Paris, Parc Asterix et Piscines

[Benin]

This past weekend I went to Paris to go to Parc Asterix, as the title so states...Anyways, late Friday night (10), me, peep and another person got on a coach from Victoria, and started out 7/8 hour journey towards Paris via the tunnel...We got there, and proceeded to get to the Louvre, where breakfast occurred, in typical fashion of trying out the local cuisine, I suggested McDonalds, but was horriffied to discover that the French don't believe in Sausage and Egg McMuffins, and have Bacon and Egg ones instead... Depressed times :unsure:After that, we attempted to find the coach that would take us to the park... Hidden down in the basement of the Louvre itself... Confusing times were had, but after parting with 23 euros for a return, we were on our way...45 minutes later...Yay for new park credits, although it was a rather busy day, with lots of schoolkids about... For those who may not know, this park is based off the Asterix and Obelix comics set during the Roman invasion of Gaul... Asterix's village has a magic potion which makes them undefeatable by the Romans, and they go on many historically inaccurate adventures... With good humour and entertaining characters, I had high hopes really...According to John (peep), the park's newest attraction (a madhouse built in 2008) got epic queues, so we did that first...It was... AMAZING, honestly amazing, the pre-shows were interactive and awesome, I really don't want to spoil the ride but we were all shocked about how good and amusing it was... As this pic shows, the park has epic theming...Anyways, after some bag related faff, we proceeded towards the park's most famous coaster, Tonnerre de Zeus, a CCI Woodie...The queue was only an hour long, which is good considering the position it was away from the actual entrance...Woodstock was very excited about his new credits to be had...Again, some epic theming...After the hour had gone, which involved French people pestering John and reminding me of being at Thorpe with people talking in a language I don't understand, we boarded the train...Zeus is amazing... Simple as, from now on it is referred to 'Tonne of Air' as that's what it provides, excessive airtime, especially on the first drop... And that was in the middle... The back is for another time...Next up was L'Moustacheynarium, a ride that wouldn't look out of place at a waterpark... Although wetness was no achieved, epic spinning was... So it was a very fun ride...After that, we had some lunch and headed towards the nearby stunt show... More epicness followed as it was very amusing and cool, the language barrier was ignored for slapstick and stunts... Brilliant thing... More photos of it later though...Oh... Vekoma times...Goudrix I believe is one of the first Vekoma multi-loopers, and certainly looks like something out of RCT, especially the first 2 loops...Very photogenic, as the queue was very Tussaudy...However, the first 4 loops were rather painful, but the vertical loop and corkscrews were rather smooth... Maybe it could do with the new trains... I dunno... Meh...Bad joke alert...The park's 3rd big coaster is a Bobsleigh...Whilst the end section is well themed, the ride overall is very spread out and high up, meaning it doesn't work that well...

[Benin]

Another epic ride, Le Grand Splatch... The majority of the ride is hidden up in the mountain where Asterix sits on top, and that's where all the epicness occurs, so no pics...After racking up the kiddie credits it was time for us to get our bus back to the Louvre (travel tip, there are only 2 buses a DAY to the park from central Paris, 1 to, and 1 back), and eventually arriving back at our hotel... We elected for food and Effiel Tower times...They had some random Russian themed event at the Tower, and I found out Sunday evening that Muse had been playing at the Stade de France as well, we missed epic party based times On to day 2, and we hopped on the Metro back to the Louvre...Whilst I vastly prefer London in many aspects, Paris does have some epic station names...After sleeping on the coach (again), we were greeted to even more coaches in the park than Saturday... Fortunately having done the major rides, we weren't worried, as that's why two days at the park were chosen...And once again, we elected not to do Zeus first, but instead the Onion boat ride...Back to Zeus...After Zeus, we walked towards the Colossuem for the Roman Legion show... We were interrupted by these guys though...They were very very entertaining, and basically lead people towards the show, as they provided some of the pre-show entertainment, though it's ironic that the romans were chanting in French... C'est la vie...This show was basically a 'recruitment' for the Legionnaires, so a lot of French was said which led to me being confused...After the random show, we went towards the park's main dark ride...The interior queue has some brilliant theming, and the ride was very random, indeed one of the major recurring characters is so designed to haunt children for a long time it's amusing, creepy puppet is creepy...

[Benin]

After some indecisive faff times about food, we went to the busy burger place...And we interrupted by the soldiers again, walking straight through the restaurant randomly...They were trying to get some womens I think... They didn't get them though... Unlucky...We then did the epic madhouse again, before Patrick (the third person) had to leave in order to get a plane... First thing me and John did afterwards? Shop of course...The park's theming goes everywhere, it's very Disney-like in several aspects, which is amusing considering it was built as a rival... We then did the stunt show again...Then the plot showed up...That was an epic stunt...Yes, they 'blew' up the ship... After the show, we elected for one last ride on Zeus before leaving, so the back row was to be done...And in the back row, Zeus stormed his way into my top 10 all the way to number 4... The first drop was just complete air, bum off seat till mid-way through the tunnel... And the rest was just brilliant... Loved it...On-ride photo...Alas, we now had to leave, but what an epic little park it is... The rides aren't all amazing, but for theming, atmosphere and general fun, it's a brilliant park... Thanks for reading...

[Paul]

I passed this park in the car a few weeks ago, and I must say I've never really considered anything of it. But after seeing the pictures and reading through your report, I might have to try that one day! Looks like a good day out.

[weeby-vuit]

I have been there two years in a row now, love this park.

[James6]

Wow, it looks like a great park and I wish I could try it out some time

[Benin]

I neglected to mention the park's one fatal flaw...Food... It's not good, minimal choice (either burgers, hot dogs or sandwiches atm, but they are building a new pizzeria), rather expensive and not the best quality food...Oh wells, just one flaw with the park really...

[James6]

Ah, well a fantastic Trip Report nevertheless

[AstroDan]

Great pics - I too love Asterix although on VERY busy days the park is sheer hell.It's an odd place though - not that many amazing rides but the park sort of links up really well. I love their log flume, for example. And yes - Zeus is totally amazing. Even having been on Troy for example - I still prefer Zeus. It's just a shame the throughput is low and the queue gets long.Asterix opened long before Disneyland Paris - so it was never built as a rival. In fact, they aren't really rivals. I read somewhere that their relationship to the French was somewhat symbiotic so there's not really any angst.Le Défi de Caesar is certainly their finest work - I just cannot wait to see their next project which is rumoured to be a themed B&M Inverted Coaster!!!!RE: Food - the self serve cafeteria near the Menhir Express is really good, did you not see it?

[Benin]

Great pics - I too love Asterix although on VERY busy days the park is sheer hell.

Not too bad in my opinion, it was rather busy but we just dossed around quite happily, not being too fussed with high ride counts helps a lot as I would rather take in the atmosphere...

Asterix opened long before Disneyland Paris - so it was never built as a rival. In fact, they aren't really rivals. I read somewhere that their relationship to the French was somewhat symbiotic so there's not really any angst.

It opened when DLP was being designed and built with a rivalry frame of mind... Indeed there have been some points in it's history that it may have closed due to Disney... Saying that they are not rivals is a very silly thing...

RE: Food - the self serve cafeteria near the Menhir Express is really good, did you not see it?

It was shut...

[peep]

Nice Photo trip report Mister Benin, was indeed an awesome trip. Asterix loves life.@AstroDan...I didn't find the park 'hell' when it was busy, yeah it meant my ride count was small but it in no way did it stop me from having an epic time (unlike Thorpe park which suffers heavily when it's busy). There is so much theming and fun to be had at the park that crowds really don't make a difference to the trip. Also, not many amazing rides? It has Zeus, Cesar and Grande Splash with some great little attractions (and some other painful coasters) but the gems of the park are the shows (dolphins and two stunt shows) and the atmosphere of the park with all the characters running around, it doesn't need some huge ride list with every one of them attempting to be the best attractions ever built.

Asterix opened long before Disneyland Paris - so it was never built as a rival. In fact, they aren't really rivals. I read somewhere that their relationship to the French was somewhat symbiotic so there's not really any angst.

Of course they are rivals. Asterix was finished in a hurry so it could be open before Disneyland Paris. Construction started on Disneyland Paris in 1988 (it was announced in 1985), Asterix opened in 1989. Asterix is also seen as the national park and has always been quite a rival to Disneyland paris. After a little look on Wikipedia, it agrees with you that they have a symbiotic relationship (like all the parks in Florida) but imo, that still doesn't mean they are not rival parks, it simply means that some people plan their holidays around both parks and not just one of them. Meh.

[AstroDan]

Thing is, I am not a ride-count whore usually - but when I am at a park like Asterix once every couple of years (or less!) and you arrive to find that it's the busiest day of the year (yes, you read that right) - you really do get down.I don't just want to take in "atmosphere" when I hardly ever get to a park - I want to get on the rides too, and do the best several times. When I went in Summer 2008, the park was almost at capacity and the queue for Tonnerre de Zeus was 2 1/2 hours .We waited, of course - but I only got on it once. Transdemonium was also 1 hour. Indeed, nothing was below 1 hour of note (Defi, Menhirs, Trace, Oxygenarium, Rapids, Goudurix all 1hr+).The park, whilst I love it, is NOT made for massive crowds as they simply do not have the product to deal with it. However, for fear of people thinking I am slagging the park off - I am not - I do enjoy it and loved it when I visited last October when it was much quieter and more enjoyable all round.Asterix suffers as much as TP when it's packed.

[Benin]

Thing is, I am not a ride-count whore usually - but when I am at a park like Asterix once every couple of years (or less!) and you arrive to find that it's the busiest day of the year (yes, you read that right) - you really do get down.

Well if that's your mind-set when you entered the park, of course you weren't going to enjoy it...We saw the busyness both days but once over the initial 'Oh we weren't expecting that', we just went in and took in the park...It was my first time to the park, so don't try and say about trying to get all the rides done, cos well obviously that was one of my first things on the list of things to do, but I didn't want to particularly rush around just solely doing rides in a park I don't know when I'll be back at...Name me a park suitable for massive crowds in that park's own view... Any park can be horrendously bad when busy, but I didn't mind myself being down about busyness over both days at all...

[AstroDan]

I am making a complete hash of my point here. I didn't rush around the park, nor did I expect to just not get on anything. I like to do both. We got on 5 rides that day, which for me was a dissapointment - we didn't actually get on every ride. If I go to a park once every couple of years, and only manage 5 rides - frankly I am a little dissapointed. I did not arrive in order to have 10 goes on everything - far from it, but 2 or 3 rides on the likes of Zeus would have been nice - and I have managed that at parks even when they have been busy before. But the busiest day of the year and a 2 1/2 hour queue is pretty horrendous, surely you would agree with that! Your visit does not sound anywhere near as busy as it was when I went in Aug 08...You are of course to say that all parks suffer when they are ultra-packed, but Asterix's main problem is that many of their rides don't have massive throughputs to cope with their guest figures.To be honest I don't even want to disagree with you, as I love Parc Asterix although it is a fair way off the likes of Phantasialand, Europa-Park etc. for the time being - they could do with a more regular programme of new rides rather than every 3-4 years given their guest counts!However, I repeat - I went in October 2009 and the longest queue was 1 hour which was far more acceptable and made for a much nicer day.

[Ellie]

As requested, a few pictures from my visit to Parc Asterix on Sunday 11th July. I couldn't see where else to put them so voila. As it turned out we didn't take many pictures.Tonnerre de Zeus (translates to Thunder of Zeus) was first on the agenda Amazing ^-^We did Goudrix about midday with a 5 minute queue. And people complain about Colossus being painful....(Picture taken from in front of the Zeus queue)Dolphins!!

[Benin]

^You could've just made your own topic instead of hi-jacking mine...

[Ellie]

^You could've just made your own topic instead of hi-jacking mine...

Where would the fun be in that now? :PThere's hardly enough pictures to strike up much interest or discussion.

[Josh R]

For a small second I thought this was TPR! Robb would be impressed, very good review, I hope you do more sometime

[TPGG]

Hey I'm going to Parc Asterix on monday and was wondering is you could offer any tips. What are the most popular rides? I've heard Zeus and their version of storm surge will be really busy.Thanks for the advice

[Benin]

Zeus is by far the busiest, but also the Log Flume, Grand Splatch, Transdemonium and of course Oxygenarium can all receive long queues of doom...Aside from that, only other major ride is Goudrix... But I'd aim for Zeus first before anything else...Take in the awesome shows and Madhouse as well... Well worth it...

[TPGG]

Zeus is by far the busiest, but also the Log Flume, Grand Splatch, Transdemonium and of course Oxygenarium can all receive long queues of doom...Aside from that, only other major ride is Goudrix... But I'd aim for Zeus first before anything else...Take in the awesome shows and Madhouse as well... Well worth it...

Thanks, I liked your photos btw, I'm quite excited now lol. Do you think this will be a busy time of year for the park?

[Benin]

No idea, since I've only been once, in June...Easter holidays could well have a say in the matter though... But as Chessie wasn't busy, asking the opinion of anyone on here isn't definitely not accurate...