Got back from Spain the other day and I of course had to spend a day (or 2) at Port Aventura after sight-seeing in Barcelona.Day 1We got the train to the park and got there for opening time and foolishly decided to head for Furious Baco first thing, I didn't realise that this was the first and only ride in the park for a a large amount of space so it was incredibly busy and we waited almost 2 hoursFurious Baco - Theming was great overall, it seemed that it was supposed to be a winery that had been overtaken by monkeys. As you leave the station, you enter a tunnel where there are lots of spinning cogs and flashing lights, then out of nowhere, a monkey comes along (at this point the train is hooking onto launch system) and the moneky presses a button and off you go! After the launch straight you go downwards slightly which created a bunch of negative gs for a second or two. You then whip round the first corner in extremely close proximity to the canyon which was very claustrophobic and at 80mph, VERY intense. This ride truly kicks the crap out of Stealth and Rita as I found it much more intense. The in-line twist at the end was yummy too. The only bad feedback from the ride was that sitting at the far sides of the train created a rougher ride than sitting closer to the middle and whilst I agree with this, I didn't mind it too much. Easily the best ride in the park. the low throughput created long queues unfortunately but we managed to sit at the front to make it worth it.We then headed over to Dragon Khan which took about 10 or 15 minutes as we couldn't find the bloody thing. The queue wasn't too bad, half an hour approx. Dragon Khan - The queueline could have been a bit more imaginative since it was just cattlepens under a Pagoda building but we were not too bothered due to the short queue and high throughput. I honestly expected the ride to be bigger when I first saw it but hey, it was still quite impressive. The ride itself is fairly smooth but you'd expect that from a B&M. There were no particularly intense parts of the ride apart from exiting the zero g roll which you seems to get pulled out of. Overall a very fun ride which isn't as intense as its appearence and the high throughput made it very re-ridable. It is similar to Nemesis Inferno because its fun without being very intense, but Dragon Khan was twice as long so twice as good as Nemesis Inferno. I got a really nice t-shirt too which is black and has a silver dragon on it with Dragon Khan writte below it which was 16.90 Euros (more expensive than other shirts because it was nicer I imagine).We were now getting closer to the intimidating tower overlooking the whole of the park: Hurrakan Condor. However we stumbled across the El Diablo - Tren De La Mina first which was a relief since I avoid Detonator every single time when I got to Thorpe Park.El Diablo - Amazingly themed, just like Thunder Moutain Railroad. with waterwheels, windmills and great theming scattered around the whole ride area. 3 lifthills created a nice long ride, I was dissapointed at the lack of any vaguely steep drops though. It was great how it interacted with the log flume though when it was flying overhead and you could wave to people in the logs. The second lifthill was suich a waste, after climbing to the top, you glide round 180 degrees before being attacked by trim-brakes, it was just wasted speed, so pointless. The last drop was good, a really long drop built up lots of speed which was great and then went through a couple of tunnels too.So Hurrakan Condor was looming upon us with only 1 out of 3 of us wanting to go on it. So we walked up to it in peril thinking how sickening it was just to watch it. I then thought, I'm only coming here once (and the day after) so I thought I had to give it ago despite consciously avoiding Detonator everytime I go to Thorpe Park. I find drop towers the most intense ride experiences by far.Hurrakan Condor - After reluctently joining the queue and after waiting 20 minutes or so, a choice was upon on, stand-up or sit-down. We chose to sit down since it seemed less scary. It is themed as a broken tower with the middle missing so about 80ft of tower was remaining which was where the brakes kicked in, so if one were to view from a distance, you would not be able to see the cars braking after the drop which was quite a clever idea. The top of the tower was jsut a themed piece of roof which was slightly wonky which added to the 'ruined' effect very nicely. So climbed the tower as speed, much faster than other drop towers since it onyl takes 4 people up at a time (there a 5 sides to the tower, some sit-down, some stand-up which all function independently and thus drop at different times). After emerging out of the building, it seemed you were hhigher all the other rides already and you were not even half way there. To put this into perspective, Detonator is 115ft and Hurrakan Condor is 300ft. at the top, the car slowly began to slow down and when it came to a halt, you knew the catchment car would unhook immediately after so it was VERY tense. You then hear it unhook and the camera catches your 'falling face' which was not pretty for me. This is the only ride that I couldn't help but scream on because it is just so ridiculously intense. I hold a steady scream for 3 seconds before I run out of breath. We are still falling and begging for the brakes to kick in at any second which they inevitably did, much to our relief. This truly took my breath away at it was a huge relief to get off. Half of me thought 'this ride was built by the devil' but the other half of me thought 'that was such an adrenaline rush!'. So I was very pleased that I managed to do it.After that, we thought we should do some of the flats in the area before heading for Stampida in the Far West. All the flats were terribly run as only one member of staff was opperating them and when you have to lock and unlock every single restraint or lapbar individually, this takes a huge amount of time which bores the rest of the queueline to death, as well as the riders waiting in the burning hot sun. After a few of these, we headed to Tomohawk which is a small Woodie where you sit single file in a yellow train which again, didn't help throughput. However, it interacted nicely with Stampida so if you were lucky there would be 3 trains at once in relative synchronicity so there was lots of waving to do. Overall though, a crap ride as it was short and had poor throughput. We thought Stampida would be a better bet after this.Stampida - towards the beginning of the queue you are faced with a decision: red or blue. We went on the red train first since its my favourite colour. So the path splits off into 2 seperate queues which zig-zagged up towards the station. After dispatching at the same time, you get to know your enemy (the blue train) which again required lots of waving and evils. The blue train gets a slight head start though because it seemed to make things fairer in the long run. Noth train storm down the first drop where the supports of the track over head create a brilliant head chopper effect so everybody puts their arms down to avoid a percieved collision which was quite funny. The next corner was very rough and very intense and thus forced you to hold on, but after that its safer to hodl your hands up. Later on, the trains split into seperate tunnels where they go their own way for bit. Both trains then come charging at eachother other which is really fun and then they join back up in synchronicity again for the last few drops and turns which was quite clever. Certainly one of the most fun rides in the park due to its competitive nature. The ride was as good as Zeus at Parc Asterix but Stampida tops it due to the fun created by the dual tracks. The graffiti on the queueline was awful, the brown wood was covered in red, blue and black marker pens with innapropriate drawing, words and pictures of Homer Simpson. That's the only downside to the ride. I felt that theming was not too important for this ride because it would get lost in the density of the huge wooden structure. There were a few waggon wheels here and there though.The water rides were incredibly budy throughout the day due to the scorching hot weather which was understandable. We did both the log flume and the rapids though, along with the spinning barrels which was the equivelant of Chessington's old ride, Rodeo. Again, very fun flat but disgraceful throughput as the woman had to unlock each of the 20 cars individually with a key.Grand Canyon Rapids - God throughput as one man was allocating each group of people to the boats. Great theming throughout, it was a canyon in the wild west which had barrels, buildings,, train tracks, tunnels, and waterfalls incorporated into it. The ride itself went very fast for a river rapids which was good because it created more splash when crashing into the white water. The only cattlepen river rapids queue I have ever seen which was strange but it soon shifted and we got our ride.Silver River Flume - A huge cattlepen of boredom, broken fans and queue-jumpers added to a frustrating queuing experience where we waited almost 90 minutes to ride. At least we got a boat to the 3 of us though when we eventually did get on. Quite a long log flume with 3 seperate lifthills and drops which all interacted with the minetrain although we didn't see any trains go past so no waving unfortunately. The splash didn't get you drenched but gave everybody a refreshing soak which was glorious on such a humid day. After having a look at all the shops, we decided to give it a rest for today since it had been very tiring. The ride count ended up at 11 which was okay considering the Furious Baco queue at the start of the day. It was a learning curve though for the next day so we knew what to ride and when to ride. I advise leaving Furious Baco to the end of the day unless you get through the park gates really early. The only major ride we had missed off was Tutuki Splash in Polynesia which we would head for first the next day. I also recommend bringing your own food since their's is overpriced, poor quality and far from generous portions.#1 - Furious Baco#2 - Stampida#3 - Hurrakan Condor#4 - Dragon KhanIf people are interested I will post Day 2 soon. Hope you enjoyed reading it (this has been longer than any of my English essays lol)
