Tom

^ I really like the Hex concept, never thought of that before! Inverting hex would be crazy and weird. They could have a transfer track and split between tunnels. It depends how much time is spent in this section to whether it will greatly affect throughput.

To add to the cars land rumours, the one of the cars land hat merchandise for cars land in california has the california castle on one ear and the florida castle on the other. EDIT:

Wreck-It Ralph Making the best of a bad situation being stuck here, I saw Wreck-It Ralph in 3D Not going to ruin anything but all I can say is that it was amazing and Pixar standard, (it probably helps that John Lasseter was the executive producer). The adverts have put me off slightly because it made it look dumbed down and for kids but that might be because they're on constantly over here like every advert you see it over and over and over again. Really it's for all ages with jokes, clever animation differences in games, and 'real life' problems that game characters would face as well as a powerful message everyone can relate to. It also came with a pixar short which was so cute! 'The Toy Story of the gaming world' pretty much sums it up. 10/10

Haha this is basically a spot on comparison between Alton and Thorpe rides, themeing, and audience.

I've known the sales department in the past have had competitions to see who can sell the most fastrack on quiet days. Great one.

I'm not sure I get it.

SW7 is a fine name in itself. Or Secret Weapon. Whatever I might call it SW7 for life like I call Saw 'Dylan' and Stealth... Stealth.

Funny.

Haha. I hope so. In my interview they said that I seemed like a person who just 'loves to work' which is true; I hope they see the funny side like I do.

Missing my first week of a new job because of a hurricane?! Such a first world problem but I really didn't want to make a bad impression and I definitely have.

Casually been stranded on Long Island. My flight was due to leave JFK on monday evening but of course was cancelled. Some local powerlines will take up to a week to prepare; a local friend of my mothers has lost power in her home. The phone lines, internet, TVs, power has been down in patches and is slowly getting back up and running. It was truly frightening even being on the outer limits of the storm on monday night as trees fell down and transformers 'exploded' in red flashes in the distance. Thankful that it's all over although I'm now stuck for a week and will miss my first week of work at a new job! Doh.

Might they mean reception of the police station?

Totally agree that with all the screens in rides comment about how all the rides are turning into the same thing. I guess universal suffers because of the popularity issue; rides at disney are made from disney classics and pixar films so don't suffer from the 'despicable me.. what is this' in 7 years time. I rode the Mummy twice in february and my first time it was truly spectacular and smooth but the second time I suffered the roughness. I think without the theming and this ride would lack. From what I remember the end was better than the hollywood version where so I'd probably rate it higher as a comparison.

Do you mean popping peoples cherries?

Pure genius. Repped repped and repped.

Congratulations!

My Uncle is a sufferer so I'm keen to donate, when is the latest I can do so?

Hurrr. You'd think that these manufacturers would get it right at some point. There's always issues with new rides with every manufacturer but I would've thought they had been doing it long enough. Surely after the Intimidator 305 blackout fiasco meaning a track replacement would have made them more cautious with Skyrush? Although saying all of that, I know these rides aren't that simple and it's a wonder any of them work!

Could just be a rumour amongst staff like 'TOADIES BEING REMOVED' at Chessington every year.

Merlin, for 2014 can we get a coaster that isn't black. Thanks xoxox

If you read my 'More Flags More Fun' trip report you'd know I had meant to meet up with someone to go round the park with but she failed. Well this was an unplanned trip that fixed that! Hoorah. Something that I don't have a picture of is the stunning lake that is literally right next to the rides (Canobie Lake Park.. duh). But yeah it was a beautiful setting. Arrived at 4, left at 7:30 after getting on everything we wanted including re-rides. Untamed This Gerstlauer Eurofighter was my second after Saw so I was naturally expecting a rough ride. I think it has the same layout as Rage, if you've ridden that! It was good! There were one or two 'rattley' transitions but I was blown away by how smooth it was. Nice compact layout and I particularly liked the station theming, bear cars, supports themed to trees, and a bear's roar as a train was dispatched. Nice! Untamed gets a 7/10 da Vinci's Dream This gets a note because it's a simple wave swinger but is themed to some extent? It was ffffffuuuuunnn. Equinox Having opened for the first time a day earlier this was the new kid on the block! It was a half painful half fun fully rotating mess. The downfall is probably that you have to 'stand up'. Imagine standing up on Samurai? Yeah it was painful and you couldn't relax and enjoy it. I'm glad I did it but it's not going to be a 'go to' ride in the future! 4/10 My view of the park was totally skewed because half of the rides are just standard amusement park rides plonked into spaces like in RCT, but I had assumed the themed attractions were the newest ie Untamed and Da Vinci's Dream but Equinox is truly just a travelling ride. Yankee Cannonball An oldie wooden coaster that ran one train of 3 cars of 6 seats. I sat once at the back and once at the front. This was definitely the stand out best ride in the park. It wasn't specifically tall or fast but it gave loads of airtime and thrilling surprise drops without being rough it seemed out of control. This was helped by the fact you had a seatbelt and the lap bar was more of a grab bar and didn't go near your lap. Great. Bad picture because of the night. As always! BUT great ride. 8/10 Skater It was just a higher faster spinning griffin's galleon. Was a lot more fun than griffins and had a higher throughput. Xtreme Frisbee A Huss Frisbee. A new flat ride hype I am experiencing. Sorry for the awful picture; wasn't sure if the scaffolding was 'theming' or what but it was just random. Turkish Twist Don't know the name of the model but it spun you around in a sort of building and the floor dropped so just G force pushing you against the side kept you up. It was weird. I mean I understand the concept but in practice it hurts your neck and you feel like you're slipping in and are trying to stop yourself falling so it becomes more of a challenge than a ride. 5/10 for the concept but not the experience! Hats off to all the staff. They got everyone prepped for rides by shouting things like 'ARE YA'LL READY FOR THIS' - I guess it's for an American audience but everyone gets into it. On Equinox they have one staff member check all the 24 seats by running around person by person. The attendant during my ride even spoke to each person individually when they put their harness down. I couldn't help comparing to Samurai where 2 attendants are used and just say 'arms out' and just walk off. Either way this was done efficiently, quickly, and with a smile and conversation so A* for her. Cute night time lights on the Ferris wheel! Thanks for reading. A bit haphazard but just mentioned some firsts for me!

A Storm Surge clone I've been on had a kind of seatbelt to keep you in. But you could just take it off if you really wanted to. It was fairly useless.

However the automated feature of blue fire means your bag is less likely to be stolen. To be honest it just saves on staffing costs. Whatever, I'm not expecting Thorpe to change! This was just an alternative.

The rides at Europa mentioned above are rides where a physical bar check is done. On Blue Fire the bar is pushed down hard as it inverts and there are no OTSRs, and Wodan I don't know why it is done but it just is! So really the staff just work hard and the bag cupboards are more spread out. You could argue an issue with Colossus' bag box is that a person in row 5 or whatever walks through and places their bag in the first cupboard opposite them, but people in row 1 have to walk down the platform and push through a scrum of people in order to get their bag in a holder - delaying the dispatch. To explain why Blue Fire's bag holders are so good I'll just make it clear that when it is running 4 trains, everyone collects their bags from the opposite side of the bag cupboard like Rita. However the cupboards are big so there isn't crowding, and there are many separate compartments that open up for riders on the ride to put their bags in. There's just so much space in the holders and no pushing through loads of people to get your bag. Bag rooms are fine however they require a few extra staff members which seems wasteful in my opinion. I would rather have a better bagging system and those staff on platforms checking bars etc to get the ride dispatched faster.