Benin

In perhaps the weirdest news story of the year, PETA are planning on sueing Sea World because they treat the whales like slaves, using the American Amendment what-not... Source...Quite simply, reminds me of a Weird Al Yankovic song...

WITCH! SHE'S A WITCH! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLdvo8J12jM

Gorgeous Raptor...9/10

No-one been to Chessie since August? Bout time for some Halloween mentions then...So I went to Chessie with the mob known as Coasterforce yesterday, after 3 years of not going with them for the annual Halloween meet-up due to several factors including uni and some annoying people, I found myself lacking a thing to do on Tuesday, so popped home solely for Chessie...The park never changes, even for Halloween, and it looked the same with all the usual cobwebs, witches, spiders and voodoo dolls we all saw last year (and for most of it, before as well), but it does look good and the fact they make an effort across the entire park for extra bits and bobs makes it more superior to Towers (which has theming in two areas) and Thorpe's nooses...The park itself was rather busy, and after an hour of faff, Vampire happened, and a 50 minute queue on two trains in half term is quite alright to me... Interaction from the Vampire in Black Forest Haunt and some of the peasant ones who walked through the entire queue was heavily approved of as well... Still the usual ride and mess around in the station though... Bubbleworks was next, and involved a mass dance in the station on the stairs... I forgot how often enthusiast groups get more insaner in larger numbers, and needless to say the staff were amused by the entire staircase dancing simultaneously...For some reason we did Seastorm then lunch... Me and John (of Italy trip fame) went off to the hotel, and both had the sausages and watched the Zebras... Such a tasty (and empty) restaurant during the day... Especially with the £10 for 2 courses deal they do... Noticed the new Fennec Foxes enclosure having netting around it... But they weren't to be seen which depressed me... Charlie was out though and all was well... Off to Dragon Falls!The trip consists of a Raffle (Faffle) were random theme park tat from many parks is given away... Always entertaining to see what gets given away, such as Greenwood mints, Vampire dummy, Gardaland dragon, and the best prize, a Rainbow Magicland mousemat and mouse set... I won something for the first time ever, which made me happy...After a jaunt on Falls, we headed towards Tomb Blaster, which was open yet closed, as apparently the 80 minute queue it had gained ( ) meant the staff wanted to put the 5th train on, so closed off the queue, got everyone through the queue and got it on... Surely the park should have been running such rides at full capacity already, considering it's half term? Oh well, Rameses was called upon to fill the void...As always with CF, something breaks down, and this time it was Rameses mid-cycle... After a LOT of faff and strange things going on, people got off, and we headed to Mexicana for a Runaway Train and Rattlesnake double bill... Nearly all of Rattle's queue theming is working again, but they need to redo the cave part of the queue... Because it is VILE...Light was falling, but we headed off to Wild Asia and the Tuk Tuks were first to be ridden as Swinger was closed due to sick (really?)... As Kobra's queue looked bleh and it was being unreliable, we elected for the new addition of the Krypt...This part of the review is in spoilers... After our journey, we headed back to the group and glowsticks! These are the big thing about this trip, and several hundreds of them appear every year... After faff with them, we headed to the Fury queue which was fast-moving and provided us with much entertainment... Fury itself was brilliant... Good spinning and just reminding how amazing it really is... Loved it...With only 15 minutes left, we legged it to Vampire (missing out on the annual Buccaneer in the dark, but for valid reasons this year) and enjoyed the dark queue atmosphere it always provides... The ride again was typical Vampire... I do really like it because it provides an extremely fun ride no matter what, even with the bumpiness... And the darkness as per all rides, really makes a difference...And that concludes my 2011 season... It was a very good end to the year for me, Chessie being it's usual self really and the group being entertaining... Although didn't do every ride (Tomb and Buccaneer) it was still a fab day out for me...Roll on next year then...And in case anyone cares, I have some pics up on the Book of Face HERE!!!

Construction fence in the zoo by Trail of the Kings entrance...All together now... "OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"

Still needs a refurb then

Or have the budget to fix it

It's hilarious yes (as is most of it to be honest), but it works as it's not meant to be scary, but an adventurous walkthrough...No idea about Black Forest and Hocus Pocus, I assume they're the same and hence Krypt will be the best attraction this year... Didn't have enough time today...

As predicted the park semi-emptied out today, with 20-30 minutes queues on the major rides after 6...Also, has no-one been on Krypt? If so, WHY IS NO-ONE GIVING IT CREDIT? I'll do a proper review tomoz (I WILL this time, promise), but seriously was a really good addition to the line up, shame about the faff involved by I heavily approve...

Seriously?Dear Mack, could you just do Chessie a favour and refurb it please?

3rd train is in pieces on the brake run...Potentially never to be used again

tests, and theming begins!

Random appearance on Young Apprentice... £3.80 for an ice cream? That's VERY Merlin

Exactly...Problem is, you shun away the families from coming, and you actually lose the most likely audience who will spend massively in comparison to the actual target market Thorpe have...Thorpe is literally going to turn into a massive themed funfair at the rate it's going tbh...

Might as well have a minimum height restriction at the park entrance nowadays.What's it now? Rapids, Teacups, Rocky Express, Carousel and Banana Boat? I know it doesn't fit the target market, but kids still get taken to Thorpe.CCR was always good for relaxing on at any rate, it had a role at Thorpe in being NOT an intense ride for about 5 minutes sit-down. sigh...

People who you don't speak to having a problem with you for no reason.That, and pointless lectures teaching us how to use a library and my FYP supervisor not being in.Urgh, just when I was feeling quite good about life again.

Nope, not allowed to wait for the front at all. Possibly due to the turnstile queueing in Italy though, so it might have one on Swarm. Depends how they go about batching really.

In terms of B&M Inverted coasters, Inferno isn't great.But considering that's like saying a Pixar film isn't great, doesn't mean it's as awful as other rides.And Inferno definitely isn't forceless, considering I have greyed out on it numerous times, anything but really. Plus Raptor is definitely better than Stealth, so I reckon this will be better than both.So we now get two great B&Ms to balance out the awful Intamins. Good stuff.

Doubt it because...1 - It has a long queue line, probably enough for 2 hours.2 - It shouldn't be breaking down every 5 minutes3 - It will probably have the best throughput in the park

I do... Regularly... Last year it was dead ALLLLLLL day ;)Year before was packed though and awful... Wasn't in the right mood either... But from working over 2 Halloween periods, it just emptied near enough every day between 5-6... Find out what it's like tomorrow, but I doubt it'll be any different...Aside from Fury, which is ALWAYS queuebound...

Stealth being caught between two superior rides.Just to make it surrounded by 3, I want 2015 to be a B&M.

I want you to work... On Buccaneer... All day... So we can yell loudly at you...

Because it's always empty at about 5/6?