Matt 236

I'm really impressed by the ride teams at Thorpe. We really take for granted how hard they work to keep the rides moving so efficiently. It's really telling how good we have it, The Swarm probably had the worst ops but they were still only stacking trains for about 10 seconds per cycle (and that is an exaggeration). 
 
The Hyperia team must have been chosen by the goddess themselves, because they run that ride so well, never stacking, always dispatching as soon as they can. Also shout out to Inferno's team who were doing a great job. They need a batcher though as lots of trains going out with two empty seats next to each other.
 
And finally, the older I get the more I see myself preferring Thorpe's coaster line up to Altons. As much as I like Nemesis Reborn, I think the rest of the line up is either gimmicky nonsense, run awfully or just dull. Whereas Inferno is running the best Ive seen it (honestly, it's so good right now), Stealth and the Swarm are just so much fun, Hyperia manages to be open (  ) and I still love hanging out around Colossus and hearing that music.
 
In general Thorpe is just a better experience all round. Better hours, better rides, better food, better operations. I would have never said that 20 years ago, but now, to me, Thorpe is in a different league. 

I did a Hyperia coaster climb this evening.
 
There was some chatter when it was made live about the cost being expensive (£120). It is, no beating around the bush. But it is worth it. My experience was about 3hrs all in, and included lots of time spent scaling the ride, time spent in the console and time spent around the turnaround outside the station, with lots of opportunities for photos, fabulous hosts and a great vibe. 
 
Find attached a variety of photos (of me). I'll write a proper TPM article later.

Depends on the park for me, especially if such place has x amount of rides that requires a minimum number of people to ride in order for it to operate. 
 
some parks when quiet feel pleasant to visit, enabling numerous re-rides and getting lots done, assuming they don’t have silly operating hours (glares at Towers). But then again, with empty paths, areas, fewer or no entertainment (depending on the park), it can definitely impact atmosphere and environment. Making it feel more flat and empty as a result. 
 
Not sure where everyone else is on this, but I find parks on average the most enjoyable when they are between the busier end of quiet and the busier event of lively. But that might just be me. 

Depends on the park for me, especially if such place has x amount of rides that requires a minimum number of people to ride in order for it to operate. 
 
some parks when quiet feel pleasant to visit, enabling numerous re-rides and getting lots done, assuming they don’t have silly operating hours (glares at Towers). But then again, with empty paths, areas, fewer or no entertainment (depending on the park), it can definitely impact atmosphere and environment. Making it feel more flat and empty as a result. 
 
Not sure where everyone else is on this, but I find parks on average the most enjoyable when they are between the busier end of quiet and the busier event of lively. But that might just be me. 

This weekend I went to Paulton’s fan day, the park certainly put on a lovely event. 
  Several tours/BTS were carried out throughout the day, from seeing Cobra’s ride workshop, Storm Chaser’s OP cabin/train workshop process, the new construction area and much more.    We had over an hour of ERS in Tornado Springs and Ghostly Manor (more on that soon) as well as a lovely buffet in Mel’s Diner and a Reveal/Q&A with park management.    The biggest news/reveal of course was the new Vikings area (Valgard), which will include a new coaster, flat ride, restaurant and also re-themed Cobra (soon to be Raven). Surprisingly, the new coaster will be a Gerstlauer eurofighter, but hopefully the park will carry it off well, I find the smaller ones the better rides usually.    Vague hints of a new water ride the following year were revealed, but not much else. Very exciting still. Magma will be a goner later this year. At least for Paultons. The lodges are several years away still.    They also did a Q&A and showed how they build Ghostly Manor, which given the areas footprint/show building is impressive they got that all in. They also did a silent disco, but I left at that point.    So, Ghostly Manor? My thoughts? It’s a lovely compact dark ride mixing screens and scenes nicely (they have 10 of them), plus the queue line is nicely done too. Whilst it doesn’t hit the same way as Alty Mans or Danse Macabre (which I did days earlier), it’s a decent addition to the park and great to see them finally obtaining a dark ride. Should suit the park nicely.    Interesting times ahead perhaps. 

This weekend I went to Paulton’s fan day, the park certainly put on a lovely event. 
  Several tours/BTS were carried out throughout the day, from seeing Cobra’s ride workshop, Storm Chaser’s OP cabin/train workshop process, the new construction area and much more.    We had over an hour of ERS in Tornado Springs and Ghostly Manor (more on that soon) as well as a lovely buffet in Mel’s Diner and a Reveal/Q&A with park management.    The biggest news/reveal of course was the new Vikings area (Valgard), which will include a new coaster, flat ride, restaurant and also re-themed Cobra (soon to be Raven). Surprisingly, the new coaster will be a Gerstlauer eurofighter, but hopefully the park will carry it off well, I find the smaller ones the better rides usually.    Vague hints of a new water ride the following year were revealed, but not much else. Very exciting still. Magma will be a goner later this year. At least for Paultons. The lodges are several years away still.    They also did a Q&A and showed how they build Ghostly Manor, which given the areas footprint/show building is impressive they got that all in. They also did a silent disco, but I left at that point.    So, Ghostly Manor? My thoughts? It’s a lovely compact dark ride mixing screens and scenes nicely (they have 10 of them), plus the queue line is nicely done too. Whilst it doesn’t hit the same way as Alty Mans or Danse Macabre (which I did days earlier), it’s a decent addition to the park and great to see them finally obtaining a dark ride. Should suit the park nicely.    Interesting times ahead perhaps. 

Studios/Adventure world still has some way to go on the park front, but this actually looks great. 
 
Must admit I had a strange liking towards studio one, but excellent work on this section. Hopefully we will see similar with the rest of the park in due course. 

Just got back from first trip to Europa. 
 
Wow. Where to start. 
Stayed in hotel Colleseio which was impressive, and to be honest a strange experience in itself that such a lavish hotel was linked to a theme park. 
 
3 days on park and 1 day Rulantica. &nbsp
 
The aesthetics of the park are incredible, it’s impossible not to feel the passion and pride that the Mack family have for their park. Everywhere you look it’s packed with hidden gems and is fresh, vibrant and visually stunning. More so, even after 3 days I know there’s so much more to discover, and the rich theming throughout really does elevate this park. 
 
The ride selection is second to none. I went for the coasters, but fell in love with the dark rides! Pirates detail was impressive, but live all the little hidden gems throughout the park. In terms of the biggies. Voltron was my no1 followed by Wodan and Silver Star, but also really enjoyed blue fire, the last inversion really something. 
 
Heard people talking up the ops for years, and was always questioning why people went on about them so much. Well not any more! Absolute perfection and efficiency. So obvious that the park is all about guest experience, the no nonsense approach in the stations is so refreshing to see, and keeps the queues down to sub 20 even on popular rides on a fairly busy day! 
 
Overall can’t wait to get back, going to be hard to find a park to top the all round package that Europa provides, yes there’s parks with better coasters etc, but it’s the combo of the selection of rides, theming, cleanliness, food and beverage offerings and most of all OPERATIONS! 
 
If you havent been. Get out there!! 

Legend goes that an old woman pleaded with the Monks of Thorpe Abbey for the charity of a coin. They cruelly dismissed her. 
 
Scorned, the old woman screamed a cursed...
 
"For every piece of Kingda Ka that falls, a month of Stealth's life will be taken"
 
And sure enough, after Kingda Ka was removed, Stealth was shut for a month.
 
---
 
All I'm saying, is that if Stealth remained closed, that will be the story for the Fright Nights mazes that will take its place.
Hex Inferno - The Revenge of Stealth

Last weekend (April 12th), I finally got to meet industry legend John Wardley.
 
It’s pretty clear 2025 is not the year to be visiting Chessington. With Project Play under construction and Wild Asia mothballed, under the guise of early construction for the Minecraft area. 
 
Operations were mixed, with mandrills being decent, despite a breakdown and Vampire doing a decent 2 train op, with just two platformers (one of which was batching). Rattlesnake’s operations were atrocious. The less said about the hideous Tiger Rock tunnel changes, the better. It looks more like an industrial estate than a theme park now.
 
Now onto the event. At first there was a Vampire themed buffet in the temple restaurant. Buffets are known for either quality and quantity, unfortunately this one was neither. Burgers were the main event and as expected tasted vile. Salt, pepper and ketchup couldn’t polish this monstrosity. The curry was at least was just about edible. The desserts were comparatively bette. Black died soft serve, sundaes, sweets and jellies comprised the selection. 
 
Thankfully the event improved from here, the VIP team were generally attentive and chatted to everyone and we got a Vampire themed welcome drink.
 
After making our way to the event suite, the main event kicked off. In the first segment John Talked about the different projects he’d worked on. Things mentioned included how the park almost became a housing estate, due to it being a failing attraction, his work with the McNamaras at the (sadly now closed) Oakwood and early ideas for the Vampire. Wardley reckons the ride still has much life left and the trains have less impact on the track than say Nemesis. 
 
On the second segment, John answered attendees questions. He said Universal GB wouldn’t impact the U.K. parks as much as people think and it’s not a David and Goliath battle. He also mentioned as far as developments go at the park. We would be in for a treat. 
 
At the end, one of the park’s long serving ride engineers Martin went through a lot of the ride’s mechanical statistics and gave away a few random ride bits to some who answered the most correct/accurate answers. There was then an opportunity to meet John, have things signed and have pictures with him. 

And now the 12 million pound question, was it worth it? 
 
At £125, even after discount it was perhaps an eye watering amount to spend, regardless of circumstances. On hindsight the food was mostly disappointing and other features were interesting, but I guess the important thing was this. I finally got to meet John Wardley. The man and legend who brought many of the countries most exciting attractions to life and such an inspiration to many. Without Wardley, Chessington may have well become a large housing estate.

Always assume sarcasm.
 
 
Like any project anything could happen to it. But once Universal had to reveal their hand it had far more chance than London Resort ever did.
 
Everything crossed.

I was lucky to experience a valley on Mandrill on Sunday, we just came to a stop at the boost launch area before the helix. I found it quite exciting as we would have to experience the rides swing launch to get it going again. I really enjoyed it as well. Mandrills launches are quite punchy as it is so going back and forth through the section was pretty satisfying.
 
I am actually quite a big fan of Mandrill tbh, I've heard all the arguments about it being the wrong fit and whatever, however every time I go on it, it gives me a lot of joy and the queues for it never seem crazily unreasonable.The team always seem really on it when it comes to batching, loading and dispatching. It also has the B&M quirk of being incredibly reliable, 3.8% downtime for the last 7 days, and beaten only by Nemesis Reborn. 

Thought I would celebrate the arrival of the 2025 season, by recording and arranging the ride’s theme.
 
 

Visited Towers this weekend for the first time this season. 
  First impressions weren’t great, from the misleading car park layout, various delapited areas and the monorail running just two trains. Rather embarrassing to what could be argued to be the UK’s flagship park.    Operations seemed noticeably inferior to previous standards, with Rita on just 1 train and Galactica on just 2 trains and 1 station, disappointing every 5 minutes. Having 3 rides closed ( albeit expected) is also a shame for a park that’s had 4.5 months to sort things out. On the p,us note, the Thirteen team were doing great!   Although not rammed, queues often reached/exceeded 90 minutes. Spinball,oblivion, Wickerman, Galactica and Rita at the very least experienced lengthily shutdowns. This excludes the heavy rain closure that evening where most rides understandably closed for a short while. However closing Spinball in the rain (as opposed to reducing capacity) now is just disappointing.   Despite running the Alton After Dark and being the start of season, there wasn’t any real buzz or atmosphere at the park which I’ve felt previously, even post Covid. The vibe improved noticeably after dusk, but there was just something missing and I can only put it down to further quality retraction from the Merlin machine. I had a Toby carvery breakfast, so therefore didn’t need to eat the overpriced and underwhelming food selection.   I don’t want to be constantly negative about the resort, so I do have some positives. Toxicator is a great addition to the park, it looks the part more than I was expecting and looks great off ride. The setting was the right level of intensity and adds more to the area. Curse is still an exceptional dark ride and epitomises what the creatives can do with the right resources. Although a little rattly, Nemesis Reborn is still fantastic and looks stunning at night.    I really want to be more appraising and positive towards the park, because they have so many great rides. But I can’t sugarcoat the place solely on this. Towers has a lots of operational issues at the moment and with current trends I see things getting worse rather than better. The park ideally needs millions spent on infrastructure upgrades, however this will probably never happen.

Imagine someone revisiting Alton Towers this year after previously going in 2015 who’s not an enthusiast?
 
Essentially they are witnessing an upgraded Ripsaw, plushed up Nemesis and a modified Haunted House. Essentially in their eyes Wickerman is the only new ride they notice since last time besides maybe some bits and bobs in Beeb land.
 
No Blade, no Flume and couple of other missing attractions, amongst some yet to open attractions and some of the most ludicrous park food. In both price and substance. Certainly makes for a rather negative return visit so far. 
 
We shall see how this season goes, but can’t hold too much optimism so far.

So thoughts and notes from yesterday, which was a "VIP preview" for the season, where the park was open 10-3.
 
-We're light on changes. A couple of tweaks to F&B is really all that is "new"
 
-Repaints for part of Colossus and Depth Charge look nice. The small side of the Beach looks nice, also repainted, but it highlights the grime of the large side.
 
-Hyperia grass is nice. Could be extended more. They've added benches to the plaza which isn't a bad idea, but they're atop the wings on the ground, which irks me a bit.
 
-Many new pieces of merchandise, which are the usual high quality we've come to expect 
 
-Hyperia had issues yesterday, in large part due to the cold. Hopefully better today. Stealth had an issue during testing and didn't open.
 
-The park usually stumbles during first day or two of opening, and yesterday wasn't any different, with the cold affecting weather, and reliability being a bit on the weak side, but it did improve. I've been to significantly worse first days. 
 
-There's a few other bits and pieces around the park. Solar panels atop Ghost Train (but you only see them if you look for them on other rides). Walking Dead has had creative tweaks to the post-ride section. Some speakers seem to have been fixed. Tweak to end of day of audio.
 
If 2024 was Thorpe's year of improvement, 2025 is their year of stability. That's not a bad thing. But after a couple of years of multiple changes, it will have a different 'new season' vibe to it. 
 
The kicker for the park this year will be the quality and reach of marketing. That will be what makes or breaks them this year, with little to shout about in the way of new things 

Rest in Pieces. 
 
 

About as excited as ordering a burger kitchen meal. 

About as excited as ordering a burger kitchen meal. 

Ding dong no
 
The sky is dark, the coast is rocky, the island mountainous. Construction is far away.
 
Wait bugger wrong account

Aaaaaand also the soon to be open Epic Universe!!  

If anything it's under-rated, its 3 against 1 in here. 😘

So I visited Efteling for the first time recently.  This park exceeded my expectations, and I was going to say its a Disney quality park.  However, considering Efteling is older than Disneyland, should I be saying "are the Disney parks Efteling quality?"
 
We spent 2 days at the park arriving around midday on the first.  We didn't realise there was a national holiday, so the park was quite busy, however queue times averaged around the 30min mark, with Danse Macabre having a 60min queue pretty much all day for both days.
 
Symbolica - Loved this ride, the level of theming was very high, and refreshing to see they didn't resort to using screens inside the attraction.  There is a bit where all 3 cars face a balcony, which would have been an ideal place to put some screens, however there was a lovely diorama with butterflies so props to Efteling.  Also great to see the park celebrating their mascot Pardoes by giving them their own attraction.   I also loved the fact that you can choose between 3 different alternate endings, however we only got to experience the one.  When we returned to do a re-ride at the end of the 2nd day the ride had closed for technical issues and didn't reopen.  
 
Vogel Rok - Awesome indoor coaster, decent amount of theming in the queue.  Quiet forceful in some places.
 
Joris en de Draak - loved these dual coasters, probably one of my favourites of the whole trip.  Loads of fun pops of airtime.  Loved the little details, such as the flag spinning at the end to signify the winner and the flags dropping in the station on the winning side.
 
Droomvlucht - loved this ride, the sets were impressively large.  Also was not expecting the spiral ending.  
 
Pagode - I've never been on this type of ride before, and we rode it as the sun was setting.  Beautiful views across the park.
 
Python - I was surprised at how well this rode and was quite forceful.  I think its great that Efteling decided to completely re-track and keep its first major thrill ride, where other parks would have removed it.
 
De Vliegende Hollander -  this ride was amazing, the level of theming in the queue and the station blew me away.  Reminded me of PoTC.  The bit of the ride that goes into complete darkness with the fog actually made me a bit claustrophobic, and the ships "jumping" out of the dark were a nice touch.  The coaster portion was decent, and we got lightly splashed at the end.  The area theming was amazing as well.
 
Baron 1898 - decent ride, amazing theming.  Probably the only "let down" ride of the trip (and I use that term loosely as it is a world class ride) as the only other dive coaster I have been to compare it to is Oblivion.  
 
Carnaval Festival - loved this, reminded me of Small World (although the tune is not as offensive as Small World haha) and Toyland Tours.  Love to see these old school attractions still running.
 
Fairytale Forest - we spent around 2 hours in this, and we missed a lot.  We underestimated how big this area is!  My standout for this first visit was the Indian Waterlillies.
 
Danse Macabre - this attraction was the standout attraction for me of the whole trip.  I don't think there's much more I can say about it other than its incredible.  We waited both days until it got dark to ride this as the darkness really added to the atmosphere.  I would say Efteling have knocked it out of the park with this ride, its so well done.  Probably the best POV I have seen online is the DLP Welcome one (link here: NEW RIDE Danse Macabre FULL ON RIDE - Efteling - World Premiere Dynamic Motion Stage).
 
Park Ops - this is an extremely well run park, each of the F&B units had at least 3 staff in them, and the park and toilets were spotless.  All of the attractions were running multiple trains/cars and the queues moved quickly.  On our 2nd day we guesstimated they had a gate figure of around 10-12,000 and the park just swallowed it up.  Each attraction appears to have been built with throughputs in mind, and considering the park doesn't run a fast track system they appear to do well with this.
 
I got asked by a member of staff on a coffee unit what I thought of the park, and when I gave my feedback (which was positive) they said "thank you".  I got the impression the staff were really proud to work there, and took ownership of it.
 
We ate at the pancake restaurant Polles Keuken (amazing pancakes, although I would recommend pre-booking as the walk up queue can get quite long). The thematic elements in the restaurant added to the whole experience.  We had lunch/early dinner at the Het Witte Paard restaurant.  This was was around 15 EURO for a decent hot meal and drink which is amazing VFM in my opinion.  In fact, the whole experience I felt was really good VFM, with park tickets costing 38 EURO and parking 12 EURO.  My only gripe is that the hot drinks were all one size (small) and were 5 EURO, but this wasn't a big deal.  We also ate at the Fabula Restaurant which was very good.  The indoor play structures looked a lot of fun for the kids.
 
We visited the Winter area that they had just finished setting up which was very well done.
 
Park merchandise was very good, and I spent a small fortune on gifts, something I rarely do at a theme park.  They also sell the various scents from the attractions which was a very unique thing to see.
 
Parkwide and attraction sound/music were on point and very memorable.  
 
Entry to the park was quick and efficient, and the park entrance building is amazing!  Construction on the new hotel looks like its progressing well, and I'm sure will be an awesome addition once it opens.
 
Attractions we missed:
 
Fata Morgana - closed for maintenance
Villa Volta - didn't get time to get round to it
Pirana - didn't get time to get round to it
Raveleijn - they were running one show a day and we set an alarm to ensure we would be there on time.  However we forgot we set the alarm and the alarm went off when we were in the middle of the queue for Baron.  
Stoomtrein - didn't get time to get round to it
Max & Moritz - didn't get time to get round to it
 
I'm sure we missed a whole lot more as the park is massive, but gives me a reason for a return trip!
 
All in all, an amazing park.  This park and Phantasialand are filled with magic, wonder and whimsy which I think is missing from a lot of theme parks now.
 
We stayed at the Center Parcs De Vossemeren onsite hotel which is around a 1 hour drive from the park.  We payed 40 EURO (each) a night for 3 nights which included access to the waterpark and breakfast!  We took a day out of our trip to chill at the Center Parcs which was awesome!
 
Can't wait to see what Efteling do next!
 
 
 
 
 

Suppose I should update some of my top 10 stuff, following that Cali trip. 
 

Coasters:
1/ Steel Vengeance 
2/ Veloci-coaster
3/ Zadra 
4/ Toutatis 
5/ Mako
6/ X2
7/ Hyperion
8/ Voltron
9/ Hyperia
10/ Nemesis Reborn 
 

Dark rides:
1/ Tower of Terror WDW
2/ Rise Of The Resistance 
3/ Indiana Jones- Disneyland 
4/ Guardians Mission Breakout
5/ Pirates In Batavia 
6/ Pirates Of The Caribbean Disney Cali 
7/ Forbidden Journey 
8/ Phantom Manor 
9/ Runaway Railway 
10/ Symbolica 
 

Theme parks 
1/ Europa Park 
2/ Universal Orlando 
3/ Cedar Point 
4/ Disneyland Resort 
5/ Phantasialand 
6/ Disney World 
7/ Energylandia 
8/ Six Flags Magic Mountain 
9/ Parc Asterix 
10/ Disneyland Paris 
 
TLDR, Wonder Woman was my 300th coaster.

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