Sorry this is soo late! Had exams and mocks recently so haven't really had the chance to. Please forgive me
Although I have a Merlin Pass, Alton Towers is a rare trip for me because I live 4 hours away from it, and I can’t drive yet The last time and the only time I have visited before was a weekend in 2012 at Scarefest.
At Scarefest it was obviously very busy, so it was nice to go to the park at a less busyier time. Early ride time was not available at Scarefest either so it was my first time using that.
ERT
Early ride time was different to what I expected, everyone is aloud in the park but then you need proof that you are aloud early ride time to get into certain areas of the park. On the first day me and my brother just walked into Cebeebies land without showing our annual passes and we didn’t get stopped? So anyone could of just walked in there. It was also quite annoying that you have to go a long way to get into X – Sector rather than just going through the normal entrance. On both days we got into the Smiler queue line at about 9:30, then when it opened we got pretty much straight on it.
Nemesis
Had a total of 12 rides on Nemesis over the weekend, and I can still say that Nemesis is my favourite coaster. Better than I remembered if I’m honest, the force on this ride is crazy. This is defiantly a ride that I prefer riding at the back Shame that the waterfalls aren’t red anymore though One thing I realised is that this ride never really seems to have a single rider queue, I think it’s because people don’t realise that there is a single rider queue. The single rider queue is at the station and not at the entrance of the main queue, I’m not complaining anyway I wouldn’t of known there was one if I hadn’t of asked a member of staff at the entrance.
The Smiler
Didn’t get to Alton last year so it was my first time riding the Smiler, and I love it The first time I rode it I literally had no clue where I was the whole time seeing as it is literally inversion after inversion! Love the theme music for the ride and the station but the baggage area wasn’t designed amazingly. Front row has got to be my favourite for this and managed to get it 3 out of the 5 times I rode it! I believe all of the effects were working and surprised I didn’t see it break down once! It’s got to be my second favourite ride on the park I was quite surprised how rough some parts of the ride are already though, especially towards the end of the ride, it’s only been operating a year! Glad I didn’t have to wait in the main queue at all, it must have been the biggest, and longest cattlemen I’ve ever seen!
Rita
I remembered this ride as ‘alright’ from last time, nothing special but I rode Rita in the rain, it’s got to have been the worst and most painful ride experience I can remember. I had to shut my eyes for most of it because the rain was hurting my eyes, and my head was just banging left to right the whole time. I didn’t remember it being this rough, and I’m not sure if it was because it was raining? On top of that operations on this were appalling all weekend and just couldn’t be bothered to queue for it again. The baggage is also a nightmare on this, so many people trying to get to the tiny baggage shelves at once didn’t work out very well.
Air
I remembered this ride as quite slow and boring, but I rode it in the rain and it just seemed a lot faster and forceful, I really enjoyed it! Second day however it wasn’t raining, and defiantly didn’t seem as fast, but it was still fast. They were only using 1 station when we were there and then it shut down for about 15 minutes, after that they were using both of them again.
Water rides
My first ride on Battle Galleons, and was a lot of fun. Got soaked, more wet than expected. Offride there was entertainers with 2 umbrellas each, one either side of you making a shield which was fun.
The queue for the flume was a nightmare. As this is quite an old log flume, to restart one of the lift hills you need to reset it from the top, so a staff needs to run all the way to the top to reset it. At one point all 3 of the lift hills stopped, resulting in 3 staff having to go off. Every time a lift hill stopped, they needed to spread out all of the boats again and because the station doesn’t space out the boats automatically, the ride host needs to literally drag the boats back and forward in the station. They then needed to run the boats empty for about 5 minutes. What was meant to be a 15 minute queue ended up being about 40 minutes. I’m not sure how often the lifts stop, but it happened very often while we were in the que which is annoying. The ride itself was very enjoyable though, makes me miss loggers tunnel even more Another annoying thing (not for us though) was that there are only 5 modified boats for people who aren’t as tall. There was an extended queing time for them boats of 35 minutes. There was no warning about this, they were just told this as they got the front. I mean come on, it’s a family attraction? At least make announcements in the queue letting people know in advance.
Was really impressed with Congo River rapids, so much more enjoyable than Rumba rapids. It’s not the fact that it’s more themed or there are more effects, it just does a lot more. We got stuck at the end of it which was quite fun, the lift hill was working, a boat just got stuck at the bottom. We were only stuck for about 15 minutes, but it was quite funny. There were so many boats.
There were boats behind us as well.
One thing I noticed about the water guns is that you actually get 10 shots, there’s not a timer like the ones at Thorpe. At Thorpe you can only end up getting about 2 boats for a quid because the timer runs out, which is really bad value!
Duel
Didn’t go on Duel last time because of time I guess, and we had no clue what it was. I was really impressed with Duel though, defiantly my favourite dark rides now. It makes Tomb blaster look terrible. I like it how you are in carts of 5, instead of Tomb blaster. Was really impressed with how well themed it was, and loved the indoor queen as well. My highest score was on my third time riding it, 42,100. What are everyone’s high scores?
Yep, my brother was great at duel
Cebeebies land
We only went on Go set go treetop adventure, to get an overview of the area. The whole area looks really nice and is well done. Can imagine it getting very busy over the summer. Me and my brother were going to go in Justin’s play house, but apparently you need someone over 18 to go in? So we gave that a miss. Don’t remember being asked if I’m 18 on the one in Chessington?
Other good points
- Queues weren’t as big as I expected
- Single rider ques are great, would love to see these at Thorpe
- Had more rides on The Smiler than I thought I would
- Some random guy gave me a gold fast track right at the time I was going on the Sunday, so I used it on the Smiler then gave it someone else. He got gold fast tracks for free from complaining, and I think they gave him an extra one by accident.
- 8 re rides on Nemesis, skipping the 20 minute queue. One time we went round we were on the same train. One of the rows were closed off for the exit queue but there was no one there, so they just sticked 4 single riders on, so me and my brother were together
- All coasters were running full capacity the whole time Although rita wasn't acting like it
Other negative points
- Staff seemed quite moody as a whole, a lot friendlier at Thorpe.
- They wouldn’t let us re ride on Oblivion; even though they were just letting empty seats go round? We had to walk all the way around.
- Even if there were queues for the rapids and the flume, they wouldn't fill up the boats which meant extended queuing times.
- Skyride down all morning on Sunday.
- Slowest operations on Rita
- Didn't see the park keepers :’(
RIDE COUNT:
Air x2
Battle Galleons x1
Charlie and the chocolate factory x1
Congo river rapids x2
Skyride x2
Duel x3
Go set go tree top adventure x1
Heave ho x1
Ice age 4D x1
Nemesis x12
Nemesis Sub Terra x2
Oblivion x6
Rita x1
Runaway mine train x1
Sonic spinball x1
The blade x2
The flume x1
The Smiler x5
Thirteen x3
TOTAL : 48
Thanks for reading
