Garet

Part 10: Tobu Zoo The mega-lite was awesome, I had to make a decision and although I really wanted to go to Parque Espana to ride the famous B&M invert I made the decision to try out the mega-lite instead, a tough decision but it leaves me a park for if i ever go back (that and nagashima spaland). I felt almost sad for the ride it was the first warm sunny day in my whole trip and a saturday but the park was so empty they were having to use fuel cans to weigh the ride down and sending people out with just the front and back cars, all the other parks had had at least 20-30 minute lines on cold days or week-days and it was almost sad to see such a world class coaster so empty. Regina looked impressive but was riding really rough on my visit. The other thing was when you leave the subway they have a corridor filled with pictures of their new attractions for each year, there were so many rides I started to worry I hadn't planned enough time but sadly I guess Tobu Zoo doesn't have the crowds so they take out the old ones for new ones, there was plenty of open space in the park so I don't think that could have been the issue for their removal, anyone know more? I'm here, it was a bit of a long journey on the subway but worth it. I sure hope that red sign doesn't mean down for rehab in japanese Regina and Max This thing felt old, it was really clunky on the way to the top, which for a drop tower was an odd feeling I rode this a few days after the Brazil incident and for some reason seeing random seats chained up made me nervous Creepy mascot rabbit thingy A missed credit The reason i'm here The longest line was just before it opened and these are the only people I saw for most of the day At least you had a 50% chance of a front or back seat ride Hair-time I've never been so sad to see a train having to be weighted down, and the black-train looked so lonely sitting on the transfer, in another reality both trains would be flying round with a line of happy people who can't believe a mega-lite has finally come to the US You'll notice the same riders in a few pictures, the train spent most of the time sitting in the station just waiting ( despite the lack of line they didn't allow re-rides I had to get off and run-around again to the entrance) Sorry for the lack of train I went round the ferris wheel 3 times to try and get shots and only saw 1 train go round. Regina likes it rough Sorry for the lack of photos but after I rode it I never saw another train go around Last photo of my trip, a credit for some strange reason I really wish I could have tried

Hope no-one minds but since the official TPR Japan trip is running and photos will be flooding in, i'm going to round up my update earlier than I planned and post the last two updates back-to-back Part 9: Tokyo Parks On my 3rd disney day I was greeted by heavy rain so I decided to grab tickets to the ghibli museum in the afternoon and grab a credit in the morning at the Aqua Stadium. Also included in this update is a park whose name I don't know but I think it has japan's oldest roller-coaster, I hadn't planned on visiting it but it turned out to be next to a temple I had seen in a guide book. A rainy day at the aqua stadium Turns out the ride didn't open until the afternoon so I checked out the quite small aquarium with a dolphin pool i really hope this tank was bigger than it looked because it seemed like their manta ray didn't have much room to swim it filled most of the tube. Really nicely themed rides The reason i'm here It was fun, nothing overly special or worth going way out of your way for The train really reminded me of a giant aqua trax for some reason maybe because of the restraints The weather went from horrible rainy friday to a nice hot saturday so I decided to check out a temple and ended up getting a surprise credit i spy something beginning with S It had a very original name of spaceshot hmm maybe the mouse didn't just steal the idea of the lion king from japan First time i saw one of these squirrel cages in Japan They were very proud to be in the RCDB It was a really fun little ride And the suprise on the last drop had me smiling

Part 2 DisneySea at night looks fantastic The volcanos eruption really lights up the whole park at night Really neat effect Line was closed after fantasmic (I think they weren't expecting such heavy crowds a lot of the bigger rides closed early to avoid the rushes of people leaving the show) I really wish I could have got a view of disneysea from the top at night. These people may have been in line 3 hours but I bet they got a great view for their patience Mickeys dressed for Japanese weather Aquatopia looks amazing at night and was thankfully still open I would now say this area looks great at night, but its Disneysea it all looks great 24/7 Honestly don't think I'll ever visit a park better than this Thanks for reading, just a few small parks left now

Hey Larry I got the new underland ride at lotte world for you in my korean park index update thread: http://themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=64957&start=10 Sadly except for the 4d shooting ride they installed down there i don't know if it counts as a new land, it's just a cover put over the shopping malls restaurants, which makes it really confusing since its a shared spare with 1 entrance for lotte world guests and one for shopping mall users but if you accidentally go out the shopping mall entrance to use a bathroom or browse shops and come back you'll find yourself locked out of lotte world since they don't allow re-entry (there was no sign in english in the restaurants just at the park exit) I'll maybe head out and try and snap pictures of everlands new safari ride later this year when the lines start to die down.

Part 8: Disneysea Night & Fantasmic People were putting blankets down for this show 3 hours before the show started (even though there were signs saying it wasn't allowed until 1 hour before the performance), thankfully I got lucky, some japanese kids wanted to practice their English while in a line, although as a teacher on vacation sometimes I do wish I could just say no and have a break from teaching but the kids were enthusiastic so I entertained them, the dad spoke English and said his wife was holding a spot for the show and I should join them and gave me a business card, 3 hours later just before Fantasmic was due to start I rang him to see if his spot was any better than mine, after he came and found me, turns out his wife had grabbed a spot right at the front. Sweet! Fantasmic Japan really is an amazing show to see that must be seen in person, even Robb's amazing videos just don't do it justice. The hat starts to light up and the show begins. It had a lot of water and a lot of fireworks And a lot of disney movies to see Worryingly Mickey got nowhere near as much applause no matter how many tricks he did as opposed to when Stitch or his girlfriend showed up World of color Wish i'd got a better picture of the snake, the thing was huge Some disney characters join the fun The volcano makes for an amazing back-drop for the show These were put to pretty good use I really do love how much stuff they fit into the water just for this one show Even Cinderall couldn't get the crowd going as much as Stitch Bad guy time Lots of fire Even the volcano is pissed What is Murphy in japanese? Maybe I got a bad night but the dragon was nowhere near as active as it was in Robb's video. The head didn't rise like in the video and mostly you just saw the laser image claws Chip & Dale shot for Elissa holy crap that's a lot of people

As much as i'm sure the new show will be amazing, I will miss the old little mermaid show, I went expecting very little and was really suprised by how much aerial work (pun not intended) went into each show when it happened so often. The little kids were fascinated with flying through the air on her trapeze (swimming through the fake ocean on her trapeze) and all the other aerial actors representing the fishes. I expected something cringe-worthy like the golden mickeys but came away really impressed.

Do they still make tilt coasters or not? Could they maybe be integrated into their looper category? This would probably destroy the website and turn away anybody who read it, but what if the filter replaced "tilt" with "S@!T" and "drop" with "OH S@!T".

Nice to see one of those intamin spinning coasters, I tried the one at Lotte World with just myself and although I can normally handle spinning rides with it unbalanced I think it's the closest i've ever come to puking on a coaster.

I noticed Elissa said smoothest Vekoma, so this even meets out millenium at fantasy island for that title then? I wish vekoma would make more i'd love to see this on more vekoma rides.

It may have been one of TPR's videos but i'm sure there was an IAAPA interview where the question was asked and they said that they wouldn't be making any more of these things, which is kind of sad i'd love to try one one day.

I rode this ride last year and the animation seemed quite blurry, glad to see it's getting an update may have to fly over and try it out next year since osaka is a pretty short flight from Korea

Final Part Heading to Morocco Stitch was all over the japanese parks I'm suprised the Disney machine hasn't made this a movie yet This tiger seemed to sell pretty well. Bumped into Aladdin And a creepy Apu The magic lamp theatre for some reason the fastpasses for it were only giving half hour windows To try and help me understand the plot The Underwater area was beautifully themed Down for rehab This was a fun little show A great touch by the disney cleaners Not my favourite flavor if i'm honest Although the brit in me was doing back flips over this one Tower of terror still had a big line before fantasmic Next update will be of fantasmic and some night pictures

Part 2 Heading over to raging spirits The little twisting car on the loop sign was a nice touch Finally my fast-pass was up for Journey i'm one elevator away And we are there, this was an incredible ride. A quick break from the rides to enjoy more scenery Tower of terror Great little effect

Part 7: Disneysea Disneysea was amazing, there's not really much else to say. It's completely stunning and one of those parks where you could just walk around all day and do nothing but stare at the scenery. After my quiet day thanks to snow in Disneyland, it seems all the people who stayed away on the wednesday were out in full force on the thursday, lines were at a minimum of 45 minutes to an hour for most of the smaller rides and 3 hours minimum even during parades and fantasmic for the bigger rides. I wonder what disneys return policy is since most rides had been shut down wednesday due to the snow, on the day I visited peopple were out with signs indicating where lines started since they were spilling out onto the paths and into other zones (journey to the center of the earths line started near aquatopia) and even getting snacks took 15 minutes with them selling out about an hour before fantasmic started in some cases (people were out with notepads writing down orders and counting off the stock until it hit 0). Despite signs saying you couldn't settle down until an hour before shows or parades people were camping out for fantasmic almost 3 hours before it started. I think it may have been Robb who said the single rider lines weren't overly advertised at Disney but a lot of people were using and abusing when I went. What shocked me was though the park was mostly teenagers it was the families trying to abuse the single rider lines and avoid the lines, whereas the teenage groups were happy to split up, on a few occasions, I would see a father with a child or 2 being spoken to by people at the ride entrance presumably about being split up when the ride operator called out for 1 and would approach the child, the father would get in a heated discussion for a minute or two and refuse to split up or leave when the exit was pointed to. It was kind of shocking since it was only on this busy day I saw it and was completely opposite all the Japanese culture i'd see so far but I saw it maybe 3 times this day and never on any other days. In the end they quite often just got let on the ride which was kind of annoying. The single rider lines were a mixed bag the day I went, the indy staff was hauling ass and I don't think I ever waited more than 10 minutes, raging spirits had quite a lot of people in the single rider line and just didn't seem to move, after 30 minutes I gave up and got a fast pass. Tower of Terror seemed to have a very thorough cast member, she kept yelling at people taking pictures in the line which seemed strange because i'd been allowed to take a non flash photo in the pre-show, on some rides and in most lines on the other rides and every-time one person was asked for would walk up and down the main queue to check first and also sometimes took a group of two out of the line who were happy to split up, I don't know if this was common for the ride or just a lady who takes her job very seriously, there was only 10 people ahead of me but i waited around 45 minutes (still better than 3 hours). There was one thing that seemed very un-disney though, some of the bigger rides shut before their stated closing times with no warning (journey and tower) , I went to see if journey was quieter 10 minutes before fantasmic was due to start but it still had a 3 hour line so I decided to watch the show and come back to find it was closed, I pointed at the ride closed time and showed the cast member my phone to show there was 10 minutes left but she just made an X with her arms, I realize with long opening hours and a 3 hour line that if they let all the crowd into the line after fantasmic then the ride wont finish until the early hours of the morning but I was a little sad not to get a re-ride, i'd always assumed disney had the same policy as when i went to alton towers - that the ride closed time was when the queue line closed not the ride no matter how busy it was. Oh crap i've accidentally gone to universal Oh wait, there's amazing theming that can only be Disneysea Amazing theming is all around This popcorn was delicious Hello tower of terror, I will see you later It was a bit too cold to ride those for me Very Jules Verne I think I went inside this in Paris The 20,000 leagues ride was fun but I'm glad I did it early and didn't wait an hour for it Hello Journey, I'll see you when my fast-pass time comes up Also delicious Stormchasers was next although for the life of me I can't remember what the ride was about, it seemed to be about clouds or something. Actually I remember the gun...... .... At least I think it's a gun And people think disney is full or naughty images Aquatopia for reasons i'm still not sure of was one of my favorite rides of the resort Heading towards Indiana Jones Geez that movie sucked It opened an hour after the park and although I got there 5 minutes after it opened, it'd already built up a line Line themeing I see dead people

When they said cutting people of rides i thought maybe they were cutting the mechanism at the back or seat belts but It looks like in that video that they actually sawed through the main restraints to cut them out, How difficult is it to have brand new restraints made for a ride? I mean if the fire-brigade cut through every restraint that's over 40 seats.

Just got back from Lotte World so here's the park index update for the new rides: The new 4d shooting theatre (that's its name) was really fun but it was strange that they only upgraded desperados into a 3d shooting theater last year since this felt almost the same, both rides have you sit on something that moves slightly, you have a practice round and it shows who did best and who did worst then the real movie where it shows your rankings at the end. Unlike desperados though it suffered like some of the other lotte world lines of having no set queue line, since it only takes 40 people every 10 minutes i'd hate to try and line up for it on a busy day. The fountain show I posted earlier seems to have disappeared but I forgot to check that area of the park to see, it's not listed on the website anymore, the dynamic theater on the 4th floor (the 3d simulator) also isn't listed but was still there when I visited however it was closed. With 3d desperados, the 3d haunted house movie outside and 4D shooting gallery I wonder if they'll opt to remove their 4th 3d ride. I didn't visit the new talk to beluga attraction since the park was dead and it's right in the middle of the young children section I didn't want to be a creeper. Also no-one was riding it and I didn't fancy a 15 minute conversation with a korean speaking computer graphic. They had the new check-in desks the goddard group have been promoting so heavily but honestly I barely noticed them, the only difference I can see is the glass is gone, it didn't feel like a "luxury hotel check-in" you still lined up in a cattle pen and got called to a numbered desk to get your ticket, instead of shutters on glass they had pulled down blinds for the closed desks but it was nice to not try and talk through a speaker to the person behind the glass but over an open counter. Empty lines in the morning, people seemed to push and run when the gates opened but all the big rides were empty outside, I have no idea where everyone was running to. Sadly Gyro-drop has fallen prey to the scream shields that were installed on gyro swing a few years ago, it really does take something away from the ride especially on hot days. Also note the holes on the bottom of the seat where seat belts used to be. Wakiki wave is no-more, seems like a disko will be the new ride for 2014 Lotte Worlds customer service has really improved since I moved to Korea 3 years ago, even when the park is dead they run their fast pass system so you still have an option if the park gets busier later. Whereas Everland has got more SBNO rides since I arrived and tends to run half capacity, Lotte World have built and built on their service each year They added a trick art museum next to Pharoahs Fury but i'm not sure how permanent it is. Not sure how clear it is looking at the first car but French Revolution had more padding than it did before (I think) The signature shot was out of order For some reason a lot of people just set-up picnics here and never moved, I passed the same groups from when the park opened to when I left to return to work at 2pm New area for 2013 Underland is actually just themed entrances to the shopping malls restaurants that already existed, Lotte World guests MUST enter and exit through the themed door and shopping mall people must enter through the shopping mall normal entrance.... why? Lotte World has a no re-entry policy, I went out the shopping mall entrance of the restaurant to use the bathroom just outside and almost got stuck not getting back in, the restaurant manager had to track me down. There was a sign in korean next to the restaurant lotte world entrance but I had just assumed it meant ticket holders only beyond this door, not you must also exit through this door. My girlfriend almost made the same mistake when she wanted to go check out the shops while I was eating. New ride Sorry for the blurriness I used my iphone and lighting was bad Sinbad on the website but in the park most signs said sindbad I can't remember the last time Atlantis was an aquatrax, I think most of my visits in the last year it's just been a trax.

I'd love to see the trackless cars put to work on a Cars style dark ride, you'd lose the thrill of the race and speed of racers but I'd love to see one giant radiator springs with tons of trackless cars together, visiting the different buildings and passing many other guests in their trackless cars cruising on the main street, imagine if the characters of cars land instead of being animatronic were also mounted on the trackless vehicles with some in the buildings (such as luigi in the tyre shop) but randomly bumping into Lightning and Mater just wandering around the town. A guy can dream.

I hope no-one minds the double post or me bumping an old topic but I got some new information that I thought might be useful for you but I was given this website by my co-worker today since their english website doesn't have one, it's a list of which rides are down for rehab on each day so you can check to see if T express is down before you go: http://www.everland.com/service/front/frontTime.do?method=holiday&siteCode=CT00101 Its written in korean but since most rides don't have a korean translation if you can't read korean just plug it into google and it will give you the rides name in english quite easily. T express is even easier to be found since T isn't translated into korean at all so just look for the T, darkened box means closed/rehab. Although in the 3 years i've been here T-Express has always had its rehab at the start of the year in feb-march for 2 weeks, that's the only time i've seen it closed for rehab the other times have all been wind. It seems to be open more in the morning than the evening since because of the fireworks, it has to close early if there is high winds in the afternoons they tend to just keep it closed to avoid people rushing to it before the fireworks start. In the case of lotte world their english website normally has suspension listings on their english page for each attraction. Mainly the outdoor rides close in rain but i don't think i've been in snow but both parks tend to close their outdoor rides sometimes even in the lightest of rains Everlands information: http://www.everland.com/web/multi/english/everland/attractions/popup/pop_attraction_standard.html and lotte worlds: http://global.lotteworld.com/app/attrctn/safetyguide.asp I was given all this information because my school is closed for the morning on monday so i have 6 hours free in the morning but sadly I think Everland is just too far to get too in that time, i'd have about an hour in the park before going back to teach afternoon classes but lotte world i should get at least 4 hours to finally experience a week-day.... sadly its forecast rain. If you visit go in the mornings opening is the magic hour when it's pretty quiet in the parks, both parks sell after 4pm cheaper passes since both parks tend to close around 10-11pm, those tickets are really popular for families after work and students so the parks don't quieten down in the evenings as much as you think.

A new waterpark named Onemount has opened in Seoul, pictures here: http://www.onemount.co.kr/#/waterpark It's a lot bigger than I thought it'd be when I heard they were building an indoor/outdoor waterpark I didn't expect it to be as big as this. Lotte World also have a website for their waterpark now: http://global.lotteworld.com/waterpark.asp I find this one interesting since it says Gimhae on the English site but doesn't state the city afterwards it just reads "Lotte Worlds water park in Gimhae", which may cause confusion if you don't know Korea too well. I know this caused confusion for some friends of mine who thought since it was on the same website and read as Lotte Worlds water park that it was being constructed next to Lotte World. Gimhae is actually a 3-4 hour train journey on the bullet train away from Lotte World down on the South East coast of Korea.

For the first ten seconds of the video I thought it was Bryan Cranston doing the voiceover.

This could be the one to take Blue-Falls crown as one of the scariest drop towers around.

Generally, I'm not a parade person either, I don't think i've ever stopped to watch a parade at day (although i'm sure my girlfriend will make me watch my first when she finally gets to experience a disneyland in hong kong) but I have always enjoyed the light up night parades some parks have for some reason. Lights and fire makes everything more fun. I couldn't stop comparing to Everland in terms of its night entertainment, the night ride parades seemed really similar in the mixture of actors and parade floats, as well as a few of the float themes and now having seen fantasmic for myself, i'm quite shocked at how much Everland ripped off the story... main character is having dreams, bad guy shows up in dream, bad guy summons fire-breathing dragon and main character pops out of a hat.....sorry light up phoenix thing. Although Everland does get bonus points for having super low fireworks really close to where you are sitting, I really enjoyed Disneylands fireworks but they always seemed so far away, I felt like it was 4th of July and I was watching from my house instead of being at the party.

Part 6: Disney Night-time Since the park was quiet, I walked around and took a few night-shots as well as of the only parade of the day. Main street all lit-up Pretty castle Looking back towards main street Mickey watches over the castle Splash Mountain The parade was about to start I have no idea which movie the first float was from actually Goofy lead the next float Followed by Minnie and Mickey I'd completely forgotten about the movie Pete's Dragon Snow White followed next And shortly after that Peter Pan Genie lead the Aladdin floats A lot of detail went into these floats The genie changed colours quite often including the colour of Jafar's snake No sign of Abu or carpet Winnie The Pooh was next The Toy Story 3 float may have been my favourite float A lot of characters were included

Part 3 Dumbo was down for the count until almost 6pm A very quiet peter pan Empty tea-cups It's a small world I have a whole 3 part update worth of small world photos if people want to see them, I actually sat down and edited them all to try and win my first ever bag-o-crap to create a small world filled tower of terror car for a photo-edit contest (sadly i didn't win) Peter pan was quiet so I rode that next. Sadly not a real shop Randomly this ride was quiet all day until the evening when everyone seemed to want to ride it after the parade 6th flavour also boring More empty toon town Amazingly themed little roller coaster which nobody was sadly riding It was a fun little ride too Lightning Mcqueen says Hello After a japanese annoucement everyone started heading to thunder mountain so I did too, they'd just opened the line as I arrived so this took about 15 minutes to clear. Snowy thunder mountain Empty bus My space mountain fast pass time finally arose I'm pretty sure i'm in the minority here but I actually enjoy france's launched loopy version more, if they got the new vekoma trains that have appeared on some of the boomerangs i'd ber extra happy. I hadn't planned on riding this but since it was on it's way out I decided to have one last ride of the original Star Tours Monsters INC, maybe I was just too blown away by winnie the pooh's technology but I had no idea this was a new ride, it seemed more like a classic dark ride with a monster inc theme (this is not a bad thing) Strange carriages Walk-on Winnie-the-pooh for most of the time after the fireworks, which reminds me tomorrow's update will be disneys night parade and night photos. See you tomorrow