rctneil

I have to give it credit as it does what it was intended for and can't fault it for that, my issue was that for me, it didn't provide the type of ride I had expected. But overall it was fun. and yes, Space Fantasy is amazing! Not quite sure why as it was weird but just super awesome cool!

Better than expected for me were: Whizzer at Great America Gravity Max at Lihpao Land Space Mountain at Disneyland Powder Keg at Silver Dollar City Tennessee Tornado at Dollywood Space Fantasy at Universal Studios Japan Fireball at Happy Valley Shanghai Riddler's Revenge at Six Flags Magic Mountain Worse than expected for me were: RC Racer - Hong Kong Disneyland Ninja at Six Flags St Louis Legend at Holiday World The Smiler at Alton Towers - (my last ride of the year was on the front row and it was amazing though!) Thunderbolt at Dreamworld Those are just a few of the ones that come to mind for me.

I really should start riding the trains at parks. The ones I have done, errm, the few I have done are: - Window on China. The train here is used to go one one side of the park to another. It was also the fastest mini train ever and with nothing stopping you from falling out either side! - Oakwood. This one takes you from the park entrance to the park. - Hokkaido Greenland. This train takes you around the lake at the bottom of the park with the cycle monorail type thing above you on a rail. - Blackpool Pleasure Beach. A weird train ride around, under and over a lot of the park and it's attractions. I think it only currently operates one of it's stations so it's a round trip. - Drayton Manor. I took the train from the zoo back to Thomas Land. Nicely themed train and actually takes you somewhere! - Can I count Dollywood?, I got on the train, sat for 5 minutes and got off it again as it had problems!

Has anyone checked out the TDR on Google Maps recently as Google have added the majority of Tokyo in 3D as you tilt the view down. Pretty neat!

I did it about two days after it was launched and not received confirmation at all.

Really excited by this. It should be possible for me to get to this park and back in a day too! I'll more than likely go and have a look around the area and do it over two days... This is all considering it actually gets built.

I love the fact they have taken the core idea of their current 4d's (rotating seats) and have totally simplified it. Removing all the clutter and by having free spinning seats rather than controlled rotating they provide a new experience. I doubt these will replace the current 4d's as I guess both rides will produce different experiences but if they can add partial control of the spinning via the dampers then they are onto a winner. If a future model is able to increase and decrease the intensity based on a group of riders preferences on a cycle by cycle basis then parks can have a ride that anyone can ride and it can provide totally different experiences.

Very nice looking train. Loved a lot of the newer well themed trains that have been seen of late.

That would work really well. Retheming Sonic Spinball to Angry Birds would be really neat. And a dodgems ride or other Angry Birds themed attraction where Beastie was along with an Angry Birds childrens play area would fit in really nicely. That then gives Alton 3 main kiddie aimed areas: CBeebies Land, Angry Birds Land and Cloud Cuckoo Land. It would finally distinguish each area as it's own rather than being a mashup of Old MacDonald's Farmyard, Adventure Land and Storybook Land.

I would do this but Scandi has taken it's place. It's amazing but all the East Coast US stuff I have not done (including all the Orlando parks). Must get there someday. Excuse that, let me rephrase, I will get there someday!

I may be totally wrong but I thought the Sega license had 1 year left? It would make sense for it to expire now though and either pull the theme in with cBeebies Land or return it to Spinball Whizzer pre Sonic. I'm really interested to hear if anything has been done on The Smiler over the closed season. I expect it has but would be great to hear or see some of the changes made.

An Air Race will be a nice addition to Drayton but I still think a Mega Lite or something like one of the smaller GCI woodies would be amazing at Drayton. I personally don't think the Mega Lites would do well at a major park but somewhere like Drayton really would be fantastic. I wish they would get a set of flyers too.

It reminds me of Chimelong's ride names: Half Pipe Coaster 10 Inversion Coaster Dive Coaster Motobike Launch Coaster Young Star Coaster

I too was a little surprised about them retheming the Squirrel Nutty Ride. I think the problem is that the ride travels over the Farm/Cbeebies Land but the station is just before to the left of the area so I guess trying to pull it all together kinda makes sense. I wish they would somehow re route the queue for Squirrel Nutty Ride around to Cbeebies Land rather than accessing it opposite to Sonic, bring it round so the queue starts where the Dungheap playground was or to the new outdoor performance area. Doing this would make it seem a full on part of the new land and also help to keep Sonic Spinball a separate area. It's just Sonic Spinball that's all alone in it's sort of area. I would say it would be a good thing to tie it into Cbeebies Land but I personally feel it's too much of a "big, scary" ride for the demographic of Cbeebies. If the area had been CBBC Land then it would have made a lot more sense and would tie in perfectly. Maybe Sonic will just sit there all on it's own for a while.

It's nice seeing a park making the effort to add all the smaller details like painting the floor and the rides footers. It's something most won't notice but you don't notice it because it's right and to me that is a good thing. It seems that the Adventuredome really take pride in the rides and attractions they have in there.

Only i305 made me grey out. Never happened on any others until I rode that. Was quite a shock when it first happened!

I think all the seats on the stand up were unlocked. Others I spoke to said the same. It was like being stretched and then squashed as you traversed the loop. Very strange.

Apologies for the delay in replying back. As a couple of people have mentioned, I know they are basically the same ride but Raging Spirits was totally revamped/replaced and retracked over about 2 years from what I have heard. By doing that the ride is now extremely smooth and an enjoyable ride, and this is what I meant by saying I hope they perform similar maintenance/work to Indiana Jones.

Gulliver's Warrington: 25 minutes Alton Towers: 1 hour Blackpool Pleasure Beach: 1 hour 10 minutes

I wasn't exactly thrilled when I heard the news of Thorpe's addition for this year (mainly as i'm not a huge Angry Birds fan) but it's grown on me. I think it will do well at Thorpe and Thorpe really needed some family/younger style attractions so this will be fantastic. It seems as though Merlin are trying to equalise all their parks attractions so each can cater for each member of the family which is great. Doing slightly more with the franchise than they did at Lightwater is also great news to me. I understand Lightwater's was an "Activity Park" rather than a "Land" but I did expect a couple of themed rides etc but I guess that's all to come for Thorpe. I hope they do it well and it should be hugely popular!

Glad you had a good time at HKDL. I really enjoyed the park and even though it's small the attractions it does have are top notch. Grizzly Gulch Mine Cars is an amazing take on Big Thunder and I much prefer it. It ran perfectly all day as far as I can remember.

Even though I am not a massive fan of the ride itself (saying that my last ride on it was amazing), i'd have to put a nod in for the Smiler. As you walk down to it there is just that mess of track all crammed in one area and when you see two trains making their way around the track that have been synced perfectly it really does look excellent.

Can't tire of another Mega-Lite video. Loved it. A funny story of those glasses was at the park with Space Mountain in Taiwan, Robb wanted a POV of it, but didn't want to risk the handheld camera as the park were being a bit suspicious about our visit so it looked as though he was putting on sunglasses for a roller coaster in the dark. oh and the "Look up" note in the case is funny. Anyway, back to the video. Aussie Steve is hilarious in it.

It's quite an interesting re use of space going from a water ride station to a coaster station. Nicely done Adventuredome!

Wow, Just seen the photos of Apocalypse. I rode it back when it was Terminator in 09 and it looks brand new. It's photo now look dreadful. Has the ride experienced changed much or is it solely down to the aesthetics of the wood changing over time (as expected) ? Nice report!