In search of Wood

[george greenway]

On the last TPR trip to OZ, Robb came out with a blooper. They had just ridden the Wooden Mouse in Aussie World, N.Queensland, A casual question was in the air, "How many wooden Mouse Coasters are there in the world", Robb's reply was 3.

Is he right, are there more, which did he miss out ...

I'll add more to this as the week progresses,

[beatle11]

Wood excites people. That's what she said.

 

I can only think of 3 myself. There's the one at Blackpool and the one at Luna Park in Sydney along with the one at Aussie World. I would guess those are the 3 Robb is thinking of.

[tiger01]

Try rcdb.com . That'll help!

[beatle11]

Ha! I found a 4th one. The Wild Mouse at Batu Night Spectacular in Batu, East Java, Indonesia

[deathbydinn]

Not exactly the traditional Wild Mouse layout, but..

 

Super Tornado

[beatle11]

^RCDB refers to that as a steel mouse, though the pictures make it look as old as a wooden mouse.

[robbalvey]

Ha! I found a 4th one. The Wild Mouse at Batu Night Spectacular in Batu, East Java, Indonesia

I wonder if this could be the third Aussie Wild Mouse that the guy that ran Luna Park Sydney talked about. He said there were three, one there, one that ended up at Aussie World, and a third one that he didn't know what happened to it.

[beatle11]

^That makes sense. The notes on RCDB state: It is believed this roller coaster came from the Melbourne Showgrounds in Victoria Australia where it was owned/operated by Wittingslow.

[downunder]

I remember going on a wood Wild Mouse at the old Sydney Showground, but this was most likely was incorporated into Fox Studios as an attraction, and then relocated to Luna Park again.

 

There was also a wood mouse at Adelaide Showgrounds that seems to have disappeared.

 

Here's what I see:

 

Wild Mouse: Luna Park Sydney -> Easter show (temp) -> Fox Studios -> Luna Park (again)

Mad Mouse: Adelaide Showground -> match stick factory

Wild Mouse: Perth Royal Showground -> Aussie World

Mad Mouse: Melbourne Showground -> Batu Nights, Java (rumoured)

 

As an aside, this may have been a very elusive credit, on rcdb in relation to the defunct Jazz Junction from Dazzleland (South Aust): "It is rumored an individual from Melbourne bought the coaster at auction with plans to set it up at his home."

[SharkTums]

^Was that the powered coaster in the mall in Adelaide? I have that pseudo credit! My parents even have a picture of me on it!

[downunder]

^Sounds like it.

 

I was going to add that perhaps the original mouse at Luna Park Sydney went to Adelaide.

[Noxegon]

Judging by the teasing I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you've found two in Indonesia.

[Popcorn54]

Also The Southport Mouse is in Storage and should be opening in Margate in the heritage Park, so that could sort of count....

[tiger01]

I've been going through 20 pages of Rddb Wild mouses and this is what I have found.

 

Devil's Coach-J's Amusement Park

Mad Mouse-Melbourne Showgrounds

New Wilder Wild Mouse-Lagoon

Pirun Kelkka-Särkänniemi Amusement Park

Runaway Mine Train-Frontierland Family Theme Park

Scamper-Cedar Point

Souris folle-Expo '58

Wild Maus-Holiday Park

Wilod Maus-Loudon Castle

Wilde Maus-Springlake Park

Wild Maus-Pontchartrain Beach

Wild Maus-Queens Pike

 

Right, I got bored i'm afraid but theres so many! You can Find the search results here: rcdb.com/r.htm?ot=2&lo=95&page=15

 

Just go down the wood/Steel bit and when you find a wood click on it. It's quite simple

 

I have been on the one at Blackpool a few times and I must say it is aging quite a bit and is quite hard to enjoy becasue it throws you about alot. It's more rideable than a Vekoma SLC thuogh!

[superman2]

Been told by George to reveal the identity of the first of 3/4/???? WOODEN MOUSE COASTERS in the world.

 

Number one) As we all know by now is the Wild Mouse at Luna Park, Sydney

 

Nice park, great little coaster and a superb day was spent there recently by TPR.

A few photos below.

 

Keep the detective work up guys, and lets see how many wooden mouse coasters in the world we can find

More would be revealed by George soon......

[george greenway]

Thanks for all the comments, there is a story to to this thread, and I'll begin the tale with the background

 

Counting Coasters can get very boring, its only a number after all, some are more special than others, like "1000", mine was in denver, colorado.

So I developed the idea of "getting the set".

For this to be fun, the set must be something of note; if you search for it on here you will find Richard Bannisters "getting the set of B&M's". a mighty achievement covering 4 continents, saddly none in Oz or South America.

 

But how did he know where they all were? How do you get your bucket list?

 

Over the years, I've been offering ideas to Duane Marden, Owner of RCDB, about how to improve it, bug fixes, etc.

The biggest change he made was just over a year ago when the complete data storage and search system had a modernization. With a little bit of practice, you can use the "Advanced Search" to reveal alot of data.

 

I have on my bucket list;

"All 51 Schwarkopf's"; http://www.rcdb.com/r.htm?ot=2&mo=8191&page=1&order=4

"All 75 B&M's"; http://www.rcdb.com/r.htm?nm=na&ty=1&co=6831&st=93&ot=2

(ive got 1 of the B&M's left!)

 

The above are easy searches, but to hone it down to find only the vekoma boomerangs takes a bit more diligence:

"All the Vekoma boomerangs"; http://www.rcdb.com/r.htm?ot=2&mo=8191&page=1&order=4

Copy that into your browser, now look at the top right of the window, you'll see the words "Plot on Map"

Because of a major effort from Duane Marden, Malcolm Marr and others, the exact location of every park and now even every coaster are being plotted in Goolge Earth.

This challenge will require me to go to Uzbekistan and Argentina to complete!

 

now you can see how sad/fanatical this hobby can get;

"All 55 Butterflies"; http://www.rcdb.com/r.htm?ot=2&nm=na&st=93&ty=1&co=7140&page=1&order=4

 

So how did I get such a fascination with Wood; there are 167 wood coasters listed on RCDB as currently operating:

http://www.rcdb.com/r.htm?nm=na&ty=2&order=4&st=93&ot=2

Back in 2008 I had 20 left to go ... and OZ had 3 majestic ones; a scenic, and TWO wild mouses.

So a plan was hatched to get all the OZ coasters in 10 days, including 3 prized woodies.

Joining me on the trip was fellow enthusiast Richard Bannister (noxegon on this forum), but fate was to deal us 2 sad blows. A couple of months before the trip in March 2008, the Melbourne Scenic was taken apart for refurbishment that took a good year. Being true enthusiasts we still went to Melbournes to get the Zyklon and the powered dragon (sad debateable inclusion in ones coaster count) and photographed the renovetion work on the scenic.

 

Research showed 3 operating Wood Wild Mouse Coasters in the world on RCDB in 2008, so this trip would complete the set. A noteable achievement.

 

I'd already added to my count the one in blackpool in 1979 and added Luna Park Sydney in April 2008, but sad blow #2, the Wild Mouse at Aussie World was down for maintenance the month of our visit.

 

As followers of the Forum may remember, in 2007 my job took me to Shanghai to work for a few weeks at a time. Over the next 3 years I took every free day I had to travel throughout the Country to visit parks, Zoo's and Cultural areas (that also had coasters), and it was at the end of the TPR 2009 trip to Chengdu and Shanghai I had a "4 day weekend" spare so I went to Brisbane to relax, and crucially look up the Wood WIld Mouse I'd only seen from outside the park the year previous. It was September, and the begining of the park season down under, so it was uncertain if anything would be reliably open. I'd allowed 2 days to get the mouse, and I also had a return flight booked to Melbourne to get the Scenic there, complete madness.

 

The plan had me flying a red eye flight into Brisbane at 7am friday. A quick call to the parks found both Aussie World and Luna park Melbourne were open the next day, so I headed to Warner Bros. Movie World for a ride I just loved, The Scooby Doo Coaster, then in the afternoon headed to Sea World to get the new launched bike coaster.

That night I had boked into the swanky resort of Pelican Waters, the hotel had just converted into a Crowne Plaza and was stupidly expensive, but I am a member of the Holiday Inn Scheme and I'd amassed enough points to stay there the night. It was just perfect, I got an upgrade to a junior suite and had an infinity pool outside the window streaching across the golf course, with the occasional Pelican dotted arounds the lake.

The next morning I was up early, straight to Aussie World, first on the door, and the mouse was not running. bummer. I was the only one in the park too, so I went around photographing, took a ride in the Ferris Wheel, and was spotted by management. Once I was outed as an enthusiast, who had flown from Shanghai for the Mouse, they got the compressor on, ran a few test trains and I had an hour of fun before I had to leave for my flight to Melbourne, where I was succesfull in getting a few rides on the Scenic before another 12 hour red eye flight that night to get back into Shanghai for work monday morning.

 

But I had all the Wood Wild Mouse credits in the world!

then the obvious happened .... http://www.rcdb.com/r.htm?nm=na&ty=2&st=93&lo=95&ot=2

some one found a Wood Wild Mouse in Indonesia, at a place called Batu, and it ran at night. what a wind-up

RCDB had a few photos of the coaster, but we couldn't get a good fix on the park as at that time the Google Earth Imagery was low quality.

This changed in 2009 when Malcom Marr locked the position of the coaster, and so a trip was conceived between myself and fellow enthusiast Talhat Mohammed at the end of 2009. We delayed the trip till 2010, as Talhat opted to join TPR on the OZ trip, and added Indonesia onto the end of that, and then the obvious happened. If we made the trip a day longer we could get ALL the credits in Indonesia in. That trip ended in a mass of flights, unbeleivable long car journeys, but would end with us standing on top of the world .... over to Talhat to add in some spice.

[downunder]

To rub it in, I've been on the original Big Dipper wood coaster at Luna Park Sydney. In fact, I was there the night it was damaged by fire, but I didn't start the fire.

 

I've been running a thread in the 2011 North East trip forum to see how many boomerangs everyone has been on. I might start a thread on the main forum because I'd be interested to see how many boomerangs well travelled enthusiasts like yourself and Noxegon have been on.

[Noxegon]

Too many.

 

(41 at last count).

[superman2]

Indonesia was hard work but immensely rewarding in the end as George has mentioned.

The logistic of trying to fit so many flights in one trip is a recipe for disaster but all worked well for us in the end.

Back to topic and lets try to complete the wooden mouse coaster set.

 

The second Wooden Mouse coaster in the world, also known by most of us by now is, the Wild Mouse at Aussie World. Another superb coaster that the TPR Australian trip participants enjoyed recently.

 

1)Wild Mouse at Luna Park Sydney

2)Wild Mouse at Aussie World

 

How many more to go????

[george greenway]

Have a look at how well spread out the credits are in this island

They fall into 4 distinct areas, 7 to the west, one cre-ho place in the centre, the cream of the trip is hidden in the parks to the west, and there is one gem tucked away on the Northern island of Salewesi, called Trans Studio. it does sound like a movie stage for a chick flick.

 

This trip held allot of other counting options. I collected 4 airport credits; semerang, surabaya, ujungpandang and jakarta. Then there were the budget airlines. for the princely sum of £30, ($50) you can fly between these places, the inflight food was a sweet bun and glass of water.

Talhat's planning can best be described as seat of the pants, we'll figure it out when we get there. Bearing in mind we know of no-one who has been there, advice was scarce. We had the broad plan timed out with flights and hotels fixed, and a rough itinerary that we thought might work. What we were told but didnt believe was a 160km road journey from Jakarta up into the mountains to Tamar Safari and then to the city of Bandung would take 5 friggin hours.

Some roads were washed away, huge pot holes big enough to hide an elephant and vehicles that were antique and then it would open up into an out of town streach where our Toyota Insipid 4x4 managed the dizzy speed of 48MPH, with the diesel engine making so much noise we needed ear defenders.

If you look at the Islands terrain, you'll see a huge ravine seperating Taman Safari and Bandung, the gorge is spanned by a large bridge which gave frightening views of the river below.

We ventured to Bandung to check on the progress of the new launched coaster slated for a June opening according to the billboards, no chance, we'll post more detail of the other places in Indonesia we visited, but for now, its over to Tal to do the reveal on the wood we found in Batu, and the surprise of the trip negotiated by Tal in true TPR style.

This is the layout for Indonesia

[superman2]

Wooden Wild Mouse number three, probably the the most famous one in the set.... Wild Mouse at Pleasure Beach, Blackpool

 

1)Wild Mouse at Luna Park Sydney

2)Wild Mouse at Aussie World

3)Wild Mouse at Blackpool pleasure Beach

[superman2]

Our trip to Indonesia was based around this very rare wooden mouse coaster. The mood was slightly down when we were heading towards this evening/night only park.

We had visiting Java Timur park 1 in the afternoon. It just started to rain when we arrived at the park, hence we couldn't ride the powered dragon coaster there.

 

Would they run the jewel of the trip for us in the rain, questions were running wildly in our heads? We only had one opportunity to ride this coaster as we were flying back next day.

We made it to the park,fingers crossed hoping for the best...................what happened next was amazing, we shouldn't have been worried at all.

We were treated like royalties.

 

Not only did the park run the coaster for us they let us walk the lift hill and climb all over the coaster.

 

They allowed us to take onride photos and video. All this was done with permission and supervision of the ride manager.

We would like to thank the ride manager and park for offering us these special treats.

 

So Wooden Mouse number Four.... Wild Mouse at Batu Night Spectacular,East Java, Indonesia

 

1)Wild Mouse at Luna Park Sydney

2)Wild Mouse at Aussie World

3)Wild Mouse at Blackpool pleasure Beach

4)Wild Mouse at Batu Night Spectacular

[george greenway]

The high point of the trip, literally; we were totally blown away at the friendly nature of the manager and his team.

The weather had canged during the day from cloudy with sun to cloudy and sporadic rain, by the time we got to Batu we were expecting the worst as it was raining hard; but no, they were very happy to run the ride in the rain. The difference being this ride is pay per go, so the opperators have that very important incentive to give the customers value for maney.

 

We were thrilled to accept their hospitality to climb all over the ride, and had numerous rides on the mouse. Our enthusiasm encouraged other locals to pay up and have a go in the rain too.

The mouse is located on the far right as you go through the main entrance, you go through a market area where you can buy both T-shirts and Polo shirts, in average UK sizes.

 

The drive back to the hotel was over 3 hours, and we debated wether to miss the last park, with only 1 powered credit it wouldnt be a deal breaker.

We both had trans world flights the next afternoon, with 16 hours travel, and a 4 hour layover in Singapore before overnight flights setting foot back in the UK the next morning; I also had to spend a happy hour changing planes in Charles de Gaule, at 6am.

Our fate was set when we started the negotiations with the hotel for a car and driver to visit the park, look after our backpacks, and drop us of at the airport, a princley sum of 1/2 million, in cash. We were running low on currency at this point so We tried to get our debit cards to give us money from the cash point, nada, they dont work. Luckily I had my travel cash card, which duly coughed out the million we needed to survive the last day.

 

The journey to Wisata Bahari Lamongan, for a powered dragon, was going to be a few hours, starting with the battle to leave the city snarlup. The time vanished as we reflected on the superb credit from last night, and we soon realised our english speaking driver only knew 2 words, "Pay Toll". We had arranged an all inclusive trip including toll's fuel, so we duly paid the toll's and deducted the money from his tip.

 

The park was a nice surprise, it was scorchingly hot even though we had driven to the seaside. We quickly wristbands and proceded through the exit as all the entrance gates we could see were chained up, but that proved a mistake so we tried again, this time following some local who just bought a ticket; success we got in the park. The park map they gave us had scribbles on it indicating the coaster was not where it was on the map so when inside the entrance we checked the map on the wall to find the dragon coaster, and then the surprise happened. there were 3 coasters in the park. The known dragon, a rotary coaster and a crazy car coaster, we were stunned ...

[george greenway]

which one is the fake

The first coaster we came across was the rotary coaster

then we found the jet coaster being attacked by a giant squid

and lastly we found the crazy car

[Noxegon]

Judging by the teasing I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you've found two in Indonesia.

 

Looks like I was right. Rotary Coaster looks like a Ferris Wheel to me, so I guess Crazy Car is another wooden wild mouse. The twenty-four million rupiah question is where it came from...