Schwarzkopf Posted October 26, 2011 Share Posted October 26, 2011 (edited) OK, This summer Ben and I (not very regular posters, but we both did East Coast 2008 and West Coast 2009!) did a huge China trip, stopping off in Qatar and Hong Kong on the way. Whilst in China we did the parks in Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Suzhou and Beijing, as well as some touristy stuff <3. I'm using a mixture of our photos. First couple of days - Doha, Qatar There are hardly got any photos from Qatar because we were only there a couple of days, and it was too hot to do ANYTHING, let alone take pictures. It's amazing what oil & gas can do... Beach... We took some frames <3 The Cred is the only coaster in Qatar. It's in a shopping mall, which has the typical 'fake Italy' theme. The cred: It's a spinner, but they must've given up on that because the cars were locked facing forwards. It was pretty disgusting... It gave ben a black eye <3 Such tack... Sunset... So yeah, Qatar was interesting, but it was Ramadan so we couldn't eat (or smoke 3) all day. Probably won't go back, but it was a nice stopover and worth it for the country cred! Hong Kong (Ocean Park, Disney and Sightseeing) up next... Edited November 16, 2011 by Schwarzkopf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 26, 2011 Author Share Posted October 26, 2011 ... Hong Kong <3 Ocean Park I didn't realise how much I failed to take photos at some of the parks... The day we went to Ocean Park it was BOILING, which didn't help my 'ugh' mood at taking photos. The cable car gets you from the entrance/zoo bit to the top bit, where the credz are. Is that a cred? I think so... The mine train thing was fab, if a bit random. The location was stunning though... The other (open) cred was Dragon, an arrow looper. I wasn't the biggest fan, but Ben seemed to love it. Asians and their bloody umbrellas. It was funny at first, but by the end of the trip was VERY irritating. We got stabbed in the head so many times that the phrase 'I just got UMBRELLAD' was born. After some other rides (Rapids, Log Flume, S&S Tower etc) we headed back down to the entrance/zoo area, via the new 'ride' which is basically a train which cuts through the hill back down, and had a date with Pandas <3 Aww <3 Hong Kong Disneyland Again, hardly any photos, but I always find it hard to capture a Disney park in photos anyway... Disney has its own 'line' on the HK Metro, which is basically an extension line of an existing line, just one station from the main part of the other line. The trains were fab <3 The park is quite small, so seemed rather packed, although when the new areas open it'll be a lot better. Small World <3 Tomorrowland... BTW, Space Mountain here is AWESOME. I think it's quite similar to Cali's, but seemed so much faster and was just totally insane. Loved it. Last photo (I really did take like, NONE), of the castle. Other stuff we did: The train, which goes around the edge of the park, which did our OCD in. The seats all face inwards (as in, you're sitting sideways looking in at the park). It sounds like it makes sense, but they've already started building beyond the original boundaries of the park, so you don't see everything. PLUS, all you see for most of the ride is trees anyway. Pointless. Lion King show <3 Stitch Encounter, which was pretty funny considering I hate Stitch (sorry Mark!)... Jungle Cruise, which was poo. Winnie, which was pooh. The Golden Mickeys show (a compilation of random characters and scenes). This was quite dissapointing due to the fact that it had too many burdenous characters, and hardly any fab ones 3. Uhhh... yeah. There really wasn't much here, but I still really liked it. Like I said, it'll be fab when the new stuff opens. Other HK stuff... This was fab. Getting darker... There we go. Mincing on the left. The towers on the right have had a few fingers <3 We had cocktails at the International Finance Center: Oh, also, someone told us to go and see this Buddha. She forgot to mention how expensive the cable car was, but we'd gone all the way so had to do it. It was :dontswear:, fake and touristy. Thanks! It did have some fab views of the Airport (built on reclaimed land), though... The Burdenous Buddha: The last Major thing we did in Hong Kong was go up to Victoria Peak, which we ended up calling 'Vicky Peak', then 'Vicky P', then 'Vicky Pollard', then 'Pollard'. Yeah, it's not funny at all, but it was at the time <3. Stuff on the way to the Vicky P tram... The tram had a burdenous queue, so we ended up sharing a cab with some randomers. I think it was a couple of quid each, so wasn't any more expensive really. The view <3 We had to wait a couple of hours for it to get dark, which was burdenous as you wern't allowed to smoke anywhere /////3. It eventually got dark, but my camera sucks at night photos so this is all I could salvage //3. So yeah, that's it. Hong Kong is fabbb <3. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Looty Posted October 26, 2011 Share Posted October 26, 2011 Great report! Hong Kong looks amazing and is definitely on my bucket list! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simon8899 Posted October 26, 2011 Share Posted October 26, 2011 Looks like a great city but I hate all temps over 30C / 100F...I take a month with freezing temps than one day hotter... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 27, 2011 Author Share Posted October 27, 2011 ^ Haha, true. It was the humidity that was the worst really. It just adds like, 10 degrees onto what it actually is! We did get used to it, but the first few days in HK were vile... Part 3 - Chimelong Paradise After Hong Kong we moved over into the actual People's Republic of China. The border crossing was a lot smoother than we expected, but the difference between Hong Kong and the mainland does hit you like a truck to be honest. It's fine after a couple of hours, but the initial faff was foul. Chimelong Paradise (and Chuanlord Manor, another random park near Chimelong with like, 9 creds) are in Guangzhou, and we were staying in Shenzhen (where most of the parks were), so we decided to get it over and done with first as a day trip. Luckily, when we rocked up at the station in the morning we took our passports with us, cus the witch at the counter wouldn't have flogged us a ticket otherwise. The journey was about an hour and a half, in a fab bullet train, so we were fooled into thinking that Chinese trains were fab... more of that later though. I think at some point in the journey Ben had to do a runner to the toilets due to an early Chinese stomach. Just thought I'd throw that in there. So, Chimelong... (Chimelong pics are all Bens because I CBA) First we minced to the B&M Dive Machine with the innovative name 'Dive Coaster' It was pretty much walk on at first, and they only had ONE train, so it did get a bit putrid later when we went to re-ride it. This doesn't REALLY need reviewing, as it's basically Sheikra. It was fab though <3. Love how the front is just empty... Chinese people are so weird. After that we headed over to the other side of the park towards the Colossus Clone and the Booster Bike, stopping off for our Intamin Half Pipe cred on the way. It was actually VILE. So uncomfortable, so painful, just UGH. The one in Finland wasn't anything special, but this one was actually offensive. Next up was Colossus. Well, '10 Inversion Roller Coaster'. Meh. It was better than Colossus, but only because it's not quite as old. It'll probably be disgusting in a few years too. Next, Motorbike Launched Coaster! It was awful. Velocity is actually better. It was just really rough and vulgar, which I didn't expect after riding the Intamin looper, which was in a fairly good condition. Kiddie coaster <3 Love these... The Final cred (I think...) was the Mack family coaster thing. It was pretty good actually, and had some amazing notices <3. Such an Intamin... Baboosh <3 As we needed to leave and get to Chuanlord, we only did one flat, the Giant Frisbee. It was quite fab, but not as good as the huge Intamin Gyroswing we did in Shanghai. That'll come eventually... We then rerode the Dive Machine and left. Chuanlord up soon! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gisco Posted October 27, 2011 Share Posted October 27, 2011 Nice Report so far. I really like Hong Kong at night. The city is just beautiful with all the buildings lit up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simon8899 Posted October 27, 2011 Share Posted October 27, 2011 The Vekoma launched bike coaster at Knotts was quite smooth for a Vekoma - maybe cause its still quite new.... After riding one or two Frisbees with top linear engine I've to say I like the classic friction-wheel Frisbees a lot more - maybe because the gondola is swinging freely in the air - but the others simply "feel" like they're somehow running with some safety-brakes on....cant really put my finger on it.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A.J. Posted October 28, 2011 Share Posted October 28, 2011 The Vekoma launched bike coaster at Knotts is actually a Zamperla. Schwarzkopf, did you get any pictures of Hair Raiser at Ocean Park? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 28, 2011 Author Share Posted October 28, 2011 ^ Yeah, I still prefer the Vekoma ones to the Zamperla MotoCoasters though. The Zamperla ones are a bit pathetic really, not to mention the restraints... Ben got a few pics of Hair Raiser. It's annoying that the track has been complete for months but they're taking so long building the area around it /3. It does look really nice though. In fact, all the newer stuff at Ocean Park was much nicer than the older stuff. I'm guessing they're stepping up to compete with Disney now. Thanks for the comments so far! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 28, 2011 Author Share Posted October 28, 2011 Chuanlord <3 Chuanlord Holiday Manor (http://rcdb.com/9924.htm) was a 30 minute or so taxi ride from Chimelong. This is the only way to get there really, and despite us having the chinese name for the park printed out it took a team of guest services, a few taxi drivers shouting and half an hour of our lives before we were on our way. The park is in the middle of nowhere, so we knew there was a chance of being a bit stranded, but we knew we were getting creds so didn't care. This park was a highlight of the trip and possibly the weirdest park I've EVER been to. You have to buy an electronic card containing a certain amount of credit (hehe), although I can't remember the exact amounts. Either way, we had enough for all the creds and a couple of other rides. We literally just ran around grabbing any cred we could see, the first being the first of MANY 'Jungle Mouse' creds. It was vile, but unfortunately the least putrid Jungle Mouse of the trip... First Golden Horse Spinner Knockoff of the trip! This was probably the most run down spinner of the trip actually. It was also the only smaller one (all the others were slightly taller and had another 'layer' of layout if that makes sense...). This park has two spinning coasters. The second one is for kids, and is basically an oval shape with a couple of tyre sections helping it get around. It was strange, and was playing really obscure remixes of ancient western songs. The surfing coasters were equally messed up. It's actually two sets of two, so four in total, but only one side of each set were open. Still, 2 creds isn't bad... They're actually like old school cafeteria seats... Standard powered dragon cred... Final cred... The dreaded... Disgusting... .... LOOPING TOBOGGAN //////////////3. No more comments, just pictures. Ugh. I've never been so scared on a coaster. Ever. Moving on... There was a LOT more here than we expected. Loads of flats, loads. Here are some pics of flats, starting with a very Chinese one which was everywhere... Ugh Ugh Ugh Ugh Ugh. Knockoff Booster: This thing looked amazing, but I wouldn't dare. NOT in China anyway... Kids fishing. This was pretty gross actually... ...dinner... The squids ///3 OMG, I nearly forgot Duck Circling <3 Throw the rings around the necks of the (real) ducks, as illustrated... We had a go, and failed: (God I look rough). After a REALLY long day, we still had to get back to the city, THEN get another train back to Shenzhen. No legal taxis would take us, so we walked to the nearest train station, which luckily was a huge new bullet train station randomly in the middle of nowhere near the park. Saw this prime property on the way: Thanks for reading! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
larrygator Posted October 28, 2011 Share Posted October 28, 2011 Hey, someone check with Fran to see if the ducks are real. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gisco Posted October 28, 2011 Share Posted October 28, 2011 They have some pretty messed up looking parks in China. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 29, 2011 Author Share Posted October 29, 2011 Knight Valley. Right. I'll start off by saying that I don't like this park. It's gorgeous, could be amazing, but... 1) They have hardly any rides, and half of them were spiting 2) The entrance price is far too high for what it is 3) They were supposed to get 2 X car coasters, but didn't, and they're still on the park map anyway... Mountain Flyer is SICK though <3. Knight Valley is in the Shenzhen area, but pretty far from the city. But then in Asia, something being on the Metro could mean that it's about 50 miles out... From the nearest metro station we took a taxi, and 20 minutes or so later we were sashaying through the entrance <3. Obviously, we headed straight for the Woodie, which was up a HUGE hill. The hills were disgusting. Ben, the non smoker, ran off and left me gasping for air a few hundred feet behind. You can see it once you get up the hill... The station was fab, as were the two fly throughs! More views from the station... The top of the first drop section: This is SUCH an odd coaster. It looked amazing from the construction photos, then when I first saw it in person I was slightly let down. It just... doesn't look that big or impressive. Then you go up the lift and look behind you, and realise how ridiculously huge it is. There's SO much just hidden in the structure or behind the terrain. It's amazing <3. It was just ridiculously fast from the first drop to the brake run, without letting up at all. It has huge speedy sections, then towards the end goes all GCI and starts bunny hopping and twisting and shiz. It really is fantastic, and we were so happy to get on it after spending the whole summer thinking it was going to be closed (it only opened a week or so before we rocked up). Points for spotting the coaster, and double points for spotting the pair of boosters? Storm Force, the only other major ride in the park was shut. This was actually really annoying because it looks fab <3. It just casually goes through the hotel and then... So annoying. It's actually excessive /3 There was also an aviary, a powered bobsled, a crappy aquarium and a show of some discription. Yeah, that's it from Knight Valley. Mountain Flyer was amazing, but that's clearly GCI and nothing to do with this dump really. To think we paid about £20 for what is essentially a one ride park... Thanks for reading (and the comments so far)! Crappy Valley Shenzhen up next... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Looty Posted October 29, 2011 Share Posted October 29, 2011 WAY jealous of this trip! I need to marry someone rich so I can go on a trip like this! The GCI looks amazing, too! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WFChris Posted October 29, 2011 Share Posted October 29, 2011 Looks like you guys had a fab time <3 !!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowboard83 Posted October 29, 2011 Share Posted October 29, 2011 Wow. I am loving this trip report, thanks for sharing! I really hope Chuanlord Holiday Manor is a park on the Shanghai section of the China TPR tour. Would love to see this messed up place for myself! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beatle11 Posted October 29, 2011 Share Posted October 29, 2011 Insert space shuttle joke here. Nice looking park. It only opened last year so maybe in a bit more time they will get more things going. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 29, 2011 Author Share Posted October 29, 2011 ^ Yeah, the park has a lot of potential. It's just run so badly. That's the impression I got from most of the Chinese parks to be honest. It's 'new wealth' I suppose. They suddenly have all this money for investment, build a huge park but don't REALLY know how to operate it properly. Hopefully in a few years they'll get the hang of it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 29, 2011 Author Share Posted October 29, 2011 Crappy Valley Shenzhen We planned this as the last park in the Shenzhen area on the long shot off chance that the new S&S coaster would by magic, decide to open. It obviously didn't, but nobody really knew how close (or far) it was from opening so it was worth giving it a try at least. The park was HEAVING, and they only had one train on all the coasters. I've heard horror stories about Happy Valley operations, but didn't realise quite how awful they were. We didn't turn up till lunch time, which resulted in a terrible ride count (we only just managed to get the creds in, and there were only 4 open!)... We started with the Big Apple knockoff on a roof. Although, I don't see why such a major park would NEED to shove a coaster on a roof? Whatever... Luckily this was walk on, unlike the Vekoma Mine Train, which we waited about an hour and a half for. Ugh. This was the first time we experienced the STUPID Chinese way of crowd control in queue lines. You know how on XNWO at Thorpe they don't let you queue in the main queue, but force you to wait outside and then let you through in groups? Well, they do this for all their major coasters at Happy Valley, resulting in a huge queue of people blocking the main paths of the park, standing in the heat, when there's a nice shady purpose built queue line standing empty, only for you to walk through when they let your 'train' enter. I can understand why they do this on XNWO because it's a dark building etc, but these were just normal outdoor cattlepens that they wouldn't use. Hopefully I explained that haha, perhaps Gavin or Ben can help. We then queued a couple of hours for the Golden Horse Spinner, which we didn't take any photos of, so I'll steal one from RCDB: The queue jumping was horrendus here, which set a trend for the rest of the trip. Seriously, entire families would just casually shove their way through like you're standing in their way or something. censoredx:. Our last ride of the day was the last credit, Kumali. If I remember correctly this was better than Kumali, but the one in Beijing was DISGUSTING? Ben? See what I mean... When inside, there were entire queue sections just closed off... Although I'll give them credit for ONE thing, the few sections of queueline they were using had these little benches, which were at all the Happy Valleyz: It was outrageously boiling, so we got some masculine snowcones... The Vekoma ///3 (note the amazing translation <3) Even the reflection was offensive. The test seat was fab... it was actually on a random bit of transfer track <3 Oh, here's some photos of the unfinished coaster. S&S, why do you suck so much? To be fair, the guys from S&S were there all day, and were walking out of the park behind us going on about how they were playing with the launch or something. One of them was really hot actually... It seemed to be several track connections which were playing up, which is understandable after doing the one in Beijing at the end of the trip. Some of the transitions were REALLY brutal just a few months after it opened, so god knows how it's going to age. Anyway, more of that later... Wtf? As this was our last night in Shenzhen, we splashed out a quid or so on a meal. This made me LOL... Dinner tonight was the dogs bollocks. No, really, it was dog. Thanks for reading! Next part will be the journey to, and first day in, Shanghai. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 30, 2011 Author Share Posted October 30, 2011 Shanghai... We were planning on getting an overnight sleeper train with beds to Shanghai to save a bit of cash, and for the experience, but they'd sold out, so we had to buy 'standing' tickets. Luckily, we stole someone elses seats, and nobody knew what to say to us as we were the only white people on the train. Totes got away with it, even if we did get stared at for TWENTY HOURS. A seat sounds fine, but TWENTY HOURS was gross, as the toilets were leaking and there was faeces on the floor. Oh, and you could smoke. It was so ghetto, and possibly the worst TWENTY HOURS of our lives. See the guy casually having a cig? I've only just noticed, the girl in the pink dress is far too fierce to be on that nail of a train, bless <3 After a quick McMurder and a bit of getting lost, we rocked up at the apartment, which was by far the best accomodation of the trip. Well, it's luxury for me anyway . We were KNACKERED from the grotesque train journey, but didn't want to waste a day, we decided to run to Gonqging Forest Park (or whatever it's called). It was another Metro/Taxi job, so wasn't too bad. The park is more of an outskirts country park with a few rides shoved in. You pay a quid or so to get into the park, then each ride is another couple of quid. Photos are a bit thin and far between due to the fact that we ran in, got the credits and left. REALLY dodgy Big Apple knockoff... Vile Jungle Mouse... They also had a Loopscrew, which was SO smooth. What's the catch you may ask? Well, I realised my restraint wasn't locked as we were going up the lift, so I had to cling on for dear life to the side of it. China //3. The only non-coaster ride we did was the electric bobsled thing. I'd never done one before (hears screams of shock) and thought it was pretty fun actually... better than the normal ones. Oh, and we saw Manila Luzon on the way out! (RuPaul's Drag Race reference) On the way back we realised we'd be changing in the 'People's Square' station, which is almost like the main central square in the city. There is also a credit here, at 'People's Park', so we grabbed it. +4 Next part: Happy Valley Shanghai. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simon8899 Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 Sounds like you had a very adventerous trip. And even if I love coasters - would never wait hours for a coaster - let alone a spinning coaster... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schwarzkopf Posted October 31, 2011 Author Share Posted October 31, 2011 ^ It's got to be done though! I'm not going all that way and missing a credit just because I can't be bothered to wait for it, no way haha. Happy Valley Shanghai. Of the 3 Happy Valleys on the trip, this was the most unique. I felt the other two were fairly similar (they had basically the same rides, areas, theming etc). Whilst Shanghai didn't have as much theming (apart from a couple of rides which had LOADS), the rides were generally better and there were more of them. This park was also HUGE, probably because it's just outside the city unlike the others, which are more inner-city... Quite a few of the pics were taken from the Flying Island, so I'll shove that in first. OK, we arrived fairly early (but still after opening), so some of the rides wern't open yet. The main other beef I have with Happy Valley is that some rides won't open till 12pm or 1pm, then the park closes at 4pm. For example, the woodie here was only open for 3 and a half hours, and it's not even like the park was empty (we queued a good hour and a half for the woodie). So, you've got to plan quite well to get all your credits if it's busy. I'm pretty sure we headed to the other side of the park to ride the Mega-Lite, stopping off at the vulgar reverchon (it's not a reverchon, but that's what I'm calling it). Oooh it was disgusting. Oooh, the back of my head is in this one <3 Next up was the Mega Lite, via some fab pride rock esque theming. The Intamin is hiding behind it... I thought it was a good ride, but quite over rated. The airtime is true ejector, but I think not having the height of the 'real' mega coasters takes quite a lot away from it to be honest. Plus, the cable lift really isn't necessary and ruins what could be an awesome first drop. Like I said though, the airtime hills were great. By this point it was 12ish and the B&M was open, so we minced back over to the other side of the park. I think we had a synchronized 'sweat attack' in this exact location. It was vile. One minute you'd be fine, then suddenly the humidity would hit you and you'd sweat uncontrollably for 5 minutes or so. Ugh. Obviously, it was fierce. Nothing else to say really... Excessive switchback. Oh, and, it's a Vekoma SLC apparently. By this point it was lunch, but the woodie still hadn't opened so we decided to do the Gyro Swing quickly and go to Pizza Hut for some aircon. It doesn't look hot in the photos, but it was over 30 degrees with 98% humidity or something... This was OMGAMAZING. So much better than the Huss ones. <3 <3 <3. After lunch we went over to the woodie, but decided to get the othe credits first because the queue was ridiculous. First was the Intmain Mine Train, which was actually amaze. It only had one lift, but still did quite a lot. It kept it's pace up for the whole ride too. It was also walk on, thanks to the fact that the entrance is impossible to find <3. Such an Intamin <3 The kiddie was the only cred left (other than the woodie), so we scooped that up too. It was actually quite vulgar and rough. The only other non-coaster ride we did was the Splashdown, because according to Ben it was 'really famous and has a huge dark ride section!'. Yeah, it didn't. It was just Tidal Wave, lets face it. The hose pipes at the end that gave you a gob full were just icing on the cake. I was quite suprised to see one of these, as I though Canada's was the only one. They are good, but we couldn't be arsed. By this point it was time for the woodie, which still had a huge queue. Well, 'Wooden Coaster - Fireball'. It overshot the station... We sat in the back, which gave crazy ejector on the first drop (see how tight the crest of the lift is?). The rest of the ride I thought was pretty good, just your standard decent large woodie. Ben seemed to like it more than me. Perhaps I let what other people have said about it influence me and I expected too much from it, or maybe after riding Mountain Flyer a few days earlier I'd become spoilt. Meh, that first drop is up there with my favourite coaster moments though... Overall: Fab rides, dire operations. Such Happy Valley 3. Next part will be... erm... Tourist stuff in Shanghai and some bonus creds! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Looty Posted October 31, 2011 Share Posted October 31, 2011 Lovin the TR...Keep it going, please Happy Valley looks quality! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gisco Posted November 1, 2011 Share Posted November 1, 2011 We found the staggered opening times on the rides as pretty inconvenient too. We did notice that a lot of Chinese would only ride once so lines usually went down after a few hours. If you could hold off a while you spent less time in line. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
odene497 Posted November 1, 2011 Share Posted November 1, 2011 Cool pics Jake! I didn't realize half of these rides were there so I'm extra excited for China next year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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