Alton Towers Trip Reports

[Mark9]

Thanks for the report

You have to wonder what goes through their heads - why would you run Rita on one train in school holidays?

Alton would only ever run Rita on one train if there was a problem with one of them. We don't have to make up conspiracy theories or attack Merlin for everything you know.

[JoshC.]

Th13teen's shutter seems to be like Inferno's mist - very hit and miss, and can completely change the experience depending on whether it works or not.

It's interesting really, I would have thought the shutter system could have been synced with the drop system, so that if the drop system works, then the shutter will also work. Seems not, but I would have thought that such a thing was physically possible, so it's curious that's not the case...

[Project LC]

Rita would have been on one train because of a fault with either the train or the launch system. If the launch system cant return in time then its easier and safer to run one train. That was the reason stealth was on one train operation for about 3 weeks last year so I imagine it was a similar case.

[Fred]

They've been having issues with the purple train a bit. So I imagine this will be the reason for one train goodness.

[Coaster]

Alton Towers Trip Report - Tuesday 27th & Wednesday 28th May 2014

Despite being the school holidays, Alton Towers was surprisingly quiet!

The weather was forecast to rain all day on both days, however we didn't get more than an hour of rain on either day. I can only assume that the forecast put some people off visiting.

We had a very enjoyable two days at the park, with very few faults and I was very impressed overall (as the visit last October had been very poor!)

Most rides were on full capacity, and apart from The Smiler breakdowns were minimum.

HIGHLIGHTS:

- Single Rider Queues are very useful at the park and I wish Thorpe would bring them back!

- Lots of re-rides on Nemesis!

- Got on The Smiler more than expected (considering it was school holidays).

LOWLIGHTS:

- Four breakdowns on Smiler on the second day (only one on the first day!)

- Skyride down until late afternoon on the second day

- Courtyard BBQ was not up to it's usual standard, and the one at Thorpe is much better.

NOTES:

- Duel is looking past it's best, and I hope it sees some work over the closed season.

- Staff weren't their usual cheery selves.

RIDECOUNT:

Tuesday 27th May:

Nemesis x7

The Smiler x4

Duel x3

Oblivion x2

Thirteen x1

Air x1

Nemesis: Sub - Terra x1

Congo River Rapids x1

Wednesday 28th May:

Nemesis x12

The Smiler x4

Duel x3

Oblivion x1

Thirteen x1

Sonic Spinball x1

Rita x1

Hex x1

The Flume x1

TOTAL: 45

[Coaster]

Sunday 7th July 2014 - Trip Report

We arrived at Alton Towers at about 8:45am after a 6am start, got the monorail in and headed over to X-Sector.

 

Two quick ERT rides on Oblivion were had before joining the queue for The Smiler, which opened 10 minutes early with no problems.  After this we had two more rides via the Single Rider Queue before heading over to Dark Forest.  Here we had two rides on Rita (still rubbish) using the SRQ, and one go on Thirteen which was playing up.

 

Hex was next, followed by lunch as the Explorer's Pizza Pasta, after which we went on Congo River Rapids.  Here they were not filling the rafts, which caused the queue to be much longer than it should have been!  Despite this, we got put in a group of 8 as they started filling them just as we were near the front of the queue.  

Two rides on Duel were next, which has seen a few touch ups such as webs in the spider room which look really effective.  It broke down on the second ride causing my brother to get a score of 105,000!

After Duel we headed over to the Nemesis SRQ, but it broke down so we had a quick ride on Air (by which time it had reopened).

 

Nemesis was running the best I've ever known it, it was absoloutely flying round the track!  Even the stall turns were intense today!  9 rides were had using the SRQ.  It would have been more but someone threw up all over the station which caused a 20 minute delay.  The man cleaning it told us that in 6 years of working there he had never seen (or smelt) anything quite like it!

I would have happily stayed on Nemesis until 5:30 but my brother wanted to go back on The Smiler so we went on that (which was also running very well) before one last ride on Oblivion as the queues were due to close in two minutes.

 

Overall we had a very good day, with very few niggles.

 

Highlights:

- Nemesis was like a bat out of hell!

- Single Rider Queues were very useful once again

- The Smiler also running very well

- Park wasn't very busy

 

Lowlights:
- Ride close being 5:30

- People who can't keep their lunch down holding us up on Nemesis!

- Quite a few breakdowns (Thirteen, Nemesis, Hex)

- Why do they make you walk through the arcade after going on Oblivion? 

 

RIDECOUNT:

Nemesis x9

The Smiler x4

Oblivion x3

Duel x2

Rita x2

Thirteen x1

Air x1

Hex x1

Congo River Rapids x1

 

TOTAL: 24

[Cal]

Here they were not filling the rafts, which caused the queue to be much longer than it should have been!  Despite this, we got put in a group of 8 as they started filling them just as we were near the front of the queue.  

 

Noticed this on both days that I went this year, the queue was about half an hour. Most people were in 2's, the queue would of been so much quicker if they were filling them up. At Thorpe we got put with people at about a 5-10 minute queue, which I think is a good thing. Same with the Flume, but by the time it was our turn we had to go with people, after it breaking down a few times making the queue massive.

[Coaster]

I'm just going to post ridecounts and a few points as I'm not sure if anyone reads trip reports anymore; 

 

Wednesday 27th August:

Nemesis x9

Th13teen x2

Duel x2

The Smiler x1

Air x1

Nemesis:  Sub Terra x1

Battle Galleons x1

 

Thursday 28th August:

Nemesis x5

The Smiler x2

Duel x2

Oblivion x1

Th13teen x1

Rita x1

Hex x1

Congo River Rapids x1

Battle Galleons x1

 

Friday 29th August:

Nemesis x22

The Smiler x2

Th13teen x2

Sonic Spinball x1

Oblivion x1

Rita x1

The Flume x1

Hex x1

Duel x1

Nemesis:  Sub Terra x1

 

Highlights:

• 22 rides on Nemesis in one day! 
• Single Rider Queues.  Without them, I would have got a much, much lower ridecount.
• Changes in Hex were fantastic!
• Getting soaked on the rapids!  I'm sure those waterfalls never used to get you.
• Closing time extension to 7pm on Wednesday and Friday.

 

Annoyances/General points:

• Not starting the monorail with all the trains on.  This causes a queue to build up as soon as it opens, especially in peak season.
• Waited an hour in the single rider queue on The Smiler on friday due to two stoppages.  One was to take a train off, and the other one was to change two trains over.  Very annoying to say the least, as it took an hour out of our ride time.
• The Smiler didn't open until 10:40 on friday, yet it was supposed to open at 9am for ERT.
• Ticket machines broke on Friday, meaning that nobody (aside from annual passholders and prebooked tickets) could get in for an hour and a half!  Didn't affect me, but I think they used it as an excuse to not open The Smiler on time.
• Breakdown on Duel resulting in all the lights being switched on - unfortunately we were in the station!  If only I had got there a few minutes earlier I would have seen the behind the scenes of the ride!

Thanks for reading.

[Mark9]

Love how detailed the negative points are compared to the positives. 

[Coaster]

Love how detailed the negative points are compared to the positives. 

With the positive points there isn't really anything else to add, whereas the negative points need explaining.  Also, I already wrote about the changes in Hex in the Hex topic.

[Fred]

 

• Ticket machines broke on Friday, meaning that nobody (aside from annual passholders and prebooked tickets) could get in for an hour and a half!  Didn't affect me, but I think they used it as an excuse to not open The Smiler on time.

Ticket machines were working fine. They had no internet across park until 5pm - so all card payments were done manually, and you couldn't pay by card across the theme park!

 

(plus stuff like queue time boards weren't really working etc)

[Coaster]

Ticket machines were working fine. They had no internet across park until 5pm - so all card payments were done manually, and you couldn't pay by card across the theme park!

 

(plus stuff like queue time boards weren't really working etc)

I spoke to several people who had been told they couldn't get in due to the ticket machines breaking, as well as someone at the same place I was staying telling me that they had to wait an hour and a half for them to be fixed before anyone could get in.

[Fred]

Ticket machines were fine. Internet, and therefore card machines, were not

[TPJames]

Alton Towers Monday 20th October 2014:

As I hadn't visited the park since I was little, I was pretty excited. I went in with high expectations from what I had heard and recently visiting Portaventura and being amazed. To say I was impressed is an understatement. The park was amazingly themed, with added extra scarefest theming and lighting all over the park. Every land was done to perfect detail and the park overall was to a very high standard. I wouldn't say it was as good as Portaventura but it did have a very high standard and was far superior to thorpe park.

We got to the park early at 9:30am however was greeted with a trip on the monorail! This was unexpected as I thought only hotel guests got to ride the monorail but it was great fun. Passing by all the lands built up the tension and the excitement. Once we got to the entrance, we literally went straight into the park as the gates had opened early. We had been given some free priority passes along with our free tickets so we decided to collect these early as we knew the park was very big and would take a while to walk around.

We went straight to the smiler and was greeted with a 50minute queue. Bear in mind today was an off peak day however everyone appeared to go straight to the smiler. We had a pleasant suprise as the queue was more like 20-30mins and 30mins appeared to be the max queue time on park throughout the whole day which was great. I think my expectations were a little high for the smiler, although it was a great ride and it was insane how many times we looped, it was not my favourite and I think the actual ride experience could have been a little more interesting. Still a good, fun and long ride experience though!

The smiler: 7/10.

Next up, we decided to tackle the rest of X-Sector and went to oblivion. The queue was stated at 15mins but we actually only waited around 5 mins to get on. I don't think it got busier than this all day which was great. Visually, the ride was higher than I expected and was pretty stunning. The fact that you just drop into darkness is pretty insane. The actual ride experience was just as intense, I loved the feeling of the drop it felt so fast and intense. Despite the ride being so short, it was great and is a B&M rollercoaster which made it so much better

Oblivion: 9/10.

Next up we made our way over to dark forest, however we tackled HEX on the way. Hex was an interesting one, we had to wait a long time for the ride to start as we had to wait for the first room to fill up before the experience could begin. I did love the theming inside the attraction, it was done to a great standard and the pre-show was great fun. The actual ride was pretty cool in itself, we all got very confused as to whether the ride was going upside down or if the walls were moving around us! It did feel like we were going upside down though! The attraction was great and was done to very high standards. When we reached the dark forest, the first ride in sight was Rita. As it was known as queen of speed I was excited to get on and see how it compared to stealth. There was about a 5minute wait and it was on 2trains which was brilliant(I'll take this oppertunity to say that smiler was on 5trains I believe however may have been 4 and oblivion was on 4 shuttles with a longer wait to get off than on!). Just as we got on it started to pour which made it so painful and I had to cover my face the whole way round. However, later on we did go on again and it was much better as I could actually see where we were going. The ride was good fun and pretty fast and longer than stealth. Unsure which I prefer however I think stealth had the slight edge as it's faster than Rita.

Rita: 7/10.

We headed over to th13teen however as it was having technical problems, we decided to take the skyride over to the forbidden valley. I was looking forward to the forbidden valley most as it had the ride I was most looking forward to, Air. The first ride we saw was the blade which was fun however I believe black buccaneer swings higher. Next up, was ripsaw. Ripsaw was on a decent cycle and was walk on all day. The first time I went on it we stayed dry however I did go on twice more in the dark and got the spinniest cycle with a MASSIVE drenching!!

So the next ride we did was air. The queue time was stated as a 'bubbly 20mins' and I think it was around that if not a bit less. When we rode only the left station was open however was on two trains. They opened the right station just as we were getting on however continued to operate two trains which was very strange. Air never peaked over 20minutes all day which was good so was unsure why they decided to do the alternate station operation. I was suprised that my legs got strapped in aswell as my body and when we raised it was pretty amazing. The ride has such a great concept and the execution of the actual ride was amazing and pretty intense. I wouldn't say I felt like I was flying as at points it was very intense however I did feel like I was gliding through the air. I did love this ride, probably my favourite of the day as it had such an interesting concept and ride design to it. B&M as well so I knew it would be great!

Air: 9/10.

Next up was nemesis before lunch. Nemesis was stated at 15mins but was actually around 5. Once again, two train operation which was brilliant so the queue moved up pretty smoothly. I will review it now, despite my second ride being better than my first. This ride is far superior to nemesis inferno, the layout and intensity is much better. However, on the first ride it was good, but not great. On the 2nd ride though, I rode it in the dark and it felt much faster and more intense. After the first corkscrew, it just got pretty crazy. The fact that it was in the dark as well meant that I couldn't see a thing.

Nemesis: 8/10.

Next we took a walk to the gloomy wood and decided to do duel. This time it was DUEL LIVE. There were actors inside the queueline and exit which scared us a lot! These actors made the ride so much better however, as otherwise it was practically tomb blaster. The actors were meant to be alton towers ancestors and they were pretty great! I even had a photo with then earlier on in the morning at the entrance aswell!

We then entered Kantaga Canyon and MutinyBay. We wanted to do the mine train however it was experiencing technical difficulties which was upsetting so we decided to go into the sea life centre. Pretty much the standard sea life centre with a bit of theming which was nice. Then we did heave ho which was also great fun as it had a much longer cycle than griffins galleon and actually had theming and a soundtrack as well! We had basically done all we wanted to do in that area so went over to spinball to try and use our dedicated priority pass to it. However, the queue was only 5mins so we decided to use the normal queue and fastrack later. We didn't spin that much, but it was a pretty fun and intense ride and I think I prefered it to dragons fury as the S-bend makes the ride a lot better. Did enjoy it but ovbiously doesn't compare to the other coasters. Good for what it is though.

Spinball: 6/10.

So then we decided to tackle th13teen as it had reopened with a 30minute queue! We went straight there and used our dedicated priority passes. I knew what was coming in th13teen and won't ruin it directly here incase people haven't done it. It was fun, but again not amazing however was much better when I did it in the dark in the evening. The ending is the best bit if course, the rest is just a bit like the runaway mine train!

Th13teen: 6/10.

We then went into the wobble world and took on Charlie and the chocolate factory. Once again, hopes were a bit high for this and there was no sign of chocolate anywhere!!! The glass elevator at the end was fun though. Would have liked a bit more attention out into it. We then did ice age 4D which was good and the effects were much better than angry birds 4D! I did prefer it overall was a fun and interesting show with a genuine storyline unlike angry birds 4D. Then we decided to do twirling toadstool! This was great fun as the operators were doing a lot of guest interaction which just made it great fun! Prefered it to monkey swings as well which was a suprise.

After a long stay in wobble world cafe, we went and watched the trick or treat party show. This was fun and the songs were great and I just thought it was great for the kids who wanted to do it. Once again, we got the sky ride over to the forbidden valley and decided to do nemesis sub terra. Nemesis sub terra was actually better than expected. The whole experience was pretty fast paced and intense except for the slow and boring extremely long wait inside the preschool before it started. The ending was pretty good too , nice to see they are putting some scare actors into their attractions as well as wasn't expecting any. Then we went over to the mine train which was far superior to the one at chessington, great fun and loved the smoke being pumped inside the tunnel. Great fun overall and once again a lot of interaction from the ride team who were very friendly! #choochoo!

We then went over to spinball as it was advertised as 20mins but was actually broken down so we headed to oblivion. Once again a 5minute wait for oblivion so we did that and was as brilliant as before. Afterwards, we headed back to spinball which was reopen however on a 3per car rule. As there were no single riders it was practically 2 per car so it was lucky we had our fastracks to hand! It was also much spinnier with only 3 in our car which was also great fun!

Afterwards, we went for dinner in the cafe before doing some night rides. As the sky ride was now closed, there was a lot of walking involved. For a start we walked all the way over to the dark forest just to do th13teen in the dark(which was walk on luckily) before having to walk all the way back to the towers to get to the forbidden valley. On the way to the forbidden valley we did the mine train again which was once again great and even better in the dark!

Once inside the forbidden valley, we decided to tackle nemesis, air and ripsaw. Both nemesis and air were walk on however running one train full followed by one train empty. Strange system as I understand they don't want to waste time by removing the trains however why not just fill both trains? Nemesis and air were also superior in the dark and then we decided to do ripsaw twice. Ripsaw at the end of the day was great, we got a particularly good cycle and he gave us a soaking. Unsure if that was a good thing or not though aha! We then took a walk back through kantaga canyon to the entrance and got the monorail back to the car park.

I had a great day and think kantaga canyon is my favourite area, it had great lighting in the dark and the area is well themed and the music is amazing. Despite only having family attractions, I loved the area and both attractions in it were of high quality. We did not do the mazes or scarezones as £7 per maze was pretty hefty. I understand the scare zoneswere free however they had long queues and I didn't particularly fancy getting scared like at fright nights. I wouldn't like to see the queues for zombies and scary tales next week as they were out of the railings(two lengths long) last night. Scary tales looked particularly good though, looked very well themed from the outside with nice music.

All the rides on park were great and the weather held off for most of the day, the atmosphere and theming was brilliant and the park was very big and there was a lot to do. A great day out and is highly reccomend visiting the park. The longest queue on park was 30mins all day for the smiler but most rides stayed at 5-10mins for most of the day.

Ride count:

Smiler x1

Oblivion x2

Rita x2

Hex x1

Blade x1

Air x2

Ripsaw x3

Spinball x2

Duel x1

Heave HO x1

Th13teen x2

Charlie and the chocolate factory x1

Ice age 4D x1

Twirling toadstool x1

Sub-terra x1

Mine train x2

Nemesis x2

Sea life centre x1

Total: 27.

[jammydodger]

So I went to alton towers in the summer and never really got round to do a trip report and my opinion on the park until now. So here it is :-)

As we only had one day at the park we decided to go for the whole day, 10-6. We managed to do all of the main rides including a couple of rerides which was good. The park as a whole was much better than Thorpe, with a much nicer atmosphere.

Oblivion

We started the day with oblivion because the smiler had not opened yet and it was right next door. Oblivion was a short yet fantastic experience and is definitely in my top 20 coasters. Maybe it isn't as effective if you have ridden it many times, but as a first time rider I really enjoyed it and was generally scared at the top. I would give oblivion a solid 7/10

The Smiler

I wasn't expecting that much from this ride, just a relatively thrilling experience that wouldn't really compare too much to oblivion. All I can say is that I completely underestimated how good this ride would be. It looks great, the queue is great and it was definitely my favourite ride of the day. I love the way that it is so long, and the way you kind of stop at the top of every inversion. All in all an amazing ride that had me disoriented and dizzy by the end of it. 11/10

Air

I had never ridden a rollercoaster like this before so I was super excited to try this one out. And just as I imagined, it was great fun. Its one of those rides that you can do over and over again, and still find it really fun. Just as expected, a really fun coaster. 7/10

Nemesis

OK, so if now is the time for quite a large portion of controversy. I knew this ride would be good, and don't get me wrong, it was good and I did enjoy it. But, I really don't think it was as good as everyone says it is. It was fast, exhilarating and fun, but I don't think it lived up to my high expectations. If I was to choose between original or inferno, and I hate to say this, but I would have to say inferno... I do apologize folks. 6.5/10

Rita

Didn't think much of this ride, basically I dont think that it was anything too special, I would definitely pick stealth over it any day. It was a lot of fun, but by far the poorest coaster of the day for me. 5/10

Th13teen

I really enjoyed this ride, partly because I had no clue about the drop at the end. It was one of the best rides of the day for me and it is a really strong family coaster. 6/10

Sub-terra

Very strong attraction that did really well to create a sense of panic, and I really enjoyed it. Most definitely nit a rerideable attraction but as a one off it was superb. Not so sure on the scare maze ending, but apart from that it was really good.

I wont bother on the smaller rides but they were good aswell. Overall a great day, and I really enjoyed alton towers, and hope to return soon. :-)

[Mark9]

I think the thing with Nemesis is that it suffers from over hype, particularly if you've done another inverter first. Over time that feeling mellows. =)

[Mitchada04]

So just got back from 3 days at Towers and despite all the hate going on around the forums about how the park has been operating the past few weeks it didn't really affect us.

 

First day (31st march) we arrived at 2pm to a park with literally walk on rides. Like no joke, went to Smiler first which was on 3 trains (didn't even need that many to be fair) and walked on row 3. Walked on some other rides and did all the coasters in those 3 hours bar Nemesis and Air because the skyride was closed due to the wind, oh and Smiler 3 times for good measure as you do (it's running a lot better this year!) Park closed at 5 but that's okay, it was a ghost town by that time. Only niggle over the 3 days was the monorail on 3 trains, just meant the queue moved in huge bursts then nothing for a while.

 

Second day arrived, read some  awful theme park related April fools jokes and headed onto park. Nemesis was on one train, fine. Air one station two trains, fine! Did those a few times, did Blade at 10, went and did Duel, did Nemesis and Air once more and then it was 11 so did Ripsaw, Sub Terra and went over to Dark forest. Simple! Although slightly annoying, when you know about the 11am openings you can work around them! So we kept doing the rides, did Smiler another 4 times that day and then got an amazing behind the scenes and lift hill walk of Smiler that evening! (A blog will be created with the juicy goodness of pictures and stories!) 

 

Final day, weather was nicer so Smiler had 4 trains and Nemesis on 2 but the park was still dead! The staff who did our behind the scenes kept seeing us and talking to us through Oblivion's microphone or running up and hugging us which was brilliant! Really made the trip that little bit different and special. So yeah, good stuff Towers!

 

RIDE COUNT!!!!!

 

Smiler: 11 (5 or 6 front rows)

Nemesis: 6

Air: 6

Oblivion: 4

Enterprise: 3

13: 2

Rita: 2 

Spinball: 2

Ripsaw: 2

RMT: 2

Hex: 1

Blade: 1

Duel: 1

Sub Terra: 1

CATCF: 1

Rapids: 1

Toadstool: 1

Flume: 1

Heave Ho: 1

Teacups: 1

Octanauts: 1

 

And if we count them, Skyride: 3, Monorail: 4, Sealife: 1 and a walk around the Towers!

[Coaster]

27th & 28th May 2015 - Trip Report

 

We had two good days at Alton Towers, ride operations were spot on most of the time with rides on full capacity and dispatch times were really good most of the time.  However, a 5:30pm close in May half term is awful, even Chessington offers better than that so I'm not sure why Alton Towers close so early - especially considering how long you spend walking around, a later closing time would be nice.

 

I'm not sure what happened - maybe it's because I have been spoiled by visiting BPB a lot more already this season than I have done in the past or just more parks in general, but we really didn't find many of the rides thrilling.

We got off The Smiler (which was the first thing we went on) and out thoughts were "I remembered it being much more thrilling than that."  Then we went on Oblivion, which had me in hysterics - it's over before it starts!  I'm not sure why I used to enjoy this coaster so much, but I guess there's only so many times that you can find one drop thrilling.

 

Nemesis was still much enjoyed, it's a fantastic coaster and I could have spent all day re-riding that (if the SRQ was still there - but more on that further down).  The Smiler was also running better once it had rained, and Thirteen and Spinball were nice, but when I get off some coasters I'm buzzing with adrenaline and want to go straight back on, this wasn't the case with any apart from Nemesis.

Hex and Duel are brilliant dark rides and I was impressed to see the second green thing in the great hall room of Duel (holding the rat) was moving again, it's been broken for years so it's good that they have got it working again.

 

The biggest negative for me was the removal of the single rider queue on Nemesis.  It's the only coaster at the park that I rate really highly, and the main appeal for me personally of visiting Towers was to re-ride it a lot, as most other coasters are average (not bad) IMO.

 

A few points I noted:

- Duel is in quite good condition, I was impressed with the lighting changes and working effects.

- Rita's launch smoke was working, as well as occasional smoke coming from the vehicle by Nemesis - it's good to see these working again, maybe this time they'll stay working!  

- Skyride didn't open until nearly 12 noon on Sunday which was a bit of a pain to be honest.

- Sub Terra has lost it's appeal for me, it was good when I first went on it but the reduction in actors and effort from the ones still there has made it less of an enjoyable experience IMO.

- The park looks quite tired and in need of a facelift in places, especially Dark Forest and The Smiler (already).

- Do not buy a double burger from the Courtyard BBQ, they have a very underhand tactic here and if you buy a double burger, the two burgers are smaller than if you buy a single one, meaning that you are paying more for the same amount of food.

- I think that letting everyone in at 9am is a bad idea, as the queue for The Smiler builds up and was overflowing from the extension queue before the ride even opened on both days.

 

We did enjoy the visit but I can't see myself returning this year - I was underwhelmed by the park as a whole this time, and it has lost a lot of its appeal for me by not being able to re-ride Nemesis.

 

 

Saturday 27th May 2015:

PARK OPEN:  10am - 5:30pm

RIDES CLOSED:  Enterprise

 

RIDECOUNT:

Nemesis x3

Duel x3

Oblivion x3 (Only because it was in the same area as Smiler and had a short queue!   )

The Smiler x2

Sonic Spinball x2 (TIP:  If it's raining use the SRQ as they only fill up the cars in 3's so it moves quickly).

Thirteen x2

Air x2

The Flume x1

Congo River Rapids x1

Nemesis Sub Terra x1

 

Sunday 28th May 2015:

PARK OPEN:  10am - 5:30pm

RIDES CLOSED:  Enterprise, Nemesis Sub Terra (although this may have been open in the morning, I wasn't in the area so don't know).

 

RIDECOUNT:

Nemesis x6

Duel x4

Thirteen x2

Air x2

The Smiler x1

Oblivion x1

Hex x1

Rita x1

Blade x1

 

I did some filming around Nemesis so took a few photos as well, but apart from that I didn't take any so here's a few random pictures of Nemesis  

 

 

There was smoke here but not when I took the photo - typical! 

 

Sorry it was a bit of a half - hearted effort at a trip report but thanks for reading anyway.  

[AstroDan]

Blackpool fans typically complain that Alton Towers' rides aren't thrilling.

[Coaster]

Blackpool fans typically complain that Alton Towers' rides aren't thrilling.

Yep, and I'm sure that fans of Alton Towers are so because they prefer the rides there.

It's a matter of personal opinion, I prefer BPB's rides by a long shot but can see why some prefer those at Alton, it's down to what you enjoy in a coaster.

[Matt 236]

Having chosen the worst weekend to visit Alton Towers this year, I made (yet another) Vlog from my day out there which shows there's still quite a few things you can do at the resort even when the park is closed.

[Craaig]

June 30th/July 1st. My first 2 days at Alton. And my, were they warm.

I wasn't in any particular rush to ride things over and over, just enjoyed the experience. Next time, it'll be more ride oriented.

 

Nemesis x4 (x2 in day 1, x2 in day 2)

Air x4 (as above)

Th13teen x3 (x2 in day 1, x1 in day 2)

Spinball x3 (x1 in day 1, x2 in day 2)

Rita x2 (x1 both days)

Congo River Rapids x2 (as above)

Ice Age x1 (day 1)

Charlie x1 (day 1)

Duel x1 (day 2)

Hex x1 (day 2)

The Flume x1 (day 1)

Runaway Mine Train x1 (day 2)

 

TOTAL: Day 1 - 12

Day 2 - 13

Overall - 25

 

I'm still not a flat ride fan generally so The Blade was a no-go. Ripsaw is still scaffolding covered. Smiler... yeah. Sub-Terra is still down. Oblivion isn't my kinda thing to start with so that was that.

 

We must've gone into SeaLife at least 4 times though, was very cool (as in temperature) in there, plus nice to look around. Avoided CBeebies altogether.

Spinball, Rita, Nemesis and Air were my favourite rides this time, in no particular order.

 

Lots of breakdowns and lots of heat but really low queues aside from for Flume/Rapids so it wasn't too much of an issue.

 

I'm undecided as to whether I prefer Alton or Thorpe. The heat made getting around really tiresome so that may bias opinions towards Thorpe. If Swarm was at Alton and I went on a cooler day, I think the opinion may be different

[Kerfuffle]

Report of day 1:

Nemesis: x2

Air: x1

Oblivion: x2 (walk-on both times )

Hex: x1

TH13TEEN: x4 (3x consecutive rides via single rider while waiting for family to get off Rita )

Sonic Spinball: x1

Skyride: x1

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: x1 (total waste of time)

Pros:

- Consecutive rides on TH13TEEN were nice. (The single rider queue was literally empty)

- Hex's new effects were cool.

- Starting the day on Nemesis was great.

- Oblivion's queue was walk-on

Cons:

- Sub-Terra won't be open this weekend.

- The Smiler was a rather sorry sight...although it'll always look amazing as just a twisted torrent of track.

- Air opened later than usual due to some apparent fallen trees in one of the ride areas.

- CatCF's existence

I do have a lot of pictures from today, but I will blog this once I'm home.

[Matt 236]

- Air opened later than usual due to some apparent fallen trees in one of the ride areas.

That darn beggar women causing havoc again :<

- CatCF's existence

Charlie is literally the worst ride ever, someone bring back Toyland Tours or re theme it alongside a mack powered inverted coaster

Edit- why didn't I notice that typo

[JoshC.]

Charlie is literally the worst ride ever, someone bring back Toyland Tours or re theme it alongside a mark powered inverted coaster

I know Towers are subject to budget cuts, but a roller coaster powered by Mark9 pedalling a bike or something is taking cost cutting to a whole new level...