Morgan

It'll be interesting to see how the new films influence the area, I'm sure I read or heard that the sequels will explore other areas of Pandora, with vastly different environments, underwater for example. I imagine the big patch of unused land to the south could make a nice sized expansion in future years if the new movies are a success.

The park has remained closed today, they posted this message on Facebook yesterday... It could be me reading too much into the wording of the statement but it does sound like the investigation may be relatively short. It's not a situation like The Smiler incident where it was obvious that the park was at fault, and a lengthy investigation was needed to find out why it happened, but if the reports of the girl standing up are true, the investigation may be concluded swiftly.

While the reports are suggesting that the girl stood up during the ride, although nothing has been officially confirmed yet, I can see this resulting in more safety measures on rapids rides. The larger rapids have seatbelts and some have either a netting barrier or doors on the entry steps, so I imagine that something similar might be installed here, and possibly the other rapids rides in the UK at least. Very sad times again.

There are reports of a incident on Splash Canyon (Intamin Rapids) at Drayton Manor, the park have tweeted the following message... No news as to what has exactly happened yet but looking at twitter the Air Ambulance has been spotted and security are apparently turning cars around at the entrance to the resort. There's a news article below which includes the original tweet, but not much more information as yet. www.coventrytelegraph.net Let's hope whatever has happened it is not too serious. UPDATE It's been confirmed that someone has fallen into the water, apparently an 8 year old boy, but that is unconfirmed. Statement from West Midlands Ambulance service below... www.birminghammail.co.uk ANOTHER UPDATE Reports have confirmed that it was an 11 year old girl who had fallen into the water, and has been air-lifted to hospital. It's also confirmed that both Alton Towers & Thorpe Park have closed their rapids rides after this incident. Thorpe have also confirmed that there's will be closed tomorrow also (Alton Towers is currently closed on Wednesdays).

The even rows on Colossus are a joke, you need to be tiny just to be able to climb into them without having to crawl.

I'd guess it's more to do with how rough it is, I've not ridden it for a few years now, but up to that point it had gotten rougher and rougher every year, to the point that I'd happily not ride it anymore, and I'll ride most things. I also imagine the last Immelmann may have something to do with it, as it's so small it does result in some fairly intense movement and forces, which some people may not respond well to.

DLP have updated their maintenance closure schedule for the next year and a half, confirming re-opening dates for Hyperspace Mountain (May 7th) & PotC (July 24th). Phantom Manor is scheduled to go down for a 9 month rehab starting in January next year, which is great that it's getting some attention, but I'm disappointed it will be closed for our visit in June next year. DLP Maintenance Schedule

I guess one reason for leaving it open would be to allow visitors to be able to see the slides contained within. I imagine there would be either people unsure whether to ride a slide if they couldn't see what it's like first, or some people that would get a nasty surprise from doing a slide they weren't prepared for. I just hope that the stair and platform structures that are on show receive some theming to help them blend in.

Alton Towers is supposedly haunted by quite a few different ghosts. Like The Ghost Train at Blackpool, the TV show 'Most Haunted' stayed through the night to film an episode in the ruins. I did a ghost Hunt night there back in 2010, and spent the night in the Towers and there was definitely some spooky things going on, not quite enough to make me firmly believe in ghosts, but it was definitely a fun experience. Unfortunately they've stopped the ghost hunt companies using the Towers now.

By the looks of them, they are a testing the idea to see if it is popular enough. I imagine that if it's deemed a success then we might see a more permanent solution being added.

My home park would be Alton Towers, which has a great selection of coasters. The majority of them were ‘Secret Weapons’, which the park codenames their big coasters, and all these except Nemesis have been a ‘World’s First’ in some shape or form. My ranking from worst to best is... 9 – Octonauts Rollercoaster Adventure This is the parks kiddie coaster, and while it would obviously be at the bottom of any coaster enthusiasts list, this really does deserve it. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great looking coaster, but it is ridiculously short, and the throughput is shocking. It’s situated in CBeebies Land (Based on one of the UK’s children’s TV channels, run by the BBC), which is extremely popular with young families, so it gets very busy. For some reason they decided to install a one sided station, which means that they have to empty the train and clear the station, before they can start to let the next set of riders onto the station, so it is a very slow process. Also after all this the coaster is a very small figure-8 layout, which is over in seconds. For a park the size of Alton Towers, and the section of the park the coaster is in, they really should’ve gone for something like Shamu Express at SeaWorld, which has a decent size layout and a huge capacity train. 8 – Runaway Mine Train As Mack powered runaway trains go this is a half decent one, it’s got a good setting and a unique layout, which interacts with the rapids adding extra excitement and thrill, especially when you get people waving at each other between the train and the boats in the tunnel. Unfortunately the Alton Towers health & safety nuts have added high fences around part of the ride, which completely blocks out the view for passersby, so some of the atmosphere has been lost. 7 – Spinball Whizzer This spinner is a good fun ride, there’s nothing particularly amazing about it, but if you get a good weighting in the car, you can spin a lot. The downside of the ride is the queues, as it’s the first ‘major’ish ride that people come to in the park, it generally builds up a decent queue at the beginning of the day, and it stays that way throughout. So generally I don’t ride it that much, when it used to be featured in ERT, it would be a good starting ride for the day. 6 – Rita Out of the major coasters at Alton Towers this is the least special, while it was the UK’s first hydraulic launch coaster, it’s layout is a little bit uninspiring, and feels like a bit of a ‘thoughtless’ addition, especially considering that a racing themed coaster was added to a then prehistoric/dinosaur themed area. While I enjoy the ride, and the launch is good, it is another ride that suffers from large queues, so again I don’t ride it that much. 5 – Air/Galactica I can’t comment on its current form as Galactica as I’ve not been on it since the retheme, but Air while a unique ride in the UK, the more sedate theme of the coaster does leave it a bit lacking in thrills, especially when compared to the likes of Manta. My biggest gripe about the ride though is the reliability. Being the prototype for the B&M Flyer has really made it suffer, and has had persistent breakdowns all its life. I can’t remember the number of times I’ve queued only for it to breakdown just as I get to the station. The VR may have added something new to it, but from what I’ve heard it’s more a novelty to try once, but not something to experience over and over again. 4 – The Smiler Part of me wants to put The Smiler further down my ranking, while it’s an impressive coaster and can be a great ride, for a coaster that’s only run for just over two seasons it is not ageing well. It is far too rough for such a young coaster, which is inexcusable when you get coasters that give smooth rides for a very long time. It’s the same on SAW at Thorpe Park, that ride has gotten progressively rough each season, so I thought this might happen with The Smiler. You need to know how to ride The Smiler, not just because of the roughness, but because there are kinks in the track in places, most notably the dive out of the cobra roll near the end of the ride, it is so noticeable you can watch riders head jerk one way and then back the other way in quick succession. If you have to learn how to ride a coaster for it not to be too painful, then there is a failing with the ride. Having said this, there is no denying that it is a fun ride with the amount and variety of inversions, and great themeing, had this ride been built by Mack or Intamin, I could see it being far better. 3 – Oblivion Oblivion was probably the first coaster I followed the construction of (I remember seeing the big pit excavated for Nemesis, but that was as much of that construction that I saw), so I have some fond memories of the hype surrounding the ride, especially the themed construction fence with the ‘Security’ actors roaming the area. The ride itself is very simple, it was the World’s First Vertical Drop Rollercoaster, and it played to that with full affect, basically featuring just the drop. Compared to the more modern dive machines, it may seem very lacking, but the theme and the huge drop underground elevate it into a great thrill ride, plus it has some of the shortest queues amongst the coasters at the park. 2 – Thirteen This may seem like an odd choice for second place, with it being a ‘family’ coaster, but when you take it for what it is (ignoring all the hype that they built about it being the ultimate coaster) for me Thirteen is a fun all-round experience. It may not have big thrills, but it has a fun albeit short coaster section outdoors, the drop track in the crypt is fantastic, and the short backwards section is good also. One of the best things about the coaster is that it’s a people eater, when they have all three trains running the queue hardly stops moving, and a full queue line can take under an hour to get through. 1 – Nemesis This is probably the most obvious choice for the top spot, but the oldest of the major coasters is by far still the best in the park, and for me my favourite coaster I’ve ridden (admittedly my coaster count is a bit on the low side). I guess it’s a bit of a bit of a stereotype for someone from the UK to have Nemesis as their top coaster, but I’m certainly no fanboy who won’t even consider that a coaster could be better than Nemesis, but out of the ones I’ve ridden it is my favourite. I’ve never had a bad ride on it, and it is a great reliable coaster that is guaranteed to give you a great intense ride everytime, especially at night after a long day running.

It would be a much better, customer friendly and surely cost effective option to set up baggage holds in the station or even the 'cloak room' style system that have been becoming more common place in recent years. I don't know if these are used elsewhere, but at the Merlin parks in the UK, most new coasters since 2009ish, have featured a staffed counter next to the station, so you handover any bags or loose items and get a numbered wristband, and once you get off the ride you hand the wristband back and get your stuff back. It's a simple system, which allows you to keep hold of your things until it is time to actually get on the ride, instead of making you leave everything in a locker and then join a queue which is potentially hours long, and is more secure than baggage holds in the station.

After somebody mentioned that the station was converted to be non-rotating, out of curiosity I looked up a video of the ride on YouTube to see how the station actually worked, and more or less at the point where the 'stuck' boat is, there is a brake paddle (don't know what the technical term for it is) to stop the boat as the previous boat unloads and loads, so potentially this may have something to do with why the boat was stuck. I can't imagine it would be a case that the boat was just being held by the brake as normal, and hadn't been released in time for the next boat to clear the lift, as I would imagine in the years it has been operating that would be the first occurrence of it, so there must be some other factor involved.

This is tragic, and baffling how it could happen, you could kind of understand if a boat flipped mid-ride, but as it was leaving the lift back into the station where it would be moving at a relatively slow, gentle and controlled speed. This will no doubt continue, in the UK ever since the Smiler incident the press report more or less on any sort of breakdown, even if it's a minor stoppage of a few minutes. Most of the time they make it sound like it was a deadly and terrifying situation for anyone involved, which to me is fairly disrespectful to those that were involved in real accidents, I've seen more comments by the attention craving people who were 'scared for their life' because they were stuck on a brake run for 20 minutes, than I have from any of the real victims of actual accidents.

My suggestion would be... Nemesis - An absolute must, it's amazing at night, it generally runs incredibly fast at night, plus I think they've actually invested in some decent lighting this year to add to the atmosphere. The Smiler - Another good coaster in the dark, and best to do last thing as it generally has the biggest queue. Thirteen - This is a good coaster to do in the dark, as normally, once you've gone down the first drop it's pitch black until you enter the crypt. Depending on your preference, Oblivion is also a good choice, and depending on how busy it is you could in theory get them all done while it's dark, if you do the mazes earlier in the day. Queues in the evening are generally quite good, apart from The Smiler, I'd say you'll have minimal waits for both Nemesis, Oblivion & Thirteen (If they're running three trains on it), and Smiler will have a queue, but like I said if you leave that till last, you won't waste any time when you could be riding the others.

As Lewis said the timed slots are generally achievable, once we had to argue a little with the staff member on the entrance to our second maze, as we were over the 'allocated' time window, which was due to the first maze going down due to technical problems which resulted in a longer queue. A lot of the time in the past, the mazes have had relatively short queues for all but the busiest nights. Again like Lewis said you do have to do all the mazes one after another with no breaks, which for me is a real downside of them. Compared to Thorpe for example, where the mazes are included with entry and you are free to queue for whichever maze you want as much as you want (queues permitting), but this obviously has the downside of having bigger queues for the mazes. When you are paying an extra £20 on top of entry it would be nice to be able to choose when you did all the mazes, previously you could choose different timed tickets for each maze and unlimited use maze tickets, but I think this led to problems with the queues at certain times which led to complaints.

There are a couple of Travelodges within easy reach of the park, there basic, but fine for a place to sleep for the night. There's one in Chertsey which is a newer one, with some limited free parking and another in Staines, which doesn't have any parking at the hotel, but there is a large car park just across the road which is chargeable. They are both about 5 minutes from the park by car. Rates for Travelodges fluctuate quite a lot, so it's worth checking their website for the rates, but I've stayed in them for as little as £30 for the night, but I have also seen them as high as £70-80. The Chertsey hotel is the nicer of the two, but Staines is located next to a big shopping centre which has plenty of restaurants and a cinema, so it has lots of choices for the evening.

The best thing for me in these awards are that Alton Towers & DisneySea are tied at 9th for Best Park. Admittedly I've never been to DisneySea, and as much as I like Alton Towers, I'm under no delusions that they are on equal footing.

It is a shame that the Flume is going, but it was really showing its age. So I think it's fair that it has gone. Having said this it's a bigger shame that they have removed a family/water ride to replace it with a coaster, as Alton Towers is lacking bit in attractions for ages between CBeebies and the big coasters. Also it leaves the rapids as the only decent water ride in the park (Battle Galleons is only really good for soaking the poor people who choose to actually ride it), which is a shame, as I can't see them installing a new flume in the future. It's already been stated that the woodland area, which the majority of the Flume occupies, will be left to nature once it has been removed, and I can't really see a new flume ride being installed anywhere else in the park at all. Unfortunately it seems that flume rides are a bit of a dying breed, which seems ridiculous when you look at how they can be done properly with rides like Chiapas. With regards to the coaster, it's exciting that the park is finally getting its woodie, but I can't help but feel that it's a bit of a compromise in scale. I'm hoping that the end result will be a great ride, but I don't think it's going to be a mind blowing addition.

Whatever the outcome of the investigation there will be a solution, if it was mechanical (restraint failure for example) they will make changes to solve the malfunction, if it was human error they will put steps in place to ensure it cannot happen again (just like The Smiler). This ride was a huge capital investment by the park, and no matter how tragic or shocking this accident was they are not going to scrap a huge investment like this. The only way that would happen is if people actively avoided the park because of its presence, enough that the write off would be more economic, which won't happen. Again using The Smiler as an example, yes it put people off from visiting Alton Towers, the park was a Ghost Town compared to normal for the remainder of last year, and it's not properly recovered yet to this day, but people still ride The Smiler and as bad as the press got for Alton Towers, it does fade over time. What happened here was awful, but I don't think for one second that the slide is going anywhere anytime soon.

Here's mine, mostly UK based... Arrow: The Big One - BPB B&M: Nemesis - Alton Towers CCI: Megaphobia - Oakwood GCI: Gwazi - BGT Gerstlauer: Troublesome Trucks - Drayton Manor Intamin: Temple of Peril - DLP Mack: Runaway Minetrain - Alton Towers Mauer Sohne: Spinball Whizzer - Alton Towers Pinfari: Mini Apple - Alton Towers Premier: Revenge of the Mummy - USO Reverchon: Primeval Whirl - Animal Kingdom S&S: Mumbo Jumbo - Flamingo Land Schwarzkopf: The Beast - Alton Towers Setpoint: Pteranodon Flyers Vekoma: Corkscrew - Alton Towers Zamperla: Buffalo Stampede - American Adventure Zierer: Treetops - Oakwood

Wow that is quite a lot of stuff, to be potentially happening. Pirates alone is more extensive than I would've imagined, sounds like they are trying to capture some of the magic of the Shanghai version, could be quite interesting to see how it turns out. As for the other rumours, it would be great to see a new Frozen ride in Fantasyland, and hopefully a meet & greet location included with this, ( I still can't believe they haven't already got an Anna & Elsa meet in place). A new version of Indy would be amazing, but I can't see this happening for a long time if at all, but Disneyland Park does definitely need a new E-Ticket attraction. It would actually be quite good if it was located north of Temple of Peril, connecting PotC and Temple creating a loop within Adventureland. I'm sure this would improve the flow of people in the area, and bring more people to Temple, as it is an easy attraction to miss completely as it is tucked away from the rest of the area. The studio rumours are the most promising though, as the park needs a big overhaul, although I would scrap the Studio Tour I don't think it's needed or is still relevant to warrant the changes needed to make it fit around the other plans.

The plans for the new mystery ride have been uploaded now, and it's a simple round ride in CBeebies Land. CBeebies Round Ride While it's not a particularly exciting addition, at least they are continue to expand CBeebies with new attractions, and they've not had a ride like this in the park for quite a few years now. It's just a shame that Cloud Cuckoo Land (the other 'kid's area) seems to be being left to rot with closures and no apparent new additions.

Also Thorpe announced two opening dates and planned two passholder previews and cancelled them with short notice, but Thorpe obviously doesn't have the presence that Dollywood does. Dollywood are handling the situation better, yes Ghost Train has now opened (although it seems to be experiencing its fair share of breakdowns, as you'd expect), but at least when Dollywood knew it would be late opening they didn't announce a new opening date without knowing if it would be ready or not. Disney never do a 'Grand Opening' day for their attractions, they soft open and test and adjust from there, it's a sound practice and the guests that get to ride have it as an added bonus, not a disappointment, more parks should use this approach in my opinion.

Surely the better option (if this is true) would be to remove it from Fastpass+ completely, and make it Standby only until everything is running smoothly. Yes you would annoy those who have already made reservations, but they'll be a lot more people that will be even more annoyed when they find out that they have no chance of riding it at all once they are there, not to mention the huge amount of disappointed children.