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Scarefest


JoshC.

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I bought fast track for the smiler yesterday first thing for in anticipation of it being busy to make sure I get on it... and it was walk on all evening, so annoying lol!

 

Ooops sorry to hear that! :o

 

One thing I forgot to mention about the Smiler - the drainage (or lack of) in the queue is an absolute joke, it was so bad that there was standing water in the projection room too. Some parts of the queue had a good inch of water.

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Ooops sorry to hear that! :o

 

One thing I forgot to mention about the Smiler - the drainage (or lack of) in the queue is an absolute joke, it was so bad that there was standing water in the projection room too. Some parts of the queue had a good inch of water.

I thought there was a massive queue in Monday morning which turned out to be 15 minutes! In fact, the only reason it looked long was because everyone was walking slowly and trying to jump over all the massive puddles inside the queueline!!

Oblivion and Rita's queue were also really bad in places... But the smiler was ridiculous!

On Monday they were both okay, but the storm hadn't started yet. I do agree though that the smiler was particularly bad but on Monday all the other queue lines were fine. Not as bad as walking under storm surge though :3

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I thought there was a massive queue in Monday morning which turned out to be 15 minutes! In fact, the only reason it looked long was because everyone was walking slowly and trying to jump over all the massive puddles inside the queueline!!

On Monday they were both okay, but the storm hadn't started yet. I do agree though that the smiler was particularly bad but on Monday all the other queue lines were fine. Not as bad as walking under storm surge though :3

 

I bought the fast track for 7.30pm so I could ride it in the dark... as I went same time last year and the park was quiet pretty much, but the smiler stayed over an hour queue all day - I never expected every ride in the whole park to be walk on all afternoon/evening regardless of how bad the weather was lol!

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I thought there was a massive queue in Monday morning which turned out to be 15 minutes! In fact, the only reason it looked long was because everyone was walking slowly and trying to jump over all the massive puddles inside the queueline!!

 

 

Yes we were glad when the back of the queue was in the indoor section once we'd battled the puddles along with everyone else- but as I say, there was still a fair bit of water inside too!

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Just from personal experience, try and be in the surrounding area you want to be at night time unless you fancy a lot of walking. We walked from mutiny bay to adventure land followed by X-sector, then to dark forest before having to do a massive loop on the way back to the forbidden valley the long way(through kantaga canyon but we had a ride on #choochoo on the way!)

The sky ride closes at dusk which will be between 4-5pm meaning there is a lot of walking involved, and if the park is busy will mean you get on less. Luckily there were no queues on Monday so I had to walk but it was good exercise and didn't really affect the amount of rides I got on.

Just another point, the mazes were extremely busy when we walked past about 2:30pm and they hadn't even opened yet. I dread to think of what they will be like on half term week but I believe last Saturday they got up to 80mins at one point, however on Monday they were 15mins max after opening. The scare zones were also busy, zombies had a full length and it's only length of queue taken up and scary tales had the full two lengths of queueline full. Despite this only taking about 10-15mins to get in, bear in mind that this was an off peak day so on half term week they are probably likely to be flowing out of the rails. Unsure how alton will manage crowd control on this week though.

I didn't really have any problems on Monday so I don't really have any advice except if you are getting there for park opening, arrive at the car park at 9:30am as the monorail will take you to the entrance for the gates already to be open. Also, come prepared with all types of clothing as the weather varies massively in the north :)

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I sure will be prepared for the weather! thanks like you said as it is half term it will most likely be a lot busier but for things like the scarezones I will make sure I am there reasonably early before they open! The maze situation sounds pretty unorginised really, am I wrong in thinking you have a booked time when you purchase tickets for them? So they must be overselling time slots madly!!

 

I will be there on many different days so I can just stick to certain areas on different nights ensuring the majority of rides will be done in the dark ;) Looking forward to this now!! (but maybe not the chaos of booking for mazes then queueing :/ )

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Unsure about the time slots for the mazes, didn't go in either of the major ones so don't know if you are given a time slot or not. They were both very busy just before opening at 3pm though but I'd imagine they manage it to some extent so the mazes don't become too busy. They are on the queue times app however so the park must be expecting them to have queues to some extent.

If you are going on several days, you will definately get everything done. Be sure to do ripsaw in the dark just before 9pm and you will get the best cycle with a soaking! ;)

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You do get a time slot with the maze tickets, you have to go to either of the mazes within that time slot and then have 40 minutes to do the second maze. Obviously if there is a massive queue for either maze they are understanding of this when letting you in for the second maze. On the first day of Scarefest, The Sanctuary had a huge queue (around 1hr) when our time slot came up at 6.15pm, but Terror of the Towers was only a couple of minutes wait. When we came back round to do The Sanctuary the queue had grown, and we didn't move for about 10 minutes or so.

The issue with the time slot system is (presuming no changes have been made since the weekend) that it doesn't specify which order you should do the mazes in. So everybody from one timeslot could do Terror of the Towers and then go back round to do The Sanctuary, and by that time the next time slot has come round and all those people could go to The Sanctuary first instead, so the queues could in theory have double the amount of people in than is intended. In the past when they had the mazes over at the hotels, they gave you separate time slots for each maze, which in my view was a better idea, for one it cuts down on the possibility of large queues and also it allowed you to choose when you did the mazes, allowing you to break them up a bit if you wanted. Now you are forced to do the two mazes back-to-back, which may not be to everybody's liking.

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I didnt know oblivion could work with 2 shuttles. I always assumed 4 was its minimum to make sure the computer was happy with trains being in blocks.

It can run with one shuttle. Used to when Oblivion opened for Christmas rides back in the days.

 

As with time slots.. it's designed so the team running the Maze make sure people go to the quietest maze first. It's meant to be that both have the same length queue (of not more than 15 minutes), but the team were useless. It's improved recently but still not good enough.

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Hi guys,

 

Just thought I would share a few thoughts on Scarefest from Saturday Night. The park was absolutley packed - even Duel had a queue (I have never seen this before) and waited over 2 hours for The Smiler! The mazes were good - The Sanctuary was great - Terror of the Towers was predictable and not as good but we didn't have to queue for either which was great as I have waited 60+ mins for both in the past. Scary Tales was a great addition but they were missing a third maze in my opinion!

 

Video from the event...

 

Some pictures as well!

15649723522_826ecf33f0_c.jpgScarefest 2014 by ThemeParkMedia, on Flickr

 

15625197516_3b0c3c3905_c.jpgScarefest 2014 by ThemeParkMedia, on Flickr

 

15646212021_42eca42c4e_c.jpgScarefest 2014 by ThemeParkMedia, on Flickr

 

FULL GALLERY ON FLICKR - https://www.flickr.com/photos/themeparkmania/sets/72157648947301796/

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Oh cool, You should have said Hi. Yur it was not bad, a tad cold, but the food was good and the wedding was fun. There were some aspects that, if I were directing it, would be totally changed. It felt like they were using specific themes, just to re-use props. The altonville Motel for example. Why not use what the building actually was, The Garden Tea Room. Having a wedding in the Gardens Tea Room makes perfect sense to me, having a motel that doesnt look like a motel doesn't. Also the ending was a bit meh. It felt rushed and no one really knew what to do. It didnt have an end really. What they should have done was.....

Groom - Thanks for attending our wedding, we have been asked to clear the venue so if you would like to follow me I will escourt you all out.

<group dismount from seating and follow the groom towards the path. to see lots of scare crows lining the path back.>

Bride - Ohh before you go, <- insert current bride closing speach here

<group chased out>

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Didn't notice you were there - even if I did, wouldn't have been able to see you from the smoke!

 

Yes, it was essentially just last year. So in that aspect it was lazy.

 

I was wondering how they would end it, so in that aspect I thought it worked okay (considering the ending lasted 3 hours in the hotels).

 

Would love something similar to continue happening, but storyline would need improving. Something which fits into Towers history would be quite good too.

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 5 months later...

Posted by ScareTour on their Facebook:
 

We have been reliably informed that Scarefest at Alton Towers will include 1 new maze (name and theme unknown), major upgrades to Terror of the Towers and The Sanctuary and two brand new scare zones

 

ScareTour are usually very reliable, so I'd be surprised if this turns out to be wrong.  Will be good to have a decent amount of investment pumped into the event with 3 new attractions.

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Whilst I am yet to properly experience a Scarefest myself, from what I've heard about the last few years (which generally sound like it was getting repetitive and going down hill), a new maze sounds a very welcomed and much needed addition and it's good to see there will be some big enhancements to the existing ones.

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  • 1 month later...

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