andyuk200523 Posted June 10, 2011 Posted June 10, 2011 (edited) Hi All, I am going to be writing this over a few days, but will post a day at a time, there is a lot of writing, but also quite a few photos, so please enjoy and comment if you like!!! European Coaster Club Totally Twisted Tour of Sweden 1st June 2011 – 5th June 2011 Day 1 – Arrival & Liseberg After pulling an all-nighter and leaving for the airport at 2:30am the drive was rather pleasant (helped by a few Red Bulls ) We arrived at Heathrow at 5:00am where we bumped into a few other members slowly arriving ready for check in at 5:40am, a quick cup of tea was required to wake up and we then met up with everyone else to board. After a short flight (I never realised Sweden was less than 2 hours flight from the UK!) we arrived in Gothenburg at 10:30 ready for our first day! Being my first visit to Sweden I have got a lot of comments about the parks; I hope they are enjoyable to read! Darren and Andrew, ready to take on Sweden! Liseberg We were led into the park by some of the Public Relations team, we had a short introduction to the park and had our itinerary for the park explained to us, then it was time for our first ERS session, RaBalder! RaBalder Great little kiddie coaster, I am certainly no Credit whore, but I really enjoyed this little Zierer coaster, although it was one ride to check then off to the other coaster for our first ERS…. Lisebergbanan As a lover of all coasters made by the late great Anton Schwarzkopf since I was a young enthusiast, I was eagerly awaiting my first ride upon his favourite coaster, it certainly looks amazing, but would it ride amazing? Well, I needn’t have worried, it was great! The use of the terrain for this coaster is incredible, it carries so much speed into the final brakes that it could easily have gone round a few more helix’s or something extra, but as per usual smooth as silk transitions, signature “Schwarzkopf” dives under Upswinget “S&S Screaming Swing” which is located on the very edge of the Liseberg hill. I loved how Lisebergbanan swooped round the S&S Space Shot, and the setting for this coaster combined with the constant speed and smooth transitions made Lisebergbanan hit my top 10 steel coaster list within 1 ride! How a station should look during ERS!! Plenty of Hand slapping as the train arrives back in the station Lisebergbanan doing its thing swooping all over the hillside Managed quite a few laps of Lisebergbanan before the park opened to the public at 1pm, we only had till 7pm today to enjoy Liseberg, as we would be returning later in the week, so as I was keen to sample everything the park had to offer whilst it was definitely working, we quickly moved onto the next eagerly anticipated ride… Atmosfear Now I’m going to let you into a small secret……Giant Drops scare the hell out of me (only the first ride of the day, not sure why, but it keeps the adrenaline pumping!) So after strapping myself into the very exposed new style restraint, (see photo of a rather nervous me below!) I went very quiet! I feel that Atmosfear would be a better overall ride experience at night due to the flashing lights and water vapour they spray above you as you are pulled out of the “bunker”, although during the day the visuals are amazing, it probably helped with my fear that for the first ride we rode facing the hill rather than facing the rest of the park, as it does not feel as tall this way, up and up we went to the total ride height of 295ft, right, I am currently the highest I have ever been on a drop tower and I am very nervous! Wait for it………clink, suddenly all of my fears are gone, my arms are out and I am falling for what seems like forever and I have the biggest smile on my face, afterwards there was so much adrenalin running through my body I almost had difficulty walking, but we went straight back round to ride again, this time figuring out where to sit to be facing the park. Time to face your Atmosfear It really stands out from everywhere in the park and a good few miles outside of the park! Time to face my fears! The ride is amazing, however on the first ride we did not have a full car so I personally did not feel that the drop was as impressive as, say Apocalypse or Hurakan Condor, however we rode about an hour later with a full car and it makes a hell of a difference!!! If you wish to ride facing the park, you need to be sitting by the operator booth, from this angle the height is really noticeable, it is incredible, and it quickly became my single favourite drop tower ever! (As you can probably tell, I am 3 hours into my first trip to Sweden and I am already redoing top 10 lists and having the time of my life!) After a few drops of Atmosfear, we headed down towards the Space Shot, well, after Atmosfear, it really didn’t give that big of a buzz for me, however you do get amazing views and Balder is certainly a better coaster to be looking at from 200ft in the air than Pepsi Max Big One (sorry BPB….PBB, whatever your called this week). We wandered back up the hill quickly to grab a few rides on Upswinget next, one facing out at the park and another facing the hill, very different ride experiences, I think I preferred facing the hill due to the feeling when you swing out over Lisebergbanan and realise your quite high up with great Airtime ! Well, it was time to venture down to the bottom of the park and discover the fun that could be had by riding a few Swedish Intamins! Kanonen Kanonen has a great colour scheme! Great views from the top of the hill Ideally I was wanting to ride Balder before Kanonen, however there was an almost non-existant queue for Kanonen as we walked past it, so we thought it was worth a quick ride, it was at this point that we discovered that in Sweden no-one seems that fussed about riding the front row compared to the rest of the train, which was great for us, as you can’t beat a front row ride on a rocket coaster ! Front row ride, that's me on the left Look ma, i'm upside down! Kanonen has quite a good strong launch and the top hat is great, however this is where the praise ends, it is a shame as this was my first rocket coaster with inversions, I feel that Intamin did a great job squeezing in a large amount of track in an impossibly tight space, but this is also the rides downside, the transitions are just too tight and this leads to having to ride very defensively to save bruised shoulders, certainly not the worst coaster I have ever ridden, however not the best either. Anyway, enough putting it off, it was finally time to ride Balder, the most eagerly anticipated coaster on the trip from my own perspective. Balder Mmmm, Intamin Wooden Goodness Again, there was almost no queue for Balder, so we queued up for the back seat (1 train wait once on the platform) and I was ready, I was literally grinning from ear to ear going up the lift, well, what can I say, it was the single most insane, amazing, airtime filled, smooth coaster I have ever ridden in my life, I could not believe the amount of Airtime I got on every single hill!! Balder straight away went into my No. 1 spot for Wooden Coasters, it had to, it was incredible! Only rode once though today as we were back at the end of the week with a special ERS . This is how busy the station was all day, good good! Wheeeeeeeee!!!!!!! We had a group meal at 5pm at the Huvudrestauranten which is a great place to host a group meal, this is the restaurant where everyone who was unsure what a Smorgasbord was, certainly knew by the end of the meal! It appears to be pretty much everything you can think of in an all you can eat Buffet style, also we were provided with a complimentary bottle of beer which was shortly followed by the great waitresses giving everyone shots of Schnapps, I declined (I like a sleep after drinking!) We spent the next hour at the park chilling out at Café Akaj (Top Tip alert…They have jugs of cold water sat on the counter with pint glasses which you can just fill up as many times as you want). We had a quick wander back up the hill to sample Atmosfear again, it was amazing yet again, certainly dropping faster and harder now warmed up than it was in the morning. We had to be back on the coach for 7pm to head towards our accommodation for the night, so we started wandering to the south entrance so we were not the last ones on the coach (no-one wants to be last!) But on the way we spotted the children’s dark ride Fairy Tale Castle, which is similar to the Peter Pan rides around the world, it ate up a few minutes and was nice and cool inside, it would appear that we picked the one week Sweden appears to be having a heat wave! The official name of the trip.....the literal translation being "Out and Back" although according to a few local Swedish members, no-one would use that phrase, they would just say it in English! We left the park and headed to our accommodation for the night, one of the great Scandic hotels (for those interested, it was the Scandic Linkoping Vast) For which we arrived at about 9pm, but due to an early start the following morning to make sure we got breakfast and onto the coach for our day at Kolmarden Zoo. Edited June 12, 2011 by andyuk200523
andyuk200523 Posted June 12, 2011 Author Posted June 12, 2011 Day 2 – Kolmarden Zoo & Grona Lund After a short drive in the morning, we arrived at the entrance to Kolmarden, it is beautifully done, and if the entrance is anything to go by, the rest of the park should be equally as nice. Kolmardens Excellent Entrance Area We were escorted in our coach through the service roads of the park to the back so that we could get straight onto the parks new attraction for 2011, Safari, just before we boarded we were introduced to the park by one of the parks PR staff, with a little bit of history and why Safari was born, then it was our time to try it out. Safari Safari was previously a typical park wildlife drive, you could drive your own vehicle through the animals enclosures, therein lies a problem, people were causing traffic jams by stopping too long to look at the animals, causing congestion and an unfriendly environment to the animals, the cure was quite simple, but I believe the only one in the world, a cable car which crisses and crosses all of the enclosures in a ride length of 2600m lasting 26 minutes! Leaving the station The cars are just like the new sky ride cars at Alton Towers, however they have metal bars on the sides rather than glass, this gives you a very good exposed feeling with the animals, especially as at times you are just 2m from the floor, at others though you are 20m above the ground, which gives you some spectacular views of the park and surrounding countryside. This is a great addition to the park and as it is a continual moving ride, I cannot see there being a problem with capacity as each car holds up to 8 people. Delphinexpressen The real reason we are here (well partly, I will discuss the other reason later) was the little Vekoma Rollerskater which was installed in 2009, there wasn’t a lot to say about it other than it was smooth and a great little kiddie coaster. The coaster is located right at the back of the park along with a Huss Pirate Ship, for the park though this is it for rides, however as a sister park of Grona Lund, and knowing Grona Lund are running out of space, keep an eye out for this park, as I have a feeling in a few years it will look much different. Animals & More Word of warning, if you don’t like walking long distances, you will struggle with Kolmarden; it is laid out over a massive area of land, with some very steep sections as you walk around. Grrr We started in an anti-clockwise direction from the back of the park and ended up walking backwards and forwards all day! The park is home to the usual zoo animal selection, Tigers, Monkeys, Elephants, Rhinos, Camels and the like, all of the enclosures were very well laid out with plenty of space for the animals to roam, however it did seem like the Snow Leopard was pacing back and forth in his enclosure, even though it was a pretty decent sized enclosure. The Tigers have a great area to roam in, featuring a nice river and lots of grass and trees with hills to explore, we did witness some play-fighting during our visit between the two Tigers, but it didn’t look anything serious. Stunning views from the restaurant The park is also home to an indoor Dolphin show which was certainly a nice way to get out of the heat for 20 minutes, and was novel as I have seen quite a few Dolphin shows and they always seem to be outside, the show made use of this by using lighting quite heavily in the show, spotlights and indoor fountains, all of which was completely lost on me as the show was in Swedish, however it was easy enough to follow as all Dolphin shows are fairly similar. As with a lot of the parks in Europe, there is a lot of playground equipment for children and adults alike to have some fun on. I would heavily recommend if you are in the area, go visit, you will have a great time!!! We left the park at 4pm for the 2 hour journey to Stockholm for Grona Lund!
andyuk200523 Posted June 12, 2011 Author Posted June 12, 2011 (edited) Grona Lund Day 1 We arrived at Grona Lund at 6pm and had a welcome from the park for half an hour, this involved getting t-shirts made for us by the park and collecting our wristbands. We then had a bit of free time before our group meal in Krejsy’s, which was a great Mexican Buffet, with BBQ! Highly recommended, and I think a lot of people agreed it was the best meal of the trip. Whoring it up on Tuff-Tuff Taget Just before the meal however, I had some credits to grab! We started off with the newest kiddie coaster, Tuff-Tuff Taget, which opened last year at the entrance to the park; this is a nice little Zamperla Mini Mouse which provided a nice setting for a kiddie coaster. After this though it was time to sample some more grown up thrills, we went for Vilda Musen as we knew we had ERS’s due on the other major coasters, the park though at this point was heaving, 45 minute queues for pretty much everything (apart from Twister, which decided to break down, more later). Busy Busy Busy Vilda Musen Vilde Musen My first Bobsled/Mouse combination ride I have ever done and I have to admit, it was great! There is a killer little helix towards the end, and with the ride cutting through Jetline’s support structure, provides some great visuals from unusual angles, when we rode we were lucky enough to have a few near misses with Jetline which was great. I think the only gripe we had with this coaster was the insanely narrow queue line! I could hardly walk facing forwards, I almost had to crab walk the queue line, it’s that tight! Vilde Musen Insane We wandered over to Insane next, although we did have ERS on this the following morning, we were keen to get a ride in now as we were fairly certain Jetline was going to be our coaster of choice for the ERS hour. Having ridden Inferno at Terra Mitica, I had a good idea of the ride experience to come, and from the videos I had seen of Insane, I have to admit, I thought it looked quite slow, however, I needn’t have worried, our first ride was facing the water, and it was, well , INSANE! Although I need to stress, read a bit further on for my report on the 2 rides we had the following morning, they were really nuts! Lustiga Huset (Fun House) Great fun watching people with the moving stairs I have never really been in a classic Fun House, so I was keen to try out this one, what a great time killer! I managed the walking steps at the beginning of the ride with relative ease, although one of our group who has been before managed to lose his timing when we were watching him, resulting in good laughs. I won’t take you through a blow by blow account of the rooms, as it would spoilt it for anyone who has never been, but it is an excellent fun house, and the slide at the end….well, imagine 3 guys totalling approx. 300kg going down that slide on the same mat and you will get the picture! Surfing the fun wheel in the fun house Kvasten Up next was luckily only a 15 minute wait, it seemed like the queues from earlier had died down was the Vekoma Junior Suspended coaster. I love the seats, the idea of being suspended and only needing a lapbar is great, and I just wish they had invented these trains when they retrofitted Vampire as these restraints would have been perfect. As good as the trains were, my personal feelings were the layout led to a fair bit of shuffling from the cars, it was a shame as the final helix is a great moment of g’s and the speed you fly into the station at was incredible! Kvasten Jetline What can I say, we found Jetline a walk on, so we thought we would grab a few rides as the park was nearing closing time, it is my new number 1 Schwarzkopf, comparing it to Knightmare at Camelot is unfair to Grona Lund, as they run theirs at an amazing capacity, they were running 4 trains all day, the loading process was very good and would show a lot of other parks up on how to get throughput numbers high! When Grona Lund had this installed, the only difference to Knightmare was the first drop; Jetlines goes almost all the way to the ground through a small tunnel, whereas Knightmares falls a lot short of that mark. Jetline was incredibly smooth, no matter what seat we were in, and during these few rides at just before 11pm, the trains were flying through the block sections, an amazing ride and so far highlight of the day. Jetline just before closing Twister The park closed at 11pm so we made our way round to Twister as the park was kindly giving us an hours ERS leading up to midnight, they had managed to get it running for about 10pm, so it had been running long enough to warm up. The first train went out to lots of whooping and cheering, when it came back in, it failed to park properly, so out it went again…….this went on for 3 rides!!!! We were wondering if we were ever going to get our ride! Twister at night = Heaven Finally we got on the front row, it is a great rollercoaster, amazingly tight, bizarre pacing (slow as anything on the turn after the first airtime hill, but comes flying into the final turns! Some of our group found the trains to be not overly comfy, myself I thought they were really great trains, amazingly comfy, and as has been stated previously, they track really well. It really looks incredible at night I managed a total of 5 rides during the ERS, after the problems at the beginning, I sat in most seats, Front/Back/Middle, the back is crazy, but the views in the front seat are incredible, you approach corners so tight you think you’re never going to make it round! I managed to be on the very last train of the ERS, so managed to come off Twister at midnight, which was great, the only problem I had with leaving riding Twister till our ERS was that I had no idea of the layout due to it being so dark, so I was quite confused overall, but will cure that tomorrow! Edited June 12, 2011 by andyuk200523
robinschroder Posted June 12, 2011 Posted June 12, 2011 Thanks for posting this TR - I totally agree with you about it making a lot of difference if you face the park on Atmosfear - terrifying!! Glad you had a great time at Gröna Lund, too - what a fantastic park!
CorkscrewFoley Posted June 12, 2011 Posted June 12, 2011 Andy, loving the TR so far. Nice pics, and as I said on Facebook, great to see some Schwarzkopf love.
simon8899 Posted June 12, 2011 Posted June 12, 2011 Great TR - rode Jetline some years ago and its a great one. Even the station is cool... Maybe doing a Scandinavian tour myself in 2 years - but thats still in loose planning stage....but you hinted my at some places to (re-)visit....
Recommended Posts