pluk

It doesn't matter how (un)clean everyone else is, if you touch things like restraints and wash your own hands after riding before touching your mouth or face you'll be fine. 
 
How long before Merlin start offering fastrack to the sinks? 😂😂

It doesn't matter how (un)clean everyone else is, if you touch things like restraints and wash your own hands after riding before touching your mouth or face you'll be fine. 
 
How long before Merlin start offering fastrack to the sinks? 😂😂

I am well aware I'm always a moany old bugger but I'll be honest, I think that is actually fantastic. Suits the tone of modern day Chessington at the fun cartoony end of spooky and looks generally great. There's even enough of the old theme in the new soundtrack to keep me happy even if I think a simpler rerecording of the original would have been a bit better.

Black Mirror is an odd one IP wise, in not having a set structure or regular characters. It could mean anything so surely is just a name above the door? If this had had any creative input from Charlie Brooker, which in reality is the only real consistent which makes Black Mirror Black Mirror, they would clearly have been shouting about it from the off as it would be actually meaningful to the marketing.

If it were The Goblin King, Sarah, Hoggle, Ludo and Sir Didimus I'd have been interested.

Fingers crossed for never. 🤞

A boat on Jungle Cruise has reportedly sunk, with guests onboard. 
 
https://wdwnt.com/2020/02/breaking-jungle-cruise-boat-sinks-with-guests-inside-at-the-magic-kingdom/?fbclid=IwAR2rH3rnsvN1tZjzz8-uXcviJmvWAxx8GifeqKnMJa-LmbzjTyKCbj4lv-o
 
https://twitter.com/nahtanoJcimsoC/status/1233125032752287744?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

I'm sure enthusiasts the world over will be hitting up Windsor for the.... *checks notes* Mack baby coaster.

I'll say it until I'm blue in the face. Given my way, it would be if you DO NOT have a blue badge (Which now covers mental health), you get your backside into the main queue.
 
I'm sorry but when I saw them queuing in a massive cattle pen just to get the damn thing last season, the only thing going through my mind was "No way on this earth can you not wait 10 minutes for rapids when you are standing in this"
 
Scarefest was a joke. RAP queues for Wicker man going out to the plaza, Oblivion going right back into the arcade,Nemesis going up to the photo booth and smiler also going right down the stairs. The system is a complete and utter farce and the people I really feel for are those who GENUINELY need the damn thing who are forced to then wait in massive lines because of those who exaggerate (for want of a better term) a condition so they get one or indeed those taking doctors letters. Legalised queue jumping is what it is and everybody visiting the parks are made to suffer for it.
 
Honestly I half expect them to give them to guests with paper cuts at this point.....
 
Sort out exactly WHO needs it
Sort out actually enforcing the time card
SORT IT OUT!!
 
 

😂😂😂😅😇
 
( Edit - I don't know where those last two emojis come from, I do know I can't delete them. It's the glitch!)

😂😂😂😅😇
 
( Edit - I don't know where those last two emojis come from, I do know I can't delete them. It's the glitch!)

Top five parks that people love but I don't really enjoy as much as others and I won't use the word over-rated because that implies that I think the place is rubbish when it actually isn't apart from the Number 1 park which really is awful.
 
 
5. Blackpool Pleasure Beach. I don't mind the pleasure beach as such. I like Icon and I like the Wallace and Gromit ride. Big Dipper is okay as well. But everything else is just a bit bad. It doesn't help that Blackpool as a place really needs to sink into the sea and never return. 
 
4. Islands of Adventure.  I know why people love this place but I've never felt any love for it. Sheds. Thorpe Park on steroids. The first park to destroy not one but two B&M's. Thats a cardinal sin. It also has that really bad log flume where you just travel past cardboard scenery but nobody talks about it because the final drops look pretty on instagram.
 
 
3. Disneyland (CA). The grand-daddy of the Western themed area, Disneyland holds an amazing amount of nostalgia for so many people. It was Walt's park, he walked those streets, came up with the groundbreaking hub and spoke, the man was a genius. But this was a park for a different generation and these days, Disneyland is a struggle. It's tiny, full of low throughput attractions and is frustrating when all queues spill out into walkways all over the place. Nah.
 
 
2. Liseberg. I like Liseberg. But its a park that gets ridiculously busy all the time and is a real hassle to get around. I've been twice and I like Helix a lot, Lisebergbananananananana is wonderful, I liked Kanonen and I don't so much mind Balder. Valraven is boring. I find this park such a pain to get around because it was clearly designed with a smaller amount of people in mind. During my last trip when it was open 6pm-12am, the park was empty and it was lovely to be around. We could appreciate the rides and layout and how beautiful parts of it are. But on a busier day, forget it. I don't like the escalator up to Helix and the drop tower and I find the park annoying to get around.
 
1. PortAventura. The typical love for this place comes down to two things; It's hot and has good opening hours. For me it has two rides worth doing in Shambhala and Dragon Khan, a pretty good show and then you have 10 hours of wasting time because there's nothing else that I enjoy to ride or see. And worse is the queue-jumping. This isn't exclusive to PortAventura (The Madrid parks have exactly the same problem). But PA is far busier and full of queue skipping children. The only park where I recommend buying Fast-lane because if everyone queue jumps anyway you may as well do it within the park rules.

Black Mirror is an odd one IP wise, in not having a set structure or regular characters. It could mean anything so surely is just a name above the door? If this had had any creative input from Charlie Brooker, which in reality is the only real consistent which makes Black Mirror Black Mirror, they would clearly have been shouting about it from the off as it would be actually meaningful to the marketing.

If it were The Goblin King, Sarah, Hoggle, Ludo and Sir Didimus I'd have been interested.

@Hethetheth makes a fantastic point about why Phantasialand are able to invest in greater depths compared to Merlin parks. But even then, it's not just Phantasialand that are able to do this: look at the likes of Liseberg, Hansa Park, etc - independent parks that are able to invest in large amounts on a regular basis. (I'm ignoring Europa and Efteling because of their other means of incoming).
 
A better question to specifically ask is simply how are Phantasialand able to invest ridiculous amounts of money? Klugheim was said to cost something in the region of €60-70m. Rookburgh is rumoured to be a larger investment. Maus au Chocolat (2011) and Chiapas (2014 but should've been 2013) cost another €60m between them. The Deep in Africa land (2006) was another €30-40m. That's insane, and beyond anything that most companies could invest in several parks, let alone one company in one park.
 
How they manage it is still mysterious. The park is owned by the Löffelhardt family, who co-started the park originally. Clever entrepreneurship meant they were able to continue to invest. They also bought Mirabilandia in Italy (they were in charge at the time the park added key rides like Katun), before selling it in 2006 (which no doubt was a big helping hand) in the future. From there, it's simply a case of having ownership that knows how to do business and how to cleverly invest in the park. There's a lot of passion within too which is great.
 
In some ways, I guess their situation could be likened to what we're seeing at Energylandia. They're owned by someone who is wealthy and already has a great deal of experience in running a business, but also someone who is deeply passionate and wants something they can be proud of. The difference there is they very openly receive EU grants and the like to help accelerate their development, and are going for size and quantity over details and quality (of theming). The amount the park have invested on new rides between 2018-2020 probably could have seen them invest in something of similar depth and quality to any of Phantasialand's investments if they wanted to.     
Let's not pretend that the UK are the only place that is thrifty. Everywhere in the world is. 
 
The trouble is, Merlin have dug themselves into a hole. They set high prices and then give out a ton of promos. So of course people in the UK are then going to dig for the best deal. They'll naturally end up complaining that something doesn't represent a good enough value because, simply put, they've be trained to think they can always get something for next-to nothing. Merlin give tickets away because they chose to. Now they do it because they have to.
This is a very common tactic. Have a low entrance cost and hit visitors with high secondary spends. Look at Vue cinemas - many of them have decreased their standard price significantly (my local one is £5 for any film). But then they can hit you with upgraded seats, high costs of drinks and snacks, etc. And people are more willing to do that because they feel they've 'saved' money for their ticket to watch the film, even if they haven't.
 
Heck, even Phantasialand do this over their winter event. They usually have strong price integrity, so their pre-book online price is only a couple of euros cheaper than buying on the gate, and have very few promotions (and their entrance price is high, around €50). But over Winteraum, especially later in the event, they sell tickets online for €24. Why? Because during the event, they have lots of pop up stalls serving various food and drink (almost like a mini Christmas market), which are extremely popular. People spend a lot of money there and the park recoup any losses they may make from reducing the entrance price. 
I'd hardly call any of those parks competition. Drayton is dying. Blackpool ticks along, but when they invest in a brand new coaster, don't market it and then don't see suitable increases, you have to wonder how big a threat they are. And the Yorkshire parks are hardly competition when they barely invest (bar this year).
 
Towers sees the most investment because Merlin know it's their crowning jewel. It's the UK's biggest park. It's the park that can easily get the highest attendance. It's well known abroad. It has hugely popular and well-known rides like Nemesis and Smiler. Plenty of legitimate world records / firsts that people are actually intrigued by. Towers receives the most investment because it's the safest bet to get a return.
I don't get how you can laugh at Paulton's as being a competitor? They have made very wise investments and continue to do so. They're improving and growing constantly. They're a very legitimate threat to Chessington, whether Merlin admit that or not.
 
Thorpe is different because of its target market. But it's clear to see that its numbers have been falling and popularity has decreased. It and Chessington benefit from location of being so close to London. But Thorpe needs to really push the boat to remain in a profitable state, because they're really sliding. It's a similar situation to where Chessington were 5-6 years, except Chessington were at least slowly retheming rides to bring them to standard.

Went to Phantasialand this weekend and just, damn, I always forget how incredible this place is.
 
Firstly, Rookburgh: no photos from me. However from the outside there's little to be seen since the last update. The glimpses are saw though are exciting.
 
Next, Crazy Bats - the VR experience that at one point Phantasialand said they'd never get. It's a weird one: the VR headsets are good, and comfy - the first VR coaster I've ridden where I haven't needed to hold onto the headset. And the film itself is good. It's humour-filled, well done, has some nice tricks and fun to watch. But I did come off feeling a bit queasy (something VR hasn't done to me before), as did everyone else in my group. I think that's at least in part down to the sheet length of the film.
 
The other issue, unsurprisingly, is the throughput. It's completely destroyed. A ride that could easily churn out 3-4 trains without stacking now just manages to send 2 with no stacking (which for a 4 minute + ride isn't good). And the first and last car were out of use throughout the duration of the visit (I don't know if that's a permanent thing or not, but that takes out 8 people a ride). And the clever conveyor belt cleaning system they had seems to no longer be used either, which is sad.
 
The really surprising thing, though, is the popularity of Crazy Bats. The public were lapping it up. It regularly had the longest or second longest queue on park. People were willing to wait over 2 hours to ride this. Now 2 hour waiting times aren't uncommon for UK rides, sure, but in Germany you rarely see those sort of waits, except on exceptionally busy days. It's crazy. So clearly this has worked for the park.
 
 
And that brings me onto the next point: the park was hugely busy this weekend. I've visited this weekend in January for the past couple of years, and whilst it's been busy, it's never felt mad. This year, however, it was heaving. The park coped very well and queues were all manageable. But it was a massive shock to the system to see how busy this tiny park gets, whilst still managing to deliver incredible experiences. People were queueing to get into the viewing area of the park's finale show (which, tbh, is a bit naff) an hour before it started! 
 
But yeah, despite the busy-ness, the park was brilliant. I can't recommend their winter event enough.

If it were The Goblin King, Sarah, Hoggle, Ludo and Sir Didimus I'd have been interested.

I love Black Mirror so intrigued to see what they do here, looking forward to it! 

If it were The Goblin King, Sarah, Hoggle, Ludo and Sir Didimus I'd have been interested.

If it were The Goblin King, Sarah, Hoggle, Ludo and Sir Didimus I'd have been interested.

If it were The Goblin King, Sarah, Hoggle, Ludo and Sir Didimus I'd have been interested.

I guess the issue with steps / stools is that the point is you need to be able to get in / out of the seat in case of an emergency. If there's a time sensitive reason to get people out the ride, they don't want to have the additional responsibility of getting a step to get someone out.

In the last ten years, Phantasialand has only seen six new rides, two if which are "off the shelf" family rides. They've only seen 1 retheme too, Thorpe have seen many.
 
Quantity means nothing.

I'm hearing Omnipollo soft serves in steins.

Oktoberfest means good beer. If they have good beer then excellent, but they won't, will they?