viking86

Yeah that place was awesome! Does anyone know any free video editing software that allows you to rotate video clips? Or does anyone wanna do it for me? I shot quite a few video clips of the slides with my camera but theyre all sideways Oh and heres the only pic I found with you in Don. I have a few with Monica in though Yngve "Alpine coasters coming soon" Oestbye Find the Don...

I highly doubt that. If you look at all of RCCA's designs, you will see that pretty much every hill has a very large radius at the top and usually they dont go very fast over the hills either. SoB doesnt look like an exception to me.

The trains might suck, but I wouldnt blame it all on that. The two RCCA woodies I rode in Spain a few years ago (Wild Wild West, now Coaster Express and Magnus Colossus) were both running Intamin trains and they were both vibrating and shaking alot.

My one ride on Colossus last summer did not give me a good impression of Intamins steel coasters. It was vibrating like crazy and it was really noisy. I dont mind loud coasters as long as they makes cool sounds (B&M) but something has to be wrong when the ride sounds like a car-crash.

Heres a few pics of our house and one showing the view. Edit: Added a picture showing my room.

Some people might not consider it a coaster, but Supersplash @ Tusenfryd has a very cool tunnel.

Yes, the track did move quite alot.

Awesome pictures! Thanks for sharing the link Yngve "Cant wait to ride Speedmonster the last weekend in April" Oestbye

That place looks really nice! I love the picture with all the turtles in

Day 3: After spending several hours on a boiling hot bus I must admit that I was quite dissappointed when we arrived at the park, and Im sure I wasnt the only one as the park looked extremely small from the outside. It didnt last long though. Already before entering the park we were greeted with free drinks, and the day continued with a nice typical austrian meal. Once inside the gate we found a very cute park with several nicely themed family rides and one PSYCHO PAX-Coaster. This is easily the most insane coaster Ive ever ridden! Good positive G-forces, slammer laterals and ejector airtime far more intense than the airtime on Balder. I rode it almost 40 times that day and I never got bored on it. Its probably in my top 3 list and thats not bad for a coaster the size of a family coaster. I cant think of a single coaster where the name "Wild Train" would fit better. To fully understand how insane this coaster is, I reccomend checking out the onride video on http://granat.es.lth.se/~olofsrnm/nyrc/rchq.php?page=movies&id=1060 as words cannot describe how awesome it. In the video you can actually see our buses as the train is heading down the first drop Okay, heres the pics: I'll end this update with a 'hairtime' picture of Wild Train. I actually rode this coaster almost 40 times that day and I was never bored. I want one in my backyard. We even got ERS on the bumper cars before we left the park. Wooooooooosh!!! I cant think of a single coaster where the name "Wild Train" would fit better. Everyone loves the psycho airtime on the "Made in Russia"-coaster. After the park closed we got ERS on Wild Train. The park manager came and yelled "Are you rrrrreeeeeEEEAAAAADY??" before every train left the station. He was awesome! Heres Olof, doing slightly better than Don in his Wiener Prater video Phil and Andy having fun on the trampolines. Weeeee! Alot of fun were had on the slides. Slides are always fun! Especially those with airtime. Don and Phil can tell you all about that! The main street. In the background you can see the mega-large ferris wheel. The one-legged duck is watching his kids ...with elephants that tries to get you wet! ...and a jungle cruise... Among the other rides there was a pirate ship... The park was surprisingly nice for being out in the nowhere in Austria. More PAX-goodness... ...and gives the riders in the front seat some INSANE lateral G-forces as the train enters this turn!!! After the turn around the cute castle the train heads down another psycho drop... Then its time for the people in the front seats to experience some insane ejector air as the train flys over this hill. After the helix it goes down this psycho drop, giving crazy ejector air for those in the backseat. The ride starts with a nice twisting drop giving some good positive G-forces at the bottom. This is followed by an airtime hill and a very intense helix. Look at the awesome supports! "Sorry Greg, its too late to get off" Greg, Phil and Nina looks a bit concerned. I was concerned too, just look at the turn into the station!!! A few of us decided to head directly for Wild train next. After a free drink outside the gate we continued the day with a group meal. Heres the group waiting to enter the park. The park didnt look like much from the outside. Luckily we were wrong!

I thought Bandit was running Premier trains like those on SoB. And Loup-Garou has a different layout than the others.

Happy birthday Don! Hope you are having a great day!

Sierra Tonanta is in Mirabilandia, not Gardaland. And its built by William Cobb, not CCI. It may look impressive, but its definately NOT a good ride. Its rough, slow and boring and has no airtime at all.

Oh yes, I forgot about that one. That ride was REALLY impressive!

LOL that was awesome! I have seen similar rides at fairs here in Norway a few times, but with bears.

^I agree! Its a fantastic place, but the rides are unfortunately 'only average'

I really like your park! It looks very realistic. Keep up the great work!

Day 2: I just have to say that Wiener Prater is a fantastic place. This is not your standard amusement park. Theres no park entrance, and you have to buy individual tickets for all the rides, which are all owned by different people. Its more like a giant fair with large rollercoasters and dark rides. There is also a very unique combination of modern thrill rides and old classic rides in this park. It was probably the most expensive park on the trip, but it was definately worth it! Okay, onto the pictures... The feeling you get when youre all the way up there with only some tiny chains holding your small plastic chair cannot be described. It simply has to be experienced. I loved this ride and I would be surprised if we dont see many more of these. Ahhh Starflyer. Probably my favorite ride in the park. I must admit I was slightly nervous on my first ride though. The park also had a Wild Mouse coaster. It was quite fun, except the evil brakes at the end. The park also had a ton of dark rides. Heres one of them. More awesome pictures of Prater from the wheel. Looking down from the top. Notice that there are no think steel beams holding the wheel, just many thin cables. OMG! Some of the cabins had tables and chairs in them. I guess you could hire those and have dinner in them. Vienna from the wheel. Heres the view from the top. Prater is one fantastic looking park. Look at all the colours!!! Going up... Time to ride "The Wheel" Interesting colour combinations... It was an alright ride. A little rough, but not bad. Super 8-Bahn was a fairly large Pinfari non-looping coaster. They look 'slightly' concerned, and they have every reason to do so. It wasnt nearly as bad as this one though. Luckily my anti-headbanging technique worked very well. Im not sure if I wanna ride one of the rough ones if thats the case. Someone claimed that this boomerang was one of the better ones... My first Vekoma Boomerang is also the only one with a tunnel. Megablitz was the best coaster in the park. It was built by Vekoma in 94, but it was smooth and the helixes were very powerfull! ...with real horses!!! I dont think there was a single member on the trip who didnt feel sorry for them. Then it was the Wiener Ponny-Carousel... This was a nice little scenic railway from the 1950's. Our next stop was Hochschaubahn. No matter where you went you could always see "The Wheel" which we called it. I belive it was built in 1895. ECC members crossing the tracks. We also got a backstage tour of the service area. It takes you through a park and into the woods. We started the day with the Prater Adventure Tour which takes you on several of the rides in the park. The group I was in started on the train ride. Usually they run their diesel engines because the steam engines are so expensive to run.

Katun gets my vote, but I also really like the wheel covers on Montu too.

Okay so last summer I went on a trip through Hungary, Austria and Italy with the European Coaster Club and I thought it was about time I posted a trip report. Hopefully you have all forgotten Don's trip report from this trip so mine will seem more interesting Day 1: Started the day by meeting up with the group at Heathrow for the flight to Budapest. Met up with the rest of the group at the hotel there and went to Vidampark. It was a park with a nice setting in the middle of the city. Its not excactly what I would call a quality park, but we still had alot of fun. The main rides there are Hullámvasút, a wooden coaster from 1922, and Looping Star, a *surprise* Schwarzkopf Looping Star from 1981. Vidampark is the ride's third home. Okay, onto the pictures. Please get off! Pictures from Wiener Prater are coming one of the next days! One of the larger drops on Hullámvasút. After doing most of the rides we went back to Hullámvasút. As you can see, it was really busy after our ERS ...and a powered coaster. The picture is taken from the scariest ferris wheel EVER! a top spin.... Among the other rides in the park was a log flume.. Happy ECC members returns from their ride. And it was VERY fast!!! Look at that beauty! For a 24 year old coaster, it was running REALLY well! It felt like it was brand new. This ride was awesome! Very smooth, but it also had some great laterals. Ahhh Looping Star! I was really looking forward to this as it would be my first Schwarzkopf looping coaster. I was not dissappointed. Credit whores in the last cars on the kiddie coaster. After our ride we got to see the original drawings from the early 1920's. There were plenty of people with cameras on the trip. Headchoppers!! The ride was rather bouncy, but still fun. This beatiful ride was built in 1922. Hullámvasút was the first coaster of the day. Heres the group waiting to go to Vidampark.

This is a coaster that I posted over on coastersims.com last week. It may look like a recreation of an Arrow looping coaster, but its more like a recreation of the Arrow/Vekoma building style. I made a few improvements though to make the ride smoother and more enjoyable, but it still has some of the typical Arrow/Vekoma trackshaping. Enjoy your ride! Screenshots can be found here http://nldc.interfix.net/p1536 Good ol' Corkscrew.nltrack

They must have repainted Blue Tornado before the 2005 season. It looked fantastic when I was there last year.

There is no correct or wrong answer to which coaster is the best. Everyone has different opinions so it totally depends on who you ask.

The early Intamin standup coasters are very similar to B&M standups. Check out these coasters to see the similarities http://www.rcdb.com/installationresult.htm?column=1,10,3,4,5&order=1,2&model=177

The middle of the train usually gives the smoothest ride on most coasters.