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It always takes a while for something to hit it's stride, whether people's patience will last that amount of time in this modern instant access world is another thing. I do feel sorry for the actors, they must get really depressed if they read certain review sites.

Normally I'd agree with you but sonny wanted to stay in the hotel and Grandad was willing to pay for it, so it was a no brainer for us

We will be at the park on a family trip that weekend anyway, but if I see any faces I know, I'll try say hi if I'm not spending my time chasing after my son or begging the wife to go on a ride.... Just FYI, the alton hotel has a discount code going ATM, it covers that particular Friday night, and depending how you play things, you could get a really cheap b&b rate, 1-2 people, £99, 3 people £114 (£38 each), 4 people £129 (£32.25 each), 5 people £144 (£28.8 each). Booking more than 6 adults sends the rate through the roof, I don't know about sleeping arrangements, depends how friendly you all are with each other (hey don't be prudish, I slept in a hotel bathtub once) but it might offer a good alternative to the travel lodge or driving to the park on Saturday morning. Code doesn't work for Saturday nights, just weeknights, the code is BIG6

LOL thanks, the Mrs will stick to the bar no doubt, her poor baby riding terror roller coasters, she's bad enough with a few hours at Thorpe, dread to think what she'll be like after 2 days at Alton...... we're going Thursday/Friday/Saturday so hopefully it won't be epic queues. Does Rita and Smiler have SRQ's? It's likely I'll be bottled on after a couple goes on them.

Is there a 'recommended route' to take round the park to get the best out of a day there? We're there for 2 and a half days staying in the Hotel in June.

It was last month in a Q&A session he said it. http://riderater.co.uk/2015/what-we-learned-from-wardley-and-varney-qa/

IIRC tourism as a whole fell in 2012 compared to 2011, it's missing the point to blame a single ride for the downturn in a Parks performance when the whole Country was in the same boat. I agree the Swarm is too short, but I understand that was due to planning restrictions rather than design. Your last sentence hits the nail on the head, we are one of those, more spare money is why we bought the MAP's, it had nothing to do with the rides at the park, for us it was a no brainer for all the things we wanted to do this year, especially now my son is tall enough to enjoy the rides at the parks with me. I also know of several other families who are MAP virgins this year, overall they are happy, but whether they renew will be another question all together, many are surprised at the queue lengths at weekends and there has been many a playground conversations to the effect of 'if it's this busy in April, wtf is it going to be like in August?', we've taken to doing flash trips after school to avoid the queues (we all live close enough to Chessie to get there before 4pm and enjoy a few rides). Back on topic, has Vampire been closed all weekend, or do they run the ticketing system then?

LOL I was so tempted to use Tesco as an example, but decided not, glad I'm not the only one to see the similarity. I haven't been to Alton yet so am not including any of those, but from a coaster virgin point of view The Swarm is the best overall ride at the park, it's unique, is smooth as butter and my son loved it (along with every single kid in his class who's been, and every other adult I know that have experienced the ride). The simple fact that Nick Varney as recently as a few weeks ago slams this ride as 'disappointing' and says Merlin are unlikely to ever build another winged coaster, tells you everything you need to know as to how out of touch Merlin management are with their customers, just like Tesco were a couple of years ago...

Yup slightly ironic that we've had more rain here today than the last 3 months combined (we're a few miles south of Chessie).

That's why I asked about queue lenghts during Summer, to me it seems slightly on the poor side given the time of year and weather today (I could understand a 2+ hour wait on the August bank holiday, but not an overcast April day), but I have nothing to compare it too, the only time I've been to a park during super-peak times was Paultons last Summer and the longest we waited for anything was 20 minutes.

Merlin operate the parks, so the buck stops with them. You'll notice nobody really blames the employees, ride operators etc. because most people with half a brain cell know they are only doing the best they can within the budgets/constraints set by Merlin. We even understand when rides run on reduced capacity for genuine reasons. If nobody makes Merlin aware of their grievences, then how will Merlin know their customers are not happy with the service they provide? If you are a Merlin employee, then I suggest you send the upper management links to sites such as this so they can read up on things, because the standard cut and paste team defending them on sites like trip advisor make it seem that complaints are not being passed up the food chain.

Agreed with the above, it's a great site, I'd love to know how you achieved it. BTW, is there a reason why Legoland Windsor isn't listed?

Might explain a few things if they did....

Probably the former, just now 2 hours for Colossus, over and hour for everything else. On an overcast, chilly, miserable April day. Have the queues ever hit 5 hours in the Summer before? LOL. Get your **** together Merlin otherwise people won't return.

That'll be messy.

There's no way that third train is going to be running anytime soon, it's not even got restraints on (*disclaimer: I'm not an engineer, so have no idea how long it would take someone to install the restraints). Also, I know some people are particular at their jobs, but do they really need to check restraints 4 times before dispatching the train? They checked ours twice on the other big spinning coaster thing then sent us off, mind you we were the last riders of the day.

We used to use pink or purple text back in the good old days of dialup to convey humour or sarcasm.

Yeah we noticed that too, a couple of times I banged my head in places I'd never thought possible. Normally you'd think it would be rougher at the back but it wasn't.

There are three trains, one looks to be built and had water filled humanoid persons strapped into it in the workshop, and the other looked like it was still in pieces, the other of course was going round. Didn't get the wife on, too chicken (but who will hold our bags......?) but we went on twice this afternoon, quiet a fun little ride.

Thanks, gonna bundle up there this afternoon see if we can drag the wife on it, don't want her to have any contemplation time in the queue to think up an excuse not to ride hahaha.

What were the queues like for Vampire?

And yet today, the longest queue I saw all day on queue times was 20 minutes for Colossus, admittedly I wasn't camped out on the site watching it 24/7, just occassinally dropping in at relevant times, but it begs the question, what changed or was it just a blip?

What was it like back then?

Careful Whovians can be a fickle bunch, they'll set Strax on you without even thinking twice about it...

In what condition does a Knickerbocker Glory arrive in?