Roodie

Unprecedented 5th post in a row...
 
The announcement has confirmed a King Arthur style theme.  The area will be called Avalon (a mythical island from Arthur legend).  The coaster will be called Fenix, and the boat ride will be called Merlin's Quest, and last ~12 minutes.  The rumoured layouts posted ages ago are correct, making Fenix the tallest and longest wing coaster in Europe.  Some pictures from the park...
 

 

 
Fenix has 6 rows. 
 


 
This just loves awesome
 
 
I'm so excited for this in case you couldn't tell.  Truly fantastic investment from the park. 
 
Some more photos from the park and the story of the ride are over on Looopings - https://www.looopings.nl/weblog/8529/Toverland-onthult-details-en-ontwerpen-van-spectaculaire-wing-coaster-Fenix.html

And the coffee!

@Han30 we all know what you are thinking off!

1) Explorer car park is the God awful grass one. The entrance and exit of the car park is via pot holed God awful "roads", it's terrible and not helped by the useless staff members who are hired to work in a car park but seemingly don't understand how parking works... To answer your question though, you'd never be looking at more than a 5 minute walk from the explorer car park to it's relevant entrance.
2) As that entrance spits you out straight into Land of the Dragons literally opposite Dragon's Fury's entrance, they don't open the gates into the park till opening time.
3) As previously stated, entrance and exit to the explorer car park is via terrible mostly destroyed "roads", it would be very foolish in my opinion to even think about parking in the explorer car park, then powering out into oncoming cars.
 
If you are that desperate, why not pay a tenner and park in the express parking car park, located to the left of the main entrance? To get there enter the coach park/express car park entrance, pay your money and you are now parked right next to your beloved Lodge Gate entrance. Saves your legs too!
 
I parked in the explorer car park once, never again. It's 10 pounds or bust for me, which just gives me even less reason to visit Chessington these days.

whos thatttttt

I love watching people running to catch the Jubilee line at Stratford. I especially love it when they miss the train.
 
I'm a horrible person.

So Chessington do some low key theming and advertising outside one of their mazes and get slated.  Thorpe and Towers do nothing but fencing and shipping containers outside and that's cool.
 
Never happy are enthusiasts..

@Han30 and myself have booked for the 12th.  This is our first time doing Tulley's, so hopefully it will be good fun!

It's been a lot less effort being weird.

@Han30 and myself have booked for the 12th.  This is our first time doing Tulley's, so hopefully it will be good fun!

@Han30 and myself have booked for the 12th.  This is our first time doing Tulley's, so hopefully it will be good fun!

@Han30 and myself have booked for the 12th.  This is our first time doing Tulley's, so hopefully it will be good fun!

Hi all!
 
Just a quick update regarding Fright Nights meet, I've been desperate to release details for it for a while now but we are having to wait for a few things unfortunately. The provisional date for the meet will be Saturday 7th October, but 1st, 8th and 15th October will also be in the vote.
 
As soon as I can release more details about it I will, but it's going to be exciting (hopefully)!

Day 8
 
Putting yesterday's complete failure behind us... It was with heavy hearts that today marked our last day in Japan.
 
On route to our final park we came across our first Japanese only train ticket machine. We must have looked as confused as we felt because within a minute a friendly lady came over and pretty much did all the work while we handed her the cash and kept saying thank you (in Japanese of course). A short but pleasant train ride later and we arrived at...
 
Hirakata Park https://rcdb.com/5004.htm
 
Having done stuff before setting off to the park and having to be at the airport at 5 we knew we had to put the run into credit run as soon we entered this charming little park. We were pretty much the only visitors in the entire park, which of course in this case was a good thing. The park was very well looked after, had that quirky Japanese feel and the staff were so incredibly friendly, it was the perfect park to end our Japanese tour on.
 
Crazy Mouse https://rcdb.com/1303.htm - Reverchon spinner, but this one didn't spin making it completely pointless really. The staff were so happy to have customers though so I pretended to love it to keep them happy, I'm such a nice person.
Elf https://rcdb.com/1304.htm - Cute tiny Intamin woodie, was completely forceless but for what it was I really enjoyed it.
Fantastic Coaster Rowdy https://rcdb.com/1305.htm - You're jealous you don't have that name on your coaster count, I'll admit that for you.
Peekaboo Town https://rcdb.com/2501.htm - Japan saved the best for last, no not the coaster, the operator, easily one of the most stunning women I've ever seen, therefore this coaster is great, end of review.
Red Falcon https://rcdb.com/1306.htm - Probably the best Jet Coaster I've ridden, bring on next time I say, can't get enough of these pointless things.
 
Leaving the park very happy and with over an hour to spare we were feeling very pleased with ourselves, then it all went to hell.
 
Somewhere between Hirakata and the trip to the hotel to collect our bags we collectively and fully ran out of cash. You can just card the trains I'm sure, I remember saying, but no, Japan's subway is cash only... After spending a while trying to find a cash point that 1) did debit cards and 2) didn't have a minimum spend (we needed enough to get to airport, not enough to buy a house) we finally got to the hotel and got our bags. Power walked to Osaka station to find that 1) taxi drivers in Japan that are clearly taxi drivers, don't understand the word taxi and just stare at you till you back away laughing 2) Osaka has 2 airports and we don't know how to get to the one we want. We asked the tourist help women (desperate times) and she said it's over an hour from here to your airport. We paid our money and got our tickets. Spent about 30 minutes trying to check into the flight while on the trains, just about did it. We were going to arrive at 4:15, for a 5 take off flight and we had checked luggage, we were screwed! Or maybe not, literally running through Osaka airport we got to the Asiana desk to see the 2 Korean women running it weighing themselves on the luggage conveyors. Walked over, "Seoul?", "yes!", "whose bag first?", so at the very least our bags were going to Korea that evening. It's now 4:30 plane is delayed but due to take off at 5:15, one of the most intense queues for security of my life and we finally made it. Thank you Asiana!
 
We got back to Korea at about 8 and went to our first Lotteria (like much better Japanese version of McDonalds) and got their cheese sticks, bliss. This time for cost purposes, Japan had shaken us in the money department, we took the subway the whole way from airport to our hotel, which was just outside Lotte World, it took forever! After too much faff to even try to remember we arrived at our hotel. The adorable girl working the desk didn't know what she getting herself in for! Firstly booking.com had somehow screwed some part of the booking, so she spent about 15 minutes slapping her computer, saying she was sorry for the wait and repeating. We got our rooms, I should of had a double room to myself, walked in, 2 twin beds, damn. I had been dead on my feet for the last 5 hours so wasn't at all bothered. Took off my shoes and went to wash my face. Knock on the door. It was the lovely girl from downstairs, I've pulled I thought to myself as I opened the door. She said sorry about a million times and gave me my new room key, walking off forgetting to take the old one. Shoes back on. Lift downstairs. Return the unneeded key to her and told her not to worry, it's fine. Went to my new room and the key didn't work, I almost at this point felt like sleeping in a hallway. I'm not sure my body can take this anymore plus I can't keep doing this to her. Lift downstairs again. As doors open and she sees me I hear her shout the Korean expression for "what can I do" and she begins slapping her computer again. Finally sorted I left her to enjoy her night and realised it's now midnight and I need to get up in 6 hours. How did I survive this trip, I'm sure there's something in the air in Korea and Japan that helped us, Lord know if this was Europe I'd have been 6 feet under by now.
 
Sorry for lack of pictures again, was powering round the park too fast to take any. They will return tomorrow in style as I take on the fabled Aquatrax!

I'm on the side of BaronC, they're second in attendance to Disney. You're comparing the twelve (?) gated attractions Disney own, against the hundred and odd Merlin now have. Thorpe doesn't even scratch the surface of the attendance figures achieved by a single Universal park, or PortAventura etc. so to make a big thing out of Merlin being second so Thorpe should be flawless is BS. Thorpe is not only a long way down in attendance of any theme park in the world, or even Europe, its probably a long way down against other Merlin sites around the world; and remember; each site has its own budgets and management who make the majority of the decisions. Whilst I fully agree the attractions should be open, I also sway to agree it makes sod all difference closing them during the off-peak if they're being ridden by a few hundred people a day tops. It's a waste on resource, everything from having the staff to open them, to the engineers to safety check them. I think some people on here think that rides just magically open every day sometimes... think about it. Saving those two staff members is the difference between a solo (poor) platform operation on Samurai and a decent one (two). It could bring the third body required to run two trains on Inferno, there's lots of positions which could easily be considered a priority position. And with it coming to end of terms, people are graduating, taking exams etc. I wouldn't be surprised if this decision is solely based on staff availability and they're taking the hit for one week.
 
And to whoever posted a while ago about 'how hard can it be to operate a frog hopper' - jog on. As an ex ride-operator every ride is different; none of them are overly complex they just naturally have different things to look out for. But having worked at a few places, including Paultons; I guarantee you now working children's rides can be and often is 10x more challenging than operating a coaster or thrill ride at Thorpe. An adult screams they want Rush to stop? Nah, it keeps going you're an adult. A child screams for a frog hopper to stop? You better stop it ASAP otherwise you're gonna have a parent giving you the odds, a complaint filed against you, and your job on the line. You've got to be so much more on the ball with your operation, your visual checks, your customer service the lot; just because you're working around children and (worse) their parents and guardians.

From the variety of opinions on here I'd say it's subjective how much people think the ride is rough. Just saying if I could have 9 back to back rides on any coaster in Thorpe, The Swarm would be my first choice. The comfiest restraints and the smoothest coaster! 

I love Saw - yes certain trains can be a bit jolty at times but honestly - I rode it 9 times one day in the space of about an hour and yes I had a bit of a headache after - but nothing in comparison to Infusion at BPB.  I've never experienced so much pain on a coaster as that one - at least with Saw you sometimes get the odd jolt - with Infusion it's constant from start to finish (and I went front row - God knows how horrific it is at the back).
I know they are 2 completely different coasters but when it comes to discomfort on a ride, Infusion is hell.  I've had my head smashed against a brick wall before and that was less painful 

The constant stream of people asking questions isn't helping either...
 
When the park/football team/corporate entity have something to announce, they will announce it... Badgering them about something is just grating down on everyone's nerves...

As Baron said - Behind the scenes planning is just as much as part of redeveloping something as the construction work its self. 
 
I know you like the "left to rot" statement - but if loggers needs X amount of £ to remain operational, but the park had plans for that area in the near future, why waste the money on keeping a ride going what has no long term future? Its not like they are short of water rides. 

First off congratulations on the weight loss.
 
I'm a 2XL/3XL and I can get on Saw Swarm (it is a little snug), Stealth and Inferno (although I always go to the big boy seats).  Unfortunately I can't really help with the flat rides as I don't really do them.  However anything with a lap bar you will be fine on. Most of the big rides have tester seats, so don't be afraid to try them.

Finally got up to Blackpool yesterday and I will do a blog thingy when I've recovered from getting my brain rattled around on Infusion but I have to say.....Valhalla - bloody brilliant.  Ok I've not been to a massive amount of parks and only one abroad (DLP) so I don't know what other big water rides are like but I was massively impressed - so much so that I went on it 5 times.  I'm not a fan of walking around with squishy wet feet but it is so worth it (thankfully it was lovely weather) 

Didn't the one in Australia have seat belts? I know it was a completely different kind of accident,  but doesn't that highlight a case not to have them?

Do we have to say it 3 times like 'Beetlejuice'?

Do we have to say it 3 times like 'Beetlejuice'?