Mark9

Mikey, your love for rides is so infectious.

The phrase "damning with faint praise" never felt so apt.

http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2010/11/01/ugandan-newspaper-publishes-new-list-of-gay-men/We're such a sad race. We are so intelligent, so world changing and yet we live in a world where socieites hunt down homosexuals to hang them or put them in life time inprisoment. Really makes me think how lucky I am to live in a country where it is becoming more and more acceptable. So horrible and gut wrenching to read stories like that.

Gosh so rude. Never known someone who thought so highly of themselves with such little reason.

I came...

Tsch.. so pedantic

Agreed. nothing like that ever happens at Thorpe.http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/southern_counties/3579359.stmhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/845267.stmhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/1639891.stmNAKED RIDERS TO THE RESCUE!

The new B&M Dive Machines at Heide Park is named..KrakeKrake firework displayAccording to a member on Towers Times, the ride will consist of three rowed trains with six people per row. The first drop will go into the mouth of Kraken and you will come out of a pirate ship on the other side. A water splash effect will also be on the ride following the suit of the Dive Machines in America and China.So there we have it, two new B&M's in Europe, both themed around some kind of animal and the theme of the rides being at the forefront of advertising.

I wouldn't call it an arguement, I'd call it a discussion.

But thats not what I am saying at all. Read what I am saying Jord.These attacks don't just happen one at a time, September 11th, July 7th were all a series of attacks. They all a targeted thing. The Tube did stop running when bombs started going off, airports grinded to a halt when the Trade Centres were hit and were still hampered weeks and months afterwards. The world effectively changed when these things started to occur.Afterall, ever seen the way a simple fire alert at a station can effect an entire underground line?I am in no way implying that Thorpe having a bomb attack would immediately stop Heathrow and they would all run round like headless chickens. What I am saying is that they would have to sit up and take note because the bomb exploding is only a few miles away from the airport.

A bomb being let off a few miles away from a major airport, and they'd only think "oh its not us, no need to worry then"The Eye, definitly because its the centre of London, but Alton, the middle of nowhere? really? They want to make an impact, but they also want to disrupt as much as possible. Somehow, attacking a theme park that isn't close to any airports, train lines or major motorways seems unlikely..

Well a few things you've made me think.Disney as more a target. true but think of Thorpe's location. It's a few short miles from one of the leading airports in Europe (in terms of air traffic and customers), the park itself is located within a stones throw of the M4 and the M25 so if a terrorist bomb was to go off at Thorpe, it wouldn't be just to destroy Thorpe but would be to cause issues to transport.Now this is rather large scale, Thorpe wouldn't be the first place I'd target if I was a terrorist. So I believe the searches are to discourage anti-social behavior. And yes they may be an inconvenience to people but I would much rather the visual deterrent of security and searches at the entrances then to have the invisible prescence at Alton where drugs, alcohol and smoking are common place in queuelines.I am happy with the random searches though.

Looking gorgeous so far. Love the strange shapes of track

I agree to some extent.. on the other hands seraches are necessary at Thorpe and I'd argue are needed at Alton.

So what we're basically saying here is that rides with excellent layouts, decent themes are unnecessary, all we need is a crayon and a piece of paper, draw the shortest layout imaginable and that will get ride enthusiasts and general public foaming at the mouth.I think I might become a ride designer, this ****s easy.

So went to Alton Towers yesterday. Not the best decision as another 28,000 people also decided to descend upon the park. The good thing however about visiting on the busiest of days is that you see that when the park is near capacity, it copes very well. Due to problems waking up we only left our Stafford hotel at 9:30. The drive to Uttoxeter was easy going but once we hit the small town, the road traffic to Alton stretched for a good 8 miles. This is why YOU SHOULD ALWAYS BE ON TIME TO PARKS.We did eventually get to the park at 12, the monorail queue lasted 5 minutes so even when the queue stretches past Adventure Golf, it's worth getting the train to the entrance. It became apparent quite early on that the park was busy as every shop, ride, attraction seemed to be at bursting point. After queuing 15 minutes for some drinks (and encountering a flash mob) we descened upon Terror of the Towers. We queued an hour and whilst Marc wasn't impressed the rest of us seemed to enjoy it. Because it's in the Towers it does feel more epic in scale then just walking around a marquee. We next decided to go for Th13teen as Michaela had never been on before. Again, we queued an hour for the Intamin wonder. I did come off wondering why we'd bothered but alas, it wasn't completely awful.After another exciting Pizza/Pasta dinner (well worth every penny) we went to queue for Oblivion. The queue-board didn't even bother telling us the queue time so we went for it anyway. We queued pretty much from the entrance all the way up the hill. It only took an hour which in my opinion is pretty impressive. The next ride was Spinball. Maurer Sohne are just a major contradiciton. There ride experience is brilliant but everything else about them is shoddy. Next was an hour long queue for Nemesis. Bloody brilliant ride, enough said. Next was onto Air and finally a ride on Rita. Yes we only got on 6 rides, yes the park was heaving and yes the park wasn't running completely on full capacity (Several areas close early at dusk including the Gardens) but we had a great time. I was surprised the queues for the coasters only took an hour. After years of hearing nightmare stories of 3 hour queues for Nemesis and Air, to only queue an hour for things impressed me on such a busy day.

Oh my god, how many were there?! Every partnership interview I've had has only lasted an hour.Still, hope you get it, Waitrose is an excellent place to work.

Canada Creek Railway (5)Colossus (6)Detonator (5)Loggers Leap (5)Nemesis Inferno (6)Rush (5)Stealth (3)CCR +Stealth -CCR IS AWESOME!

Canada Creek Railway (7)Colossus (5)Detonator (5)Loggers Leap (5)Nemesis Inferno (6)Rush (6)Slammer (0)Stealth (6)CCR +Slammer -GOODBYE SLAMMER

Agreed. There's nothing quite like guests being stuck over gorilla cages and shouting "When I get off this I'm going to kill you all."

Canada Creek Railway (6)Colossus (5)Detonator (5)Loggers Leap (5)Nemesis Inferno (6)Rocky Express (3)Rush (5)Slammer (5)Stealth (5)CCR +1Stealth -1

I've been posting in "what I'd do to Chessington" topics about the state of the parks toilets for a few years now. I don't understand how Thorpe seemed to have changed their toilets every year now whilst Chessington's haven't been updated since the early 90's

I would but I think me and Benin posting endlessly may get rather tyring