planenut

Nice shiny green and red, let's hope they keep them clean, unlike those at Chessington.

~As the weather forecast was so good, I put the replacement of shed roof felt on the waiting list and attended Thorpe Park.... The team on Stealth were mostly new, so the loading was slow and the queue kept around the 25 minute mark most of the day. Colossus I consider is running nice and smoothly and had virtual walk-on queuing . Saw, well, it had a "ten" minute queue shown on the board, the announcer said "thirty"; I got to the loading in ten minutes, then it broke down for ..... twenty minutes, so the announcer was right. Nemesis Inferno was running well, queued for no longer than ten minutes. Rush, still swing A (nearest the control hut) has the over ninety degree swing, but the whole cycle just seems short. Vortex was really swinging well. Angry Bird-Land is coming on and with twenty-five gleaming red and green dodgems just waiting for hoards of people to try and smash them to bits. A nice day, with a good overall ride count. I.e. Stealth 29 Saw 3 Colossus 5 Rush 1 Vortex 1 Nemesis Inferno 2 Total rides 41 - a very good day.

Rode it today, swing A, and though I was getting good airtime it seemed a terrifically short cycle - the op. assures me it was that standard cycle.

It seemed to give a really good ride today, loads of "floaty airtime".

Keep watching, told by an "angry bird" today that it should be back in operation very soon.

Just had a great evening in Oxford in the company of Pentatonix, great entertainment, and great talents...... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzB2lf2gQyY

If you've not come across Pentatonix, they are a fabulous American group who sing almost entirely A Capella, or Accappella, depending which dictionary one uses. Absolutely outstanding......http://pentatonix.org/ and I'll be catching up with them in Oxford on Thursday - which will be entirely different from having seen Rick Wakeman last week giving a live performance of "Journey to the Centre of the Earth" at the Royal Albert Hall.

Must be, I've been on it.

Interesting article. It's an okay ride for me, but it just drops. Drop towers appear popular wherever they are. The new name seems a little odd, as it's supposed to have Angry Bird connotations, and this takes it into a more confrontational term - unless it relates to something to do with that theme?

Hmm, pre-SWARM, and he still gets down in a quicker time than the duration of the ride.

EVerybody's different and the obnoxious ones prove how good and pleasant you are, you have a comparison in those plonkers.

You do take them on Tidal Wave, and the updraught from the water displacement will take any waterproof covers - away for ever. Rumba Rapids I recall they get left on the platform. If you are concerned over small valuables, wear a bum-bag under clothing and put said items in a freezer bag or similar, and then in the bum-bag.

"Drunken Barrels working properly, tilting on an angle.... " That's a nutty ride and with a tilt, even more so, which I have not had the chance to experience.

Likewise; you certainly had a longer weekend and more events, nice one. The Big One has still got the "cans" through which the ride runs prior to the launch hill, and they don't look like they've been cleaned since it opened.

For me, the Aerial Flying Machine is such an important piece; when it was built in 1904 by Hiram Maxim, only one year after the first successful controlled flight by the Wright Brothers, it was to earn money to finance his interest in aeronautical research. To the Edwardians it was the fastest thing they could do safely, and the unsafe thing would be to jump off the Blackpool Tower. The motors for this ride are still the original electric motors, and the workings are a sight to behold.

The historic rides make for so much more at BPB and I really wish I could make the journey for one of their "behind the scenes" tours - I would love to see the workings of the Derby Racer, plus more, but it's always the wrong time of year, and yes I do understand why.

Well I did offer him pedals for it but he didn't get that.

Have a look here, but spot the 747 on finals for Heathrow!

It appears that Merlin are the closer to choosing a Woodie than they have ever been since their establishment, and TP would be the likely place. Sadly with all the water around it they are limited by the base structure, unless they build it under water and give everybody snorkels.

Funny you should say that, I do consider that it would have to be extremely warm weather for me to consider Valhalla, so, ashamedly, still not done it. One of members of the club I went with paid £160 for a Big One wheel in a charity auction - and it's got no saddle.

Some years back the Hampton Court Green fair (Easter) would almost cover all of that but this year it was only a small area, and looked like no decent rides, from outside. Hmm, Cambridge, though I would be getting back from an up and down trip to the States two days prior to it.

Well if it's raining and you don't mind then you might as well ride Tidal Wave, so long as you have a change of the essentials.

Returned from a weekend at BPB ; if you've never been, you really must go, for a couple of days. Infusion though was bashing the ears more than in the past. It is a different type of park to TP and run in a different way. It has enough thrill rides for most members to thoroughly enjoy their visit, and take time out to do some traditional rides.

It is odd how many people "wish" for a roll-back, but the delay it would cause would be really annoying, and as I understand, it would be for a computer reset, and take about twenty minutes. I consider myself very lucky, that having ridden it lot's of times, I have never had a roll-back and don't want one. ......and it really stings in the rain, they put me on twice on the front in a shower last year and I backed out of a third, as my hands were stinging from protecting my face.

Haven't been there since I was a kid - and that was a long time ago. The fair used to cover the whole of the Midsummer Common, massive.