viking86

DO NOT GOOGLE THIS MAN ^I wasn't planning to, until I saw your post. That's the same as saying "don't press that button". If someone says "do not google this" then of course you have to google it. So now I know who Peter North is, thanks to you!

This is what came up on my phone.

Great pictures! I love the first one, it's always fun with pictures where you can see the various facial expressions of the riders! Now, I have a geeky question. I noticed in your picture a lot of 'grab rails' (or whatever the correct technical term might be) on the track. I looked up an onride POV, and they seem to be all over the ride, both inside and outside the track. Now my questions is, is Riddler's Revenge the only B&M to have these? I cannot recall having seen anything like this on any other B&M's. Where they on the ride from the beginning, or was it something installed later by Six Flags?

^I see in the concept art picture that it looks like they will be using the same style of fences as in Walt Disney Studios Park in Paris. Now for me I thought this fence style didn't really work. I understand the concept of what they were trying to achieve, but for me I thought it just looked terrible and had a very cheap look. Example (not my picture) Just my opinion of course, and not a major detail, but I hope they're able to make it look better at Hollywood Studios.

A shooting dark ride would fit perfectly into Lisebergs lineup. I never thought about it before, but I definitely like that idea. I hope that is next on the agenda after the dive machine. I wouldn't hold my breath, my visits in 2015 and 2016 were both terrible. One train operation on Thundercoaster with 60-90 minutes line seems to be standard. Speedmonster has always been an exception though, it has always been running two trains during my visits with about 20 minute line.

Unfortunately that cannot be said about all of Scandinavia *cough*Tusenfryd*cough*. But the Danish and Swedish parks definitely seems to be handling this very well.

LOVE IT! I visited Miniatur Wunderland for the first time in March this year with friends who are also into model railroading. It's a truly amazing place! It's definitely a place that you don't need to be particularly interested in trains to enjoy, and I would recommend anyone to go if they are in the area.

I approve of this update simply because you started with a picture of Hansa Parks small-scale replica of buildings from my hometown.. I do agree with what you say about Hansa Park, it doesn't quite have that "big park" feel yet. But I liked the park very much and had no problems spending a whole day there. As for Kärnan, I thought it was an awesome ride. It had a couple of weird jolts, but overall I didn't have any problems with roughness. Not gonna claim it's a smooth ride though. Like you said, that stengel dive was really intense! I was not fully sold on the backwards drop either. Yes, the drop itself was a lot of fun, but it took a lot of time for 2 seconds of fun. Not a huge fan of the roulette room either. If I want to wait for a specific row I want to have that option. However, we did get lucky and got front row on our first ride. But we were never able to score a backseat ride. I was also positively surprised by Fluch von Novgorod! Intense, fun and mostly a very smooth ride. Really cool to see the real gates in Lübeck that the entrance gate at Hansa Park was modeled after. I had no idea about this. Thanks for sharing this great trip report!

Just been catching up on this trip report, and I must say I really enjoyed it. I loved Wildfire, in my opinion the best wooden coaster in Scandinavia, and in regards to Liseberg I just love the whole place. Beautiful park, awesome rides and some of the best operations I've ever witnessed. I've never seen any of their rides being understaffed, and the staff always seems to do their best to get the trains rolling again as fast as possible. This is definitely true. I spent a whole day at Kolmården last year, so I spent quite a bit of time walking around (because as you said, this place is HUGE). And it's really incredible that the only times you notice that Wildfire is in the same park is when you can actually see it. I remember when they announced it, there were a lot of comments in social media from locals that "Oh no they're gonna ruin the zoo", but somehow they managed to make it fit in perfectly.

I just had to be rescued from the hotel bathroom because the door handle on the inside decided to come off. Never go to the bathroom in your hotel room without a phone!

Just looked through your Port Aventura report. What an absolutely beautiful park! Thanks for sharing your great pictures!

Awesome report! Oktoberfest looks like a blast, and something I would love to experience one day!

Disney's Animal Kingdom, with the exception of the Dino carnival, was the first thing that came to my mind. Anything else in that park is just beautiful! I would love to go back now that Pandora has opened.

Now that you mention it, I did notice that the ride made some rather loud noises in a couple of spots, but it never occurred to me that the ride had a built in mechanism in the trains to slow the ride down. I did however notice a couple of trim brakes throughout the ride. Even with the ride being slowed down, I thought it was a ton of fun, and to me the last tunnel still felt really fast. If it was running much faster before then I would have loved to have ridden that version of the ride.

Thank you! I agree, the resort definitely has its flaws, but those are mainly connected to the Studios Park. Overall I came back pleasantly surprised with what I experienced during my three days there. LOL it looks like you're trying to put on a brave smile to hide your terror, but failing miserably! But yes, these restraints can improve a ride so much. This was my second experience with the vest restraints, the previous one being the boomerang at Walibi Holland, and even that one was half-decent ride with these new trains.

^Yes, Sky Dragster @ Skyline Park is a Maurer Spike coaster. I had to check myself, because I've never heard that term used either. ^^And yes, it was what I also first thought of based on the description. But the steering bit?? I have no idea what this is going to be...

^Huh, for some reason I thought it was the Intamin version we were getting until I saw your post and looked at some real-life pictures. Either way it's definitely an awesome addition, and I agree that it was something the game was missing. I'm looking forward to playing around with it.

Thank you, I enjoyed putting it all together! The arcade shot was planned for the first post, but it got lost in the 550 pictures I came back with on my phone! I didn't notice any signs for the arcades, but the names you mentioned makes sense. I remember the one on the right having various plans and small scale models of various inventions through history, while the one on the left was definitely more "US themed"...

And another wooden mega coaster bites the dust, which is hardly surprising anymore. I guess there is only so much the traditional wooden coaster track can handle. I'm super curious to see what they will do with the layout!

Part 3 - back to Disneyland Park Alright, time to leave the Walt Disney Studios Park behind and head over to Disneyland Park. In this third and final update I will be taking a look at the amazing Discoveryland, where the best ride of the whole resort can be found, before I will end this trip report with a look at some of the afternoon/nighttime entertainment the park has to offer. But before that, here’s an interesting little detail which I didn’t notice before on my second day. The plaque at the park entrance is different from it’s CA Disneyland/WDW counterparts. In stead of reading “...enter the world of yesterday, tomorrow and fantasy” it says “...enter the worlds of history, discovery and ageless fantasy”. I don’t know why they have gone for a different text, and for me it doesn’t make any difference, I just thought it was interesting and worth mentioning. Here’s a look at the park entrance gates, which are directly underneath Disneyland Hotel. And here’s the plaque on the wall underneath the train station. I also found that I had taken a picture showing one of the covered walkways. This is the one that is on the right side of Main Street U.S.A. The park was being decorated for Halloween, and back in Frontierland there were more decorations for each of my three days. Okay, let’s jump straight into Discoveryland. This are of the park is FANTASTIC! While the attraction list is very similar to it’s Tomorrowland counterparts, the theming and the atmosphere in the whole area is completely different, and I love it! The buildings look fantastic, particularly with the use of gold/brass colors the whole place is almost glowing when the sun shines on it. The sign welcoming you to Discoveryland. This pillar has a plaque with a quote from Jules Verne. Translated into English it read “Everything that is within the limits of what is possible must be and will be accomplished”. The big eye-catcher in Discoveryland is of course Hyperspace Mountain. I don’t think I’m excaggerating if I say that my jaw dropped once I got to see the whole ride structure ride with my own eyes. It’s just stunningly beautiful, unlike anything else I’ve seen. The main feature here is naturally the Columbiad cannon on the side of the building, a true masterpiece! The only downside is that there are no longer any physically moving parts on the cannon, but it’s still awesome This is the view you get of Hyperspace Mountain when you enter Discoveryland. Look at it! I can definitely live with wait times like this. A closer look at the Columbiad cannon. It’s a little bit of a shame that there are no longer any moving parts on the cannon, but it still looks awesome! The whole area surrounding the ride is beatiful as well, with water featured, rock formations and a small-scale version of the Nautilus submarine from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. The lagoon in front of the ride, and the Nautilus submarine. With the exception of the post-parade crowds on the third day the line was usually in the 5-15 minutes range, but I still took quite a bit of advantage of the single rider line. The single rider line also has several really cool features. First it gives you a real close-up look of the cannon. And second, it takes you on the elevated walkway past the station, giving you some unique views you don’t get from the regular line. I really liked the station interior also, a very different look from what I’m used to. As you can see from the pictures, the ride has also been fitted with brand new trains from Vekoma. This is the view from the single rider line, where you go across the walkway on the right, giving you a great view of the station. To the left of the control booth you can just see the bottom of the stairs. This is where the single rider line is coming down. I didn’t get any good pictures of the trains, so this will have to do. But damn do these trains work wonders for older, less smooth rides... Okay, so let’s talk about the ride itself, shall we? I have not ridden the original version so I cannot compare it to how it was before, but I knew there was a lot of hatred for this ride, and I must admit I was actually quite nervous before my first ride. Not only am I going on a ride that is probably going to be quite rough, but it will also be in the dark so I will not be able to see what is coming and brace myself. Well, I’m happy to say that boy was I wrong, because this ride is AWESOME! No, of course it’s not a smooth ride, but it’s not bad at all and this ride is also INTENSE! There’s really only a few spots I would call kinda rough, and the new trains with the vest restraints remove any potential headbanging. If riding multiple times there can be a slight discomfort from your shoulders rubbing against the vest, but overall I LOVED this ride! Heck, it might even be my favorite Disney coaster from those I have ridden (DLP and WDW). Now, I can absolutely understand if people hated the ride with the old trains as I can easily see the ride being on the uncomfortable side before the update, but now it’s a fantastic ride! I’m not going to do a step-by-step review of the ride, simply because I’m not able to since the ride takes place in the dark. I know the ride has three inversions, a sidewinder, a corsckrew and a cutback in that order, and you definitely know it when you’re going through them. But what happened between them I wasn’t always sure about. In terms of highlights I liked the launch. It’s not a very strong launch, but it’s definitely enough to give you the funny feeling in your stomach. My favorite part happened after the first MCBR. While I’m not 100% sure about what was going on, it feels like the ride is doing a triple-down while turning to the right before the corkscrew. Particularly in the backseat, this part (and the whole ride really) was a lot of fun. So to wrap it up, this is a perfect example of a ride refurbishment done correctly, mainly with the new trains. Just for fun I had a look at the 2013 steel coaster poll, and I saw that this ride was ranked as #246 out of 364, and by far the lowest of all the Space Mountain coasters, with the second lowest one being Space Mountain at WDW almost 100 places above it on the list. And I get it, and maybe I would also have hated the ride if I had ridden it with the old trains, but now it has become a pretty damn awesome ride and I would love to hear from someone who has ridden both versions to hear how much of a difference the new trains make. I never thought I would come off a 22-year old Vekoma thinking “that was freaking amazing!”. Hyperspace Mountain onride picture with Andrew and Dylan in the backseat. But while it’s definitely the main attraction in this area of the park, Discoveryland isn’t all about Hyperspace Mountain. So let’s have a look at what else is here, shall we? They also have Autopia here, and the petrol driven cars feels just as out of place here as they do at Magic Kingdom. Les Mystères du Nautilus is a walkthrough attraction, simulating a walkthrough of the Nautilus submarine. It’s worth a go! They also have Star Tours here, almost hidden back in the corner behind Hyperspace Mountain. This is such a fun ride, one of my favorite simulator rides. It was also pretty much a walk-on all the time during my visit. Another big eye-catcher in Discoveryland is Cafe Hyperion, hooked together the Videopolis building. Looking at the building exterior, with the fantastic looking airship, you would think it would be housing a spectacular ride, but nope! Inside is actually a large quick-service restaurant, but what is most interesting is the huge arena style seating centered around a stage. The lower half has bench seating, while the upper half are restaurant tables for the quick-service restaurant. Definitely an interesting setup, although during my visit I didn’t see anything going on stage other than some movies being shown on the screens. The entrance to Cafe Hyperion At 5:30 PM it was parade time in the park. While on a slightly smaller scale than the WDW parade (yes I know I keep doing the WDW comparison all the time, but it’s the only Disney resort I can compare it to) it was still fun and very popular with the park guests. Mickey, Minnie, Donal and Daisy leads the parade at DLP. Buzz Lightyear in his spaceship. I loved the Crush float! DLP also has the awesome fire-breathing dragon! Not all of the characters had their own floats, but at least Rapunzel and Flynn Rider didn’t have to walk unlike Snow White behind them. No float for Belle and the Prince either... And of course finally my favorite girls! It was at this point my phone decided to freeze up and I had to restart it, forcing me to scramble across the hub to try to get some pics on the other side. Unfortunately this was on the third day with a more crowded park then the two days before, so this was as close as I could get. Elsa, over here!! My favorite time of the day at this park is during sunset, it’s just stunningly beautiful. The sun is starting to set on the castle. Frontierland is very pretty during sunset. But the most impressive area of the park at this time is Discoveryland, where everything gets this wonderful glow. Here’s the Orbitron carousel. Hyperspace Mountain looks amazing during sunset. Heavy air traffic over Disneyland Paris. Lights starting to come on. Crowd gathering for Illuminations. At the very end of the day it was time for Illuminations. This was a fantastic show, featuring castle projections, water fountains, lasers, searchlights and pyrotechnics. I was particularly impressed by the projections. The only other projection show I have for comparison is the now gone Celebrate the Magic at WDW, but the projection quality for Illuminations was definitely a step up as the image quality was top notch! The only thing I was missing was the “big boom” fireworks, pretty much all of what they have are silent fireworks, but other than that it’s a fantastic show and a worthy ending to each of my three fantastic days at Disneyland Paris. And yes, when the Frozen music started you could hear the entire crowd going “OOOOoooohhhhh”. That didn’t happen when any of the other scenes started. So if anyone of you out there was hoping this thing was starting to fade away, I’m afraid you’re going to have to wait a little longer. While most of the show is mainly projections, fountains and lights, the finale of the show features plenty of fire. I mean literally fire! You could really feel the heat from this one! And one final overload of pyrotechnics brings this awesome 20-minute show to an end! Some final post-show projections reminding us that the park has been around for 25 years, Crowds leaving the park. The covered walkways on either side of the main street really helped to empty the park quickly. Mickey waving goodbye to the guests from the train station. So that’s a final wrap on three fantastic days at Disneyland Paris! Yes, the Studios Park wasn’t really that great, but that was expected. Disneyland Park however managed to provide me with a lot of the Disney magic. Service still leaves a little bit to be desired, and like others have previously the people here don’t seem to care that much about where you can and cannot smoke. But I didn’t see any line jumpers or badly behaved guests during my stay, and I didn’t have bad experiences myself either. So all in all Disneyland Park is a fantastic park, and one I would definitely reccomend anyone to visit. And again special thanks to Andrew, Chris and Dylan for making the trip a great one! Until next time...

It's never a good idea to read trips reports from Epcot Food & wine when you're hungry, and this was no exception. My stomach is basically yelling at me now to go get some food!

Finally got around to seeing the video. Here are my thoughts summarized: 1. Awesome videos! 2. That drifting coaster is one mad contraption! 3. I want to ride Hollenblitz so bad!!! Thanks for sharing!

Nah I don't have them on display. I use them occasionally for candy, dip sauce, etc... Oh, and while not really a theme park related item, I also have this awesome Thomas Kinkade Disney calender!!

Now there's an idea! I'm with you both on that one! Now, about the GotG rumor... while I'm not against the transformation itself, I feel that there are so many better places in the park to spend the money, and where it's a lot more needed as well. Now for something that is confirmed, DLP has announced their Christmas lineup for this year. http://www.disneylandparis.co.uk/events/christmas-at-disneyland-paris/ The projection show on Tower of Terror is anything but surprising to me, as when I left Disneyland on my final day two weeks ago I could see them testing some of the projections.

Currently enjoying a #500 Imperial India Pale Ale from Nøgne Ø brewery. 10% ABV 100 IBU and my goodness is this an awesome beer!