just coming up to 1 o'clock now, and we'd done everything major already. We stayed inside for a bit and did a couple of the smaller rides in there that we missed out on, before doing some rerides. According to my ride count I wrote up in the car to Efteling, we'd done all the coasters multiple more times, and the water rides again (including the surprisingly wet indoor water slide which was so much fun!). I remember riding Dwervelwind one time and smacking the back of my head against the seat quite hard mid-way through the ride, and the rest of the ride being quite uncomfortable. The rest of the group did another ride on it straight away whilst I sat out. Troy was the most ridden ride on the day, and despite the temperatures soaring (34-35 degrees; possibly the hottest I've experienced in my life..), I was happy to keep on riding it during the day.
    We also watched the Fountain show, and in general had some fun by the fountains, which was nice. Pictures don't really do the show justice...


    I continued doing all the rides till about half 4, before the constant high temperature had finally gotten to me and I had to stay inside. It was a shame to miss out on a couple more rides on Troy, but despite staying well hydrated during the day, the heat had really just gotten to me. We left the park not long after 5, so that we could set off to Efteling to try and get the ride on Baron...
    Final Toverland thoughts: Toverland is a fantastic little park with some really good attractions. Their coasters are all good fun, and having pretty much half the park indoors is great too. One or two more attractions would be nice to help give the park just that little bit more ride-wise, but still is a great little park as it is! Not a park I'm dying to visit again any time soon, but that's not a bad thing I suppose.
    ---
    Now, I don't want to steal the thunder from Toverland, but since I'm doing these blogs in days, I can't not put a bit about Baron here. With Efteling a little over an hour away from Toverland, we made our way to the park, hoping that we'd be able to get to the park before the 8pm close and sneak a quick ride in on Baron, on it's opening day. We made good time on the road, and checked into our room in the Efteling Bosrijk Village (which was lovely!). By the time that was all done, we got into the park just after 7 and headed straight to Baron. I won't go into it too much, since my ride review is here, but the hour-or-so queue for front row in the heat made it quite a long and gruelling experience, but oh so worth it!
    We then went to the nearby town to try and find dinner, and almost had no luck before finding a kebab shop which did nice and cheap-ish food. A short walk back to our room and I quite happily collapsed into bed at some point around 1am I think (goodness knows where all the time had gone...).
    And that's where I'll leave it for now. The next report will combine our 2 days at Efteling, and hopefully shouldn't be too long before I post it!
  19. JoshC.
    The last day of BelGerAnd is here! And unfortunately it's not ending with a bang, but rather a slur of 'b's and 'a's in one word - Bobbejaanland. For those curious, it's pronounced Bob-e-yan-land (we didn't fully know this until about half way through the day).
    Being close to the park meant that after our free breakfast, we arrived with plenty of time for the 10am opening. We got there at about 9:45 and let through the main gates, where we were immediately bombarded by a costumed character and member of staff forcing us to having a photo with them. Whilst this was happening, Adam had seen a hidden A4 sign saying that the park was closing at 6pm, instead of 7pm as advertised on the site. This filled us with some hope, since it indicated that the park might be quieter than the park originally expected, especially for a lovely (33 degrees) Saturday in July.
    The entrance area can be likened to Towers Street at Alton I guess, in that there's a street with a few shops and stuff. At the end of the street, they had gates which would open at 10, after a little intro show my The Smurfs (yeah, bit random). So whilst we waited for the gates to open, we went to the customer service kiosk to ask where we got maps; turned out they were 2 euros each!? Fortunately I had some loose change I was trying to get rid of, so did get one, but the cost for a map is ridiculous.

    My 'How on earth do I pronounce this?' face.


    Even the Smurfs had no clue why they were there.
    With the entrance show done, we headed into the park. We realised that a map wasn't really needed for the park quickly, since the park was just based around an oval lake, with nothing particular hidden. So we essentially just went round the lack and ticked off the rides as they came. Bobbejaanland had the most coasters out of all the parks on the trip, with 7. Just a shame that none of them were very good...
    Our first ride of the day was Typhoon, the world's second Gerstlauer Eurofighter built. I was quite keen to try out another Eurofighter, and was looking forward to it. But the ride just doesn't really do a lot. After the standard (and VERY slow!) vertical left and 97 degree drop came a vertical loop, which was actually very intense and the highlight of the ride. The rest of the ride slowly meanders abouts, doing some turns, some twists and some inversions, but it just feels slow and boring. A real shame.
    The coaster opened on 3 cars (out of a possible 5 by the looks of things), but at one point in the day, was down to 1 car it was so quiet! We didn't bother riding it again because there were other, better rides, on park.



    We had planned to do the nearby Dizz, the Maurer spinner, afterwards, but since it opened at 10:50, apparently, we moved onto Revolution, the indoor coaster with a rather impressive 30 car train (and thus being able to hold 60 people per train), and a very long-winded spiral lift hill. I was expecting a coaster with such a ridiculous gimmick to be a bit boring, but it was surprisingly fun. It wasn't a 'good' ride (indeed, it just about scrapped onto my 'Top 20' list for coasters ridden during this trip), but it was fun.
    The remaining coasters quickly followed. Speedy Bob, a Wild Mouse, was very meh, and it really shows how much theming can do to a ride, as it feels completely different to Rattlesnake. Dream Catcher, a suspended Vekoma coaster, was next, and was very forgettable. The junior coaster Oki Doki was a surprise; a nice fun coaster. The powered coaster Bob Express was also pretty neat, featuring an interesting enough layout. We eventually rode Dizz in the afternoon, but it was by far the worst spinning coaster I've done; the layout doesn't lend itself to allow the cars to spin that much..




    Bob Express geek board.


    We also watched the first showing of their new show, featuring magicians Rob and Emiel. I don't know how big they are in Belgium / Netherlands, but they have their own website, so they must have made a bit of a name for themselves I guess? Unfortunately the show wasn't very good (a lot of the stuff was very visual, so the language barrier wasn't much of an issue), though they did seem to be a bit nervous, and there were some crowds troubles. They did speak to us before the show though, after noticing we were English, and did have a bit of a chat with us.

    The redeeming feature for Bobbejaanland though is in some of its other rides and, surprisingly, their indoor attractions. The park has many small attractions, like boat rides, water slides, slidey slides, and a few flat rides / dark rides. However, there are four that really stand out:
    The first of which is El Rio, a park's rapids. With the majority of the layout hidden away, it was hard to tell what to expect. But the ride had a decent layout - featuring a whirlpool! - and got you a good level of wet. It was nice to see a decent rapids at the park.
    What is most interesting about this ride though is the ferris wheel feature on its ride:

    Don't get too excited; it's not in operation. Essentially, what would happen is a boat would travel onto a platform, the wheel would rotate, and the boat would go down a long, steep-ish drop, likely making a very nice splash. Unfortunately, the wheel hasn't been in operation for about 9 years, according to TPR, because it was an operational nightmare. Boats instead take a route around the wheel.
    The next stand out ride was Indiana River, an indoor log flume. This is one of two log flumes on the park, though the second, outdoor, one is very meh. Given the looks of the outdoor rides on park, it was a pleasant surprise to see this ride so well themed. It was very jungle-like, and the majority of the route had some nice features to look out. The ride seems to get the front of the boat soaked, and the back of the boat stays dry (we tried a couple of different seating configurations on our goes and this always seemed to be the case), which is a bit odd.


    (Above photo taken with flash on; the place feels a lot more atmospheric in low light!).
    Another water ride which stands out is Banana Battle, an indoor splash battle. The layout has LOADS of interaction points, meaning that you get drenched. It's a great ride all in all, and even if it's a bit too wet for my liking, I still enjoyed it. The ride smelt a bit too much like chlorine for my liking though..

    Finally, the best attraction on park is, by some way, The Forbidden Caves (warning: spoilers!). New for this year, it's an immersive tunnel ride. In a similar vain to Hex, the ride has 2 pre shows before the main ride. The premise of the ride, from what I gathered/remember, is that we're going on a Cave Tour, inspired by explorer Jasper Dubois. He had many adventures, but got lost on one whilst trying to find some treasure, so we're going to go find him.
    The group is taken around by a 'tour guide' during the pre shows. Usually this is in Dutch, but on our second go, it was only us and an English-speaking French couple, so we were fortunate enough to be given the pre shows in English (lucky that the staff member spoke very good English too!). The first pre show takes place in an elevator, descending us down "several thousand meters very quickly", and the guide tells a few jokes. It was a standard effect, but done well. The second one involves a lot of talk about the treasure and the guide touches a found gem, which, in turn, activates loads of effects, with things shaking of the walls, loud noises, smoke, lights, and a evil force warning us to go away. It was very dramatic and very well done.
    The ride itself then follows. Unfortunately, it's a bit of a letdown. It's either too hard to see the screen (if you sit too far back), or all the immersion is ruined if you sit too close to the front (you see the trough the ride carriage travels in, etc.). The video itself is alright and it's not a bad simulation experience, it's just that the ride hardware is very meh and average.
    All in all, Forbidden Caves was a fab attraction, and its overall quality feels out of place at an average park like Bobbejaanland. Indeed, in terms of quality, and even theming, it wouldn't have felt out of place at some major parks that I've now visited! So kudos really need to be given to the park for opening such a solid attraction! The one thing which was a bit of a shame was that is opened at 1, and closed just before the park closed.



    Overall Bobbejaanland thoughts: Bobbejaanland is a very odd park, and it's not surprising that a park of this size and quality cut it's opening times by an hour at such short notice; they clearly weren't getting the guests to warrant it. But, despite its overall average-ness, there are a couple of neat little rides there, and if Forbidden Caves is the sort of level of theming and quality we can expect from the park in the future, it might be one to surprise us all in a few years time.
    ---
    And so that's it! We left Bobbejaanland and hit the road for the long drive back to Calais. Funnily enough, we actually passed Plopsaland on the way, which made the trip feel nice and closed in a way. Unfortunately, when we got to Calais, we were told that no ferries had gone to Dover all week (because of the immigration problems at the time), and so we had to try our luck at Dunkirk. Fortunately we managed to get on a ferry there, but it meant we didn't get back till rather late (I tucked myself into bed at the cool time of half 3 in the morning...).
    Thanks to anyone that did read all the entries or leave comments; t'is greatly appreciated!
  20. JoshC.

    2015 Containment Review

    By JoshC.,

    Captain Obvious Alert - This blog may contain spoilers.
    So on Sunday, I did Containment, the new escape experience at Thorpe. I've never done one of these escape room things, and I've always been a bit sceptical about the idea - so many things can go wrong which can ruin the experience. But nonetheless, I was still excited to try it out...
    One thing which is worth noting was our group was made up of only 6 people (4 TPMers and 2 randomers), rather than the full 10. This was at the 4pm slot, so it makes me wonder if not enough are keen to spend the money on another attraction / there's not enough advertising going into it? Anyways, review time...
    The pre-show video was nice, and did seem to nod to Experiment 10? The trouble was, it was very difficult to hear (not helped by the nearby leaf blower and Swarm's roar). Whether this was intentional (to draw people in closer to the screen to help with scares) or not is hard to tell, but it does just need to be easier to hear. Big thumbs up need to go to the actor here though; really did a great job at creating a funny, but also slightly eerie, feel.
    The first room I assume is meant to play on the fear of darkness. It was a bit disorientating, but not scary or challenging really. I guess it's a nice way to introduce you to the concept and get you rolling.
    The second room was a lot more challenging. The actor in here gave us a great jump scare and then started acting very crazy and creepy. Constantly going 'tick tock, tick tock' and 'clock clock clock' to try and give us a hint to the situation. I'm not entirely sure how we cracked the code, but I believe we did just in time? Not really sure.
    So we moved onto the third room, where a lovely female actor started to cough all over me. She appeared to be dying and was in desperate need of the much sought-after antidote. Wasn't she taught about 'Catch it, Bin it, Kill it'? Anyways, this room was a bit tricky, in that it was relatively easy to figure out what we needed to do, but it was just doing it which was the problem. After a while, and following some general interaction from the actor, we eventually got it done. The final room awaited...
    Final room is a weird one. The lights went out very quickly and we were left really unsure what to do. The actor shone a UV light to reveal the hidden message of 'Find antidote' on the wall. After some general walking around in the darkness and trying anything and everything to get closer to figuring out what we needed to do, eventually the actor shone a torch in the general direction of a massive clue to help work out the final code. Once the code was worked out, it was just a case putting it in - in very little light - before we had escaped.
    And that's how it ended. We pressed a button and after a few seconds, the actor opened the door to let us out. It had all ended so...confusingly. We had cracked the final code, and got let out. The story has disappeared and it just leaves you feeling so uncertain. I had to ask the actor if we had completed the task because it just felt like the end wasn't there. Being lead outside and asked by an ordinary member of staff if we had completed it (to hence be given our wristband) feels like a missed opportunity too.
    Despite the sudden ending, and perhaps my less-than-excited sounding review, I really did enjoy Containment. It's a fun experience and something very different to what the park has ever offered. It needs some more work, but on the whole, it's a neat thing.
    So - what could be improved?
    1) The preshow. Having the preshow inside would be best, as it would make it far easier to hear. Alternatively, just not have a video and let an actor give it. I appreciate space is the issue here though.
    2) The scare rating. This was rated 5/5 stars, and yet was not really scary. Yes, there was a couple of jump scares and a couple of dark scenes, but not enough to warrant a 5 star rating. Arguably, this isn't scarier than Blair Witch, and so isn't even worthy of a 2 star rating. That's not to say it's not a good attraction and not something that doesn't deserve its place at Fright Nights.
    Either the park need to make it scarier / more intense. Make you have to work against the actors, with them deliberately trying to sabotage you, rather than have them being generic scary people who eventually point you in the right direction. Or, lower the scare rating. Given what they've tried to do, and that I assume more people will be 'got' by the scenes, a 3 star rating might have been more suitable.
    I guess giving it a low scare rating would make it harder to sell tickets though. Speaking of which...
    3) The cost. Given the restricted numbers and the popularity of the attractions at Thorpe, I think a charge is a sensible idea. But a £10 charge is a lot. And perhaps too much - if they're not filling out the groups and have already stopped offering timed tickets online (instead giving you a time on collection I believe?), then maybe the demand for such a high-cost attraction isn't there. Lower the cost, reduce the group size or push the experience more.
    4) The ending. There needs to be more of an ending. I think scene which shows you which rooms you solved and ones you didn't (say by a green / red light on a screen), along with a corresponding message, actor interaction to give you a wristband, plus a scare to get people out would really help the attraction feel complete.
    So - is it worth it?
    In a nutshell, yes. It's a steep charge for what they are offering, but I genuinely think it's a neat attraction which can only grow if they continue to offer such an experience. Let's hope it does return next year; though with new / updated puzzles and scenes!
  21. JoshC.

    BelGerAnd2 - Germany

    By JoshC.,

    I've wanted to complete my BelGerAnd2 "trip report" for a while, mostly for sake of completion, but I've really struggled to figure out what to say about Phantasialand.  It's easy to sing the praises for the park, and most of those praises would see me reiterate myself.  So let's get those out of the way...
     
    Maus au Chocolat and Chiapas are the perfect examples of how to a shooting dark ride and water ride respectively.  Black Mamba is a great coaster that really turns into a beast in the afternoon, and Winjas is a fine example of how to blend coaster and 'other' elements into one ride.  Colorado Adventure is a neat little family ride, though nothing *that* special in my books.  River Quest is disgustingly terrifying and yet amazingly fun, and the new theming it's received thanks to Klugheim is great (though I wish they disguised the lifts a bit better).  The Berlin area is generally fab too.  The park's general atmosphere, theming, sense of showmanship and storytelling is surely one of the best in Europe.  
     
    And, in an unusual twist for me, I'll focus a bit more on the negatives...
     
    Mystery Castle
    I honestly do not get the fuss over this ride.  I went into it last year with no real idea of what to expect and was left disappointed.  Though after hearing there's 2 cycles, one of which is not great, I was left with a glimmer of hope.  But this year, I realised that what I had previously experienced was in fact the 'good cycle', and I had the joy of experiencing the not-so-good one.  Disappointed is probably the best word that describes my feelings about this.  Underwhelmed also springs to mind.  But at least the queue is fantastically themed!
     
    China
    Though the China area looks good, the two dark rides (a madhouse and omnimover) are far from good.  The madhouse is definitely my least favourite one I've been on, and the omnimover is more outdated than anything else.  The trouble these rides have is that whatever park they were in, they would only ever be 'okay' or 'passable' at best, and so their quality - or lack of - sticks out like a sore thumb in Phantasialand.  I know not everything can be sorted out all at once and these are on the potential hit list, but that doesn't mean it's acceptable.
     
    Temple of the Nighthawk
    Jack and Matt seemed to adore this because of the new music it has.  But I still found it awful and boring and just generally a waste of space.  Again, it's another ride like the Chinese duo; it's lack of quality sticks out so badly within the park.  And, unlike China, it feels slightly forgotten and neglected, almost as if the park are just waiting to axe it.  
     
    Operations
    Perhaps a bit of an odd one, but one thing I noticed during our visit was that some of the operations weren't great.  Not really talking about throughputs or getting through the queues here, moreso how they dealt with them generally.  Queue times weren't that accurate (especially on the not-so-big rides) and queue boards weren't updating properly (the boards were advertising a 6pm close for a few hours when it was in fact an 8pm close, leaving some confusion).  And when one of the Winjas coasters closed, they still allowed the queue to split, creating confusion in the queue and havoc in the station area.  Something that should have been dealt with better, especially since the side that did close seemed to have a problem which didn't have a quick solution.
     
     
    Klugheim
    Not to leave this blog post on a negative note, let's talk about Klugheim.  It's reason enough to make the effort to go to Phantasialand.  Taron might not be everyone's cup of tea, and it might not break into everyone's Top 10, but I can see it being appreciated by almost all of the enthusiast community (and the general public as well).  Raik is a solid family coaster, and Klugheim in general is a fantastic area to explore.  Oh, and the staff uniforms for that area are just incredible.
     
    Also, much to whole group's excitement, we got to (albeit briefly) speak to Chris, one of the park's managers who was seen in build up videos to Klugheim's opening.  He was a super nice guy, and he let us queue up for front row on Taron at the end of the day, despite them closing the front row queue.  Only wish we had more time to talk to him because he genuinely seemed so passionate and excited about the coaster when we saw him in the station area; very hands on too!
     
     
    I really hope that despite my laziness in writing this up, and focusing a bit too much on the negatives, the absolute joy I had at Phantasialand is still shining through somehow.  Yes, there's a couple of niggles and a few rides that are getting past their shelf life, but recent investments indicate that when they kick the bucket, something incredible will come in its place.  I genuinely cannot wait to go back, and I really hope more and more people but Phantasia on their radar!
  22. JoshC.
    "Day 3? What happened to Day 2 though Josh? Have I missed a magnificent report of a wonderfully obscure French park that most people don't care about?" I hear no one ask. 
    Well, it's been edited into my previous blog entry, to save me hogging all the blog entry space  
     
    When this trip was planned, it was prior to the Formule incident at Parc Saint Paul. For those who don't know: a woman fell out of one of their roller coasters (Formule1), dying. The ride has a poor history, also being the reason another person died at the park in 2009. It was later found out the ride should have had a seatbelt restraint as well as a lapbar, but the seatbelt had been removed by the park, by decision of the director. They have said the ride will be removed once all investigations are complete.
     
    I didn't know much about the park beyond their reasonably new woodie, but after the accident I'd read more on it. Needless to say the accident was shocking in itself, and the reaction from the park's director was even moreso. There was a point where loads of rides were closed, and even rumours the park may be closed as a result of the incident, so we had looked at alternatives to the day if that was the case. This turned out attention to Jardin d'Acclimatation - a small garden-theme park type area on the outskirts of Paris, somewhere which I had completely discounted / forgotten about.

    Ultimately, Parc Saint Paul had all rides bar Formule running, but we realised we wouldn't need a full day, so decided to do both parks. More creds! And "Jar-da" (which was much easier to say) also had 2 Soquets - even better! 

    Parc Saint Paul
    Covid measures
    Like other parks, they had signs saying where masks were obligatory. From memory, I think basically all the rides we did you had to wear one. There were a few hand sanitising points about, and social distancing seemed minimal. It seemed that some rides were having seats sanitised after every 2-3 cycles too.
     

    We pretty much arrived as the park opened at 10am, but most rides weren't meant to open till half 10. After some milling around, and a go on their slide, first ride of the day was the log flume. Credit to the staff member here who was brilliant too. Set an expectation that the park would be one of those ones where staff were the right level of friendly, whilst also being efficient. Turned out she was the exception - most staff were more focused on talking among themselves.

    Log flume was exceptionally wet though; took a solid couple of hours to get dry.


    We moved onto Wood Express, which I later realised was my first Gravity Group woodie. I was both surprised and disappointed by the ride - there's a good few moments of airtime throughout. Nothing major or really powerful, but a few moments which were nice. But the ride was incredibly rattly. For a ride that's barely 2 years old, it was really bad. Vibrating all over the place and really just not that enjoyable to ride. The restraints aren't the greatest either which doesn't help. So yeah, despite some nice moments, it's just not that good.
     



    A quick go on the spinning wild mouse (where we sat sensibly this time and had minimal spinning!) and drop tower (which takes WAY too long to reach the top), we moved onto their open Pax - Wild Train. It had the classic Pax uncomfortable-ness from going side-to-side, but the first drop was pretty damn fun at the back.
     

    We moved on quickly and collected the final 3 open creds (Wacky Worm - which actually had a queue, disgraceful! - the custom Vekoma Rollerskater which was meh and the Zamperla Mini Mouse). All creds done by 11am! Temperatures were soaring so we cooled down on their dingy slide, which has an impressive entrance feature, before heading to the infamous Telepherique. For those unacquainted, this thing...

    I'd heard about this a few times before visiting, and had forgotten on the day it was actually here until I saw it. For those who don't know - you stand on a little podium suspending under the track. You run off the platform and gravity goes the rest; with your platform swinging and spinning frantically throughout. I'm sure there's videos on Youtube showing it off better. Frankly, it's a bloody terrifying experience. I was hanging on for dear life throughout, and I spun an obscene amount through the second half, to the point I had no clue how to stop myself near the end. Took me a few minutes to recover too; bloody spinning rides making me feel old...

    To more or less round the day off, we did their indoor walkthroughs. In particular, Le Château Hanté was fantastic! A really well done, scary walkthrough in my eyes - some solid jump scares, really dark and good triggered effects. It does feel like it would be a bit better as a Ghost Train rather than a walkthrough, but I guess that any walkthrough done this well would be the same.

    We wandered round the park a bit more, opted to do a second ride on Wood Express, which was a little more uncomfortable at the back, which rounded off our time at the park, a little before midday.
     

    Entrance to the dingy slide was cool - love me a good waterfall!

    I rarely do Disk'os, and this was no exception - but it looks really cool!

    Honestly, I wasn't a big fan of Parc Saint Paul. Rides themselves weren't great anyway, despite some pockets of good theming, but the park just didn't sit right with me. From things like the seemingly circus-like lion show, which feels like an outdated principle, to them parading the fact they have extremely tall and extremely short staff members like they're an attraction in themselves, it just felt off with me. Along of course with the recent incident. With most (perhaps even all?) parks I've visited, I could at least envision myself revisiting them in some circumstances - but Parc Saint Paul, I really don't envision me wanting to return, without some larger changes.

    For those wondering what the state of Formule is...
    Some fences with fake grass draped over them. The cars are covered in tarp. No signage accompanying it.


    Taking to the road, an hour and a bit later we were at the outskirts of Paris, in 30C+ temperatures getting ready to enter Jardin d'Acclimatation...

    Entering was a bit of a faff. There was a small queue to buy entry/tickets, and since we were paying by card, we were directed to the automatic machine for buying entry. However, it wasn't till after we got there that we realised we couldn't buy the wristband (which gives entry and unlimited ride access) there, and instead had to queue to get to a booth, which took a long time.

    We were eventually in, and food was the first sensible stop. The first food place we went to was out of all lunch options, except for a few kids sandwiches. We eventually found somewhere that was open, albeit with a long queue and food options weren't the greatest. It was just after 2pm by the time we ate - meaning it took about 50 minutes to enter and find found. Not the greatest start, but given this was a Sunday on the outskirts of Paris with temperatures now peaking at 33C, perhaps not overly surprising.

    Covid measures
    Just another little word about that pesky virus. Masks seemed to be obligatory on all rides. Interestingly, they have also set up 'zones' whilst walking around where masks are obligatory, with the rest of the pathways only being recommended. Hand sanitising points were all around, and particularly just before you got on a ride, and social distancing was recommended to be 1.5m (though, as was rather common in France seemingly, not really adhered to much!).
     

    After eating, the first stop was Dragon Chinois, one of the park's two Soquets. It has a weird layout, with three "lift hills", if you can even call them that, and honestly not much else. Wasn't the most exciting thing in the world. I didn't even get a photo of it...though that was in part down to me eating my lunch, and having my ice cold drink, a bit too quickly I think..!

    We would have done Machine à Vapeur, their powered Soquet, next. But alas, it was closed, and has been for a while it seems. The first spite of the trip! Fortunately, having got the alpine cred the day before, I was still on track for hitting 200 creds, but I would need no more spites...  
    Spite 💔

    Instead, we moved over to Speed Rockets, their Gerstlauer bobsled. The ride had a long, almost full queue, and a little bit of downtime, but we were on quick enough. Given the park can't go above tree height, the ride does a good enough job with it's restrictions. But it's still probably the weakest one of these I've done - it just doesn't have much to offer. But the weird double down drop element is fun - would love to experience more of these!  
    Weird-but-fun mini double down!

    Carrying on with the cred-theme, Souris Mécaniques, their junior Reverchon spinner, packs a little punch. Due to the park's '2 adult per car' rule, I was in a car by myself. For such a short and weird layout, I got a surprising amount of spin in my car. Not something I particularly enjoyed, but if spinning is your thing, I'd guess that would be..

    None of the creds were worth a re-ride, and all had very long queues, so we took the opportunity to just wander round the place and do a few of their smaller rides, including their cute little boat ride. A stand out in terms of rides was Kinetorium, their shooter. Another 'sit on a saddle in front of a screen with 20 other people' experience, this had a pretty cool pre show (with not-perfect English subtitles) explaining the story: some biology thing gone wrong basically. The system was much better than Bocasse's one (it actually worked with a room full of people!), and the story and video were much better. A fun little experience; so much so that we did re-ride it.
     


    Originally, Jardin was meant to close at 7pm, with rides shutting at half 6, but clearly due to the weather and how busy it was, they extended both closures by an hour! However, by 5pm we were pretty much done - with nothing worth doing again and having explored around the non-ride side of things, along with the beating heat and little shade, it was time. Despite some areas only being 'masks recommended', I wore my face covering everywhere on site too, so this was my first time wearing one in hot temperatures - I was fine with it, but certainly appreciated taking it off after a few hours!

    Overall thoughts: whilst a nice-looking place, Jar-da didn't do much for me. They've done great to integrate a park into the surroundings, but yeah, it doesn't do it for me. The really hot weather probably didn't help either tbh. Glad to have gone and experienced it though. I was also surprised at how few English signs were about, and how little English staff seemed to speak. Given the location, I expected some more multi-lingual-ness. I guess it's not big with tourists given the location and what it is, but still, surprised me a little. Didn't affect my day as I was able to get by with my limited French, but yeah, surprising.

    Another Premiere Class Hotel awaited us, and this one was ever so slightly better than our previous one! Still not good enough to warrant spending an evening in it, so after another Buffalo Grill meal, we headed to a nearby bowling centre which was open. One of the group is a big bowling fan, but since he hadn't had the chance to bowl for a few months, I thought this might be the perfect opportunity to come close to his score...
      ...seemingly not!

    And with that disappointment, Day 3 drew to a close. Day 4 brings more disappointment, as there's no Soquets, but I'm sure being at Parc Asterix will compensate for that, right..?
  23. JoshC.

    Symbolica Review

    By JoshC.,

    To me, Symbolica was the biggest new European attraction for 2017 for theme parks. It's not exactly a difficult feat to achieve, with little of note actually happening this year. But I found the prospect of Efteling, a park known for creating highly detailed and love dark rides, investing their biggest sum in a ride ever, much more exciting than Port Aventura sticking Ferrari Land at the edge of their park and adding a taller and faster Stealth to their line up.
     
    It's difficult to review a dark ride without giving spoilers, but I'm going to try my best to not spoil anything. Knowing as little about Symbolica will, of course, be advantageous if you come to ride it - though if spoilers are really your thing, just check out Efteling's YouTube...
     
    For some context, the storyline of Symbolica is simple - you're have a feast with the King, but Pardoes, the King's jester, has other ideas and takes you on a behind the scenes tour of the 'Palace of Fantasy'. The pre show sets this story up brilliantly, is easily understood in any language, includes 2 incredible animatronics and a real piece of magic which bought a huge smile to my face.
     
    After the pre show, you make your way down the cellars of the palace towards the station. Symbolica has 3 slightly different routes you can take (themed as 'tours' - Music, Knights and Treasure), and you choose these after the pre show but before you board. After doing all 3, they're all of equal standard, and don't differ THAT much, but each one has its own special little feature.
     
    The ride itself is trackless, with 2 rows of 3. You go around the palace, exploring several different rooms, whilst Pardoes makes an appearance and does some magical stuff. Each scene is very Efteling, in that it's just whimsical, magical and doesn't quite make sense (in a good way!). Most importantly to me though, there are no dead spots and no wasted moments. Each transition between scenes is themed and makes sense. Each scene is themed 360 degrees. Everything flows in its own weird sort of way. This was a huge issue I had with all other Efteling dark rides (and indeed many dark rides in general) - they either have dead spots where nothing happens, other there's some part of the rooms which are unthemed and make no sense with what's going on. Symbolica, in that sense, is perfect to me.
     
    An interesting feature is that the front row has 2 touchscreens. These screens allow the front row to choose their language (it doesn't affect any audio, it's just a message at the start and end of ride), make some of the animatronics do 'things' during the ride, and make your vehicle 'dance' during the finale. It's an interesting idea, but doesn't quite work - I found it more of a distraction during the ride, and it never really added much. Also, it leaves the back row a bit left out - why they couldn't have one screen per row confuses me.
     
    So yeah, in short - Symbolica really is a fab attraction. It's clear to see where the 35 million euro budget went, it looks and feels great, it's interesting and immersive to be in and, most importantly, it is fun. Efteling are onto a winner of an attraction, and definitely worth a trip!
  24. JoshC.
    So, I figured I may as well give a bit more insight about my views on The Walking Dead - The Ride.
     
    I know plenty of people have pretty much written it off already, and it's almost trendy to hate the idea, but I do think it's worth going into this with an open mind.  The overall experience is good, well themed, and does justice to what the ride and building was designed to achieve.  
     
    The entrance portal is nice.  It is standard run down Thorpe style, but it is still good.  The queue is, again, standard Thorpe in that it's "how much queue can we fit in one space", with just little nuggets of theming - in the way of themed signage and Easter Eggs to the show - to go with it.  There's no extensions or anything, so on quiet days, you will have to walk through the whole thing, which is a pain..  Audio in the area is nice and creepy, and the watchtower looks alright to be fair.
     
    Bag room is now outside the building, and is clearly unfinished at the moment.  Hopefully it can be themed up, especially to the standard of the inside of the ride.  After that, groups of 20 (so 2 trains worth) get batched into pre-show.  The pre-show is extremely basic - a minute long video featuring a character talking to you, encouraging you to make your way through the building because we're under attack.  It's well done, and I don't think it will get tedious during re-riding, but I feel like they could have done more here.  Some big special effect, to give you the personal reason to get moving, rather than some guy on a screen telling you...
     
    The walkway to the station is exceptionally well themed.  You go through different areas of 'the safe zone', and as you go through them, audio is triggered saying how those zones are under attack, encouraging you to keep moving.  The tone is perfect here, and really sets up the experience well. 
     
    The ride itself is themed to a 'transit system' in the safe zone, and is being used to transport you to safety.  It's clever, and gives you a reason to be on the ride.  From there, it is just X, with special effects, and I don't think that can be stressed enough.  I really hope that people have ended up being ignorant the OTT "it's the scariest thing ever" marketing approach, or are able to just look past it, else it sets the ride up to fail.  In saying that, the special effects that are there are good, and really do enhance the ride experience.  There aren't any animatronics, just zombie mannequins (which aren't the greatest, but to a casual rider will more than do the job).  There's also screens, smoke, audio and lighting effects, all of which are used very well.  The one stop during the ride is a real highlight actually, fitting in with the story perfectly, and just being a lot of fun!
     
    The ride ends with us still being under attack; everywhere in the safe zone is overrun with zombies.  The post-ride experience happens, in the form of a loud noise, and is...just a bit naff?  There's terrible noise bleed from there to the waiting bit before the station, so if you've been unfortunate with timings, it does spoil it somewhat.  There is more to it, but I believe that tweaks were still being made, so I don't know what to say / expect from that for now.  There is a lot of potential there, but it needs a bit more direction.
     
    So yeah, to round it all up...
    +Fantastically themed experience
    +A fun ride experience, with good special effects
    +An experience that stays true to what the original X:\No Way Out aimed to do
    +A cohesive story which is easy to understand
    -Pre-show could do with a bit more oompf
    -Post-show needs a bit of clarity / more direction
     
     
    But before I go - One final thought.  
     
    I like this, I won't deny that.  I also liked X.  I haven't decided whether I like this more than X or not, but that's neither here nor there for now.  Personally, I think X is the better thing for Thorpe now; it had potential to be a fun ride which was accessible to all.  
     
    I can't help but wonder what Thorpe could have done with X if they had the budget this had.  Or even half the budget.  They really could have created an attraction where you rode "on a wave of light (and sound)", went through tunnels of light, etc.  I imagine that having the trains 'chase' lit up track, with lasers and smoke effects around, along with an extended original soundtrack would have been more than possible, along with some fun lighting effects in the entrance and exit walkways.  I reckon I'd have loved that, as would a large majority of people.
  25. JoshC.
    Last weekend, I visited Berlin and Leipzig for a quick cred run and culture trip. I had originally planned to go to Finland and hit up Linnanmaki this month, but since Taiga opens next month, we opted for something a little different..

    After arriving in Berlin Friday morning, the first port of call was Little Big City. Owned by Merlin, LBC is one of their newer midway brands, and is basically a miniature village which goes through the history of Berlin. This one opened up about 2 years ago, and one opened in Beijing late last year, so it's struggled a bit so far. We had free tickets thanks to a member of the group being a Merlin-worker, and hit the attraction up at 11am.

    We were the only one in the pre show room (which is basically a projection explaining the concept), and there was probably only about 10-15 other people in the attraction whilst we were there. It's not a large attraction, and all the exhibits take place in one large room. However, it is well done: there's lots of interaction points, you can get very close / touch basically all of the models, and it's really informative and relaxed. It handles the more sensitive parts of Berlin's history well too. We spent about 50 minutes in there, but a family / more interested group could easily spend closer to 90 minutes I'd say.

    So yeah, it's a shame this isn't doing better and the brand isn't taken off. It has potential, but feels poorly marketed and in an awkward location. At about 13 euro for entrance, it's perhaps a little steep in price and I probably wouldn't have paid to do it personally, but I reckon for those who are interested in learning a little about a lot of the history, it's perfect.
     



     
    We then made the 45 minute ish drive down to Karls Erlebnis-Dorf Elstal. This came onto my radar last year when they opened up the abc tube coaster K2. For some more context, Karls is a massive strawberry farm brand, and we saw a few strawberry stands in Berlin in our brief time there in the morning. The place itself is a bit weird: it's like a garden centre, mixed with a market, mixed with an adventure playground, mixed with a small theme park in the making. Over the past couple of years they've added more rides and more to the theme park side of things.
     

     
    Entrance to the place is free, and includes a few attractions (mostly adventure playground stuff, like climbing frames, outdoor maze, etc), and the rides are pay per ride (1-4 euros per ride), or unlimited rides for 12 euros, the latter of which we opted for. After a delicious and reasonably-priced lunch, we moved onto the rides.
     

     
    K2 is one of the biggest surprise coasters out there, given it's unassuming location. The ride is themed to potatoes / harvesting potatoes / a crisp factory. The queue line (which is exceptionally long), is beautifully well-themed. It's like walking through a crisp factory, going from the harvesting of potatoes to the prepping of them into crisps. For those who have been to Phantasialand, it's similar in style to Maus au Chocolat's queue line. And it is themed amazingly. This is honestly one of the best themed queues I've ever been through: in the same league as Maus, Flying Dutchman at Efteling, etc. Which in itself is a feat.

    The ride itself is great fun. The cars have a lot of room and only have a seatbelt to lock you in. You go through an indoor pre-lift section which shows the harvesting of potatoes, before climbing up the 80ft lift and going round. There's some nice little pops of floater airtime, and it's just a fun, speedy coaster. It hits a MCBR which kills a lot of speed, before going through a couple of helixes and hitting the brakes. We did it multiple times and it's just as fun every time.

    Another quick thing to add: the throughput. This ride was running 4 cars, on a Friday afternoon when the place was super quiet. It occasionally had a queue, but it was running really well and cars were constantly flying around. Was really great to see!

    The rest of the park is fairly standard fodder. There's a Zierer water carousel thing (like Squid Surfer at Legoland), a water drop thing (the first one I've done: it was terrifying), mini drop tower, tractor ride, etc. All were really well styled and worked really well. And in saying that, we had a really good time. The place is really relaxed and a lot of fun, and has plenty to do, especially factoring in the non-park stuff. The place is usually open 10-8 as well, so it's easy to visit whenever you want. 

    The place clearly has a bright future, financial backing and a long-term place, since they're planning on adding some form of hotel / camping / resort experience in 2021 too. Definitely one to watch!
     

    That's all for now. We drove down to Leipzig (a couple of hours away), ready for a..erm...fun day at Belantis tomorrow...
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