Mattgwise

All but Colossus were on full capacity yesterday and queues that I saw ranged from 10 to 30 mins. I think they have upped their game since the period of complaints from around a fortnight ago. Also it turned out it was all for technical reasons they ran one train on all but Nemesis Inferno, not lack of demand.

It is still dismantled in exactly the same way as shown in the picture a couple of pages back.

Strangely no music at entrance, dome, beach/fish/DC area, WWTP radio (despite them only yesterday asking who loves it on Facebook), no Colossus music, no rumba rapids music, no angry birds or dodgems music or Canada Creek (possibly due to loggers closed) Really made the atmosphere much less.

Much better operations at Thorpe Park today compared to my previous visit. All staff worked hard and efficiently as possible Only issue was queue times inaccurate. For example it said 45 mins on X and it was only 20 and Rumba said 5 but had a virtually full queue from bottom of stairs. Angry birds stated 8 mins till next show and had the waiting area completely full for it to then not even have the doors open and the timer reset to 20 mins. By the time the second timer got to about 15 mins a lot of us gave up and left.

Much better operations at Thorpe Park today compared to my previous visit. All staff worked hard and efficiently as possible Only issue was queue times inaccurate. For example it said 45 mins on X and it was only 20 and Rumba said 5 but had a virtually full queue from bottom of stairs. Angry birds stated 8 mins till next show and had the waiting area completely full for it to then not even have the doors open and the timer reset to 20 mins. By the time the second timer got to about 15 mins a lot of us gave up and left.

Arrived at the park entrance at 945 and was handed a letter apologising that 4 rides would be down offering a free return visit. At 955 the queue to vampire stretching all the way to pirates games was let in and instantly a 35 mins wait. Poor operations as usual. Why do they start letting people into the bays after it starts unloading then only open the air gates once the station fully cleared? Such unnecessary time wasting. I know it's been like this regularly for several years now but really is annoying. Bubbleworks was then closed till about 1115 and reopened on reduced capacity and waited 40 minutes. After every loaded boat one had to remain empty. Bizarre. Walked round the park once and rides closed included the 4 advertised and monkey swinger. We left and went to Thorpe Park which was better.

Problem is with Monkey Swinger whenever I have visited over the last few years is that it is mostly operated by one person. This means it takes about 8 to 10 minutes to get people off, fast track and disabled on, load with those room queue, check all swings and start the ride. This could be more than halved if it was operated by two staff.

Video showcasing Chessington in 1993. Features Chessington Railroad, Safari Skyway, Fifth Dimension, Professor Burp's, Runaway Mine Train, Original Vampire, Weather Vane, Dragon, Old Crocks Valley, Toytown Truckers, Dragon River with all it's theming haha, the circus and more. I really miss these days!!! What is hilarious is to see Vampire being operated ultra efficiently and the train coming off the second lift and over the buildings, to already see the next train on the section after the first lift!

Surprising about Swarm considering both recent days I have been the ride was closed temporarily and then sent many empty cars around before reopening without having to add weight to the cars like say they do with the big one. Maybe the wind speed was a little higher as I know they have a wind speed limit on Swarm.

There has been a death at Cedar Point today. From the Cedar Point Facebook page: "At approximately 5 p.m., a guest entered a restricted, fenced area of the Raptor roller coaster and was struck by the ride. Park safety officials responded immediately to the situation. Unfortunately the guest has passed away. Local authorities are on the scene conducting an investigation. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family at this time."

When I was at the park during a storm all of the rides I could see temporarily ceased operation. X may have stayed open, but didn't see that. The storm passed over in about 20 mins and everything reopened. Never known them to fully close the park. But then we don't tend to get whole days of thunderstorms.

Sounds like a repeat of last Wednesday.Waited an hour and fifteen minutes when I had joined an advertised 40 mins queue. I did complain as Colossus and Swarm were similar stories (not as bad as Stealth's) and was offered "return for £10 vouchers" and 2 priority passes each. Crazy, when part of the complaint was excessive fastrack on one train operation!

The geyser is also working as well as the yellow sprays at the bottom of the trough. If you pass through with them on you get soaked. I prefer it with these effects, makes it a tiny bit worth going on compared to before, but Only downfall is that the boats were already deep enough in water and this has been made worse now as they still don't bother pumping out the water.

Of course I would like to see it successful too. But three years and everytime I've been it has been chaos I am going to be negative about it. I completely agree about the other points of one train operation and fastrack overload. Simply too much to cope with having three types of queue on poor capacity. I still remember it being stated during construction updates Stealth being given three trains so that it would never run less than the two it can run!

I don't understand how it is still going as a "trial". I don't think I've ever known a trial to last three years!!!! Either always use it or scrap it for good! I know which will get my vote!

People who used RnR were complaining at Stealth yesterday. They waited the Reserve and ride queue time and then faced a queue of 40 - 50 others waiting for Reserve n Ride (The set of stairs on the right/old SQR queue) As half the fastrack queue was full (probably 100 people) and the normal queue was there, plus the ride on one train it meant very few people from the three queues getting onto the loading area. Simply doesn't work having three types of queue on one train operation.

They certainly would yet virtually every year fail in this area. There were a few years some of the rides had some extra themeing such as CCR, skeletons and masks placed in ride areas, cobwebs etc, but none recently. Some pictures can be found at Total Thorpe Park on the 2007 - 2009 pages. http://www.totalthorpepark.co.uk/features/events.shtml

Nemesis Inferno was the only one on two trains and therefore the queue was short and walk on from 4:45ish. Everything else quite slow. Stealth was advertised at 45 minutes and 1 hour 15 minutes later, finally there. The fasttrack queue was half full and reserve and ride had 40 - 50 people waiting. Was painful! At least the flats all had short queues and despite the poor one train operation on most coasters still had an enjoyable day. Good news though for Tidal Wave. It is back to two boats running.

Not overly busy on the park but Colossus on one train, Colossus on one train. Swarm island closed but was on one train. Yet to see nemesis inferno but guess one train too. Half the park was still closed at 10:15. Loggers closed and samurai closed all day.

I know nothing is confirmed fully yet but the 2 free tickets in the sun newspaper had a fright night description and it mentioned only blair witch project, cabin in the woods and Saw.

Haha - I'm sure about 5 years ago Merlin started charging for Maps. It was very short lived though!

Samurai is still popular, lots talk about it and I think the park will try and keep it. Who knows maybe they will replace it with a newer model like they did with Zodiac. If they ever do, lets hope they paint/theme it! Can imagine a fairground model such as Top buzz With the Samurai logo stuck over the Top Buzz sign!

I read a post on Facebook only earlier today which was someone asking what rides have SQR. Thorpe answered, Samurai, Vortex, Rush, Detonator and Quantum. However this has since been removed suggesting it's not officially ready for the rest.

I'm sure we have all been saying this for the last three or four years. Yet every year it makes it back into the lineup.

Anyone know what's up with Loggers? Been down since Friday according to the queue-times site. Unusual for it to be down nearly a week.