Morgan.B

Woah Woah Woah there friends!
 
Put down your pitchforks! Extinguish your flaming torches and disband that mob!
 
That title is what we call in the industry as "clickbait". A very clever way of getting people into a boring article with something shocking at face value,
Now where as most people include an image of female speed bumps to get peoples attention, I thought I would offer a thought provoking question...
 
How do you solve a problem like enthusiasts?
 
We are a great burden / privilege to theme parks. We think we know best, If a park does something right, we commend them and cheer them on!
However, this is the real world and quite a lot of the time choices made by other people are wrong! Horribly Horribly Wrong!
 
*Cough Cough*
 
Where was I...

Ah yes...
 
This thought of how do we solve this problem became more prominent after the recent news of certain enthusiasts behaving atrociously at the Bubbleworks Goodbye Party.
 

 
Enthusiasts shouting at staff to be on the last ride before it closes forever.
 
Now at first glance this just seems like some people wanting the bragging rights, "Guess who was the last on Bubbleworks!" sort of how we do it for ride openings, (3rd Public train of The Smiler and first public train of Galactica... Just saying )
But unlike ride openings, we don't have to put in effort to be the last to ride something, just turn up last and on you go rather than ride openings where those committed enough will be at the park before the staff, run to the ride as soon as the gates open and be prepared to live with the blood on your hands from those who stood before you!
 
However, there is a more personal connection to being the last on something, people who have grown up with Bubbleworks will have a very strong bond with the attraction, it still doesn't accuse the behavior but that behavior comes as a side effect of passion... And we are not the only ones!
 
Take football fans, we constantly hear of fights starting against team fans due to one beating another, and again I don't condone these actions but this again comes out of passion, they obviously want the team they support to win and unfortunately when they don't they behave in unusual ways as some don't really know how to react.
 
So what is my point? Enthusiasts want to be the last to complete there special bond with the ride, the be the last to share a memory with something so special to them. Now a morbid warning... the closing of a ride is a bit like the passing of a family member or relative. (Where am I going with this...) Some people feel more comforted being there in that persons last moment as that then means that there last moment with them was the last moment they had with that person. As weird as it may sound with rides, some people don't feel as connected if there last ride was a month before it closed, as it would have given a lot more memories out after you. It's pretty petty... but it's human nature.
 
Conclusion: How do you solve a problem like enthusiasts? You don't as they are what make theme parks great, and terrible and... what was my point again?

Two weeks after experiencing the wonders of Europa, I would be experiencing another new European park. This park was Liseberg, Sweden's largest amusement park located slap-bang in the middle of Gothenburg home to a fine number of flat rides and coasters. Prior to 2014 I knew nothing about this place until a certain ride helixed into the lineup making this park leapfrog onto my list of must do parks. 



After checking in and dropping our bags off at Gothia Towers we headed over to the park. This is a lovely hotel which is beautifully modern inside and conveniently located across the road from Liseberg and worth a stay. It's striking appearance almost makes it look like something from the Matrix. 

 Such a simple, but highly effective entrance.

New for 2016 is Aerospin, a Gerstlauer sky roller, which is similar to sky force but riders are positioned on a raising tower instead of an arm.

This ride is mixed bag for me. The views from the top of the ride are absolutely stunning offering some lovely views below but trying to spin on this is even more difficult than on the sky fly models. That said trying to freely spin over 200 ft in the air is terrifying enough. IMA score soundtrack for the winning though.

Also new at the park for 2016 is this traditional looking carousel and this lovely looking garden area.The park used to have two S&S drop towers and small wheel in this area but they were removed last year for Aerospin and these. Parks need quiet/green spaces aside from the rides IMHO. 

Another of the park's recent flats is Mechanica, a star shape which opened last year.

 


all this theming and attenton for a flat ride? Amazing! Mechanica has to be one of the most intense rides I've ever experienced too.

They also boast a decent afterburner, this time from Zamperla. Flamingo need one!

And a better and more scary version of Rush. This one goes over a cliff [ if you're looking the right way].
 
There's also a Jukebox themed polyp ride which is great fun and an automatically operated Waltzer which can do some crazy spinning if the timing is right.


They also have a log flume which features an impressively original name. What makes me even more happy is that at over 40, this is a working log flume. Good drops though.



The park also boasts a fun and wild set of rapids. Whilst Fjord is still my favourite, this is still better than Congo and wipes the floor with Rumba.



Liseberg is also home to Europe's largest drop tower once observation tower. Whilst the drop isn't the best, this is made up for this with the superb views at the top and atmosphere. The ride is actually called Atmosphere.

There is however only dark ride at the park, the Fairy Tale Castle. The best thing about this ride is that it's indoors and plays the dream flight soundtrack.
 
Their scare maze Hotel Gasten however is absolutely amazing and worth the paid extra [around £4].

 But there's another important aspect to Liseberg.


The coasters. The park is home to four major coasters, the first of these is Kanonen, an intamin launch coaster.





Considering how small this coaster's footprint is, the layout is remarkable. Unfortunately, the ride's setback is the restraints which are rather tight fitting and dig in during the ride. Well done Intamin. Still a good coaster, but probably not a great one due to the restraints alone. 

Liseberganen is the 2nd of the park's large coasters. A 1987 Schwartzkopf


Whilst at nearly 30 years this may be the park's oldest coaster, it packs one amazing punch and is an amazingly fun thrilling ride. Flying through twists and turns, hills and helixes on the park's hillface. The ride's only minor issue is the brakes, which hit you worse than absinthe. It literally feels like you've almost experienced a car accident each time they kick in. 

Then there's Balder, the park's intamin woodie which has apparently won a number of rewards since it's existence.

Which features  number of other coasters in it's queue. Nemesis, Grand National and Megabobia all feature here.




Which is a fantastic coaster. This features some brilliant moments of ejector airtime throughout the ride, although the corners are unfortunately a little dull honestly speaking. It doesn't beat Wodan but is still one of my favourite woodies. 


And now for the ride you've waited for. Helix














And what a spectacular diamond she is. Helix alone is worth travelling out to the park for. From it's modern airy sci-fi style queue line to it's amazing ride soundtrack. The ride starts as it means to go on, hurtling into a corkscrew immediately after leaving the station followed by a vast array of inversions, twists, turns, helixes [no pun intended] and hills delivering a significant amount of ejector airtime. This ride never shows any signs of slowing as it ascends into the second launch before the ride gets stale in anyform, launching round more exciting elements before entering a final corkscrew into the brake run. 
 
As a result of the ride's immense layout and superb styling amongst being one of the most photo friendly coasters around, makes it my new number one coaster even over taking Wodan. Never have I been on a ride so many times in one trip and still been wanting to go back for more. Once Blackpool gets one of these, it could well be a game changer. Throughputs on this were also very good, no faffing around at all. I would say most park-wide operations were on a par with Towers overall.







And it's in one of the most picturesque  parks out there amongst being my favourite amusement park [not theme park].

And Darkadder won a giant Toblerone!

I got back from a trip to Italy ab out 3 weeks ago. Personally, I think the trip could've been better. This was down to several reasons;
1. The people on it were eh
2. The people running it were rubbish
3. We were 20 minutes from Cinecitta world at one point AND WE DIDNT VIST WHY
buuuut it's sop picturesque I can't really complain too much
Anyway, here's a little collection of pictures and talk through my 5 day trip to Naples and Sorrento and Capri (no sun).
Day 1.
So we spent most of the day travelling but when we arrived in the evening a group of us (there were 40 people on this trip) decided to have a quick look round Sorrento's centre. There really isn't very much, but you get some nice views and architecture here and there.
(this was also a brilliant opportunity for me to get used to my new camera and see what it's like in the dark. The whole trip was basically a chance for me to play with it, as I was given the title 'officially official photographer of the trip guy')


You see right across the bay to Naples. Bare in mind it was very very dark, I couldn't even make out Vesuvius with my naked eye, so I sort of jumped when I saw the photo because it was like a ghost mountain.
Day 2.
Spent most of the day on the Amalfi coast, which is so stereotypiucally Italian you wouldn't believe it.

god h8s u lol



One thing very visible in Italy is the amount of stray pet animals you see. There were wild hot dog dogs. It was absolutely terrifying.


favorite shop of the whole trip tbh


One of the Michelangelo's crypt churches. It's pretty cool but unfortunately my lens was too small to take a picture of the entire structure so I had to take the photo through my friends phone XD
Day 3.
So today we visited Pompeii and Vesuvius. Again my camera's lens wasn't wide enough to take any good photos at the crater of Vesuvius, but yeah the Pompeii photos are alright.


It's not very clear from the pictures but it's mentally windy up at the top. It's a weird sensation, your head is absolutely freezing from the wind yet your feet are quite warm from the rocks.

There were some pretty fun rock formations at the top to take arty pictures with. Played around with the shadows and focus a lot up here; this one is probably my favourite.

After our traditional at every foreign country we go to we have to get a McDonald's at least once meal, we continued into Pompeii, where you're immediately greeted by a bunch of rock people who were caught in the blast, giving you a '15 minutes into Pompeii and chill and he give u dis look' glare.

The ruins were pretty cool to run around. I could see a themed area looking amazing with something like this at a big park like Universal, or maybe even Towers?




A couple cool facts: Pompeii was purposefully built in the shape of a fish, for strategic reasons. Whilst a lot of it is uncovered, archaeologists still reckon about 1/4 of it is under dirt, however after recent excurvations costed so much and actually caused damage to a lot of the artifacts, the excavations have stopped and the site is now being preserved. Also, the roman building technique of this entire city has a particular name which meant 'whatever' or, 'random', but I can't remember the name of the technique in Italian. But it's the reason for some of the structural collapses, and the reason why any of the buildings are prone to just falling over if they decide to.
day 4
We spent the whole day at the island of Capri. Really beautiful place, clearly the inspiration for some of the scenes in How to train your dragon.

probably my favourite picture of the trip. I borrowed someone else's lens for this, and oh my it's just so picturesque and look how blue the water is and the rocks are all so cute I want to hug them

clear httyd resemblance

and from above (with someone elses lens again)

18 people were sick on the boat trip around the island of Capri. I'm proud to say I was not, one of those 18.

Stray dogs everywhere!

Italy just does have the greatest ice cream.


Day 5.
The last day on our trip we were given 6 hours of free time to do whatever. Unfortunately from our hotel the nearest theme park was a 2 hour drive away and no one else wanted to give it a go.
I didn't take any pictures that day because I wasn't expecting to go anywhere particularly picturesque, but anyway, here's a couple from the evening pizza making thingy we did.




After pizza we did some bowling. I broke my all time high score of 27 and got 72!
Only those who went to Guildford know how much of an achievement that is for me.

Aaaaand then we congo lined all the way home.

Oh yes, and kinder bars. I lived off them for the week. You can buy pakcs of 48 for €7 so I was like buying 200 a day. They are great. Just yum.
Sorry for long non rolly toasty post, here's an Italian potato.

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!