Cal

Sup nerds,
Before last August I'd been to a theme park a maximum of probably 10 times.
Then in August I'm dragged on Stealth for the first time.
December I'm taken to Winter Wonderland.
January I get bought a Merlin Annual Pass for my birthday (thanks SCB!)
February I go to Thorpe Park's early opening.
And this month I dash to the proper opening day of Thorpe Park after college, narrowly missed out on a spur-of-the-moment jaunt on the London Eye, and go to Chessington' Annual Pass Preview day.
Oh and did I mention in the rest of this month I'm going to TPM's Thorpe opening meet, the opening of the I'm a Celebrity maze, and am dashing to Thorpe Park on the morning of the 31st for a last-minute go on Colossus before going up to Alton Towers for the first time for a three day break. And next month I'm going to the TPM Chessington meet.
Busy month, isn't it?
Winter Wonderland was great (expensive but great). MY impressions of travelling rides were something along the lines of Carter's Steam Fair, nothing particularly big, and NOTHING on the scale of a theme park.
Yes okay so I've never been to a travelling funfair in Europe.
Obviously what I saw completely spat on my expectations, and even though ice skating was cancelled and refunded instead I got to see my first proper circus (awesome by the way!)
Thorpe's opening in February was a bit meh. Six rides open was a bit anti-climatic but the queues were short enough to make up for it. Me and SCB managed to get a ride on every row on Stealth, and more than half of the forward-facing Swarm rows. Oh and two dodgems battles as well.
That was only half of my Valentines Day. As well as the added bonus of not having to listen to SCB going on about his withdrawal symptoms and the peak times of off-season.
Proper opening was better but there was still a lot closed. Arrived at half two, left at five, got five rides on Colossus and a few on Nemesis and some others, including one or two on X. I forgot how much I had an absolute LOVE of thumping dance music... Nah it's not that bad.
Got close to going on the London Eye during a trip to London for an important interview, until I realised I'd left my wallet (and pass) at home. Anyway the evening ended up with me and SCB walking down the Merlin South Bank at half seven in the evening, wondering where the new Shrek thingy was going and looking at all the attractions there that I hadn't yet been to. This is going to be a busy summer.
As for Chessington... Where do I start. I hadn't been for years so couldn't remember what I'd been on before and what I hadn't out of all the rides that existed last time I was there. It was a bit sad seeing how so many familiar pieces of theming I remembered had been taken down, leaving some areas looking like some of the unis I visited last year. Industrial. Not being much of a Chessington geek yet I don't know what's expected to go soon or stay a while, or what new is being bought in. So (on this occasion practically being an ordinary punter) I was left a little disappointed. Also with so many rides closed for it's supposed 'opening' and with Dragon's Fury running just as if it was open but with no people on it, it was slightly as if the park was teasing me. As were the ride boards, with several rides that were closed listed as having queues of 5 minutes. I'm not going to go on about it. People do enough of that on here.
On a more positive note, I'm so excited about Alton Towers. It's one of those parks I always wanted to visit as a child, but not having parents who had a particular interest in theme parks there wasn't really a possibility until I became old enough to get myself more mobile and go without them. Now it's actually happening I'm so excited XD
I guess I'll write again about Towers and how it goes.
Later nerds! See you at the next meet!

2014 is almost over, which can only mean one thing...it's time for my review of Thorpe's season! In a way, it kind of feels silly to do a 'season' review on behalf, since I've "only" made 8 visits this year (by far my smallest Thorpe tally in memory!), so there's a few gaps here and there, and my views may not be fully representative of the season. However, I hope this review will end up giving a nice roundup of the season, and my views on what's gone down. If anyone wants to see my reviews of previous seasons, they can all be found HERE (once again, apologises about the pictures no longer working - darn Facebook!). And with all that out of the way, let's "get ready to go...looking good...3 2 1..."
New for 2014 - Angry Birds Land
Rewind a year ago, and I said that for 2014, "There's been talks of a new 4D film, the return of the Canada Creek Railway, the movement of Vengeance to the park and ...at least one of those things should happen." Fortunately, one of those things did happen.
I don't quite know how ABL has been received by the public, but enthusiast opinion is certainly more on the negative side. However, I must admit, I side with the side that, on the whole, it's an okay investment for the park. The 'land' is very small - it seems almost silly to call it an area of a theme park given how small it is. The 4D cinema, whilst a bit over the top with the effects, is a nice break from the bombardment of rides and is certainly a vast improvement on Time Voyagers (though that's not saying much, mind!). The Dodgems are good fun and, whilst nothing special, a nice filler ride for everyone to enjoy. Personally, I think that Detonator is the biggest waste in the area; new audio was needed, and a bit more of a feel around the ride was required. But instead we end up with a new name and cheap logo plus a random bird plonked nearby - still feels out of place unfortunately.
So yeah, all in all, I don't think ABL is a bad investment. I think it will work in the long run (Angry Birds will no doubt continue to be popular, and with a major film set for 2016, I can see a second wind for it coming up), and brought life into what was a lifeless area. Many say that it's destroyed Amity Cove - but let's face it, there's a huge difference between Stealth-side Amity (Amity Speedway) and Tidal Wave-side Amity (the Amity Cove). A divide is necessary really, and this gives a chance to divide the sides further, which would be a good thing. For the future, I'd like to see the Teacups given an Angry Birds theme, since it feels a bit out of place at the moment, and the well-known Angry Birds tune be made more prominent throughout the area - it's something I was looking forward to hearing if I'm honest!

Detonator - needs more work...


These metal plate theming bits are...okay. Not my first choice thematic feature for the area though!

King Pig's Wild Hog Dodgems - a bit bare, but good fun.
New for 2014 - Other Stuff
Though a quiet year on the rides and attractions front, there were a few new and improved things around the park...
The Shark Hotel replaced the Crash Pad, and is Thorpe's own attempt at a shipping container hotel. Indeed, the shark idea was my favourite of the three concepts (the other two being the Pier and crashed ship). I do quite like the look of the shark - it's quirky and different, and likely a nice talking point for people visiting. My only criticism of it is that, on the inside, you can see all the framework - a bit of a shame in all honesty, but I guess there's got to be limitations to everything. Maybe not the most spectacular thing ever, but I have a fond spot for it if I'm being honest.

Bite me.
Then there's the improved entrance. It must surely be a short-term solution, as the whole ticket and entrance plaza needs a big rework in my opinion. Baring that in mind, I think it's an okay solution - the video loops they play do a nice job of showing off the park, and presumably do help build a bit of atmosphere and anticipation for guests. Also great to hear the original Thorpe entrance music being played once again!

Hard to get a decent image of the screen, so here's the best I've got..
The few other touch ups around the park (Stealth Diner and shop, Mexican Cantina extension, etc.) are also welcome additions, now giving more indoor seating, and improved chippy on park - I never really liked the old Fish and Chip place for some reason; maybe the old look of the place just put me off? - and meaning every major attraction has their own sort of shop to some degree. The small things ey!

Stealth shop looks quite nice really.
The Coasters
The Swarm remains top dog for another year. For me, it just had everything I want, and it's just a beautiful roller coaster to me. After being able to climb its lift hill this year and do a couple of behind the scenes bits and bobs, I have no doubt that Swarm will have a place in my heart for years to come... With it looking very likely that I'll be breaking into Europe next year, I somewhat doubt this will be my favourite coaster next year, but hey, I'll let it bask in its glory till then.

Looking up

A pretty sweet alternative view of the ride in general

Pretty helicopter.

Standard picture.
X also saw some changes, with new audio and a new lighting set up. I think the reason why I like it so much is because it's so different to anything else the park offers - it's a bit of fun and a laugh. It doesn't try to do anything special and it's not a serious ride. Something that the park needs more of in my eyes!
Inferno was as solid as ever, and it was nice to see the mist and lights working for the majority of my visits. Also interesting to see the workshop area as part of the John Wardley meet too; geeky moments I guess! I still have a soft spot for Saw, even if it does leave many with a soft spot on their head after riding. Again, got to do a nice backstage tour of it, which was great fun and really interesting. Colossus remained as uncomfortable as ever. Stealth was alright too I guess; I'm not too fussed about it though to be honest.. .

Dear Thorpe, all I want for this closed season is this sign cleaned / replaced. Lots of love, JoshC.

Arty-farty Saw photo.


Put my camera through its paces by taking photos of Saw from the Loggers queue line. Funny results followed.
The Other Rides
Won't really put any specific focus on any other rides now because: 1) too much effort, 2) I haven't visited enough to say that much and 3) I don't want to put you to sleep any quicker.
So yeah, in short... Slammer didn't open with the rest of the park, but managed to remain consistently open (more or less) when it eventually did open. Big thumbs up to all those involved with getting the thing to live again, and to actually stay alive. Personally, I think the ride just needs binning - I don't find it exciting and it just seems to be a waste of resources in my opinion. It seems Thorpe/Merlin think otherwise - as do many enthusiasts - so let's hope for their sakes their faith in the ride lasts for a few years before it eventually conks out. When that day comes, I'll happily be the first to volunteer to take some explosives to the ride.
Rush, Samurai, Loggers, Zodiac and the like all did well during the season, and I think they're all good rides that add to the line up. On the other hand, I've been disappointed by the likes of Vortex, which is showing its ages, Rumba Rapids and Depth, rides which I do enjoy, but really need some TLC to make them look nice again.

A working Slammer - a slightly less rare sight than usual.
"What about Storm Surge?" you might be asking yourselves. I didn't ride Storm Surge this year, and this picture sums up my views on the ride nicely...

I'd much rather look at a building.
The Big Easter
I unfortunately didn't attend this season's Easter event, due to revising for exams. However, by the sounds of it, it was a great event for the park and their new direction. All the reviews of the Brainiac show were great, so I'm glad to hear that's returning for the February Half Term event. I look forward to seeing what Thorpe come up with for next Easter (and fingers crossed I'm actually able to make it!).
Summer Nights
Summer Nights returned for a second season, which is great news. This event is just a brilliant idea from the park and works a treat. I know some say that opening till 10 should be standard for the park during Summer, and maybe that should be the case one day. But right now, I don't think the park would be busy enough to warrant it - making it a separate identity is the best thing for now. The event has definitely gained popularity, and I'd be curious to see if they'd consider adding two trains to the coasters if the event become much more popular.

Teacups are still an addition for Summer Nights - good thing too, since it's relatively popular during the day..
Summer Event - Huh?
Last year, I said: "Despite Sun Scream obviously being popular enough to last many seasons, I think it's time to think of something a little different now". However, when I said "a little different", I did mean they should at least do something! Unless I completely missed it, there was no specific summer event this season that filled the role Sun Scream had done for the seasons beforehand.
The park seemed popular enough from marketing alone and such, but it seems like a wasted opportunity, especially with the family market. Hopefully it's just a one-off, and next season gives us some decent event for the summer. It would certainly help encourage the crowds to visit during what is one of the busiest periods of the season for the park, and a chance to stand out from the crowd a little bit.
On the other end of the scale, I guess they could partner up with MoS for another event. Mash Up seemed good during Easter 2012 and 2013, so why not bring back that back? Speaking of MoS, still haven't been to a MoS night - they're just not my thing! - however, I'm glad to see that they're still proving popular and successful.
Fright Nights
The biggest change for this season's Fright Nights was, of course, the farewell of The Asylum, and the introduction of Studio 13: The Motel. It's been said a hundred times already, but I may as well say it again - last year's controversy over Asylum was NOT the cause of its removal. The park were planning on getting rid of it even for last season's event - let's hope that that myth doesn't become fact to many.
Another thing which has been said a hundred times already is that I wasn't really a fan of The Asylum. It was a maze of strobe lights which gives you a headache, with no apparent story line other than 'you're locked in with scary people' and very repetitive. So I was glad to see the back end of it. Studio 13's premise sounded exciting and very promising, and it was great to see the park come up with a non-IP maze which still fitted in perfectly with the park's overall theme (which I still love by the way).
Personally, I loved the maze. Great nods to the past, good theming, a story which followed through the maze and overall a good idea. In fact, out of all the mazes I've done, it's the maze where I've felt most apart of the story. It's such a simple idea (you tour through a studio where a horror film is being filmed, then all of a sudden, you're IN the film), which makes it easy to execute, yes, but it was executed so well that it just a beautiful maze.
As for the returning mazes, Blair Witch went from zero to hero, which was great. I hope this gives the park more confidence with scare zones and outdoor attractions. Cabin and Saw remained good attractions, though I think Saw needs a bit of an update, as it feels kind of tame compared to the rest. My Bloody Valentine was yet again the worst; no real scares or anything - just dark, cramped spaces all the way. It will scare many, yes, but you can't just simply rely on that! It will be interesting to see what happens to the maze next season now the arena is in use - will it just move elsewhere, move out of the containers and into someplace else, or what?
I also did Face it Alone again this year. I can't sing the praises of this experience enough - if you like scare attractions, it is well worth giving it a try! I'm so glad the park have continued to look into other scare ideas than your bog-standard conga line maze, and here's hoping that things like Face it Alone, the Overnight Experiences and original maze ideas continue for many years to come.

Fright Nights proved to yet again been the most popular time of season.

Me with The Director.
Reserve n Ride
The second season we've seen RnR now and I remain in the minority who like the idea. I'll keep my views here short and sweet since I've argued them to death throughout the year in the appropriate topics - the idea is a nice one and has a lot of potential. The system itself seems to work now; they've slowly managed to iron out technical issues. What the park need to do now is try the system as it was intended - with no standby queues. That way, they see how viable an option this actually is. Make sure there's enough non-ride stuff to do too; that'll help (and, in fact, is a good idea in general!).
Food and Merchandise
As mentioned above, I've gotten into a bad habit of falling in love with the new Fish and Chip place, nice and unhealthy. My lunch of choice usually varies between that, the Mexican Cantina or Bar 360. For the most part though, all of the Merlin-owned food places are good quality and value at Thorpe, which is good. I'll no doubt try the punnily-named Peckish and the new Pizza-Pasta joint in the new season though, because why not ey?
As ever, the merchandise at Thorpe helped empty my wallet. The new resins were all great, and the Swarm billboard is my personal favourite of all the Merlin resins. Then there's the brilliant new clothing items which give some geeky nods (ride opening years and such), which I just love! The new Angry Birds merch is good to see too, even if a bit overpriced in my opinion. Then again, on the whole, merchandise is reasonably priced I think, so I'm not really complaining. Would like to see more bears at Thorpe though - please?
I guess the VIP packages fit into merchandise sort of, so just a quick mention of them. Whilst the main ones are a bit too pricey in my opinion, the lift hill walks and backstage tour are okay, especially if you can get a deal on them (and they do indeed do deals on them at points in the year). Again, really glad to see the park doing cool things likes this!

The Inferno shop has a makeover too. At least I was spending time in shops, and not just money...
Chief Ranger's Carousel - RIP
Whilst no official note has been made, it seems that CRC has left us after 20 years of service. It's sad to see a ride so rich in Thorpe's history leave. However, in all honesty, it's surprising it stayed as long as it did, especially during the years when families were just not in the park's target market. It's not like the ride has a specific appeal the 99% of visitors anyway - time to let go and move along in my opinion!

A Carouselfie.
A Look Ahead
2015 brings us...well, we don't know. Potentially nothing of note. We have gathered that Pizza Hut is being replaced by Pizza Pasta, and that building is getting an extension. I have no doubts that we'll see some touch ups around the place (Canada Creek still has a lot of the old branding about, some rides are in desperate need of TLC and I expect Thorpe know that), and there'll be a few little things to keep us happy. However, it seems like 2015 could be the first season since 1997 where Thorpe don't bring us any new attractions. Then again, Angry Birds Land didn't have plans submitted till January, so who knows?
Of course, we'll all be able to gawp at the construction site for 2016's exciting new development - maybe that in itself will be enough to keep us happy next season?
That's it for me; another season well and truly done with. Thanks if you read it all (and sorry for the length)! As ever, any comments / thoughts / criticisms are welcome!

WARNING: High Liam content.
Well, what an amazing day this was! It was a joy to see everyone again and to meet some new faces
(Btw, I got the xmas smilies by googling them, started typing this during xmas, was gonna remove them since but meh, it's a Christmas meet )
After being greeted with hugs and smiles at Waterloo station, it was off to The Eye (and that wonderful 4D experience). It was a clear day so we got some great views, could even see Stealth! Liam was such a tourist (actually, he was for the whole day) and came out with a great response to The Shard: "It doesn't look real! It looks like it's been painted on!"
Seflie time!

Next up was The Dungeons, which were a great laugh as usual, and with it being Liam's first time, we were provided with much entertainment in the form of his vocalizations. Such as: jumping on the boat ride; screaming in the plague doctors scene when the leeches crawl under your bum, and just general camp reactions. The highlight was, of course, when he got picked in the torture device scene Just...perfect! Shame we couldn't take any photos! Although...
Our ORP from Drop Dead with Luke (and some random lady) was quite something...

Luke's face!
We skipped SeaLife and headed straight to Nandos, about an hour before our booking We managed to lose Peaj on the underground, whilst gaining Mark9 and Dan9...but were eventually reuinited in Nandos. Secret Santa was fun as always (but did we actually finish it?!), I think Liam was most impressed with his sexy fireman calendar
At this point, I had intended on going around and handing all my Christmas cards out...not really sure what happened! So instead, I just went to people individually throughout the rest of the day and gave them their cards. But because of this, there were some people who I didn't get round to giving their cards to, so major apologies!
BUT I did bring loads of candy canes And I tried to make sure everyone got one lol!
After this cheeky dessert of candy canes, it was off to Madame Tussauds for most of us while the rest headed to the pub. A few bits (and groping of!) from Tussauds:

Santa Banter!
(In full HD 60fps, as are all my videos)


http://youtu.be/FWs9qD1OAro

I also added some silly/amusing annotations And it appears that our meet organiser was clearly still in shock after becoming seperated from us on the underground, and couldn't even catch a giant box
A few stills from that footage:


W're royal, ya know

Erm, I still have no words...

Aww I do love this photo!

Soon, it was time for The Spirit of London!
Here's some stills from my on-ride footage ...Because the detail in this ride is just brilliant.
Luke popped his head round to tell us something important...

(Watch the video that I have included further down to find out what, I didn't upload them for nothing )
Rebuilding London and St Paul's



#Lad

Hmm, this reminds me of a particular coaster...

Only just realised when watching the footage back that this helter skelter is also Big Ben!

Where did everyone go?!

Plot twist: they were taken by the creepy fireman!

I think it's partly the fact that his right eye just stares straight ahead which makes him creepy (ish).
I thoroughy enjoyed the ride as always, as did Liam!

Why not see (and hear!) for yourself?
http://youtu.be/boytOANK8_E


I was a bit sheepish about being too obvious filming it, hence why the view seems quite low down at points. But it's the things that are said/the reactions (again, mainly from Liam) that are the highlights of the video, really! "WHO'S THAT?!" "Oh my god we're going down...OOOH!" "We're going oop...WE'RE GOING OOP!"
Winter Wonderland
Well, once we'd eventually got inside and shuffled painfully to the Carousel Bar, we could enjoy ourselves (as much as humanely possible). Myself and some others did Wild Maus XXL, which was even more insane, hardly seemed to trim! There's a particular corner which is ridiculously fast - you can actually see people being thrown to the side when watching!
Then while some others did Barrel of Laughs, we did XXL. It was definitely worth it! Far more than just a giant Freakout or better version of Vortex It was fast, pretty intense, had both great force and great airtime, and when I thought we'd reached full height, it still went higher! Pretty sure I shouted "What the f**k?!" a few times!

Winter Wonderland off-ride footage
http://youtu.be/E3htSa9TRvU


At 14-15 seconds in, watch the corner just above the blue sign - that's the corner I just mentioned, you'll see how fast the car flies through! You also get to hear the wonderful operator on XXL, who kept repeating the same things over and over again. OH and watch (and listen) out for my little edit at the end
It was eventually time to say goodbye It really was lovely to see people again, especially people like Liam who I haven't seen in a long time and live bloomin' miles away! Actually had to hold back from crying when hugging goodbye
Although, it was nice to go to the pub after with some peeps and just chill, was a nice way to finish such a good day!
Here is the album with all my photos in for any who want to see the rest of them: Christmas London Trip 2014
Oh and any photos with people in are set to private (the above link is a guest pass, so only those who I share the link to can see the private photos)
So thank you to everyone for making it such a great meet, and of course to Peaj! Last year's meet unfortunately ended up on a very sad day for me and my family, so I don't have great memories from it. And for various reasons, 2014, up until around late October/November, was a pretty awful year for me personally. BUT (cue happy/triumphant music), since November-time I've finally been on the mend, and for the first time in a very long time (a few years perhaps!) I feel back to my old self - if not, better than that! Something must have shone through as I was often the one the actors spoke to at The Dungeons Seriously though, I feel so alive and more chatty, and I was eager to see how I'd be at a meet (especially with so many people), and I'm very pleased to say that I felt amazing!
So here's to 2015 Happy new year! x

Well first of all I would like to say, if you ever decide to go to PortAventura via Barcelona, once there, get the train!!!! We had a large proportion of our day cut in PA because we were waiting for the shuttle bus to arrive, which was an hour late, we then waited an extra 25 minutes so that the bloody grump that was the driver, who wanted a fag break then proceeded to have an argument with someone on his phone... yeahh wasn't exactly pleased but yeah rant over and onto the trip report!! This will be more of a what I thought of things rather then what exactly happened as we were there for 4 days it would have gotten pretty boring you to read haha!!

waiting waiting waiting...

20 minutes into the fag break...
But yeah eventually when me and DGC got to PortAventura finally, we just ran straight into the park, to the nearest ride we could find and since we were staying in the Hotel PortAventura, this was the nearest ride...

Now I had heard a LOT about this ride, some saying that it is the worst thing ever created, some saying its the best thing ever, and because of this this was the ride that I was most eager to try out, all I can say is nothing can prepare you for what this ride does, I can honestly say you need to ride it before making any presumptions of it because this ride is just fricking horrid... BUT amazing at the same time, I don't know how but this ride I like because the launch and the inline twist is just something else but the ride is by far the roughest steel coaster I have ever been on, in the front as it isn't that rough I can easily give it an 8/10 for the launch along, dat launch doe but the outside seats on anywhere else but the front row and especially, (which was really odd ) the 3rd row, were just horrific, to the point where I came off the ride and I literally had to go back to my room and sleep it off as I was in so much pain (migrane, bruises, ringing ears) felt like a zombie, but I don't know I just kept on getting drawn back to it, which was odd, but yeah the inside seats were fine, Colossus rough nothing major, but the outside seats were like getting KO'd by a boxer, but yeah for the rest of the trains outside seats I'd give it a 5/10 because I still sort of enjoyed the ride and on the inside 7/10 not bad but not good either.
Here are some more pics of it in action
Lets face it, it is a beautiful ride to look at
Looks so calm over the lake, anything but on the damn thing!!!!
#BACOFACE
So yeah after that ride the second coaster we did was a little bit of a trek into Polynesia No joke it was so humid in this part I was sweating like a rat in a gym sock but we soldier on!!
Entrance in sweat shop central AKA Polynesia!
What's that peaking in the distance I wonder??
SHAMBHALA AND DRAGON KHAN!!!!! These were 2 rides that I had been waiting to ride for years and now they were the right in front of me !! Kid in a candy store was a good cliché to describe how I was feeling when I saw these two . Me and Dean decide do save Shambhala for a little while to try out Dragon Khan. This is an imposing ride to be under and look at despite being dwarfed by Shambhala, does and did intimidate people, so we decide to hit middle row just to get a feel for the thing and this is what I think about it...

It is an awesome layout, and one which was quite intense and that Zero-G roll is amazing BUT this ride is ruined by the incredible rattly trains, which for me ruined the overall ride for me, as the further back on the train we went the rougher it got to the point where on the back row, I came off with an almost Baco bad headache! At the front like Baco, it is raw and a little rattly but no problem and was an awesome ride, any other row though and it was quite uncomfortable to ride, made Smiler and Colossus feel smooth, no joke! Which was so unfortunate as I really wanted to love it but it was let down by those trains. So like Baco again, on the front row, I'd give it an 8/10 but for the rest of the ride I'd give it a 6/10 as the trains were way too rattly for me to enjoy on the other rows, but dat B&M roar doe!!
So now onto the big boy himself, I had heard a lot of great things about this ride, and lets cut to the chase but this ride is without a doubt the best roller coaster I have ever ridden!!!!!!!! Its SMOOTH, its fast, it has amazing airtime floater AND ejector! The water effect was absolutely amazing the themeing around the area was just fantastic, I just adore it so much the ride is just amazing and special and makes up for the disappointment of the first 2 rides completely, so Shambhala.... 10/10!!!!! Just perfect
Now onto this thing!
Hurakan Condor, I have to say that this isn't as intense as Detonator, no where near in fact! But the shear terror I had for it and the fact that I actually enjoyed the drop (well maybe not on the standup seats) meant that this is my favourite drop tower, great ride! 9/10
Next was El Diablo...
For some reason I only took a picture of it's station... !
But this ride is ok the first part was the most fun for me with the rest being incredibly meh... +1 4/10
Here is a internet photo of the ride if anyone is even bothered...

But yeah enough of that on to Stampida!!
Yeah, one thing I have to say is It was a god send having the unlimited fastpass, as the queues were huge for rides that weren't the best, but onto the review of this ride. This was another ride I had heard bad things about and it wasn't till I had gotten onto the ride for the first time (blue side) I understood why people say it lives up to its name... The blue side was absolutely horrific, easily the worst coaster I have ever been on, just all it was, was 2 minutes of just pure pain getting launched into the horridly uncomfortable restraint at every twist and turn, it was just horrid, and my dad (who was on the trip with us as he'd wanted to go to Spain for a while) said and I quote " It was the worst f***ing ride I have ever been on "... and he had only come off the back row of Baco's outer seat about 30 minutes before! :excl: Kumbak have ruined what was probably a decent ride on the blue side it has to be a 1/10. However the red side was quite decent but the 2nd half was incredibly dull, like really dull!!! Which was a shame as it has a good first half as its a lot smoother then Blue. For the Red side I give it a 5.5/10.
I had taken strong painkillers so it didn't feel as bad on my poor head!

The rides best asset was that it was a great sun umbrella, thats the only positive...

Next up are the 3 big water rides that were in the park before 2014!

The Rapids ride, called Grand canyon rapids, were great, easily the best themed one I had been on and for me was the 2nd best after Fjord rafting at Europa park! Despite the fact I literally knocked my self out for like 10 seconds after hitting the side very hard which launched my head into the hard plastic corner of the back rest (I really don't know how I managed to do that but it happened!) but over then that minor blip it was a great rapids which I will give 8/10 for!

Next was the silver mine log flume which all in all was a good little flume but unfortunately it meanders a lot like Alton's which is a bore and the final drop doesn't get you that wet other then that its quite good and well themed! 7/10!

Now finally was my favourite of the water rides Tutuki Splash!! This ride is amazingly themed for the area has 2 awesome drops and gets you absolutely soaked, for me much better then Tidal Wave at Thorpe Park and Drenched at Oakwood. The themeing that this ride had was perfect and really just makes the ride look lush! Tutuki Splash gets a 9/10 for me
Now for the new for 2014 attraction, on the 2nd day of the visit we rode Angkor, which had a 3hr queue we completely skipped... hehe got to love the fasttrack package! And its good we did because apart from amazing themeing this was a disappointment for a splash battle as we didn't even battle with anyone till near the end because of its layout which completely defeats the point of a splash battle! Its a 6/10 for me mainly because of the epic themeing!

This up next was one of the last coaster creds we got on the trip, quite tucked up and if you didn't walk right past its entrance you wouldn't have known it was there due to it being nestled up to Stampida, for this coaster was Tomahawk a tiny, quite unassuming woodie that actually packs quite a punch for a ride of its size, it was smooth for a woodie, which was quite good and I think it was a cracking little ride that for me was better then its bigger brother for me it was a 7/10. Only downside is the trains are ridiculously small so it was quite awkward fitting my legs into the ride, Dean had problems as well as he is taller then me haha:

The final proper ride I will talk about is in this area Sesamo aventura ( I think that's how its spelt...), which despite it being completely different to any other part of the park, by not encompassing a country or ancient time as a theme, this area holds its own well. It is a really nice area to look at and was always one of the most busy as it was always packed with families, so I think job well done PA!

Tami Tami! The final cred in the park and one that looked really pretty with the lush plants and with it being situated mostly over a little pond it was a really nice ride to look at. Its a +1 but its a really good +1, its a nice little ride which its train looked like it was designed by a guy tripping on weed, what's not to like about it! 7/10.

The final thing I have to say about on this trip is Templo del Fuego. Its basically a walk in show with special fire effects and what not and has a special finale which was quite good. I would have probably enjoyed it more if I could understand Spanish, but it was a good show, but one I think you could only do once on a trip as it can get a bit monotonous, but for this ride I would give it a 6/10. We also did, as it was part of the Halloween event there at the time, La Selva de Miedo, basically forest of fear and I can straight up say it was much better then any Thorpe maze hands down, it was a very long maze and a good atmospheric one at that, whist it didn't scare me as such, it scared dean which was a mission accomplised! Like Blair witch it only takes place after dark to give it the atmosphere but it was a good maze I think so for this, it's a 8/10
Here are a few more photos we took of the trip


On the final day, we waved goodbye to PortAventura with one last ride on Furius Baco and Dragon Khan, (Shambhala doesn't open till 11am... the spite!!!) and we set off on our journey to Barcelona!!
Here are a few photos we took in barcelona!

One of the many Gaudi-designed buildings in Barcelona!
The Barcelona tubes were like London's but worse, basically miles of tunnels before you even get to the platform!! And the tickets are ridiculously priced compared to the London Underground!!
The trains were nicer though

Where could we be going I wonder??
To La sagrada Familia!! The Unfinised church that, on one side looks brand new and on the other looks ancient!!


La sagrada Familia is an architectural marvel, such a beautiful building with lovely parks to the front and back of it. Its only marred by the tacky shops and fast food restaurants to the side of it but none the less was a beautiful building.


The dog looked a little unimpressed by it


We got lost... many, many times...
Weird dildo sculpture thing
We thought this was a theatre at first but we actually found out it was a...
Huge shopping centre! It doesn't look it but that top floor is high up!! It did make my knees wobble
La Sagrada in the distance from the shopping centres observation deck, which I forgot to mention it had! Great views though!


This was an Art Gallery, we didn't go inside but it is a majestic looking building, almost looks like a palace!
The Barcelona Olympic park in the distance.
Such a beautiful view from the Art gallery walkway.
After this we left for the airport as our journey had ended.




Not sure what Dean was doing here...
Overall it was a fantastic trip, Barcelona although filled with tacky shops, is an amazing city from the parts we saw and a city I wouldn't mind visiting again! Salou was great, the beach was lush the pubs were actually quite decent and the final stage of the WRC Spanish rally was in Salou at the time as well so we saw a bit of that as well which was awesome This was my first visit to Spain and I hope it isn't my last
Here are a few pics of Salou


What we really came to see and do was Port Aventura. A park that I had wanted to do since I became really interested in roller coasters ( which is a long, long time!) so I was revelling in the chance to go last year in 2014. And I have to say its one of the most beautiful parks I have been to just everything is just lush and I really, really like it! Sure there are some humb dingers there but that is made up for the fact that it has the best coaster I have ever been on, Shambhala!! The only ride that has ever truly scared me, Hurakan Condor. And a ride that got me stupidly soaked when I most needed it Tutuki Splash! I love PortAventura, and I hope to go back soon!
Here are a final few photos before I round off the report









The best view of any theme park I have ever been to!!!!!!
Finally some pictures of my hotel, Hotel Port Aventura. This hotel is amazingly themed and is one the nicest hotels I have stayed in. The service was great, the rooms were lovely and clean, and the beds were nice! Also the food was great and decently priced


I think this last photo sums up PA for me, the place has its ups and downs, can leave pained expressions on your face, and ones of surprise, but overall it will be and was an amazing experience, and one I will remember for a long while!

Once again, thanks for reading my report

The most important* awards are here! It’s been one hell of a year for me, and as a result rather than review things on a whole (it would take a very, very long time to go through each park) I’d prefer to just give out awards to the best and worst rides and parks I’ve experienced this year. So let’s get cracking:
Best Park – Efteling (Honourable Mentions – Phantasialand, Europa Park)
I fell completely in love with Efteling this year, everything that I want parks to do oozes from the place. It stinks of class, care and thought throughout the place, with one of the best park atmospheres around, you can tell why it’s one of the biggest theme parks in the world, and why 90% odd of all Dutch people have visited it. Quality over Quantity is clearly their ideal, as the dark rides there are Disney tier good, and the coasters fulfil the family fun market perfectly. The Fairytale Forest is the biggest attraction and it’s gorgeous to wander through for 2 hours and not feel like time was wasted. The hotel is also lovely and continues the feeling of care and attention, whilst Aquanura is a fantastic end to the day.
To be honest, this won the award for the Pancake House alone, so the rest of the park didn’t actually matter.
Best New for 2014 Ride – Helix (HM – Chiapas, Ratatouille, Lost Temple, Alpina Blitz)
This was predictable eh? Yes Helix was clearly the best new ride for 2014, though there are plenty of rides that did their best to entice me otherwise. Unfortunately Helix is pure perfection, from the comfortable trains, to the adventurous track, the amazing airtime and interaction with both other rides and mountain. Mack and Liseberg struck gold with this, and there aren’t enough words in the dictionary to praise it enough.
Best “New for Benin” Ride – Maus au Chocolat (HM – Van Helsing’s Factory, Twister, Superman Madrid)
Probably one of the most trickiest awards to hand out, there were several rides vying for this award, even more than the Honourable Mentions that got into the list. But the winner in the end had to be Maus au Chocolat for being a fantastic interactive dark ride with tonnes of theming and details from the entrance to the exit. Bonus points for being one of the few rides that made me feel hungry through the deliberate mixture of imagery, recipes and piped smells.
Best Water Ride – Chiapas (HM – River Quest, Nautic Jet)
There was only ever going to be one winner here, Chiapas being the best modern day water ride around. Theming, interesting layout, the soundtrack and rave room all add up to provide a fantastic overall experience.
Best Flat Ride – Gerstlauer Sky Fly (HM – Talocan, Spin Spider)
Not too many choices here, but the Sky Fly (ridden at Nigloland and Legoland Deutschland) was a real stand-out in the category. Possibly because I have the knack for it which is an issue with the ride type for many people rather than it actually being good though, regardless it provides a level of interactivity that shouldn’t be ignored, even if the throughput is dreadful.
Best Dark Ride – Fata Morgana (HM – Droomvulcht, Bla Taget)
There are plenty of boat rides that take inspiration from Pirates of the Caribbean, and this one is no exception, but is one of the few that could probably be seen as a massive step up. Using the tow boat system is possibly one of the biggest advantages to the ride, as it allows the sets to be more intimate/smaller and yet still grand in scale. Whilst it is probably full of clichés, it does everything so well, it’s certainly deserving of this award.
Worst Park – Fantasy Island (HM – Walygator, Heide Park, Movie Park Germany)
It’s no wonder this place ended up in administration this year. Location is an issue, as Skegness is probably one of the most seedy of UK Seaside Resorts, combined with the arcade Pyramid and the giant market results in clientele that make Blackpool look classy. It’s tacky but not in a nice way, and for a place that does consider itself a major park (rather than a sea-side funfair most similar parks do such as Bottons or Joyland), it just feels awful to be around for more than a few hours. Plus the rides are crap bar Millenium Coaster. I felt glad to leave.
Worst Coaster – Bandit (HM – Odyssey, Coaster Express, Temple of the Night Hawk)
I rode a LOT of duff coasters this year, ranging from the dull to the obscenely rough to sometimes a mixture of both. I’ve also now discovered why people detest anything made by RCCA, for the two coasters that I did were both terrible, but Bandit was by far and large the worst. You’d think a modern take on Coney Island’s Cyclone would improve it, but you’d be wrong. Bandit is obscene pain from start to finish, and would be better served as a pile of ashes then a ride.
Worst Flat Ride – High Fall (HM – Huss Condor, Huss Frisbee)
Stand-Up Floorless Drop Towers are a marmite ride type at the best of times, but High Fall is one of the worst examples available to experience. The fact that upon every drop a scream of all the riders was followed by cries of pain as it came to a stop makes this the top of the class in being bad.
Worst Water Ride – Wakobato
A Splash Battle that has zero interaction between boats and theming? Utterly pointless, handing this the title quite swiftly and without much need for deliberation.
Biggest Surprise – Van Helsing’s Factory (HM – Tranan, Twister)
This is probably the biggest surprise because of how crap the rest of the park’s attractions are. This ride completely stand-outs amongst the dregs and is definitely one of the best examples of how to do a dark ride coaster. With good theming and a layout that takes full advantage of both the building and the Gerstlauer Bobsled’s tight turns and drops, it deserves recognition for being an unexpected gem.
Most Over-rated Ride – Expedition GeForce (HM – Colossos, Balder)
Controversy time, though the Honourables are just as controversial, GeForce is deemed one of the best rides in the entire world, but it’s an uncomfortable mess in reality, where each airtime hill throws your thighs into the lapbar. Once again an Intamin with a great first drop, but the lack of comfort makes the ride unenjoyable. Also Intamin’s just seemingly appear over-rated when I ride them, but Balder is the one I most enjoyed out of these 3, but wouldn’t say it’s one of the best in the world.
Strangest Park – Schloss Beck (HM – Klotten, Parc Saint Paul)
There were a few parks looking at winning this award, but Schloss Beck wins for the weird placement (round the corner from Movie Park), having an old building centrepiece and some strange assortment of rides and woodland sky walk thing. Whilst many other parks have the manual operation rides, this one had my first and as a result, it wins.
Best Park related Experience – Nigloland Personal Tour (HM – Departing Liseberg with Ride of the Valkyries)
Thanks to my friend John playing the goon card, we managed to meet one of Nigloland’s project managers who gave us a complete tour of the park, from the hotel to backstage. It provided some great insight into the industry as well as how the park in particular takes itself to a serious degree in regards to theming and experience (from theming plant rooms to moaning about visible concrete blocks in the water).
Worst Park related Experience – Peugeot 206 dying in France
On the way through France my car decided that she’d had enough with life and the gearbox died on a random French motorway. As a result she was left in a small town and the panic of having to sort out a hire car and continue our journey wasn’t the most fun thing I’ve done on a trip.
Best Ride Experience – Helix at night
As we all know, night rides tend to make rides even better than during the day, so unsurprisingly this also affects Helix. Though I loved it from my first ride, the night-time ride was nothing sort of astounding, especially through the airtime hills and the hill-side helix. With the views of Gothenburg surrounding you just showing that even inner city parks can have moments of beauty.
Most Hilarious Ride Experience – Anaconda at Walygator’s brake issues
Walygator was one of the worst parks I visited this year, but one incident that stands out is the problems its Wooden coaster had with the brakes. To put it simply, they weren’t working properly, resulting in a varied level of stopping position, be it too early or late. On our ride, the brakes stopped us halfway in the station, resulting in the front end pretty much on the lift-hill. So bad, it was hilarious (the park was still awful though).
Milestones – 350th (Odyssey), 400th (Twister)
And there we have it, the most important* awards of 2014. Thanks for reading, and bring on 2015!
*Note; the actual importance of these awards may be contestable.

So Christmas is almost here as 2014 gradually comes to an end in what has been one of the most mixed years for everything [in what could easily be material for a new soap opera]. However here I will only be mentioning the theme park side of things [after all it's a theme park forum).
Unfortunately compared to a number of active members here such as Benin, my theme park collection trip is on a much smaller scale, as someone quoted to me talking about how comparing Thorpe park to Universal & Disney World was a bit like comparing a corner shop to a large supermarket, something which is very much the case here, but carrying on.
Thorpe Park
Total number of visits 12
visited March 2x,April, May July 2x, August,October 5x
In what might be the park's busiest year for a while, Thorpe has had a very mixed season. The park has seen some minor but excellent improvements such as a new map, improved eateries [Amity Fish & Chips & Cantina extension] and the Inferno shop [which has some great touches in there].
Park events this year were also on a roll and the easter event at the park looked very good [although I didn't actually make it this year] and Summer Nights improving further with not just the main coasters open but also opening of rides such as the teacups and Dodgems on top of a park wide DJ. MOS was just as good as last year [maybe even a little better] and Fright Nights delivered once again bringing us Studio13 [a decent replacement to the Asylum], some great improvements to Blair Witch and Face It Alone, which is an amazing experience for anyone who loves scare mazes and wants to experience them on a more extreme setting.
OK, moving on to something [which I appear to be dodging opinions upon] and that is the opening of Angry BIrds Land, perhaps the greatest opinion splitter since Saw, some people seem to love it whilst others hate it like the plague. For me there I love and hate it for different reasons.
I love the installation of the new 4D cinema and Dodgems. The cinema offers a fun,interactive & immersive experience for the park [plus a much needed indoor attraction too] whilst the dodgems offer a decent filler ride for the park with the Bird VS Pig car designs offering some good competition which hasn't been seen since the Beanoland days. The area also gives us a new area dedicated to families [something Thorpe have lacked in recent years] and utilising space that was previously rather wasted.
What I didn't like about the area though was the fact it has divided the Amity area in half [one of the park's best area transitions] and feels a bit shoe horned and Detonator's retheme feels a bit cheap [pun intended] and more could've been done [the ride music is fine by the way]. I also don't like how the flooring and lampposts in the area are very miss mash in comparison and should've been redone.
Whilst the park has made quite a lot of improvements, there is still a long way to go before perfection as the park is still suffering from ongoing problems such as Fastrack, ride breakdowns, Stealth & Samurai in particular were unreliable this year [though the engineer team I know do work very hard [which could do with a few more in numbers] and the continuation of 1 train ops on weekdays and mornings on peak days. There are also a lot of park areas that do look very worn such as Canada Creek which still had no new Loggers tunnel, Ranger County & Rumba to name some.

This year we also said goodbye to yet another classic attraction at the park, the Rangers Caroulse, an attraction which was in service at the park for 20 years which disappears to make way for the highly speculated 2016 dark ride. Whilst just a Caroulsel contained rich history of Thorpe's past, not just being the second to last park Ranger attraction to survive but featuring a collage of former park ride vehicles onboard including Phantom Phantasia, Thunder River & Hudson River Rafters. Lets just hope the park salvage as many horses/models from the ride as possible [if there is no chance of the attraction's return].
Best Year since 2009
Alton Towers
Total visits 2
Visited June
Arguably the most magical theme park in the Uk and our nearest port of call to Efteling, Europe & Euro Disney. during the last few seasons some could argue the magic has been lost a fair bit with three disappointing seasons in a row. 2011 saw one of the lowest number of guests and 2012 featured the then disappointing Sub-Terra ride [amongst still low attendance]. 2013 was supposed to be one the year the park shined as a whole but was trashed completely due to how the park's big new coaster The Smiler was handled overall plus it's poor reliability.

Whilst far from perfect, 2014 appears to have been a better year for the park. Operations seem to be on a roll again, ride reliability is better [bar a few exceptions] and improvements in food and entertainment too.

Whilst having naturally low expectations, I was rather impressed with the new/re-themed area that opened replacing the ageing farmyard. The area is full of life including freshly re-imaged rides, plenty of themed walkthroughs and gardens and lots of friendly enthusiastic staff. The In The Night Garden Ride was very good in particular with it's animatronics and storyline, Postman Pat was a great fun ride full of heavy themed models and the Get Set Go was a brilliant re-incarnation of the random Squirell Nutty [it feels more like an experience now].
As I'm not the biggest fan of IP's in theme parks [bar some exceptions], the idea of brand-name here makes perfect sense and fits in well within the park.
Scarefest proved a mixed bag this year giving us the new Scarytales which looks to have been a good addition however with the loss of one of the former Scaremazes Carnival Of Screams, which was not replaced.
Best year since 2010
Chessington
Total visits 2 [very very nearly 3]
Visited April, May [almost October]
2013 at Chessington [to some] was complete shambles, park falling apart, poor/slow operations, closed rides, disappointing opening hours and also a fire at one of the park's newest outlets. Nothing seemed be done right [even the new Zufari ride].

However for 2014, the park's come it's own again and whilst [stastically speaking] hasn't installed a 'proper' new ride it's improved much of whats there significantly. The hugely retimed Scorpion Express [formerly Runaway Train] whilst definitely being better with the now removed rock face, has a lot more personality now with it's quirky features such as abandoned town backdrops, moving/squirting Scorpion and fire tower plus the overall back story of a town overrun by Scorpions and new soundtrack. Despite losing the Boiler in the queue [which is now in the ride area], the queue line is still nicely themed [for Merlin standards] with interactive elements and the like throughout the queue.

Other additions such as the re-imaged Market Square, Mexica & Transylvania areas also impressed me among noticeably better park operations among having more soul altogether this year. Amazu is also an interesting update to the monkey walkthrough which looks nice and updated compared to it's old form and whilst the Azteca hotel has taken up a fair portion of land that could've been used for new development it should hopefully bring in more guests and customers to the park and also the theming [on top of the retheme of the 1st hotel] should definitely add up to the wild/exciting experience for staying guests.
Sadly I never [quite] made it to the now rebranded Howl'O'ween event which looked very good from the reviews I saw and heard about, but who hopefully this will finally happen in 2015. Speaking on 2015, I'm looking forward to see what more the park will be doing as we will see a big update to the penguin enclosure and a new show [after all penguins are rather popular at the moment plus more updates to the park overall.
Whilst a massive improvement to the disastrous 2013, there's still a long way before the park gets back to it's old 'magic making' days [pre2005] as there's still lots of areas at the park looking old,worn and forgotten. Falls, Tombs, Skyways & Bubbleworks are good examples of this.
Overall
Best year since 2010
Legoland Windsor
Total number of visits 2.5
Visited, April,September, November

Despite it's lack of anything groundbreaking or eye-catching in the last few years, Legoland continues to remain as popular as ever [shockingly receiving even more guests than the nearby Thrill Capital]. Unfortunately, 2014 wasn't the best of years of the park as once again nothing too exciting and worthwhile for those over 10 appeared with the main new addition being a big new play area replacing the ageing Rat Trap and a chunk of the enchanted forest walkthrough.
Unfortunatly the other new attraction for the park this year was the [3rd] re-theme of the Pirate Falls log flume featuring new models, audio and storyline. Whilst the new one features better audio and looks a lot more fresh in appearance I still prefer the original as it featured more charm and humour then.

Aside from a new play area and re-themed log flume, the park also received two further additions which are perhaps unwelcome appearing in the form of Burger Kitchens. Located in the Pirate & City areas of the park, these outlets see the replacement of Burger Ranch & Crossed Ribs [an eatery that has existed since the early park years and did some good BBQ food]. Despite offering more indoor seating for cold/bad whether days these aren't a good addition as the food line up at Legoland has been reduced slightly and Burger kitchens haven't been renowned for good quality [I'm still yet to try one actually].

Despite not being too impressed with the park during main season, I opted out [and paid the perhaps overpriced fee] to visit the park during it's Christmas event which despite the reduced ride line up [and park access] I really enjoyed as I virtually had the park to myself when I went not just getting on rides without queues but getting actually rides to myself and the park was also lit up beautifully with loads of lighting scatted over the park making it feel like a christmas kingdom. It was a truly magical experience there [either that or I'm reflecting on the amount of friends who went to Euro Disney at that time of year ].
2015 was set to be one of the most exciting years for the park for a while, with the addition of a big scale immersive themed Haunted House attraction [giving the park another much needed dark, high capacity and older aimed] ride. However unfortunately this plan was ripped to shreds due to the selfishness of the residents and local council resulting in the rejection of the plans [despite recommendation] and what we will be receiving instead will not just be on a smaller scale but also strongly unappealing too. I just hope the park can send an appeal and get this ride approved in the future instead.
Blackpool Pleasure Beach

Blackpool for me was the biggest theme park venture for me [at least outside of the Merlin circle] in what proved to be one of the most exciting weekends this year gaining lots of new credits at the famous Pleasure Beach. Whilst it's no Disneyland, it proved to be surprisingly good with some very exciting coasters including Grand National, Steeplechase and Avalanche with each ride holding it's own. I also got to experience the highly immersive Valhalla which is an amazing experience and is the best uk water ride by a country mile.
Many of the other rides also proved to be very good too including Wallace & Gromit which was a very good dark ride whilst Alice [although rather dated] proved to be an entertaining and fun attraction]. The only ride that left me feeling disappointed was Impossible which was just pants.

Other attractions I was able experience included the Blackpool Dungeons which was a very good experience and whilst there were some flaws, some elements were better than the London ones including the Drop towers at the end. The circus show and tower themselves were also very and interesting [the latter offering some loverly views from the top]. Coral Island was an interesting attraction with a cool monorail and ghost train which was sadly ruined greatly by funny and moody staff.
Oakwood
Whilst having a very enjoyable trip in 2013, I sadly never had chance to return to the park in 2014, however by the looks of reports, that was possibly for the better as the park had apparently gone backwards greatly, featuring poor operations of rides, lots of rides closed daily and many areas completely rundown [which make Thorpe's flaws sound almost forgivable]. Lets just hope the park learn from their mistakes next year and finally open the Sleepy Hollow area.
Disneyland Paris
Where do we begin with this soap opera of my life? Well, It didn't happen [at least in 2014].
There were at least five attempts to get to the park in 2014 [no exagerration] but a lot of things down to budget, timing and personal reasons [which I'm not going in to] none of these trips were successful so I never got to see Remy. 2015 however will hopefully break this spell.
Tivoli World

Like the last 5 years, the park has virtually remained unchanged still housing the same ageing/out dated attractions that have existed for many years. The park hasn't gone backwards but it certainly hasn't gone forwards and only receives a mention for being the only theme park in Europe I managed in 2014.
What looks ahead for 2015?
In terms of the uk parks, not much I'm afraid at least for the Merlin parks as so far the only new additions confirmed are glorified log cabins, a retimed area [without any new rides] and a new penguin show and enclosure, meaning we won't get any official rides [as we currently know].
For smaller uk park's though it looks a better year though as we will definitely be receiving some new attractions next year. Blackpool will be getting the Red Arrow flying ride, Paultons will be getting a brand new themed area called Critter Creek, Drayton are getting [yet more attractions] in Thomas Land and Oakwood will finally be receiving it's new Sleepy Hollow themed area.
As for Europe, Efteling will be receiving a new major exciting dive coaster, Gardaland will be receiving a dive coaster, Hansa will be gaining a new exciting coaster whilst parks in Denmark and one of the Walibi ones are expected to also earn new rides too.
And this marks the end of 2014, roll on 2015 I say, a year I will hopefully be getting some new parks and several across sea [that aren't Tivoli World].

It's been a long 14 years since my first trip to Phantasialand and despite my love affair with the park when I visited in 2006, It hadn't been a park on my radar to revisit. All it took though was a read of Benin's August trip report, some willing volunteers with the cash and just like that, it was off to Germany. For those that have never been, getting to the park is as easy as pie and incredibly cheap. I heartedly recommend it, despite having to fly on Easyjet at 7:05 in the morning as the train/bus system in Germany gets you to the park in less then an hour from the airport.
For less then £200 we got two nights in Hotel Matamba, two days on the park and two fastracks for each of us. One thing we concluded on the trip was that the park is amazing value. Sure, it is one of the more expensive parks in Europe to get into but for the quality of ride you get and the cheapness in the park itself (5 euros for on ride photos, meals at fast food resauraunts for less then 8 euros, even better cocktails in the bar were cheap for European standards).
With us all checked into the stunning Matamba (it really is stunning) we were off to the park. Despite some of the quality attractions held within, there is an aspect to the park that is stuck within the eighties. The entrance for instance is quite basic for example and doesn't look like it's seen any changes since the park opened. Reminded us of Epcot. We decided for our first ride would be the 2006 inverter, Black Mamba. Back when it first opened I thought it was a fantastic piece of work with a fast, intense ride cacooned within some intricate, detailed and beautiful theming. I'm happy to report, time has been kind to this ride and we all thoroughly enjoyed our rides. I disagree deeply with Benin on his analysis of the ride however. This is no Silver Bullet or Inferno that peeters out heavily at the end, this is a ride that maintains its intensity, speed and enjoyment from start to finish. The four inversions are taken right at the start of the ride, almost to get them out of the way quickly. The ride then takes on three high speed helices which I found pretty intense as the ride was running so well. I was even surprised to find a nice pop of air time as the ride dips into the first helix. The general ambience of the ride is the greatest of any B&M out there with only Oz'Iris giving any real competition. The level of detail is franklyy stunning so even if you aren't a fan of the ride itself, the theming and feel of the ride more then makes up for it. My only criticism is the aggressive staff. One actually pushed me backwards causing me to hit my head on the top of the train. Completely unnecessary on a walk on, one train operated ride.




With the Biting ride done, we headed to the new for 2013 but actually opened in 2014 ride, Chiapas. First and foremost, this is for me, is the most beautiful ride in Europe. Everything about it has been designed to the nth degree. From the surrounding pathways which afford great views of the ride, to the queueline and ride itself intertwined so perfectly into a neat little package, there is nothing else quite like it. Even the queue itself, with the batching lanes being divided into fastpass, single riders, groups of twos and everyone else shows that thought has been put into how this ride is operationally run. Well it's top level and shows effort unmatched by anywhere else. But what about the ride itself? I have never come across a water ride run in such a precise and technically perfect way anywhere. Intamin have worked magic here with the different ride systems running perfectly in sync so that the ride show never feels under threat by the ride mechanics. The backwards room in particular is a highlight as is the final drop that feels far steeper and longer then it looks. Everyone comes off of this ride with a smile because it's fun. I in general hate Log flumes, but this goes to the top of my class and is easily my favourite water ride.


Talocan was our next ride. I've never done a floorless top spin before as the one at Knotts was closed on my visit. Suffice to say, the theming and ride show really helps to push Talocan as a top tier attraction because the ride itself isn't as grand as everything else around it. That being said, this was one of the better ride cycles I've done but I still can't rate this as high as other much more appropriate and interesting flat rides. The restrain in particular was slightly odd as the bottom has a nice sharp pointy bit that could cause a lot of men to be unable to have children in the future. You have been warned.


Back in 2000, Colorado was the main attraction if you like. Now, with Mamba, Winjas and Chiapas to help lighten the load, Colorado Adventure takes president as the main family rollercoaster on site. And it truly is a wonderful Vekoma mine train. The only real problem for it though is the first part of the ride. With the removal of other attractions and the addition of Chiapas, half of the indoor area has been removed exposing the ride itself. The job is clearly half finished as well as corregated steel sticks out over pathways and the shed area is completely on show. Which is a true shame as it ruins the illusion that this is a western themed ride. Luckily the ride after the second lift hill is intact and what follows in the dark is hair-raising. Truly scary with the ride jerking you around back and forth and you have no idea where you are going. Part of Colorados charm is that it can go from sedate little mine train to throwing you back and forth with no warning. The final helix in particular is excellent. I felt like I was dying or about to. It's fantastic.

On our travels we took on the omnimover which can be descibed as Chinese Haunted Mansion. It's main flaw was that it was way to light in there at one point the view is solely a fire exit, illuminated up all nicely for your pleasure. River Quest followed which is a terrifying experience for all involved and makes it the only rapids ride that I'm not a fan off. We next ventured onto Mystery Castle which was terrifying as a 12 year old, but completely underwhelming as an adult. I like the idea of all of us strapped to the castle walls but the ride itself isn't scary enough. Nice concept blown by a rather blase ride.

With this side of the park done, we went over to the Berlin and Wuze Town. Our first port of call was Winjas, the Maurer spinners featuring trick track. I was suitably impressed with Fear in particular but this time I was a bit more warey. When it comes to spinning rides, I expect a little bit of spinning but these two don't spin too well. Fear I found was better at it but both have a severe lack of it. The other thing is the trick track of the see saw and moving track kind of threaten the flow of the ride, they break the pacing and the rhythm. Thankfully, Fear has a surprise immelman.

With Phantasialand, there is a real drop on quality on this side of the park probably to do with its location near local housing. Temple of the Knight Hawk is a dismal attempt at a Space Mountain rip off. It doesn't impress and left 'Fred', Dan9 and Tom feeling ill. The problem is it just isn't interesting enough and just goes round and round almost bored of itself. A similar effect can be felt on the Hollywood Ride, a rather dismal attempt at evoking Hollywood glamour but just coming across as cheap and run down. Sad and terrible is the only words I can use to describe it as. We tried on other rides in the area such as the Splash Battle which features no splash battling and nothing to really aim at, no effects whatsoever. We also tried out the Race to Atlantis which might have been good back in the eighties but is no longer relevant. Pirates 4D was a nice kick back to Thorpe when it was an up and coming theme park in the 2000's and the final ride to really talk about is Maus de Chocolat. I don't like the shooting system really in the same way that I don't like Toy Story Manias shooting style. I just can't get the hang of it which means I always lose. Sad times. I love the theming around it even if it is just a Ratatouille film rip off.
So thats the theme park. A wonderful place to visit with half the park being ahead of the game and the other half sadly lacking. Luckily, the awesomeness of Mamba, Chiapas and Colorado really stick in the mind. The management here know what they're doing and it's a joy to visit. I recommend staying at Matamba as well, with a true ambience and joy to it. I even tried Zebra in the hotel restauraunt.


A yummy Black Mamba cocktail!
Thanks foe reading.

Here it is, my blog on my trip to Florida! It will be split up into 5 entries, 1 on each of the parks: SeaWorld, Busch Gardens, LEGOLAND Florida, Islands of Adventure, Universal Studios.
Because it is always such a relaxed park and was the start and end to our holiday, first up is SeaWorld!

It's just a lovely place to walk into and as the holidays were approaching, everywhere was all Christmassy! What more could you want?
Of course, a B&M flyer with a water splash right in front of you as you turn the corner.

What's its name I hear you ask...

And up they go!
The ride is amazing, such force on the pretzel loop and a great flying experience with some decent interaction with the waterfall entrance feature. Definitely stands proud on SeaWorld's skyline! What also makes this ride great is that if you hate rides, there is a lovely aquarium next door which shares the tank you walk past in the ride queue and has some of its own species such as an octopus.


Moving on we find ourselves at yet more stingrays, so we must be at Stingray Lagoon!

This pool allows you to stroke (if that's what you'd call it) stingrays! They do like to splash around though which is always good fun!
On our way to Trek with some Turtles, these fellas swam by.

Blue Horizons (dolphin show) is a great mix of music, colour and dolphins.


Woah dude!

Look a turtle!

2 turtles!
Turtle Trek is a lovely new attraction. Whilst I wasn't a massive fan of having to queue to see the underwater viewing, 5 minutes isn't bad and the 3D 360 degree movie was a great story! And the music in that area is so calming and relaxing.
Time for some sunbathing.

Who doesn't love alligators?

Journey To Atlantis was next and I have to say, this is the ride that needs refurbing next! The dark ride bit is seriously outdated in its effects, makes little sense and is wasted potential. It just shows how old it is especially with the dark rides being made by Uni. Other than that, a good fun water ride with a coastery final drop.

The Kraken awaited us!

Fortunately it was wide awake so we didn't have to disturb it.

Poor Kraken never gets any sleep with these sea lions and gulls around!

Pirate Island! Clyde and Seamore save the day in what has to be my favourite show at SeaWorld. The humour is great and the audience interaction is amazing. A tip for everyone, get to this show 20 minutes early, it is so worth being there that early!

Next up we travelled to a different place entirely, Antarctica!

Where they also celebrate Christmas.


This icy world transports you to the freezing cold penguin environment.



The enclosure is superb! The ride good fun (mild is very mild wild is basically mild) but nonetheless a decent ride and a big improvement on the old penguin area.

Continuing on we ascended this 300ft SkyTower.

Previously you've had to pay for this but now it is free for everyone and offers some great views of the park and surrounding area. You can clearly see the Epcot ball, Tower of Terror, Space Mountain and Doctor Dooms Freefall.




Jaws I mean Shark Encounter followed and hopefully this will be the next enclosure to get a refurb once the Shamu one is complete.



We then had a go on the flamingo boats.

Saw some actual flamingos and went on the quest for Shamu!

As Shamu's area was being improved I hereby name this squirrel who was on the construction fence Shamu (We could have watched the show but always missed it and weren't overly fussed.

The Polar Express will help us move along swiftly...
To the end of our Sea World adventure, but don't fear, the adventure will continue at Busch Gardens very soon!

Our penultimate instalment takes us to what has become my favourite theme park...

Welcome to Universal Studios Florida!


What will this chapter of our adventure have in store I wonder?

The Cat in the Hat shall enlighten us!

Let's start back...

To the Future

Now home to Jebediah

Lard Lad

And Clumsy Wigum!

Watch out for Kang and Kudos though! They'll put you in a spin

And make you a bit Tipsy

Or Sirly.

DuffMan doesn't care though

As long as you buy Duff!

And then treat yourself to a Krusty Burger thanks too

Krusty himself!

Moving on we have

Men In Black!

Which really isn't a disaster (even though some peoples scores were!)

Something tells me the Amity retheme has gone a bit overboard...

Christmas Tree was Rocking out over the Christmas period!

Really it's a massive grey shed.

Hiding a red train.

Time for a musical interlude

Not enough?

Have some Blues Brothers as well!

Warning Civilians, your help is needed!

E7 Error!

E7!!

Optimus Prime needs your help (or just wants whatever he is pointing at, probably a dink)

We were called away from the music to try and stop a doll?

This I can understand, but really, a doll?!

Of course not, this was the Horror Makeup Show!

What's this?

Hop?

Ohhh, the film about a bunny!

Garfield didn't want candy so instead

This was actually due to Macy's parade. The All Star Parade didn't happen while we were there so every half hour one of the 4 floats/routines would come out and do a performance followed by a meet and greet. The 4 acts were Hop, Despicable Me, Dora, and SpongeBob! On our first day it was a huge surprise but a great one at that!

Shrek 4D

And to conclude let's talk about in my opinion an overly underrated ride (or highly criticised for flaws that have been resolved/improved)

Hollywood

Rip

Ride

Rockit!


This element is great, really pushes you out of your seat and a great high speed change in direction!
It's a fun ride which has massively improved since I rode it in 2009!
Opinions are free and everyone is entitled to their own but these are mine.

And this Twister of events brings us to the end.
A little write up on two things before I finish.
Transformers: Using the same technology as Spiderman this is a brilliant dark ride and is much more screen based than Spidey (that's why I prefer Spiderman over it) but it certainly feels much more involved at times with the riders being a key role to the story.
Despicable Me: The ride basis is exactly the same as Jimmy Neutron but just a much more complete experience with more pre shows and guest interaction. And MINIONS! Enough said.
So thanks again for reading and we hope to see you one more time!

For the first in about 10 or 11 years, I visited a non-Merlin theme park. It's been a long time coming, and anywhere was a start. And that start was to be Drayton Manor.
After such a beautiful week, Saturday decided to take a turn for the worst, and give us rain, thunder, lightning (though with a couple of breaks of sunshine during the day!). Adam picked me up and we arrived at Drayton around 9ish. Even though we were early, we could tell it was gonna be quiet day, and thank goodness, after some of the horror stories I'd heard about the park's operations.

We arrived to some sun, though we could tell dark times were ahead.
Half 9 came and the park opened. One of the first things which confuse me about the park is opening the park at 9:30, but not the rides until 10:30. There's not really enough to do for a whole hour, other than the small zoo, which we headed to straight away.

Tigers are a'coming.

A chimpanzee looks to Apocalypse in the distance.
Rides were testing so we headed over to G Force (which apparently had been closed for a couple of days) and we were pretty much first in the queue. 10:30 came and it opened; yay. This was my first coaster with inversions that had lap bars, and I'd heard some pretty poor things about it, but kept an open mind. And yeah, I thought it was quite fun. My first ride didn't give me any problems with the restraints, and it was a fun, fast-paced ride. I did get a bit of air time as well, which is nice. It's an odd ride (especially with the "humpety bumpety" lift) and seems to do all the best bits at the beginning, giving a week end, but hey-ho, it's a fun enough ride.

My G Force face.
Next up was the big, new thing - Air Race. I wasn't quite sure how it'd ride, what with the continual spinning and moving and stuff, but it was actually really good. The rocking start is very good, and then it just keeps spinning, round and round and round. It doesn't get boring, and there's some nice moments where you're left hanging upside down for quite a while. Near the end of the ride, we started spinning in the opposite direction. Would be nice if it did it sooner, just to mix it up a little, but hey ho. On a ride later on in the day, we counted that we went upside 18 times (sorry Smiler! ).

Air Race does have a nice entrance feature though.

Air Race's queue line is a nice cattlepen - like many of Drayton's queue - and has a TV playing annoying things.
Shockwave followed. Have to say, the station and theming in the queue line is quite nice actually. The seats and restraints on this thing though is very, erm, eurgh. Yeah, I'll go with eurgh. They're not comfortable and they just don't feel right. The ride itself has two highlights - a random little dip before going onto the lift, and the zero-g roll (which is actually incredible). The rest is uncomfortable, rattly or boring. There vertical loop was bleurgh, the double corkscrew is verging on painful and then the random straight bits are unimaginative (though, at least they don't try to castrate you). Now I see why so few stand ups have been built...

Found in Shockwave's queueline - made me chuckle...
Next up was Splash Canyon, the park's rapids. It was barely 11 o'clock, but we were already soaking wet, so water rides wouldn't make much difference. Fun little ride, not that wet really, though the indoor section did take me off guard.
Another water ride followed, and this time it was in the famous Stormforce 10. I'd heard a lot of good things about this, so I was excited. Have to say, the queue - which we once again walked through - is nicely themed and works really well. Onto the ride itself. The first drop is nice, and the way it's done was unexpected by me. Then wandering through the random waterfall is cool. The second drop, the backwards one, was a shock. We were sat at the very back, which meant we got the full force of water. For a split second, I thought I was on Tidal Wave I was that wet. Brilliant water ride. Not-so brilliant for when the weather is already chucking it down. Final drop is quite nice too. So yeah, a great water ride all in all, but I'll try to avoid the back next time...
A quick spin on Malestrom (nothing really to say about this, just a nice filler really) and drying off in one of the heater things (which was so worth it given how wet we were...), it was time to venture indoors for Pirate Adventure. It's an indoor boat ride which is basically a knock off of Pirates of the Caribbean. Have to say it's alright, though it seemed like a lot of the animatronics were broke. The ending was super anti-climatic too, which was a shame. For the record, this was probably our longest queue of the day at an amazingly long 15 minutes. Goes to show how quiet it was I guess. A go on the dodgems, sponsored by Free Radio, followed, and they were pretty decent.
Food followed in the Safari Pizza & Pasta:

Very nice indoors restaurant located by the zoo. Indoors there's loads of animal animatronics which move and stuff and it was quite a nice atmosphere in there. (By the way, unlike Merlin's Pizza / Pasta, this isn't all you can eat in case you're wondering. We just had a nice pizza and wedges meal).
We headed over to Ben 10: Ultimate Mission, the world's first Vekoma Junior Boomerang. It looked surprisingly tall and quick for a junior coaster, and I have to admit, it was one coaster I was really looking forward to. Again, there was next to no queue, which was great. The majority of the queue is indoors, and is very well themed, with aliens, loads of 'high tech' stuff, noises, lights, etc., and a false corridor which tricked Adam and I. Very, very good.

Aliens.
First ride gifted us with front row. Being lifted up backwards was a nice sensation, though the stop is very harsh and judders you around a bit. Then you're dropped down and you pick up a lot of speed very quickly, meander around a bit, then up a random wiggle. You hear the laser fire and do backward to the station. It's a short ride of course, but it's great. It has a bit of everything and left both of us happy. No doubt kids love the ride as well. It's certainly Drayton's most complete ride and is fun for everyone. What's even more impressive is how it takes up so little room. Given the lack of queue, we went straight back round to do it again, which is a testament to the ride's quality.

Look at that joy.
Afterwards, we ventured to what I'll nickname 'dark ride row'. We started off with The Haunting, a Vekoma madhouse. Much like Hex, it has two pre-shows before the ride. The first pre-show is very nicely done, with some TVs giving you an introduction, and one or two nice effects used. The second pre-show isn't as good I found, going on for a bit too long, and that you couldn't always hear what was being said. The actual madhouse itself is good, with a nice ending I thought. So all in all it is a nice ride, but it also showed by just how good Hex is as well. Haunting is great in its own right, but Hex is in a different league.
Next door was Golden Nugget - Wild West Shoot Out. As the name suggests, it's a gun-based ride where you shoot things for points. Other than the name and logo, there's no reference to the Golden Nugget cereal. It's a very cheap ride clearly, and to be honest, is quite laughable. It's nice that some things happen when you hit the target though. But still, not a great ride. We ended dark ride row with Drunken Barrels, the tilting teacups. They were good fun, and the plate actually tipped, but our cup was way too stiff to spin.
It was now time for the last major ride (in my opinion), Apocalypse. Decided to go in at the deep end and do stand up first (though, unfortunately, the floorless seating wasn't available today). The seats are okay - more comfortable than Shockwave's at least! - and the tilt is a great twist; did get me a little bit. However, the drop itself is okay at best. Just doesn't really get me as much as I'd hoped. Though the suddenness of the drop is a nice touch. Sit down followed straight away, and I think I prefer that seating arrangement due to the added comfort. One thing which disappointed me with this (and a lot of Drayton in general actually) was the lack of audio, apart from the occasional siren. No atmosphere, very little tension and it just felt like the ride could have been so much more intimidating with some sort of background noise.
We decided to get some other rides done, including Flying Dutchman - yet another odd Drayton ride - and Buffalo Coaster. Buffalo is quite possibly the weirdest coaster I've done, with an odd layout, monorail-like speeds, yet the occasional okay bit. It goes on forever as well. I feels like it's time should be nearly up, and the space and surrounding area would be great for a family coaster (hi there Mack!). Oh, one laughable thing about Buffalo - on our ride, the train overshot the station, meaning the people in the front row couldn't get out, and had to have another go (I feel for the poor souls).
I would do a list of all the things which are more useful than Buffalo, but I think I'd be here for too long...

Buffalo with Apocalypse in the background. The Buffalo should look a lot more sad though.
We then went to the other side of the park to venture round Thomas Land. Looks nice, and I know that my younger self would have exploded with excitement to be there. Only ride we did round here was Troublesome Trucks Runaway Coaster. For a ride set in Thomas Land, it was actually alright, and the ending on it was a specific highlight. Great ride for the younger market.

We saw Percy whilst queueing fro Troublesome Trucks.

NEW FOR 2015. Funnily enough, when you're in the park, you don't really recognise the construction going on. When you're outside the park, by the entrance, you see the site, but have no idea what it's for.
With basically everything done, it was time for rerides aplenty. Air Race, G Force and Shockwave were all done again, as was Ben 10. After a while, a storm came over, bringing more rain, thunder and lightning, bringing most rides to a close (as an interesting fact, Apocalypse was hit by lightning this past week ). One of the few rides which remained open was Polperro Express Train; a short train ride which goes round part of the park. It gave some nice views of Shockwave, Stormforce 10, G Force and the rapids, and it was a nice break from the rain.
Some rides slowly began reopening, so we were able to get a few more rides in (including on the Golden Nugget ride since it was indoors, and just so we could laugh at it's awfulness some more). We ended up riding Ben 10 five times during the day, which I think shows how it is indeed a good ride for the park. The day ended off with a ride on G Force, and it was the only one where I had an uncomfortable experience. However, I still stand by my views that it is a fun ride; just a shame the restraints can cause it to be otherwise.
Drayton Manor is a nice park all in all, and given it's a small park, it's done well for itself. But there's a few rides which are very cheap and laughable which need sorting out, I imagine on a busy day it's a bad place to be in (queue board times to some description would be nice for example), and there's some things lacking (audio on all rides for example). I don't want to end on a negative note, as I enjoyed the place and had a fabulous day out, and if you take it for what it is, it is good. I definitely would recommend people trying it out (especially if you have a voucher of some description), there are some good rides there which make it worth going there once.
Visiting has given me the extra incentive to try out other parks as well. It's not that I haven't wanted to, but it's more that I've been a been a bit blasé about it all. However, after yesterday's experience, I now have an urge to try parks new and different (and who knows, might even crack Europe next year!)
I'll leave with perhaps the best photo of the day; our last ride on Ben 10:

Oddly placed sign in the trees

Odd water slide effect at the entrance.

"You calling my park odd?" Yes.

The Lynx didn't want to argue

That's a Fishing Cat. Odd that it wasn't fishing.

Odd chimp (because there's one of them ) looks at Appocalypse.

This seems more humpty bumpty

Compared to this. This is just weird.

But a good weird.

How odd.

BEST ENTRANCE EVER!!!

AND QUEUE!

This is odd.

But so much fun!

Rainy Shockwave

With odd straight bits.

Designed with a ruler.

Seats were a bit bumpty.

Odd dip before the lift hill.

Poor dinosaur. Clearly wan't a good enough oddity for the main park so got stuck on the train route.


What a strange looking cloud. How odd, it rained in England.

Slowest turn from lift to drop on any water ride. Wouldn't be Drayton if it didn't have an odd feature.

Free Radio dodgems were very odd! Especially as it took them longer to check all the cars were empty than load the ride. Odd procedures.

Urgh. Not odd, not humpty bumpty, just rubbish. Will be getting my vote for best UK ride

Something normal

Phew. Oddness best IP on a ride ever! It's literally the sign, that's it!

Odd, quirky, but great fun

YAY MORE THOMAS!

Percy loved this idea!

It means we'll get duelling bubble people

Back to the oddities. The bats are just weird.

Oddly placed lights.

The odd stand up with no floor wasn't working. So quite normal really.

So let's have some more humpty bumpty goodness!

No Merlin, this isn't a colour you seem to know of. It's green.


Lot's of green!

It has a splash zone, that doesn't get you wet. Really odd.

And just in case you'd forgotten where we were. The oddity makes it good fun, the weather made it interesting, if you made it to the end of this then the word odd will probably annoy you from now on. How odd.

At the end of June I spent a week in Salou. This of course meant that some trips to PortAventura would be happening! As well as a trip to Barcelona and the somewhat little known park of Tibidabo.
First off, Salou is a lively large town situated right on the coast of the Costa Dorada, we stayed in a hotel in Salou and couldn’t fault anything about the place. Right in the centre & 5-10 mins walk to the beach. Loved it. One thing I particularly enjoyed about the stay was on the evening of the 23rd of June, the longest day of the year celebrations took place, aka Summer Solstice aka St. John’s Eve… and a bank holiday follows the day after. Fireworks are on sale at pop up shop shipping containers in the street and they’re going off until the early hours… Fabulous atmosphere all evening!
PortAventura
We did 2 days at PortAventura, using the Plana bus (every 10 mins from Salou, €2 pp), cheap & very efficient taking you straight to PortAventura in around 10-15 minutes. A land train also operates but takes around 20-30 minutes.
The entrance area of the park is fantastic and you immediately have a view of the fountains in the lake with Baco rushing round and Shambhala & Hurakan Condor in the distance. Seeing as the park has staggered ride openings we opted to start at the back of the park at Dragon Khan. Khan opens at 10:00 with the park along with the rapids, Tutuki Splash, Furius Baco, and select other smaller attractions. If this was a UK park it wouldn’t be an acceptable way of operating. But when you consider that the park is open until 8PM, 9PM, 11PM, midnight or 2AM - 4AM, you still have ample time to get everything done more than once without express. I’ll probably mention this again later on…
Mediterrania is the area you first enter. This pic was taken from the opposite side on the bridge between Mediterrania and Far West. You enter not far from where Baco's train is in this pic. One of my favourite things was how picturesque PA is.

Queue jumping was something that we encountered at various times in our visit. The spanish seem to not care at all if someone jumps over the fence or in front of them. Anyway, except for that, I really liked the general atmosphere around the park, lots of foliage, lakes, extremely well kept garden areas and all queues are at least partially covered from sunlight. The (many) small & large shows dotted around the park also provide nice breaks from the rides for a few minutes here and there.
One of the smaller shows...

I would recommend purchasing express if you want to get *loads* done as a group. Naturally, most people head to Baco first and it had already racked up 1hr of queue when we passed it. Got to Khan and waited 2 trains and were on. Hurrah!
Dragon Khan
It's 148ft tall, yet with Shambhala overhead it really doesn't feel that way from the ground.

Dragon Khan was operating 2 trains for the entirety of the 2 days we spent at the park. The area that the ride shares with Shambhala is impressive, I’m not usually one to care much for theming but it’s all done to a high standard, the large ‘Shambhala’ area entrance signs and singular theme items as you enter the area are nice.
Khan starts off with the classic B&M pre-lift turn, followed by what seems to be a gentle climb to the top due to Shambhala’s domineering steepness from above. Once at the top of the lift, I found the first half of the ride to be taken at quite some speed even early in the morning at 10:30AM, the zero-G being the highlight of this half for me. The second half was ‘good’ but not amazing, I have read on other forums that the ride has new computer settings this year, and the MCBR now trims EVERY TRAIN to this pace, all day, every day:

(Not my video)
I very much enjoyed Dragon Khan, it isn’t anything which is personally going to go in a top 10, but it was a solid ride. It is quite a ‘generic’ / ‘american’ style layout (+1 loop), I suppose you could say. But the reason things become generic, popular, and cloned a lot is because they are good, no? Colossus still remains my favourite multi-looper, but that’s because I have much love for it’s inlines and non-stop paced ride given.
Shambhala opens at 11:00, as does the flume. All other rides (Stampida, Hurakan Condor, El Diablo, Tomahawk, etc) open at 12:00. Templo del Fuego opens at 13:00. Again, this didn’t really bother us, if you plan and make sure you hit up attractions just as they open, you should have a good amount of rides done by mid afternoon. By the time you’ve done the rides open from 10, the 11 ones are open, then the 12… and it goes on. From a logistical side I can understand why they do this.
*Hearts in eyes Emoji*

Next was a wander round 1/2 the park, taking in the early atmosphere through Mexico & Far West and up to the rapids for a ride, followed by the Flume. We took the first couple of hours easy knowing that queues would die down once everything opens at 12. (we queued 40mins for the rapids), refreshing and got quite wet, surprisingly as some people were coming off quite dry! We took a look in some shops, and for some reason the park has an obsession for selling Betty Boop merch? Lol.
The Silver River Flume at PA is built to have fantastic interaction with El Diablo, much waving occurs between boats and El Diablo. A very fun flume overall of nice length and a quickly moving queue thanks to the turntable station.
Spinning flat ride thing called Serpiente Emplumada. Like Drayton Manor Sombrero's across between a Polyp...

El Diablo, aka Tren de la Mina. It’s Lifthills and coathanger turns. It’s still an enjoyable ride and I prefer the Arrow Dynamics mine trains to the powered Mack ones. The queue on 3 trains moves fast once the express queue dies down. It’s interaction with the flume was a highlight, we had the back row and the drop out of the station provides a wonderful surprise pop of airtime, though when the pre-lift of a ride is one of the best bits it says a lot about the remainder of the layout!! Between lift 1, lift 2, and lift 3 the ride just does a lot of meandering around, until after lift 3 where you get the ‘big swooping drop’ and final dive through the smashed hut over the queue. Cool, but the many other Arrow 3-lift mine trains dotted around the world look to be better.
Not bad but a bit odd!

Shambhala. There is absolutely nothing I can criticise about this ride in B&M terms, it’s an all round crowd pleaser. My first B&M hyper coaster, it domineers over the entire park with a drop of 256ft. The ride ran 2 trains for the entire day on my first day of visiting, and had a queue of approximately 40 mins - 1hr 20 mins all day. On my second day of visiting it ran 2 trains from 11:00 til 12:00 when the 3rd train was added due to Furius Baco breaking down and Shambhala gaining a 2 hour queue. When running three trains, the single rider queue is nearly always empty. They manage it THAT well that when batching, not one seat goes unfilled. I even got a front row ride from the single rider queue one time!! In the station they have an LED screen which counts down how long they have to dispatch the train. On 3 trains they have 60 seconds from air gates opening to when it needs to be dispatched to prevent stacking. The screen then shows (what must be) the capacity number as a figure like 16:24 (was certainly not the time..!) for 1624PPH, very funky / nerdy & not bad considering it can get 1680PPH! They were running it very well on 3 trains.

Onto the ride itself, when leaving the station, if you’re on a happy train you may get some cheering and drumming of the restraints! ha ha. The lift is speedy and if Khan is also climbing it’s lift some waving / interaction below will certainly occur! At the top of the lift the train sends you down the first drop so gracefully, put your hands up and just float down… it’s amazing! In the back seat you get the best airtime over all of the hills, anticipate the hills and you’ll get the best floaty feeling. The ampersand turnaround is a unique touch and looks cool from a distance, below is the view of the park from my hotel!

Floaty drop airtime for everyone!!

The mini ‘speed hill’ after the ampersand provides some slightly stronger airtime but it’s still not gonna leave you with feeling *omg ejected*. My preference is very strong thigh-pressure ejector airtime, but the B&M style is still an enjoyable feeling. If you’re in an outside seat, reach out to your side and get a refreshing spray through the splashdown, then get prepared for more airtime! The ride just does not let up and has 'floatiness' by the bucketload even in the final hills before the MCBR. (MCBR only has 1 hill after it).
Overall, 9/10, most certainly a top 10 ride, it isn’t ‘OMG wow intense’ like I usually like, but it’s very fun and the most re-rideable coaster I have ever ridden. The train design is brilliant. Top ride!
Hurakan Condor

This was my 3rd Intamin drop tower. Apocalypse floorless was my favourite drop ever, until I rode Hurakan Condor! I rode it only 2 times due to lack of express pass and even a long single rider queue. Got standup both times (cue “yaaaass”). The height alone is quite terrifying (not too much off 300ft?) so when you get tilted forwards at around 20-30ft from the top, your heart rate races and you might just swear once or twice. Take advantage of the amazing view then put your hands out and prepare to drop… The falling feeling is fantastic and beats Apocalypse. My favourite flat ride on the park. 10/10.
Stampida. One ride. Blue side. 4 trains running, 2 each side. A CCI wooden coaster which has been rehabilitated / improved by KumbaK with 'new' trains. Take the word ‘improved’ lightly here. The trains look like park benches and they also feel like them. The lap bar is hydraulic and will tighten as you go round the circuit with every jolt that you go over, I couldn’t brace myself against it because you have to take your bag on the ride with you and I didn’t want that to go flying so had to hold onto the bag… The ride could be good… But it’s flawed with track which feels like it’s washboarding so incredibly badly and trains & layout which prevent airtime because the lap bar isn’t moulded in the best of ways. Nonetheless, fun interaction times can be had when the trains separate and duel, the same with Tomahawk which shares the Stampida structure. I need to ride it again really to get a more clarified opinion.
Tomahawk. Pretty much a kiddie wooden coaster with dinky trains. It seats one adult per row or one adult and a child. Runs 2 (old) trains and has new in 2007 KumbaK control and braking systems just like Stampida. I should imagine this is an incredibly thrilling attraction for kids as it’s actually quite violent around some corners! It’s also smoother than Stampida and has interaction with Stampida. Alright..!
Furius Baco.
Before reading this review, bear in mind that my favourite rides are Saw: The Ride, Speed (Oakwood), Mondial Capriolo, KMG Tango, Colossus, Slammer, Stealth and Rita. They are all rides which I enjoy because they are somewhat on the extreme end of the scale… In one aspect or another.
First of all, check that speed... I'd love to know just how fast it actually goes thru that inline..!
>>>>>>> https://vine.co/v/MtZq1MwKOj5 <<<<<<<
From every aspect offride, Baco looks to be an relentless, furious (ha ha ha) ride which throws the riders around it’s speedy course like it can’t get back to the brake run quick enough. And that’s exactly what it does. And I love it.

I had 4 rides in total on it, 3 on outside seats and 1 inside seat. The pre-show is weird. The theme is weird. Once at the pre-show, you do some shuffling back and forth as the catch car prepares to engage whilst the naughty monkey comes along and causes havoc. The launch feels INCREDIBLE, especially in the front row. Going at such a speed and having so much of yourself out in the open really enhances the feeling of acceleration. The launch ends with a hill down into the first pit which can deliver some intense airtime. Dropping down into the first pit, slammed around a corner at 80+mph before switching direction briefly and then switching direction again, you take a leap over the launch and a left turn to approach the inline twist. The feeling of speed is again, greater enhanced as you head for the inline twist. This is SO CLOSE to the ground you feel you could almost touch it, the feeling of speed is astounding and the way you don’t go through it as a heartline creates a rather cool twisty feeling...
Final turn out of the inline and over the lake, with the final bump onto the brake run and I was totally wowed. Incredible ride. Baco gives you the wow factor in a way that most crazy Intamin creations do… I’m told that Mack mega coasters also have fantastic inline twists so can’t wait to try one out! Back to Baco - Now, there’s no other way of putting it, the ride is ROUGH. But if you can cope with intensity on the scale of Saw, Rita, to some extent Stealth, then you may enjoy Baco.
The head banging could be reduced if they didn't have these 'elephant ear' type things on top of the restraints. Though I believe they are there after the incident with a restraint last year... Reminds me of Vekoma SLC restraints. Shame as Intamin's modern bars like on Baco are otherwise very good imo because you are pinned at the thighs.

Overall, Baco is a ride which isn’t shy of pushing the limit and provides an intense experience which doesn’t ‘play it safe’ in the comfort department in order to limit intensity. I feel like the ride could probably make it round the circuit with a launch of around ~60mph seeing as it keeps so much speed for the entire circuit, but I’m glad Intamin pushed the boundaries when they built Baco! 9/10.
One final thing. I can't not give this a mention. A bird opposite Tomahawk (yes the kiddie coaster) which sings Sex Bomb & an array of ~4-5 other songs all day long. (Not my video)

So that’s it for PortAventura… Fantastic park which has a special collection of rides all in areas which have a great feeling of character. It was my first international park and I look forward to visiting the likes of Europa Park, Liseberg and all the other amazing locations on offer to us in Europe over the coming years… Can’t wait to return to PA in the future though! I had an amazing time!
One final, signature PA pic!

Trip report coming up from Tibidabo, Barcelona soon..!

After my weekend at Towers I thought I'd explain why Nemesis is my favourite.

Even before this point you can hear it roaring around its twisted layout which can be quite intimidating. It is the roar of a monster! An untamed alien that wants to escape!

The British weather was brilliant to help set the scene! But you can stand directly under element of Nemesis with no netting ruining your photos.

Unlike Smiler

Without the netting these photos would have been half decent!


Nemesis is full of force! It's relentless!

This is one drop. All be it forceful but not anything significant. The only bonus about Oblivion is the long ride time you get due to the stacking.

Nemesis may be a mix of a few colours but it looks good for the ride theme.

Due to height, the black sections on this look stupid.

Nemesis has never been rethemed.

This has (although I do really like Duel).

Some say it's rough, no just intense.

This was rough.

It has a cooler station.
This makes you look at blue lit concrete.

It's not trimmed.

Th13teen is.

It's never caught on fire.

The Skyride has.

It's fun all the time!

The Flume isn't.

And it's 100% photogenic!
Okay so maybe I've been a bit harsh on the other rides, but for me Nemesis is best! Some of you probably think I'm a sheep and just follow the herd of people who love it. No. My first experience of Nemesis was when I'd just hit 1.4. Never been to Alton Towers before hand and we went on the Monorail to the entrance. With our AP we went to Forbidden Valley for ERT and I heard the roar! No idea what it was until I saw it. And there it was, Nemesis! I remember my first ride and after many years it's still never disappointed! Sure it's not the fastest, or the biggest, but for me it holds a special place in my heart and has never let me down. I appreciate everyone is entitled to their opinion, but that is mine

Next month, Universal Studios Florida introduce their 'Diagon Alley' expansion to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. It sees the headline attraction 'Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts', the Hogwarts Express, as well as numerous shops from the Harry Potter universe.
As to be expected, everyone is excited about the development. However, why should we be so excited? We've got a newly opened area which is much better than Diagon Alley ever could be - Angry Birds Land at Thorpe Park! Travelling all the way to America seems pointless when most of us on this forum can pop down to Thorpe in under a couple of hours to enjoy the delightful Angry Birds Land.
First of all, let's look at the rides and attractions in each area. Angry Birds Land has a 115ft drop tower, perfect for thrill seekers, some fun dodgems, which are perfect for everyone, and a 4D cinema experience, which again is perfect for everyone. So, here, we have a land which caters for all ages - we have a ride which is solely dedicated for a thrill audience.
As far as thrill rides go, Detonator: Bombs Away! is as thrilling as you can get; there's not many better drop towers around after all. Then there's a good set of dodgems. Okay, so dodgems aren't anything special, you can find them anywhere. But people like dodgems, and if people like something, you give it to them! Finally, the 4D experience is clearly something that's been designed for a younger audience, yet it works for everyone. What's most surprising about it is how immersive the attraction felt - it's a film about a set of cartoon birds, who don't speak, trying to get the precious eggs back from some bad pigs. Yet you feel a part of the film, you can create emotional bonds with the birds, and you feel like you're there with them. For a cartoon, that's pretty darn impressive.
Now, Diagon Alley. We have a headline attraction being ride about escaping from a bank. Escaping...from a bank. Just let that sink in for a moment. And this will have loads of goblins scattered about. Not gonna lie, those goblins looked pretty hideous in the films, I imagine they'll look even more hideous in real life. Not exactly a family-friendly thing to have is it? Especially considering this is already a ride about escaping from a bank that you've broken into (great moral values there!). Now, this ride is apparently some epic dark ride/coaster combo. These types of rides are always risks, since some people's expectations can really shape how they react to the ride. Expect a coaster, you may be left unthrilled. Expect a dark ride, you may be left unimmersed. It's a really, really big risk.
Then you've got a train ride linking two parks together. Now, it will of course be more like a 4D experience, and this all sounds well and good. But it's not going to be easy to create a 4D experience about a franchise which already has so much going for it; very difficult to create an emotional link to the story. I have so many concerns.
Then there's also theming. Okay, Angry Birds Land's theming isn't the greatest, and there's room for more. However, let's step back and look at what Diagon Alley's theming will entail. Firstly, there's a dragon that breaths fire. Fantastic. That's better than anything at Angry Birds Land. However, this dragon doesn't move, from the looks of it at least. Talk about unrealistic! What's the point in having a creature for theming if it doesn't move. You're meant to be in a world where a dragon has just escaped; it's not gonna stand still, lording it over everyone else puffing some fire occasionally. It's going to move.
Angry Birds Land's theming at least makes sense; you're in a snapshot of a game, where some birds have just been catapulted, others are about to be, and so forth. It makes perfect sense to the story. Diagon Alley's dragon does not. Then there's all the shop fronts. They're shop fronts from shops in a back alley in London. Where's the excitement in that? The transportation to a whole new world? You can't get that here. It's basically just like walking down a part of London with shops you've never seen before (which isn't exactly difficult). Poor theming really; it's taken realism a step too far.
There's other things as well. Harry Potter is an outdated IP. The last book was released 7 years ago. The last film 3 years ago. Even if it's still popular, and there's a spin off film series on the way, the main Harry Potter IP is outdated. It's got little more than nostalgia now. It's time to let go. Take away the nostalgia and all we have is a kid's story that finished many years ago, and whilst still memorable, should be left alone, instead of picked away until its dignity has gone away. Angry Birds is about to get its second wave of popularity. There's a major film to be released in 2016. Mobile gaming is still huge, and a new game could easily make it to the top in 24 hours. Now that's a popular and current IP for you.
I think that's all I need to get my point across. Harry Potter is an outdated IP, and Diagon Alley is shaping up to be an overhyped dark ride that teaches bad moral values and a 4D experience which could go really well or really badly. Perhaps not the best family area. Angry Birds, however, is a current, popular, IP, with Angry Birds Land having a quality 4D experience and rides for everyone, which everyone will enjoy. It also teaches good moral values (don't steal, fight for what you believe in, yadda yadda yadda). If that's not quality, I don't know what is.
So save your money. Avoid Diagon Alley. Save yourself the disappointment. Take a trip down to Thorpe Park and bask in the greatness that is Angry Birds Land, and smile to yourself that you're in a better place than some hocus pocus area set about robbing a bank. You deserve it.

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

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

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

As part of the 2-4-1 deal TPM was given for the new VIP experiences, a group of us went down to go behind the scenes and ascend 127 feet.
We began our day going into Stealth's bunker where the launch system sits. The size of it is ridiculous! There are a few photos of Inatamin accelerator hydraulic systems around the internet but they don't do it justice! It also makes the coolest noise ever when it launches unfortunately, no picture were allowed down here so here's one of everyone's favourite Stealth element.

I also really like this photo

Next we headed up to the console where we saw people press buttons and how the system registers where a train is at any one time. For anyone who loves codes, Code Bronze is where it doesn't launch (because the dog is out of the 3mm tolerance on the 3 tonne catch car), Code Silver is a rollback and Code Gold is a stall at the top of the ride.

We were however allowed out onto the platform thingy of the station to take pictures



Yes, we also got to wear fancy hi-vis jackets alongside our steel toe capped boats.

Still amazes me that this thing is 3 tonnes!
We then headed under the station to watch a launch and here the dog fall into the catchcar (that's what the lovely ping noise it makes while moving back and forth before launch is) and then down the metal path to the warehouse.






In the workshop we were lucky to see one of the trains that is operational this season (don't ask me why it was in there and not operational, surprisingly that wasn't a question that came to mind). In here we saw them drop the dog and realised how little actually touches the catchcar to launch it. There was also a cannibalised train which they rebuild over the season so over winter they only have to strip down one train as the other is done during the season. We were then meant to head to Saw but we overran at Stealth (2 hours we were there for ) so were given The Swarm's workshop before our lift hill walk.

Wee!

With 10 of us around this hatch taking pictures, people soon began to wave and shout at us

We waited around for it to close and then watched the magical transfer table move!

Although it may look slow, you have to remember it's carrying a ridiculously heavy train and it is moving as fast as possible as this was requested by the park and B&M set it to the fastest safest speed.
The track locks into place

We all ran away


And in it came!
Like other B&Ms, the wheel bogeys are left completely open making it easy to inspect and change without having to move the train (like you have to on those wretched Intamin rides) so the train runs on a set of wheel in the middle and two rails where a slot between the seat runs along.

And out we went

To the control booth

Sun setting

To ascend this!



Still going


Higher

And we made it

And what a view it is!






Quick panoramic of the park

And it was time to come down
Few things, the park went to B&M and asked how they'd go about making it backwards. They considered alternating rows, one whole train backwards and the other forwards and in the end when with what we have due to the queueing situation. B&M supplied four new chassis for it and they do still have the other four for when it went forwards so it may return but for now it will remain as it is as it's still proving popular. The engineers do try and keep the theming in working condition and even want to replace the sign as its peeling away but budgets say other things and it's not always possible for them to fix effects such as the water spray and fire as their job is to get the ride operational and often by the time they've done that it's open and they can't get to the effects. The gas tower was also mentioned and they are looking into bringing back the fire especially with ABL now open but again budget and time says otherwise.
Was a great day and the view from Swarm's lift is amazing!

Goodnight Swarm.

As some of you may know, I've been over in California for two weeks embracing the west coast. In that time Chris and I visited five new theme parks and went on some of the most well known rides out there. So to start off with;
Six Flags Discovery Kingdom


I don’t know many people that have been to this park so for me, it would live or die based on how my trip was to go. The day started relatively badly. A heavy hangover from the Eurovision celebrating the night before meant some hangover coffee and food was required from Starbucks. Nevertheless, we sobered up and drove the 40 minute drive to one of two Six Flag parks in California. Now, when it comes to Six Flags, enthusiasts always come across as frosty. It’s reputation is near the bottom of the barrel. Reports of poor operations, rude and unhelpful staff ad dirty, littered areas are common complaints. I’m happy to report none of these came across on this particular visit.

Access to the park was swift, we purchased annual passes (at $100 each including parking and discounts it was a steal!) and made our way over to our first ride and my first new B&M since Dæmonen last year, Medusa. Now our first mistake was to take our bags into the queue so unfortunately our first ride was actually my first ride as Chris sat it out to put bags in lockers ($5 for all day use in all lockers in the park, very good value!).



Now, when it comes to the Floridian B&M’s they were very hit and miss. They are either large and overblown but over rated like Hulk and Montu or they little pieces of perfection like Manta and Kumba. Having already ridden Superman de Acero, Kraken and Dæmonen, I was fully aware that the floor less riding seat wasn’t the be all and end all of these rides. When it comes to Medusa I just took it for what it was; a glorified sit down ride. I have to say I really enjoyed it. It gets away with a few things though. For example it is as much of a car park coaster as Scream is at Magic Mountain. But that doesn’t effect the ride experience much at all. Secondly it’s oversized vertical loop, dive roll and zero g roll are a lot of fun. There is so much hang time throughout the inversions and it has that old style, B&M aggressiveness that some would say are missing from modern day Beemers. The Sea-Serpent roll which features exclusively to B&M rides on here isn’t that great but is the only dull moment on this ride. After the MCBR, the ride hots up with some very forceful helixes over the faded car park white lines. These are all taken at ground level and feel very quick. The corkscrews are also very quick and intense and the final helix is great fun.


I have a feeling that Medusa was running so well because of the heatwave that California was having at the time. It was 37 degrees on our visit, (absolutely stifling weather) and all the rides were running fast. This helped Medusa in particular as it just seemed to have that extra wallop. It was running two trains the whole day and the staff were giving great guest interaction. I thought they were supposed to be unfriendly idiots and no interest in the guests. Not true here. I found their visual check spins quite funny as they put their arms at full length, say visual check and spin on the spot. So, first ride down, three rides done on Medusa (two in the back row, one in the front) and a fantastic start to the theme park trips.




Our next stop was Kong, a Vekoma SLC. My only other experience with this ride type is Infusion at Blackpool. This wasn’t too bad although it was definitely a slight head banger. We had one front row ride on our trip, no more goes were required.

Next stop was the weirdly named Sky Screamer, a glorified wave swinger that gave great views of Medusa and nothing more. This was closely followed by Cobra, a Zierer junior coaster which wasn't too bad, not too dull but nothing crazy.

We stopped for a little bit too have some water and chill out and then head to our next batch of rides. Discovery Kingdoms entrance is weirdly placed between areas. On your left is Medusa and Kong, over the entrance is V2 and to your right is Superman:Ultimate Flight and Roar. So naturally our next stop was the other coaster corner starting with V2

Starting with V2 (Vertical Velocity), this is an Intamin impulse coaster that has a weird angled piece of track at one end and a vertical spike at the other. The ride launches you one way then the other then back again until you reach nearly the end of the track. Weirdly the zero g at one of the end is angled oddly so sometimes you get halfway through the inversion and others you make it the whole way through. Oddly, this never had a queue but this may be down to its poor reliability as it seemed to rarely run through our day.

Next up was Superman: Ultimate Flight, a premier launch roller coaster that won awards a few years ago for its original ride design. I can understand that, it is pretty out there in terms of rides but it has a fatal flaw. It’s poor throughput means queues can rise quickly. Luckily it was relatively quiet on our visit but I can imagine long waits on busier days. So with that being said, how is the ride. Yeah its good, the constant launching back and forth through the station feels very good and the ride definitely has some good bum of seat action. It also features a good amount of air time and the sensation of speed is there in bucket loads. I just question whether parks can justify such a low throughput ride.


Our final major roller coaster was Roar, a wooden coaster built by GCI, the masters behind Wodan at Europa Park. Before our visit, Roar was a very unloved ride, thrown aside by the enthusiast community (well.. TPR) for being rough and uncomfortable. Luckily, the ride had a slight refurbishment with track being replaced before our visit so the question was, could it take down Wodan.

No it can’t.

But it shares many characteristics with the German version such as the relentless sensation and the amazing sense of speed as you are thrown left and right the whole way around the circuit. The first drop was a particular highlight. The rest of the circuit kind of melted into one in my mind. Suffice to say we enjoyed both our rides on this ride even though it only ran one train. The other didn't seem to be around at all.

So with the major rides all done it was time to kick back and enjoy the rest of what the park had to offer. A nice lake surrounds the park affording it a nice scenic view. We had some nice chicken and chips and then went around the zoo area. We were slightly surprised by how close we could get to the animals such as the giraffes and elephants. You could also pay to ride the elephants around a little enclosure.

Next up was Boomerang: Coast to Coast or as I refer to it as, my first Vekoma Boomerang. I’ve heard the horror stories and the outlook wasn’t great. But you know what, I thought it was fine. Sure there was the odd jerky sensation but I’ve had worse. It certainly wasn’t uncomfortable.
In the park is several huss creations such as a top spin (that had no water thankfully) and there was little roller coasters for the kids dotted around. Our final stop was a show with Dolphins called Drench. With marine life being a hot potato at the moment, what with the Blackfish documentary this show had a slight edge for me. The dolphins looked well looked after and seemed well treated so erm.. not much more I can add to either side of the argument.


So to conclude. Discovery Kingdom. Done a large floorless or a decent woodie before? Probably not going to add much to your interests. But if you want to go to somewhere relatively ignored in UK coaster circles, somewhere that does have genuine charm and some cracking good rides then you can’t go far wrong then Discovery Kingdom.

As we know, next month will see Thorpe Park give a slight retheme to their 115ft drop tower, Detonator. A general shift in target market has to led to the perhaps knee-jerk reaction to bring in a family-themed area, and the easiest way to go about that would be an IP. So we have 'Angry Birds Land', and Detonator will become 'Detonator: Bombs Away'. Who knows what this slight retheme will bring? Well, we will find out in little under a month's time anyway.
With most eyes focused on the future, I've decided to turn my head and look back on the past. Detonator opened 13 years ago and is a staple thrill ride within the heart of the park. The ride and its overall experience have remained pretty much constant, so the ride's history seems far from exciting. However, the circumstances in which the ride even came to the park and the behind the scenes stories are far more interesting...
The story starts on a Friday afternoon, in July 2000. A smoker discarded their cigarette into some bushes, which quickly started a fire; 'The Thorpe Park Fire'. Slight damage was done to Mr Rabbit's Tropical Travels. However, substantial damage was done to the nearby Wicked Witch Haunt ride.
Wicked Witch Haunt was so severely damaged it could not be saved; the building was completely destroyed. Of course, the ride needed replacing. At this time, there were very few major rides at Thorpe, and the multi-million pound, record-breaking Colossus was in its planning stages. So the ride had to be cheap and not steal the limelight from that. Also, Thorpe were still very much a family-park, with a big focus on family rides. So the ride had to appeal to a large audience.
The park's first choice was, however, not Detonator. Instead, it was this:

Photo from Wikipedia
It was a standard Vekoma SLC! The photo shows Traumatizer at Pleasureland Southport, and was later moved to Blackpool Pleasure Beach and named Infusion. The ride is a family roller coaster, very simple, nothing too special or exciting. Plus, it was quick and easy to construct. At the time, it would have fit the park perfectly. The plans were very quickly rushed together and submitted to the council (in fact, Traumatizer was used to judge noise levels for this new coaster). And, from what I can gather, they were approved. Unfortunately, the plans themselves are not online at all, so the exact look, location of the ride is unknown to me! But why was no such coaster built?
Well, very simply put, it came down to troubles with the energy supply! The plan was to get the ride opened for summer 2001. However, associated costs with the ride and power supply for the ride (whatever that means) meant it wouldn't open by then. So the plans were shelved.
At this point, we're in October 2000. The 2001 season would start in March; a mere 5 months away. So Thorpe's management decided to go for a drop tower. Due to the naturally thin structure, it would have little 'visual pollution', it was quick to construct and, though quite thrilling, did temporarily fill in a missing part of the park's line up at the time. Note - temporarily. The original plan was the have the ride operating for 1 season, then replace it with what another coaster. This is why Detonator 'broke through' Thorpe's height ceiling of 100ft - it was only meant to be around for a year and it was under special circumstances!
Everything was all approved and everything was all good. Detonator opened at the start of the 2001 season, along with Zodiac and Vortex (funnily enough, Vortex opened rather late and the park were investigated by Watchdog for misrepresentation. Oops). Colossus was under construction and was hoped to put Thorpe Park 'on the map'. Behind the scenes, plans for a new roller coaster, namely Nemesis Inferno, were well underway.
However, something unexpected happened. Detonator was popular. Really popular. In fact, it averaged "over 9 out of 10" on customer reviews. No park can afford to get rid of a ride that is THAT popular. It had to stay. So the utmost was done to ensure allowed for the ride to stay. Fortunately, the layout allowed for this to be the case.
There was still one more problem though. The ride only had temporary planning approval. By the end of 2001, they would have to take it down. So an extension to this application was sought after. It was by no means a guarantee approval would be given, due to the fact the ride was tallest on park. But, fortunately, the ride was approved for another, temporary, 5 years.
Why only 5 years? Well, Detonator was not in Thorpe's long term plans and it's a fairground ride. Could 6 years of constant operation be too much it? Would it maintain popularity for 5 more years? Would it fit in with the park then? The park weren't too sure.
Of course, the ride stayed, and the park applied for permanent approval of the ride, which was granted. In fact, the MTDP at the time even indicated a second drop tower joining Detonator, but alas, it never happened.
Detonator is, in terms of G-forces, the most intense ride on park. It's regarded as one of the better drop towers in the world and works so well within Thorpe Park. Yet the ride only arrived due to a series of accidents and misfortunes that the park had to get over. Had those accidents never happened, the park could well be very different and - in my opinion - worse off. Would we ever had gotten Inferno if a Vekoma SLC was put in place? Would said SLC still be here today? Would Thorpe be as popular as it is now? Who knows! All I know is that, 13 years later, Detonator remains a favourite to all. How nice, ey?
May Detonator stand tall for many more years, regardless of theme...

"Detonation...complete"
Disclaimer: I cannot guarantee 100% accuracy behind this information. A lot of the information was deduced from past planning applications and, in some cases, such applications were not always complete. Should there be any information which you believe to be incorrect, please feel free to leave a comment and say so!

Here it is - the 2013 Review of the Thorpe Park season! I'll be sticking to a similar formulaic approach as the 2011 (sorry about the pictures being broken here; I'll be sorting it out asap!) and the 2012 Season Reviews I've done. If anyone has any suggestions on how to improve the style / format of it all, let me know! Sorry about the length of this; it's hard to a balance between a detailed review and keeping it short. Also, for anyone wondering, I won't be doing any for other parks, simply due to the fact I haven't visited them enough to do a 'season review' like this one. Watch this space though - who knows what the next season will bring for me? And so, with that out of the way, in the words of Thorpe Movie Studios' Director, "get ready to roll...lights, camera, action!"
The Swarm
We all know the story now - an alien race has attacked Thorpe Park, leaving destruction in its path. Unfortunately, this didn't bring in the guests last season - maybe the park's marketing was too effective and people actually thought real aliens had invaded? So, the thrill factor of the ride was upped - giving us the billboard and the 2 backwards rows. The general consensus is that, simply put, the billboard is a great addition, which is visually pleasing on and off ride, and creates what many regard as the best near miss of the ride. So Thorpe really hit the nail on the head there.
The backwards rows, however, have divided opinion a lot more. It certainly creates a unique and interesting experience, but it does detract from the 'point' of Swarm. That said, it still is a crowd pleaser, so it's not all bad. The main problem which seems to have arose from it is that of the station queue are being congested, and loading procedures sometimes being affected because of it. I noticed towards the end of the season, the backwards passes were scrapped in favour of just going backwards after seeing the queue size, so maybe that's the way forward? (Pun NOT intended!) I also see that Heide Park's wing coaster is having bag storage in the station area, so if that works out, I'd love to see that implemented for Swarm to solve the problem of the crowded bag area.
All in all, Swarm's touch ups this year are welcome to all, keeping a great ride experience and improving it with more large-scale theming.

The billboard, featuring the winning competition slogan.

The reverse of the billboard.

Swarm is still one of, if not, the, most photogenic rides on park.
X
Another 'New for 2013', though not heavily advertised, was the rethemed X. Finally, after closed season upon closed season of rumours that it would be given attention, the rumours were true! Forward facing trains, individual lap bars, a lowered height restriction, a vague theme, lights, music all in one - it added up to a whole lot of potential for what was likely a cheap-ish retheme. Now, my first go on the new X happened when the block brakes were still on the ride. It created a slow, boring and unenergetic ride which was a shadow of its older self in my opinion. Being a fan of X:\ No Way Out, it was hard for me to see how the park could successfully improve it.
However, my goes after that were without the block brakes. And the ride got better. And better. And better...you get the picture. I love it now. Everything about it just works; it's just a fun little ride which everyone can enjoy, and was something that was really missing in Thorpe's line up. As someone who remain sceptical over an overhaul of the ride, I'm really glad it's worked out and given the ride a new lease of life!
Nemesis Inferno
In 2003, the public felt the heat of Nemesis Inferno for the first time. 10 years later, and the fire is getting hotter and hotter! Inferno ran brilliantly this year, giving a faster and more relentless ride than ever before. It just goes the show that even B&M Inverters which are seen as 'boring' or 'unforceful' can still grow into something which can pack a punch. The tunnel's effects were a bit hit and miss, yes, but for the most part, I think they've been pretty good this season.
What speaks more volume about Inferno than I could ever say, though, is what I saw back on a cold, snowy April's day this season. The park wasn't busy at all, and rides had a maximum of a 5 minute queue, with 5 minute queues. Inferno, however, had a consistent 20-30 minute queue throughout the day, not because of slow loading procedures or anything, but simply because it was pulling in the crowds. Goes to show you don't need some amazing gimmick to create a coaster which will keep people coming back...

Inferno on a sunny day.

Inferno on its 10th birthday (look at that queue!)
The Other Thrill Rides
In a season where the park has aimed to slightly shift its target market so it's not all about thrills, the park's thrill rides themselves have had some mixed fortunes.
Stealth has had a pretty successful season, with no major breakdowns coming to light. It's nice to see a ride which was previously having a few troubles here and there be continually running smoothly. I love how the park use the ride's plaza area for loads of small little things, like Dr Pepper stuff and the ice cream event, making it feel like it is not only the 'icon' ride of the park, but also the icon area. Also, the Ice Cream event photoshoot was massive fun - 20+ rides on Stealth on a summer morning is always a great way to wake!
Colossus and Saw, known as the two rough rides on park, have also had decent seasons. Whilst Colossus is no longer the coaster with the most inversions in the world (or even the UK; thanks Smiler...), it's still got the 'world's first' to draw people in. It needs a spruce up, yes, but hopefully that will come sooner rather than later - after all, the park themselves have said they're keen on the idea when the time is right! Saw is a very Marmite ride; most people seem to have a strong dislike for it, whereas a few have a soft spot for it. I'm in the minority who enjoy it and feel that this season has been alright for the ride. Effects have been good on the whole, and I still don't think the ride is rough. If I have one criticism of the ride, though, it is that the outdoor audio is broken / turned off / too quiet to hear (I have no idea which); really would like to see that rectified.
Slammer started off the season really well (if anyone had been asked to place a bet on it working throughout days of snow, most people would likely have kept their money...), but it unfortunately hit its snag around the half way point of the season. It's a shame to see a ride which is having so much time and money invested having so many problems (and, as far as I'm aware, it's not reoccurring problems, it's usually a different problem each time). Hopefully 2014 will be 'the season' where it manages to be pretty much problem-free as you do wonder how many more long periods of downtime the ride has to have before the park say enough.
Slammer's S&S brother, Rush, has remained pretty consistent during the season, which is good news. It's been a bit of a shame to have shorter ride cycles this season compared to other seasons, but I assume there's a reason behind this. Detonator and it's shiny new restraints has been brilliant as ever; always gives you 'that feeling', and never fails to deliver. Vortex has been feeling very 'juddering' this season though, which has lead to an experience which makes me feel rather queasy unfortunately. Fingers crossed that this closed season will see the ride given a little bit more TLC.

Samurai also had a bit of trouble this season.

Detonator stands tall as the park's most consistently good flat ride.
The Water Rides
With the charge in target market becoming obvious just before summer time, the park's water rides played a bigger role than normal this time around. For a park the size of Thorpe, I think 5 water rides is a on the larger side, so why shouldn't the park put them in the limelight a bit more?
The season began with everyone fearing that the removal of Loggers Leap's tunnel would ruin the ride. Fortunately, not all of the tunnel was removed, and the ride experience isn't really affected by it at all. Of course, this is no reason for the park not to replace the tunnel, as I bet for first timers, the indoor lift is somewhat of a surprise. Other than that, Loggers has remained on good form for the most part, though seemed to struggle a bit towards the end of season. Also, the smell after the tunnel seems to have gone away / become less potent; if that's the park's doing, then yay!
Rumba Rapids is a ride high on my list (maybe top) to get a bit of attention. It doesn't need too much, a bit of work inside the tunnel, a fresh lick of paint and hey presto, it's pretty much done. The thing is, even though it's a short ride, rapids rides are the perfect ride for everyone and can work on any level. Tidal Wave is a ride I don't do, but it still looks as striking and wet as ever, so no complaints! Depth Charge's new boats are presumably heavier, as I've found boats to go faster and further, which is great fun.
As for Storm Surge, well...I'll let you fill in the gap here for yourself...

Tidal Wave...operating in the snow.


A variety of TPM members show off their Storm Surge reactions...
All the Rest
Not much else to say really about the other rides. It was nice, but a bit strange actually, to see the Teacups be repainted with the Tetley branding half way through the season - goes to show that they are working towards a good look for the park. Other rides like Quantum and Zodiac were doing as well as ever I felt, and rides like Rocky Express and Flying Fish were nice fillers which will no doubt become more popular as the family market builds all the more.

A blank Teacups midway through the season.

Despite supposedly closing at around 5pm for Fright Nights, Rocky Express stayed open much longer. Perhaps there's more demand for the ride than the park realised!
Thorpe Park Mash Up
Mash Up ran for a second year, again in conjunction with Ministry of Sound. The fact that the previous couple of Easter events only lasted one season must say that the name and style of Mash Up was appealing. Unfortunately, I didn't go to the event this season, but I expect it was much the same as last season's, which worked well, so no problems there!
Sun Scream and Dr Pepper
Sun Scream returned for what I think was its fifth season, and was again sponsored by Dr Pepper. The more family-friendly direction the park were heading saw no stunt show, but instead a 'chill zone' take the arena, sand-sculpting be in the smaller half of Neptune's Beach and other things for everyone to enjoy. Then there was the Dr Pepper red button roaming around the park long after Sun Scream had finished, giving everyone the chance to win prizes if the dared to press the ominous red button. Good to see random little fun things like this crop about.
Despite Sun Scream obviously being popular enough to last many seasons, I think it's time to think of something a little different now. It's all feeling a bit tired and overused now; just a slight change in direction and couple of other tweaks with give it a fresher feel which I think is needed.

Sand sculpting on the beach.


The Colossus sculpture was highly detailed.

The Chill Zone was very different to the usual bike stunt show which would take over the arena.

The Red Button.
Smaller Events
There's been a fair few smaller / one-off evening events this year, no doubt to help encourage people to make use of the other evening things the park does (keeping Bar 360 open till 11pm for example; great idea!) and to give something extra for Crash Pad guests. These included comedians working their way up, roller disco nights, lesser-known groups such as 'Please..?' and 'Anttix' playing in the dome and others.
It's nice to see the park experimenting and trying to get crowds in for longer / for other reasons than 'just the rides'. In honesty, I doubt these were huge successes, due to the lack of marketing they got, and that people probably weren't drawn to smaller names. However, the park shouldn't give up with them - they need to stick it out with things like this, find what works and what doesn't. Yes, it's a bit of a risk, but that's what the park need to do!
Summer Nights
A surprise feature of the season was Summer Nights - 7 roller coasters and 2 water rides open for 3 hours for a small charge. Okay, at first the park were wanting to charge what was probably a bit too much (£18 for non-AP holders, £15 for AP holders), it was great to see Thorpe respond to the criticism and swiftly lower prices. The park was very quiet for all of the nights it ran (the first night being essentially dead and there literally being no queues). It was great to be in the park with such a relaxed atmosphere, and the staff were clearing enjoying themselves as well. Everything about the event worked so well.
The true testament to the quality of the event is that the park are doing it again next season, for pretty much every weekend during summer!
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Queue free indeed.

A literally empty left hand side of Swarm's station area.
Fright Nights
Two words - Intellectual Properties. These are what dominated this season's Fright Nights, and will do for at least the next two. IPs are tricky things to pull off at theme parks, but I think that the risks involved with pairing up with Lionsgate paid off.
Some may say that the IPs have ruined the mazes, but I think that isn't the case. Cabin in the Woods was a brilliant and unique idea, which worked brilliantly. Blair Witch Project was something different to the rest of the park's line up, and even though it didn't live up to expectations, it's a good learning curve for the park. Also, considering it was a 2* rated attraction, it really isn't that bad. Saw Alive remains a strong maze in the line up and the idea if the You're Next characters roaming the park was very clever. The only weak spot was My Bloody Valentine, which was a shadow of the original Experiment 10.
I expect we'll see at least 1 or 2 replacements next season (or maybe even a completely new line up bar Saw; who knows?), so the event should continue to grow in its own way. The way to improve the event from here is for park-wide theming; the park has got the mazes more or less sorted, they've got lighting and audio done rather well. To create an event which can start to compete with the best, theming the park is essential, and with Fright Nights being the crowning glory of the park's season, let's hope they can continue to go all out!
The highlight of the event, for me, has to be Face it Alone. By far the most extreme experience possible, well worth the money and exactly what the park needed to add to create this 'terrifying Fright Nights' which they claim. This really should return next season, as it is certainly a great experience.


Small theming pieces were around the park; specifically by the mazes.

The roaming actors caused quite a crowd when they were around.
Reserve 'n' Ride
Another experimental thing for 2013 was Reserve n Ride. A free-to-use service which replaced Swarm's main queue for about a week and a bit all in all. The overall idea of it seems very optimistic - turning the park into a queue-free environment, because you can book the time you want to ride.
The system worked to be fair. However, there are some problems, such as having to rely on having a smartphone with a decent battery life, and people understanding how the system works. The idea of making the park queue free is highly ambitious, but this might be a suitable replacement for Fastrack in some respects. Again, it's great to see the park trying out totally different things, and it will be interesting to see if this develops further next season.

When it worked, there were no queues in sight.
Food, Drink and Merchandise
Back before the season began, many were wondering if the outsides brands would be leaving the park, especially with the Burger Kitchen outlets arriving at Alton Towers and Chessington. Fortunately (based on reviews of BK at the parks), all outside brands stayed and no new food outlets came to the park in 2013.
All food outlets have continued to serve good quality, and the prices remain good value for what you get (which are made really rather good if you have can take advantage of Annual Pass discount). The only shame about drinks is, for a period of time, some outlets wouldn't refill the quenchers. Seems really odd, just doesn't make any sense (apart from for outside brands, of course). I did notice that during parts of the season, they became more relaxed about it all, which was pretty good.
A quick word on merchandise too. It's been great stuff yet again and of decent value too. Swarm's merchandise is still beautiful!

Amity Drop n Shop got a new sign!

Enjoying amazing kebabs.
Nature
It's no secret that there's not an awful lot of green space around the park. It's all too easy to forgot that the park is surrounding by water, which is actually a really beautiful setting when you think about it. So here's a couple of photos showing off the little bits of natural beauty that is around the park...

Sunken Gardens towards the beginning of the season...

...and in the middle of the season.

Swans and their babies by Swarm. They ain't afraid of no aliens.
Other Stuff
Just a couple of other bits as well. We've seen new LED signs outside ride entrances come about this season, which are good quality and much more inviting than the previous ones. If there wad one criticism (which is quite a picky one too), it would be that all of them say 'WELCOME TO THORPE PARK' every so often, which seems a bit pointless really. Having it on the large queue boards, fine, but on the individual ride ones is a bit excessive.
Also, one thing I noticed on Summer Nights, when all the audio was the same all around the park, some of the speakers were a few seconds out of sync. I don't know if it was a one off or if that's now been sorted, but if it hasn't, then I'd like to see that fixed up. It's such a small thing really, but it makes a world of difference.
Speaking of audio, 'The Noise' was a great idea, and something which was well executed. It will be interesting to see if they stick with a similar idea next year, or go back to a themed entrance music piece.
A Look Ahead
2014 brings us the rebranded Crash Pad, aka 'The Waterfront Hotel'. Thorpe are creating their own shipping container hotel, with brighter colours and more rooms available. It will be interesting to see if there's a change in quality or price now there's no ties with Snoozebox, but that's only something time will tell. From reviews that I've heard this year, The Crash Pad was actually nice inside, despite the unpleasing exterior, so maybe it's one of those things which will get more popular as word of mouth spreads?
Other than that, we have no concrete announcements of anything new next year. There's been talks of a new 4D film, the return of the Canada Creek Railway, the movement of Vengeance to the park and others, but will any of it happen? If the change in target market to be a bit more family friendly becomes more prominent, then at least one of those things should happen. Thorpe have alluded to a spruce up of the entrance as well, which is much needed in my opinion. Other than that, I expect we'll see a couple of spruce ups around the park, as there are a couple of rides in need of a bit of tender loving care. Whilst it will be a quiet year for the park investment-wise, it doesn't mean that there won't loads of interesting little things come the new season!
So that's it for another season - onwards and upwards as they say. Thanks for reading!

Thorpe Park Trip Report 27/10/13
After our short 25min drive from our hotel (following our 4.5 hour drive the day before) we arrived at Thorpe at around 10:15. We then proceeded to the MAP office to pick up our shiny new passes before heading in to the park just after 10:45, I checked the queue times using the app and saw that the majority of the rides were still on 5-10 min queue with the exception of saw and swarm which were both already up to an hour.
We headed toward X as we hadn’t been here since it got turned around and wanted to try it out. The ride seemed a lot tamer this way round in my opinion but I’m not sure if this is because we went to universal in the summer and spent a lot of time on The Mummy.
After this we headed over to nemesis and it’s 5 min queue, as we got into the building we decided to queue for the front as there was not that much of a queue. However at this point the ride decided to break down on us and was then only running on one train. After about 15/20 mins of waiting it was our turn to ride and this was one of the best experiences I had that day, it is definitely better at the front and seeing the track appear before you without another car in front was an unusual experience, and one I haven’t experienced very often.
Next we decided to buy or directors cut fast-tracks for later on in the evening an while we were there purchased some fastracks for the swarm backwards as this was something else we had not experienced yet. We then headed straight over to swarm and “braved it backwards” it was definitely odd going backwards and the only downside was that the theming and near misses were all missed
due to you not seeing them till you’ve gone through them.
We then headed over to Saw and it hour queue, but as we got inside we noticed that the queue was a lot shorter than it normally is when it’s a hour so we thought we’d be out quicker than expected, However after about 15 mins of queuing the ride broke down, we decided to stick it out an after around 20 mins the ride was up and running again, however after another 10 mins the cars
disappeared again and we were left waiting another 10 mins before it was up and running again and we were finally lead into the building to “play a game”.
By this point it was lunch time and we headed over to calypso for some chicken and watched a man Eat a ton of ribs (was that there all season or just fright nights).
We still had an hour before our fastracks kicked in so we headed to Colossus as it had a half hour Queue, once we got the fastrack entrance the woman asked how long we’d be queuing, we worked it out to be 15/20 mins and she was surprised by this fact (even asked us if we meant this queue ) we then rode the 10 loops and headed over to asylum to watch the chainsaw guy in action.
Then it was our turn to venture into Asylum, this maze seemed a lot longer than the last time I went in 2 years ago. Also the strobe lighting made it look like the walls were moving at numerous points during the maze, we lost half our group at one point due to a door being left open and the front of our group escaping outside, we then saw the group that went in before us being called back in and were then right behind us for the rest of maze making our group very large. I must say that the theming of the maze has had no lasting effect on me and I can tell that the actors in the maze were not real mental patients and that is not how they act.
Our next maze was my bloody valentine, upon getting to the entrance we were told that we couldn’t enter as they were “dealing with an issue” so we waited around for about 10 minutes before witnessing a group of irish travellers being escorted out of these and threating to set off the fire alarms in the park! We then ventured into the maze and got told to be careful about driving home due to the storm before being told the story of Harry Warden. I’ve seen the remake of this film so kind of knew what to expect but other people in my group were a bit freaked by the first scene. We keep checking all the dark corners and actors made use of these very well. This was the only maze which made me scream (due to actors jumping out of darkness and right into my face). We escaped harry and carried on with our day.
Our last maze was cabin in the woods (we didn’t bother with saw) this maze was my favourite of the new ones and I hope it’s back next year so I can experience it again. We had kiko this week but I don’t remember seeing her during the maze, the rooms I remember are a forest, wallpaper and deer head (with a door to the control room but didn’t get to go through) a room with a guy that was proclaiming his love for the girl in front of me, a tunnel, the room from the facebook videos, some long corridor that turned on itself with about 4 actors in it and the last room with the plaques.
After surviving the mazes we headed for some rides in the dark we did swarm, Colossus and nemesis, the last two were not as fun due to the rain starting and hitting me in the face. We were going to queue for blair witch but we had a look when we came off nemesis and it looked awfull :l it was also raining pretty heavily by then so we called it a day at 9:30 and went back to the hotel.
Ride list
X x1
Swarm X1 backwards X1 forwards &dark
Saw X1
Nemesis X1 Day X1 Night
Colossus X1 Day X1 Night
Mazes X1 (except saw)
This is my first trip report so sorry if I’ve done anything wrong :L it also seems to be a bit long :L sorry again.
ThaliaKelio