Benin

Day 2 - Tivoli Gardens After an afternoon of lovely sunshine and warmth, the Sunday morning was the complete opposite, with rain pelting down as we prepared to venture into our first park of the trip. As we waited outside the park, the Gumball 500 decided to venture forth, so we had some entertainment building up to the park opening. The park opened at 11, but the majority of rides opened at 11:30, so we hid under a building and awaited our first ride and coaster to open Daemonen. The smallest B&M and by definition the cutest, 6 rows of the tiny floorless cars flit about the tiny compact layout, squeezed into the back end of the park (the exit steps might as well be on the adjoining road). The area and station however are nicely themed to a Chinese back alley area. We followed the ride staff who had opened the ride and went for the front row, ending up to be the only people (stupid enough) to ride during the reasonable rain storm on-going. As such, I didn't see much of the ride, but the ride itself was decent, not the best B&M, but at the same time, not the worst. You can see how limited the park were in their design of the ride with the space and local area unlikely to it anything bigger than the existing layout. Upon repeat riding in the back due to no queue, it still set itself as a solid if unremarkable ride. It's flaws are to do with the limitations of the park's ability to build anything bigger or longer, and I cannot fault the ride for those limits set upon itself. It was still a fun and enjoyable ride at the end of the day, and that's what counts. 6/10 With the rain still lashing down, we seeked more shelter and hid in the nearby dark ride The Flying Trunk. This 'such a cred' dark ride takes us through the various tales of H.C. Andersen in a rather Small World style ride. Typical European dark ride that are always random anyway, and at least we were able to listen to the narration in English. We exited into, surprisingly, more rain, but it had slightly lessened so we went onwards to our next attraction Odin Expressen. A trip above one of the many buildings in the park is this powered Mack's forte, not particularly brilliant although the final helix into a tunnel is decent. Either way it's not the best Mack Powered I've ever been on. 5/10 We headed towards Rustchebahn (furthermore known as Rusty Banana) only to find it was closed due to the rain, so we elected to find the other coaster, discovering a live band playing Musical Statues at the main stage area. Onwards to Karavanen, one of those small Tivoli creds which proceeded to give us 7 laps of it. Usual affair with this type of ride, randomly decent airtime though. After this it was suggested we ride Monsoon the Inverted Magic Carpet which had an excessively long cycle but was good fun regardless. We missed out on the water fountains being used however, no doubt due to the spiteful rain. The Golden Tower was next, an S&S drop tower, for which we had an audience for since we were the only riders. The rain still pouring, we walked towards the Dodgems we had seen earlier, only to find that they had laser guns attached. Mentally fast Dodgems with targets and lasers, Takeshi's Castle called Tivoli, they want their attraction back! However they were awesome due to the ridiculous speed, however with tempermental guns and a lack of obvious scoring system meant it wasn't as good as it could have been. After this we elected for lunch at the Burger Kitchen, which was cooked to order and damn tasty once we had translated the menu. It was a trend to continue throughout the week with our surprise at the quality and the portions of the food at the parks. Upon our exit of the restaurant, the Pippi Longstocking show was starting at the main stage, so after seeing that we went into the Fun House located in the Rusty Banana mountain. I miss the one at Southport, and this was a decent substitute, with lots of levels and different obstacles up and down the building. After some time we heard a new rumbling noise in amongst the sound effects, and realised that they were testing Rusty Banana. We headed out and waited for a short time before it opened. Rusty being 99 years old is one of them old Scenic Railway style coasters, brakeman included and cable lift hill before Intamin made them cool. Having only done the one since Dreamland I was excited to ride another (and the others hadn't done one before at all). What we found was one of the most fun, smooth and brilliant coasters we had ever ridden. Glass smooth, great airtime, good laterals. Rusty has is all, ducking in and out of the mountain element all the while, with some portions in the pitch black to boot. Quite simply a brilliant attraction, and for something reaching 100 years old next year to be smoother than rides not even 5 years old says a lot about the quality of the ride (and it's renovations). They plan on redoing bits of it next year so it might even gain more thematic elements in the future, but regardless, a class ride that all should ride before it gets Bakken'd. 9/10 Time for some more flat rides, and we started with the Star Flyer, which was heavily affected by the high winds flowing through Copenhagen, making the experience better than usual. This was followed with a visit to the park's new area, with the Air Race and Spinny Tower thingy. The Air Race was certainly something different and quite intense at times, it required ice cream times to sort it out, but I wouldn't say no to one being built in the UK. A quick meander around the gardens followed, it is a very nice park to be sure. We went searching for costumed characters who unfortunately weren't around, however timed it to see the Guards on Parade. The most random thing I've ever seen in a theme park environment quite simply, but when in Denmark. Another ride on Rusty followed on, before we rode The Mine another excessively random dark ride of random. This indoor boat ride decided that laser wands shooting coloured gems would be an idea, and it actually kinda worked in the end. Random, enjoyable and long, a hidden gem. We followed with a ride on the Breakdance, which made us all miss Rodeo. Back to Daemonen for two more goes, was still quite good before me and Nicky decided we would brave Vertigo, a Technical Park thing of WHY?! Two planes of 4 people attached to a massive arm are either controlled by the guests or put on a preset setting, either forwards, or backwards, with a potential for a turbo mode which sends you to 5G. We didn't opt for this one, going for the basic mode, which lead us to do some mental spinning as the ride got started, then lots of flat rotations before once again spinning as we began to slow down again. One word describes Vertigo, mental. I would dread to think what turbo would be like (as I saw it often from our hotel). In the end I enjoyed it up to the spinning at the end, which was just too much, but I survived it, and would have no doubt regretted not riding in the end. We rode Karavanen again for 7 more laps before Mark and Holly ventured back onto the S&S, upon returning to the floor, they proclaimed that they heard Only Teardrops playing at the main stage. So we ran to discover Emilie receiving an award from some bloke and looking like she was going to leave. But then, peer pressure won out and she performed the winning song again, everyone went mental and we joined in. Certainly an unique moment to have at any park, let alone on holiday. We had a quick go on Rusty again before heading back into the Fun House for the girls to let off some extra steam as me and Mark made use of the free WiFi available. Another ride on Rusty in the front followed before we headed to Wagamama for food (local Danish food ftw!). One more ride on Daemonen followed by Rusty again and we were done. We bid farewell to Tivoli and thanked it for being a lovely park. Blackpool with a sense of decorum and class I'd like to see it as, randomly plonked in the middle of a city with some old school and modern attractions in amongst each other. We didn't see much of the actual gardens but we already have the idea to return to here over a weekend at the least, I would recommend the park to all for its atmosphere, decent attractions and of course, Rusty Banana.

A trip designed to visit one of the lesser countries in Europe known for its parks, even if it has 6 big parks, including one of the most visited in the continent, not much ever seems to come out of Denmark, so as such, this trip was created, organised and visited. Day 1 - Arrival and Copenhagen We arrived in the afternoon to a warm and humid Denmark, a certain surprise to the 4 of us who were travelling along, and it wasn't long until we realised the Danish way of life was completely different to our own. Very laid back, no expectations and a good versing in foreign languages, leading us to just speak English all week, such is the way of life. We picked up the car, found our hotel in central Copenhagen (near Tivoli and the central station) and began our adventures through a quick wander around the city. We headed to the main plaza where they were setting up a big screen for Eurovision later, whilst the Gumball derby was also taking place. We later learnt that this was a Bank Holiday Weekend for the Danes, so we had clearly timed our trip well to coincide with these events. We went down towards the Royal Palaces to have a quick look at them, before hunger struck us and we went back to the plaza in search for food. In the end, McDonalds was our port of call. Afterwards we decided to head back to the hotel via a small supermarket to stock up on drinks and snacks, and we had a mini-Eurovision night. Great fun, especially as Denmark took the honours, the atmosphere outside our hotel was bouncing around and it was great to be part of a country that won for a change. And with that, the first night ended on a high, and we hadn't even ridden a ride yet.

More parks need to do this in general, although Thorpe's layout helps it organise this in a happier fashion than say Chessie or Towers... Positive move from Thorpe...

Probably another reason why they're getting rid of it being totally free then, to stop certain levels of 'abuse' of it... They are a business, and considering the amount of MAP holders they can't just throw money away like that...

I have a drinks capsule, so it doesn't affect me in the slightest does this (as I don't drink hot drinks anyways)... Least they've moved it to 2 separate places now, that was hilarious to see this massive long queue of MAP holders in Land of the Dragons...

See now that makes sense... I might sort that out tonight (my report is broken up into various word documents at work and at home), and will more than likely begin to use that system for further (long) trip reports...

If you want everyone to create a blog post then, what's the point in having a sub-forum for trip reports? Either have one, or the other, not both...

Have you tried reading it on TowersStreet? It actually kills Firefox for me at work... Could try the Coasterforce version of the report since it goes to 2 pages as people actually responded

Day 8 – Farup Sommerland And so the final day, we packed up and departed Aarhus northwards. We eventually arrived after more venturing through country roads and paid upon arrival in the car (which took us all by surprise, fortunately we were prepared for this) and ended up in the car park, which strangely sits in the middle of the park, allowing for some good views of the two main coasters. Our first destination was Lynet, the Gerstlauer launched, to which I was excited for because Anubis back at Plopsa is made of win. Would Lynet (their first) continue the trend? After the dark and dingy Shockwave-esque queueline we arrived in the dark and atmospheric station before taking our comfy seats and rolling out into the small drop into the launch. Rolling launches need to exist more, and the quick and tight layout really showed some good imagination on the park and Gerst’s parts, featuring airtime, 2 corkscrews and a few tight helixes. This seems to be something Gerstlauer do well in relatively intense compact layouts. There was some bumpiness to it but nothing too extreme, why every other Gerstlauer I’ve been on that’s 2009 or older tonnes better than Saw? Either way, a solid headline ride perfect for Farup. 7/10 Another go lead us searching for a change of coaster, unfortunately Flagermusen was closed due to vomit cleaning, so we headed deeper into the woodland in which the park is set and eventually found Mine Expressen, a Vekoma Junior which was rattly and rough, hence, not very good indeed. It was at this point we realised that Farup was very much an adventure park with rides added on, rather than Djurs which seemed more focused on the ride aspect, as such we hit up the next play area to entice us, as well as some more Bouncy Mats that we found. New for 2013 at Farup is Ice Age 4D, so we headed to that corner of the park to see what system they had for times. Being regular, we decided a quick cool down on the Log Flume would be in order, before drying off. The flume was surprising long, with 3 decent drops throughout, although the force at which you stop on the final one is enough to fling you practically out of the boat if you’re not careful. Back to the show, which had an enthusiastic operator who treated us to the effects prior to the show, including moving chairs and the unsurprising water sprays, the moving seats were at first a novelty before becoming tiresome halfway through. It does have a scene missing from the version at Towers (the plant scene) which I found weird, but I didn’t really care that much in the end. We walked back towards the park entrance and decided to ride Flagermusen, yay for Zamperla spinning coasters! Actually, after Tornado, this was a god-send and actually quite fun since we had a relatively balanced car for it. Quite good in the end. We broke for lunch at the entrance and sat outside, enjoying the vast sunshine Denmark had decided to give us upon our last day, before our quest to the left side of the park continued with Pindsnivet a random kiddie coaster which was a welcome change from the constant Zierers we had endured. Onwards we went to were Orkanen (new for 2013 but alas, closed, actually opens on the day I am writing this) and Falken, a S&S Wooden coaster. This was good aside from the cornering not being brilliant, with lots of bumping along the track occurring at the finale helix. Not brilliant but not great either sums it up quite nicely. We felt like we needed a sugar rush, so Mark, Holly and Nicky elected for candyfloss whilst I went for a normal ice cream which was then dunked in chocolate dust. If I wanted chocolate ice cream, I would have asked for it. No matter, we headed back across the park to the woodland side, and proceeded into THE adventure course… Treasure Hunt is something we did not see coming in its entirety. I had seen bits of it such as the water steps and the monkey bars over the water, but nothing can get you ready for the sheer length of the thing. It starts with a ‘maze’ before proceeding to make you slide, climb, step and pull your way around the woodland and over the lake. It was an amazing thing to go through and when we got through to the end we felt a high sense of full on achievement that we had done it. I’ll let the photos speak for some of it, but it cannot be missed. Next door there is a Fun House, which was exceedingly dark due to the theme of being the home of one of the woodland creatures. We then did some Mini Golf in which I managed to get 2 hole in ones throughout the course, of which some of the holes were excessively made of WHY? We found another playground and after some mincing around there we all felt like we were done for the day (Treasure Hunt really took it out of us, and we were in there for at least 45 minutes). So we headed back towards Lynet, being enticed by Chairswings along the way before laziness got the better of us and we got the train back to Falken for our very last ride of the trip. And that was that, we headed back to Aalborg to find it was in the middle of a Carnival the likes which were unprecedented, with our hotel slap bang in the middle. With some negotiating we got in and enjoyed one last burger in our oasis of calm before the flight home the next morning (N.B. Norwegian Air currently have Wi-Fi and fly from Gatwick to Aalborg). Overall, I would say Denmark is a wonderful place. We didn’t do that much in the way of culture, but in our week we could tell that the people are lovely and friendly, speak great English and have a good sense of humour. Bakken and BonBon aside their parks are lovely with a fantastic atmosphere in each one, whilst they might not be full of the biggest or best rides ever, you can tell the parks do care and there is great fun to be had at them. I would say Djurs took the top park spot, although Tivoli is just behind it, with Juvelen and Rusty Banana taking the top two spots for best rides. In the end though we discovered a wonderful country with some good (and bad) parks that I think we would happily visit again if we could in the near future. I would recommend Denmark to any theme park enthusiast who is bored of the typical European countries, and it excites me for the trip to Sweden next year. Happy Hedgehog thanks you for reading

TowersStreet claiming it has now opened after a morning of dummy testing...

Wait, they're copying the colour scheme of their Vekomas? What is this I don't even......

But this can apply to any park in the world that has a ride closed on you... Parks do cover themselves for this in the majority in their T&Cs but Smiler is certainly the exception with it being brand new... Lots complaining about X-Sector being shut as a result... Clearly no-one realising it was purely due to access reasons for the crane rather than a 'media blackout'...

The 2012 park attendances are HERE! http://www.aecom.com/deployedfiles/Internet/Capabilities/Economics/_documents/2012%20Theme%20Index%20Combined_1-1_online.pdf Dat Merlin increase

IF it reopens... Though why a Kings Island coaster would be affected by Smiler I have no idea...

I didn't even change my team after the first month once... Not that anyone else clearly did either... Palace team in next year's

80

Not a fair comparison, Chessie went from family market to kids market... And was then ignored for the younger fresher (easier to build new rides onto) face of Thorpe... Chessie's lack of adding anything worthwhile also affected them...

But what about Air being shut Mark? Why does no-one care about that?! I'd probs be frustrated, like Bon Bon Land, but I'd get over it quickly personally... As for the average guest, Towers will no doubt give out compensation for returns... We got feck all from Bon Bon (not that we tried cos, we were THAT bothered? )... EDIT - DAT QUEUE ATG

Considering Smiler stalled half way through the first half of the course, I'm not surprised they need to take it physically apart... It's something that quite frequently happens on multi row coasters... Didn't Shambhala stall last year? Leviathan stalled earlier as well as Gatekeeper... Something that can happen to any ride at any time... Then considering that new rides can (and will) go through teething problems, it's something that I really cannot get myself worked up about... Stuff happens... EDIT - And Towers have extended the ride close to compensate apparently... And then they'll probably continue the free return tickets thing they did back on the 23rd May...

You mean like every other ride that's ever stalled in the history of rides? (Fun fact, cranes are used to move stalled coasters, be they small 2 row or 10 row B&Ms) There just seems to be a sheer over-reaction about this that I've not seen before... Don't remember much reaction when Saw stalled recently or any of the other times it's done so...

:unknw: A ride has stalled... Is it THAT big a deal?

Chessie have added something!!!!

Only if he wears a red and blue scarf...

- I wouldn't call X a brilliant family coaster... Sure they polished a turd, but it's still a pretty crap coaster for all intents and purposes in comparison to a fair few family coasters which wipe the floor with it... - Wodan already has a 1.2m restriction, most wooden coasters do... A low restriction would be allowing 1m tall onto them... - I was sick of the capitals about 2 minutes after they insisted on doing it constantly, I'll be glad to see them gone...

The final coaster of the day was Timber Ride, another Zierer coaster, which was well landscaped and themed but that was about it. We wondered over to the 4D Cinema to see when the Chima show was on, and had ages, so we elected for the Atlantis attraction. About the only Merlin thing in the park (no, serious), this is a walk-through Sea-Life with crap pre-show (we and the Danish family with us walked out) and a very well themed experience, with lots of buttons that activated bubbles in various figures. There were also Spider-Crabs, everyone loves them right? We then decided to do Mini-Land, which was the usual high standard you’d expect of a Lego park. We also did the Observation Tower, Lego Top to faff around and get some decent overall views of the park. Way too many photos to choose from on this one We ended up back in the Western area and decided to go on Mine Train, which is literally a train going through a mine. It had a mini dark ride section with a non Lego figure within (the HORROR) and was rather pointless if I’m honest. Lego Canoe was done by myself and Nicky, and was a rather boring Log Flume that went past a few animal figures with a singular drop. I might have fallen asleep mid-ride. After the faff it was time for Legends of Chima 4D, new for 2013 and a tie into the new range. I have no idea what was going on and it was even in English. It centred around a tour of the land and featured very basic 3D and 4D effects, and the two main characters were friends, then enemies. It made no sense. Then Mark said he thought they were fighting of Cheese rather than Chi, which made it funnier, but still no sense was made. To be young and naïve again. After that we had done pretty much everything we wanted to on park, so a few re-rides on Dragon, Temple, Ice Pilots and Polar X-Plorer were done. Overall Legoland Billund is a very nice park, and the least Merlin of the group, which can only be considered a good thing. We really enjoyed our day there but I sense it’d be absolute hell when packed solid and some of those cattlepen extensions were in use.