Chessington Trip Reports

[James6]

Queue's, ride count etc ?And do you mean the Jeep around the Explorers Gate? If so that's been there since the start of the season when the entrance was re-done

[Benin]

it was packed

What tosh, 15 minute queues at the end of the day... Hell Fury was only by the transfer track in the middle of the day...There is a new jeep stood by Trail of the Kings now...Gorillas were shut as were Creature Features (meaning no big meerkat enclosure )Tomb Blaster has a rubbish new loading procedure...Lorikeets weren't very friendly today...Griffins Galleon was dead...Keith is a rubbish platformer ;)Bloody boiling today...I adore AP refillable drinks...Ride CountVampire - 2Bubbles - 1Buccy - 1Fury - 1Rattlesnake - 1Runaway - 1Tomb - 1Lorikeets - 1Kobra - 1Sea Dragons - 1Spike and the Missing Griffin - 1

[James6]

Ah ha Thanks Benin, sounds like my trip a few weeks ago. They were doing that loading procedure then but I assumed it was down to it being quiet, maybe not.It really was hot today and I bet those AP refills are amazing when it's like that

[A-Kid]

I was with Benin and a few others today.Was a fantastic day. I didn't find it busy at all concidering its a saturday and baking hot. I don't think we really waited more than 15 - 20mins for anything. Full of good stuff, just like having a photo with two meerkats at the begining! Me walking into a bollard, castrating myself and cracking my kneecap. At the end though a ride op fell over badly at Fury, and my mother stopped to help her (we were on the ride at the time) and stayed with her untill a St Johns person came. He insisted on getting my mother another go on Fury, but she didn't feel like it, so he got us an extra spin on fury after the queue was finished. So I'd like to thank him again for that. Yeah, Tomb Blasters batching was rediculous and slowed the queue dramatically. Thats my only moan for today. Lorikeets were a bit anti-people today, but theres nothing you can do about that really. Staff were generally fantastic today, full of energy, hyping the rides up. So credit to them. RC:Fury x4Vampire x2Kobra x1Lorikeets x1Rammy x1Tomb x1RattleSnake x1Runaway train x1Spike and the Missing Griffin Show - 1 Buccy x1Bubbles x1Thanks to those who came.

[Benin]

Me walking into a bollard, castrating myself and cracking my kneecap.

BING!God that was hilarious...

[A-Kid]

Haha, it actually still hurts slightly. Theres like a small inprint of the post cap on my leg!

[James6]

Ha Really does sound like you guys had a fantastic day

[themeparkmad]

Ahhhh the sun was lovely today!!

Keith is a rubbish platformer

Be quiet

[Mattgwise]

This Tomb Blaster loading business is silly. I bet it is a damn H&S thing again, maybe as there are no airgates it is now seen as a risk allowing customers to queue in the rows as they might step over the line. H&S get more over the top as the years go by.

[Mark9]

This Tomb Blaster loading business is silly. I bet it is a damn H&S thing again, maybe as there are no airgates it is now seen as a risk allowing customers to queue in the rows as they might step over the line. H&S get more over the top as the years go by.

On the other side of that, it's because UK guests are just generally thick. Once I was at fury and someone got off and decided that the lift hill was the exit to the ride... No wonder UK parks are so damn H&S critical if UK guests are going to try and jump into ride areas or get themselves into trouble.

[JoshC.]

Well, here's my TR for yesterday.To answer your question peep - yes, it was busy. ;)Got to the park at about quarter to 10 and arrived at Explorer Gate. Meant I got to hang around Wild Asia entrance. At 10, got in, and had the fiasco of Kobra. Can't even be bothered to summarize it. Anyways, after that, went to AS and got my nan's disabled pass. We decided not to complain about Kobra and just move on. Ended up queuing very quickly for Rattlesnake (my nan hates the ride so she didn't go on it) and got the ORPs.Used the wristband to get on Tomb Blaster. Nearly beat my mum for the first time, but lost by 4000 points. Unimpressed. :nunu This was followed by Rameses Revenge then lunch at the Fish & Chips by Vampire. After lunch, had a good wander round the zoo and taking quite a few photos...Now here comes Wanjama Village and Reserve pics...Then headed over to Lorikeet Lagoon. Most of the pics were pretty poor from me. However, they have someone taking 'ORP' photos that you can buy from the Wild Asia shop. I asked if I could use my USB Wristband I bought (which allows unlimited ORPs at Chessie this half term - hence why there was so many!) and was told yes. Go to the shop, "Oh, we haven't got a USB Port as this is only a trial run." That annoyed us, so we headed over to AS and complained. We also brought up the Kobra incident as well as an unsafe part of pavement for wheelchairs by Explorer Gate. After the latter two were noted, we headed over to the main Picsolve part of the park with a member of staff (who was extremely helpful and friendly) and saw if the issue could be resolved. After the Picsolve lady goes over to Wild Asia, it turns out they actually have a USB Port! However, as they had to use an on screen mouse and keyboard, it took a while to get them on. After this, it was 4 o'clock and unfortunately I had to leave. Was a great day, just a shame about some niggles.

[James6]

Amazing Weekend at Chessington ;)Chessington 5th June , took 3 1/2 hours to get there, stupid M25! Anyway was there from 3.30 till 6.30 7x Dragons Fury5 x Rattlesnake 2x Vampire Chessington 6th June, was there from 9.30 till 16x Dragons Fury5x Rattlesnake 1x Runaway Train1x Tomb Blaster2x Vampire 1x Ramases Revenge 2x Kobra1x Monkey Swinger1x Bubbleworks

[Paul]

Glad you had a good weekend James ;)Quite an impressive ride count for the times you were there!

[James6]

^ Indeed! At the time I was quite disappointed but now, on reflection, I can't believe it!

[James6]

Good to see you had a great trip, I saw Kobra was down on the site, doesn't look good :s

[Marc]

And its still there now?

[Kevin]

The ride vallies on the other side regularly, it just gets evacuated and reset, restarted and it's fine.How strange.

[JBdaWonderLlama]

RAAAWWWR FIRST TRIP REPORT :PI went to Chessie today and it was brilliant. Was there from 10:30 AM - 4:00 PM and got an amazing ride count for that time period. We got there at 10 at the Lodge Gate and had to queue outside for half an hour. Then we headed straight to Bubbleworks and got a ride on that, after that was Vampire. Then we got lost and ended up at Hocus Pocus Hall and decided to go in just for the mirror maze. Then we decided to get back on track and legged it over to Tomb Blaster, I got beaten by a girl by 100 points... I was sad. I got 9300 and she got 9400, she's the only person to ever beat me. Then we went over to Rameses and some fat person got stuck on it and wouldn't get off so that was the longest queue of the day. Then it was... Dragon's Fury time!!! :(LUNCH TIME! BURGER KING NOMNOMNOMNOM!Then I became the ongoing joke of the day, I was saying I hated everything people said and someone said "lets go to Wild Asia" and I said " I hate Asians" so whenever any Asian people walked past my mates all said "Oh look there are your best mates" fun...Black Buccaneer straight after an XL Bacon Double Cheeseburger doesn't do good things to the stomach... Then we went to Dragon Falls and got soaked again, we laughed at the Buddha's random thumbs on his sleeves and headed over to "Asialand, the land of hatred" where we went on Monkey Swinger and Tuk Tuk Turmoil (They'll always be Billy's Whizzer and Roger's Dogems to me) and cried at the fact that Kobra had decided to be an idiot and break. Lorikeet Lagoon was next which was awesome, it was probably better than the time I had a hawk on my armGETTING LOST AND ENDING UP AT RATTLESNAKE TIME!!We rode Rattlesnake 3 times in a row then we headed back to Transylvania and rode Bubbleworks twice and Vampire once more (we might've done Transylvania first and then Rattlesnake, my memory's a bit hazy)Then we went home :(So here's the Ride Count:Bubbleworks - 3Vampire - 2Tomb Blaster - 1Rameses Revenge - 1Hocus Pocus Hall - 1Dragon's Fury - 1Black Bucaneer - 1Dragon Falls - 1Monkey Swinger - 1Tuk Tuk Turmoil - 1Lorikeet Lagoon - 1Rattlesnake - 3Overall - 17

[Paul]

Could you provide some average queue times from the day?

[JBdaWonderLlama]

All queues were 5 minutes except Rameses which was on 15 minutes.

[Paul]

Thanks a lot

[Benin]

I got 9300

Hehe, and you said that 100 points more was the only person who ever beat you?You have a lot to learn...

[JBdaWonderLlama]

That was my worst score ever by the way my high score is about 30,000 odd

[Fred]

Went chessie yesterday. Overall good visit.Vampire looks good, though they need to keep on top of the lights.. they look a bit faded already over organist, just keep replacing the gels and its all good. Music still booming, and the ride actually has staff on offpeak periods now, amazing!The lowlight was tomb blaster, 20mins it took to ride, from the tv/mirrored effect point. Extremely stupid, and why on earth after all these improvements around park was tomb run with only three trains, with a poor loading system and an operator which insisted on sending the train once it hits photo area. Bloody rediculous. Oh, and someone has gone MAD with the UV lighting so the entire building it is in is lit up. Major, MAJOR leak for a park which is now seemingly more caring about these things (like falls crap wall).Really did enjoy the visit though, I love the place so much and its very close to looking extremely top form. Just needs some improvements to get rid of the leaks in the themes and its on its way to being almost perfect!

[rygr]

Okay. This is my first trip report on here. May be quite long, may be quite short, lets see how we go!!Got to the park for opening time (10am), queue's for the advanced ticket collection were enormous, luckily we had a print at home ticket and an annual pass, so could go straight in. On my last visit, you were allowed to go through the turnstyles at just after 9:30 so you could look through the zoo before the rides opened. However today, the turnstyles opened at just before 10 and you could go straight into the park, not sure why this was changed (?).After entering the park, we headed straight for the Bubbleworks. I was very pleased to see the station looking so clean, the ride also seems a lot darker in places, most notable the first scene, hawian scene and the fairground, with the finale having much more strobe! A lot of the animatronics still work fully, and the rubber duck hatchery has recieved some attention, as all of the three levers now move up and down which is great. Its a shame they haven't kept up the bubble machines this year though, although I think there is a bubble machine in the fireworks bit at the end now, there were a few bubbles around there! Staff didn't seem to want to wear their yellow builders hats as costumes either, so wore the white lab coat on its own. I also enjoyed the fact a fountain was dislodged so the water literally came into the boat!After Bubbleworks, we headed onto the Vampire which was running TWO trains today. The queueline has had some more attention with some gravestones moved and put onto some fences ect. The tunnel leading to the station seemed a lot brighter than usual. I was a little sceptical about the new lighting. The organist I have to admit does look quite strange in blue colours, as it is JUST blue, with some strobe, so in that respect I prefer the organist to be green. However, the red shining onto the walls and lighting up the theming on the walls worked really well, and at least we can see this artwork now as the lights were always quite dim. The ride itself was on two trains and ran very smoothly.After Vampire, we moved onto the Safari Skyway. Not really sure why the announcement when the doors are closing had to be redone? It left me thinking, come on and just close the doors already! Because the person doing it spoke quite slowly. It basically wasn't as snap and quick as 'Please mind the doors'. Anyway, the trains still look really poor, and I'm tired of saying they need to be repainted. Its something the park should put on their list of things to refurbish. Was able to get a good view of the new gorilla enclosure and the African Savannah experience.After this we moved into the Wild Asia area where Kobra was shut, and there wasn't actually any sign of them trying to fix it, which is a shame. Had a good ride on The Monkey Swinger. Then we moved onto the Dragon Falls which was running very smoothly. I'm not a big fan of the cloth building cut out at the top of the second hill. Especially as it is mesh type material and you can still see through it! I still love the water fountain at the bottom of lift 2 which guests can operate as well as the elephant. After this we moved onto the Rattlesnake which gave some very abrupt rides which was good. The rest of the day was pretty much the same. The staff working hard to make sure everyone was having a nice day, and were friendly to guests which is always really good! This season I'm really liking the fact that the staff on the games stalls aren't so much in your face asking you to play, its a much more relaxed atmosphere.For lunch we went into Burger King which I spent 20 minutes queueing in just to get to the tills - which was ridiculous in my opinion as they should have had more tills open!The park itself as I mentioned in the other thread was really busy with lots of school trips taking place which filled the park up. I'd be interested to see the gate figures actually.Ride Count:Bubbleworks (Todays queue time was around 30-45 minutes) = 3 Safari Skyway (Todays queue time was around 15 - 20 minutes) = 3Monkey Swinger (Todays queue time was around 15-20 minutes) = 2Rattlesnake (Todays queue time was around 15 - 30 minutes) = 2Vampire (Todays queue time was around 60 - 80 minutes) = 1Black Buccaneer (Todays queue time was around 10 minutes) = 1Dragon Falls (Todays queue time was around 45 - 60 minutes) = 1Runaway Train (Todays queue time was around 5 minutes all day) = 1Hocus Pocus Hall (Todays queue time was around 0 minutes) = 1Ride total was 15. Dragon's Fury remained about 60 minutes all day.Also visited the SEAlife and African Savannah Experience, which was a really nice addition and it was really good to see some Zebra's back at Chessington again!! Also, today I had my first visit to Hocus Pocus Hall which actually was quite freaky, especially the mirror corridor at the end!A really good day in spite of the long queues, and the weather was nice too!