Thorpe Park Discussion Thread

Why are all of your so called TR so negative? Hard to know why you bother to be honest.

Having visited Thorpe Park for about 20 years straight I was lucky enough to visit Thorpe Park in what I would call its "Golden Years" between Colossus being constructed and Nemesis Inferno opening. After that the park started to lose more and more atmosphere in my opinion and it has never managed to return to that time.

I personally don't believe my trip reports are negative, I like to think they are constructive. As I said previously the Ride N' Reserve is fantastic and once the bugs are worked out it will be great for the park. Some staff were brilliant but others were awful.

Having worked for Merlin I know the standards that the company expect from all their parks, so when I see staff ignoring guests, standing around talking about their weekends instead of trying to deal with the hour long queue the ride has built up it really pisses me off.

I don't expect everyone to agree with my opinions and if you don't I'm certainly not going to cry about it. If people like reading my trip reports great, if they don't I'm not going to be losing any sleep over it.

I think thats kind of unfair, I don't really see negativity in the TR, he talks about how great the new reservation system is. What I see is someone who regularly visits and so can point out flaws against previous visits or things that can be addressed. I think this is true for many people's TR's who frequent the same parks over and over. Look at most of the SFMM and Fuji Q TR's by people who have frequented the parks often or my own Everland TR's compared to when I first visited Korea. There's a big difference between being negative just to hate on a park and appearing negative because you are comparing to earlier personal experiences.

I think you have summed it up pretty well there. When you visit a park so often you start to notice different things because the illusion of everything being a new, exciting experience to you is gone.

-Craig

As its getting closer to Fright Nights its time for a bit of news from the park before their biggest event of the year.

Recently the park have applied for planning permission to expand the Pizza Hut restaurant to include more indoor seating and a new exterior seating section. This can be found here.

Here are the proposed plans for the new Pizza Hut.

Does this mean Pizza Hut could be leaving the park and we finally see Merlin's own Pizza Pasta Buffet arrive at the park? This has yet to be confirmed by the park but could be a possibility with this expansion.

Also in some what of a strange move the Flying Fish is now closed to the remainder of the season according to the parks website. The reason for this is unknown right now but there is a few rumours floating about that February half term opening could be coming back next year and this is way to get a head start on winter work. With that being said Flying Fish has never really pulled in the guests since it returned in its current location so this could be a crafty way of allowing them to send staff to other rides/attractions for Fright Nights to help out instead of running a ride that gets very few riders.

Now with 17 days away until the parks 13th anniversary of Fright Nights preparations are well underway with the installation of all the mazes and attractions and the excitement is building. Will you be visiting?

-Craig

wouldn't surprise me if flying fish got an angry birds retheme

wouldn't surprise me if flying fish got an angry birds retheme

Flying Fish really isn't anywhere near Angry Birds Land so I really couldn't see that happening unless Tidal Wave also get an Angry Birds retheme. It would be nice if the ride did get some work though as it is very bland where it is now and could really do with some theming or even just some nice trees and flowers around it.

Is this Pizza Hut the last remaining 'real' pizza hut brand at the Merlin parks?

Is this Pizza Hut the last remaining 'real' pizza hut brand at the Merlin parks?

Yes it is. All the others left a long time ago and turned into "Pizza Pasta Buffet" (Creative name right ). I am surprised this one has lasted so long and not changed over.

^No more Pizza Hut? That would be downright un-American for a British park!

Hello England! Im planning on doing a Thorpe park visit this week while visiting from Sweden. I was wondering how the crowds are going to be? Will a fastpass be needed? Im planning on going there on thursday the 30th.

It's currently our October half-term period so all the kids are off school at the moment, plus it is Fright Nights as well, so potentially it will be busy. Fastrack tickets can be bought on the day though so I would wait and see how it is when you visit before purchasing, I've never known them sell out. With it being Fright Nights they also have the 5 scare attractions running, so rides tend to be less busy later on (the park is open until 10pm), so if you are only concerned with the rides then this is generally the best time to hit the coasters, but the mazes are definitely worth a visit if you get a chance.

I did Thorpe Park 3 years ago during the Halloween event (regular weekday) and the fast pass would have been extremely needed. Saw was a 100 minute queen, Colossus 120 minutes etc..

I bought single fast passes for the coasters (they had staff selling them at the entrance of each ride) but in the end I should have just bought the real one. We did get the fast pass for the scare mazes in the evening, which was also just as needed as they had insane lines.

Can't answer if it's still that popular during Fright Nights, also remember that the big crowds starts arriving during the afternoon, so it may seem quiet earlier in the day.

Some local may chip in here and give you some more recent experience

Thorpe Park have just announced that they have hit capacity today and only people who have pre-booked tickets will be admitted now, they are strongly recommending that anybody wanting to visit this week to book in advance to avoid disappointment. I've also just read that this last weekend has been one of the busiest Thorpe has ever had, so it looks like it is going to be a very busy week.

A word of warning regarding Fastrack, it would appear that even with Fastrack tickets queues are still significant, although this appears to be mostly for the scare mazes, and not too bad for the regular rides and attractions.

it would appear that even with Fastrack tickets queues are still significant, although this appears to be mostly for the scare mazes, and not too bad for the regular rides and attractions.

Well from what I remember they do sell a lot of fast passes at Thorpe, I remember having to wait for most of the rides around 20 min even with a fast pass, and even more for Colossus.

Thorpe Park hitting capacity for Fright Nights usually happens once or twice during the event so this isn't a big surprise.

The biggest problem with the current fastpass system is that when the allotted amount of tickets for each time slot sells out they usually get the sales duty managed to come along and allocate a crap load more which then increases the fastpass queues! Hopefully with all the mobile reserve'N'ride testing this will be a thing of the pass if they also introduce q bots!

Hello England! Im planning on doing a Thorpe park visit this week while visiting from Sweden. I was wondering how the crowds are going to be? Will a fastpass be needed? Im planning on going there on thursday the 30th.

Just a quick alert, Thorpe Park have just announced that Thursday, Friday & Saturday this week (30th-1st) is strictly pre-booked tickets only, so if you are still planning on going this Thursday you will need to make sure you have your tickets pre-booked online before you go, you won't be able to pay at the gates if that is what you were planning.

Great news for Thorpe Park, not only did they reach capacity again today but they have had to make the decision to make Thursday to Saturday pre book only!

Here is the post from the parks official Facebook:

Calling all Merlin Annual Pass & Merlin Membership and THORPE PARK Passholders.

 

We know there's some confusion about Annual Pass usage for Fright Nights, so here's an update on the current situation.

 

Standard Merlin and Thorpe Passholders purchase a £10 Annual Pass ticket to enter the event. These can be bought on our website but are now sold out for Thursday - Saturday.

 

Premium Merlin Passholders enter the event for free but must prebook a space to be guaranteed entry - the links are on our website, but again these are now sold out for Thursday - Saturday.

 

Due to high demand, Thursday - Saturday are strictly prebook only for all guests so no entry will be permitted without a prebooked ticket.

 

Tickets can still be prebooked for Fright Nights on Sunday and Monday.

So today is BIG NEWS from Thorpe Park as they have applied for planning permission for a new dark ride to open in the site of the old arena for 2016.

The application they have submitted is for a building "to fully house an indoor themed attraction to comprise the new 2016 attraction at Thorpe Park".

This is looking like a huge investment for the park and I imagine construction will take place most of next year if accepted. There is no clues as to what the ride system will be as all they are required to apply for is permission to erect the building. If Thorpe Park/Merlin are sensible they should try and keep this a secret but I can't see that happening. Once again though it does look like we are getting another warehouse/derelict building look though which personally I'm sick seeing but we will see.

If you wish to look at the planning application for yourself click here. I have attached some of the plans below!

So what are your thoughts? Do you think its about time Thorpe Park got a dark ride? Comment below!

The rumours are that it will be Doctor Who themed, Merlin have already worked with the BBC with cbeebies land at Alton Towers so it is thought they would be working together again on this. Not sure what the ride system will be though.

I thought they submitted the planning application for a coaster no higher than 35 metres for 2016?

Unless its a coaster dark ride which would be cool plus, if it was Dr Who themed then I'd have very very little trouble convincing my wife that we need to go to Thorpe Park again.

Cheers

James

^There was never a full planning application submitted, I believe it was just outlined in Thorpe's MTDP.

The possible reason for Thorpe going with a dark ride as opposed to a rollercoaster is in preparation for Paramount London, which is becoming an increasingly real prospect for them.

This building doesn't look high enough to house a decent sized coaster. But I'm pretty pleased if they would build a decent darkride.

This building doesn't look high enough to house a decent sized coaster. But I'm pretty pleased if they would build a decent darkride.

Im pretty sure it won't be a coaster, they really don't need another one right now. They have been craving for a proper dark ride since Wicked Witched Haunt burnt down in 2000 (I really miss that ride!) so I expect this will be a proper dark ride. I really hope they don't go the laser gun route though. Im sick of shooting dark rides!

wouldn't it be great if they got one of those gossetto ghost trains?

It'd be so nice to see a decent dark ride cone in, WWH probably wasn't the greatest ride and I might be looking back with rose tinted glasses, but it's an area that the park has been lacking in for 15 years so I'm excited to see what they can do.

Thorpe definitely needs a dark ride. I thought this was a rather large omission based on my visit with TPR to the park back in 2006. Love to see them install a high-quality "ghost train."

A dark ride would be perfect for that park! I can't wait to see what's announced.