Massive Europe Trip Report

vuurvogel · April 29, 2012

Expedition GeForce varies wildly depending on the weather - the most amazing rides are generally delivered during the summer on a hot, sunny, wind-less day... It is often reported not to be running so well at the start of the season. If you're ever nearby when it's 21 degrees C plus, don't let your first experience put you off from a re-visit!

I completely agree, Expedition GeForce is very temperamental. The first time I rode it I thought mehh, I know better coasters. But that was in the morning with temperatures just over 15 degrees C. Then I rode it again in the afternoon with temperatures over 20 degrees and the coaster warmed up by the many ride cycles of that day. Wow, it then feels like a whole different coaster.

To bad you rode it on a cold day, it then does not live up to its hype.

Mrenata · May 1, 2012

Day 11: Freizeitland Geiselwind and Freizeipark Plohn

That was one of the crazyest days of the trip.

I left Frankfurt at 8:30am and drove 171km (about 2 hours) to Geiselwind. I entered the park right after the gates were open (10:15am), so there were just a few people there.

Geiselwind is one of those parks that you have just a few information about it. It barely appears on the industry news or websites, but it is a park that is worth a visit. It's not a theme park, even thought it has some kind of dinosaur theme/rides. It's more like an amusement park, with a zoo.

The rides are pretty much standard: kiddie rides, a wild mouse coaster, a boomerang coaster, a drop tower, observation tower, pirate ship, powered coaster and of course, the boat jump! It reminded me a lot of Fantasilandia (Chile).

The boomerang coaster is an average boomerang. It's not as bad as the one in Argentina, but it's nearly as good as The Speed Of Sound. The wild mouse seems to be a traveling coaster that Geiselwind rented for one or more seasons. In fact, their wildwasser ride gave me the same impression. Does anyone know anything about those rides?

Drehgondelbahn, the spinning coaster made by Zierer, is a little bit different from the other spinning coasters. It's one of the dinosaur-themed rides at the park, and has a fun small drop inside the "dinosaur cave".

The drop tower is actually pretty good, probably the best one I've found on small parks around the world.

Geiselwind is a cute small park. It's woth a visit, for sure. Had it been built in South/Central America, it would be one of the best parks here.

This dino train takes passengers all the way to the zoo

Really odd theme

56m shoot and drop tower!

Boat jump!

Bad ass birds

Freizeitpark Plohn

I left Geiselwind around noon and drove another 212km to Freizeitpark Plohn.

Plohn is another park that you don't hear a lot about it, since it's almost on the Czech Republic. It's one of those small parks with an incredible rollercoaster. I think the word that better describes Plohn is "weird".

Plohn was built on an area that looks like a national park. The layout is very, very confusing, since there are rides everywhere, most of them hidden by the trees. It's divided in a lot of areas, some of them very nice, some of them creepy as hell.

The park has 4 coasters and a few flat rides. It also has an "enchanted forrest" attempt that looks nothing like Efteling's. And when you think it's over, you discover that they have a swamp area with a small free fall ride and a dinosaur/swamp ride that looks like "Malaria: the ride".

Silver Mine is just ok, but Plohseidon is actually a nice junior coaster. But let's talk about El Toro! El Toro is great! It's fast, with a lot of unexpected turns and hills. It's not better than Joris, but it's definitely better than Troy and Wodan. And when I was leaving El Toro, I saw a newspaper hanging on the photo booth with Robb on it! Awesome! haha

I left the park at 17:30 and drove another 511km (5 hour drive) to Hamburg, my last stop on this trip. In case you didn't keep track of the numbers, this day alone I drove about 900km (550miles) just to ride rollercoasters!

The park is really weird, starting by it's entrance

On the first level, you find a "lake" with paddleboats, this Buddha and a "surf" ride that looks creepier than the ones in Brazil

That's the "surf" ride

On the second level, you find most of the rides

Plohseidon!

El Toro!

Look what/who I found!

Silver Mine

They also have an indoor western show

On the third level, there are some playground rides and a family coaster

The fourth level is some kind of enchanted forrest

But it's more creepy than enchanted

Last, but not least, Malaria Land

Malaria, The Ride

The free fall ride

simon8899 · May 2, 2012

You must be very late in Hamburg if you started at Plohn 1730. Did you had a fast car making a spin on our Autobahn?

Mrenata · May 2, 2012

You must be very late in Hamburg if you started at Plohn 1730. Did you had a fast car making a spin on our Autobahn?

No, I had a Fiat Panda that barely made 160km/h. In fact I got to Hamburg around 22:30, not bad considering all the road work and traffic jam around Heide-Park. Seriously, why do they close the roads like that?

simon8899 · May 2, 2012

Many Autobahnen are expanded from 2 to 3 lines per direction - especially on Autobahn 1 - and its horrible at times. The fun begins while overtaking on the narrowed left line...

Toasty82 · May 2, 2012

The wild mouse seems to be a traveling coaster that Geiselwind rented for one or more seasons. In fact, their wildwasser ride gave me the same impression. Does anyone know anything about those rides?

Yep. The wild mouse is rented for one season. It's a portable model that is usually on the german fair circuit.

Wildwasser is a semi-portable model, made by Reverchon in 1997. That's why it looks different compared to other Wildwasser rides.

Mrenata · May 4, 2012

Day 12: Hamburg Dungeon and Hansa Park

First of all, I have to say that Hamburg is one of the most beautiful cities in Europe! I'm so glad I could spend 3 days in Hamburg and get to know the city a little bit.

Hamburg Dungeon is pretty much the same as Amsterdam Dungeon. The difference between them is that in Hamburg their english is not that good, so I could not understand what they were saying at times... And in Hamburg they have a small creepy boat ride and a 10m drop tower that scared the hell out of me! I was expecting an interactive drop tower, like the one they planned for Nemesis Sub-Terra, but the one at Hamburg Dungeon is just a regular drop tower with some Merlin effects.

Hansa Park, on the other hand, was one of my favourite parks in Europe! What a nice park!

Hansa is one of the forgotten parks in Europe that no one talks about. What a shame! Hansa is such a nice park and should be featured more on foruns and websites around the world.

Everything at Hansa is really well planned, well executed and well taken care of, starting by the flowers at the entrance, showing the day, month and year.

The colors at the park are all vivid and the landscape is really nice. It was one of the busiest parks of my whole trip.

There was something special about my visit at Hansa. My 200th roller coaster would be either Crazy Mine, Die Schlange von Midgard, Fluch von Novgorod, Rasender Roland or Nessie. I chosed Nessie for 2 reasons: My 100th was Revoution at SFMM, a classic one, so I thought I should stick with the classics for the 200th. The other and most important reason was that in Argentina there's a "Nessie without the looping" coaster called Aconcágua, that was once South America's highest coaster and it's abandoned for 5 years now. I visited Aconcagua early this year when it was already abandoned for years, and it was very special. So, Nessie it is!

I rode Crazy Mine and Rasender Roland, 198 and 199 and then, Nessie! You gotta love Schwarzkopf! Nessie is a classic! The only down point is that it gets reaaaaally noisy inside "Nessie's body", when the train hits the brakes. But it's a good coaster anyway! I'm happy I chosed Nessie to be my 200th!

My next ride was the observation tower. I was told I could see the Baltic Sea from up there, and for someone who lives in Brazil, the Baltic Sea is something far far away! Nice!

From the observation tower I could see Fluch. The only thing I knew about Fluch was that it was an Eurofighter, something that is hard to believe if you look at it's building. Fluch ended up being my favourite coaster in Europe, along with Blue Fire. Fluch is AMAZING! Something out of this world! There are no words I could use to describe how awesome Fluch is. It's really well themed, and there's a story along with the roller coaster. The train leaves the station and there's a small story before a sudden drop, a launch, a hill, some turns, a building, a vertical lift, more effects, a 97° drop in the dark, some nice turns and a surprise at the end that scared the hell out of me! OMG, Fluch is AWESOMAZING. How come no one ever talks about it? It made my top 10, with honnor!

Die Schlange von Midgard deserves an A for effort. Even though it's a small family coaster, it has some effects that could make even Disney envy.

The flat rides are also all very, very nice. They have a boad/river slide that it's so rare to see nowadays. I've only seen one in Fantasilandia, Chile, before Rio Dorado. The Bell ride is also something very, very unique. There's also a 50m very cool drop tower, a 85m Star Flyer and tons of other fun rides.

I really hope people would pay more attention to Hansa Park in the near future, as it is one of the most interesting parks I've visited in the world!

Beautiful Hamburg!

You gotta love Hamburg!

The Dungeon

Hansa!

I loved the flower/calendar detail

Nessie!

200th!

Fluch

Fluch Von Novgorod

Would you call this a coaster? Coaster-Count does, RCDB doesn't

simon8899 · May 5, 2012

Would you call this a coaster?

It's a BHS Metroliner - a powered coaster made after the original Schwarzkopf Bayerncurve. And as other powered coaster are included I clude this as well into my count.

Glad you liked Hamburg and Hansa-Park as these are my homecity/homepark. Hansa-Park may not have as many coasters as other german parks but those they have are quite unique - at least the two "big ones". And with Hamburg DOM my teen years were "all-Schwarzkopf" coasterwise: Nessie, Triple-Loop, Katapult, Thriller, Olympia, Alpina-Bahn (then Himalaya-Bahn).

North of Hamburg in summer you've all the great holiday-areas at the north and baltic sea - and what I miss most when in the US are all the snack-shacks, beer-stands and self-service-restaurants right at the piers/harbours to just lounge and enjoy the day, maybe doing a small one or two hour sea cruise - or a bigger one to Duty-Free island Helgoland.

robinschroder · May 5, 2012

I completely agree that Hansa Park is amazing!! For me, it's up there with Europa Park, Holiday Park, Alton Towers, Mirabilandia, Liseberg and Gröna Lund as one of my favourite parks in Europe. And Fluch von Novgorod is my second favourite coaster in Germany - second only to GeForce!

Mrenata · May 13, 2012

Day 13: Heide Park and Hamburg DOM

Sorry for the delay on the last part of my report, my internet went down for a few days!

My day at Heide-Park was, well, odd!

I decided to visit the park on a monday, so the park wouldn't be crowded. Well, my plan worked so well that in fact there was absolutely no one there! Really, there were less than 1000 people there, witch means free ERT on every ride!

Heide Park is huge, but it's easy to get around. If you just follow the path, you won't miss any ride.

Krake was my first ride. It would have been just another ride on another diving machine if it wasn't for something really, really odd: It started snowing during the ride! Well, what happend was that I rode Krake once, and the operators let us stay on the train and ride again. On the second ride, it started raining, a very cold rain. On the third time, the rain became snow flakes, that droped from the sky for like 2 minutes, and then stoped. For someone who lives in Brazil, that was AMAZING. The ride itself was just ok, althought the Krake monster is really cool.

I noticed a sign on my way to the Transylvania area advertising the new coaster for 2014! Later I was told that it is going to be a new B&M flying coaster.

Even though I'm not a big fan of drop towers, Scream was really good. Way better than the regular towers with 4 or 5 sets of track. BCW in Brazil has a 90m Intamin drop tower, but it's not nearly as good as Scream. I think the single gongola makes the drop more intense due to it's weight. Too bad Scream doesn't tilt before the drop.

Schweizer Bobbahn was the best bobsled coaster I've ever ridden. Really, really nice. Limit was one of the best SLC's too. On the other hand, Big Loop was very painful. Those old Vekoma coasters should be banned for life!

Colossos was one of the most disappointing coasters ever! I was expecting something as good as El Toro since they are "sisters", but Colossos is a crapy ride! It's not fast enought, the layout is predictable and there's not even 1/3 of El Toro's airime. Very, very disappointing. My last hope to find another "El Toro" in the world is The Voyage, witch I'm going to ride for the first time in June.

I left Heide-Park and drove back to Hamburg to visit one of Europe's biggest kermis, Hamburg DOM. There were 2 rides there that I was looking forward to ride for a long time: Olympia Looping and Konga

I thought Konga and Artistico would be pretty much the same, the only difference being the seats facing inside or outside, but they're 2 completely different rides. Artistico is super fun, with lot's of airtime, and Konga is way more intense, you can feel the G forces on your body the whole time. If I had to choose, I would say Artistico is better.

Olympia Looping was the other super disappointing moment of the trip. I always admired Olympia Looping. I even wrote an article about it for the brazilian rollercoaster club, with it's story and fun facts. I was so excited to finally ride it, but then, something happend:

During the first loop, the shoulder harness came all the way down, trapping my body and crushing my spine like it has never been crushed. I don't even remember the rest of the ride. My only thought was that I needed to get out of this torture machine.

I felt so bad about hating Olympia Looping that I came back the next day and decided to give it another try. This time I tried to sit in a different position and make sure there was room for my body to move if the same thing happened again. Well, the same thing happened again, the shoulder harness seems to go down and lock on the lowest position every time on the first loop. I don't know if it's supposed to be like that, but it makes the ride very, very painful. I hope they get new trains for Olympia Looping in the near future, like the ones that Teststrecke has now.

Heide Park 13:00 on a monday

Krake!

Seriously. where did everyone go?

It's big, it's fast, it's coming closer and closer (german friends, it that correct?)

Painful Big Loop

From another angle

Scream + Best Bobsled Coaster in the world!

Limit! Top 3 SLC's in the World!

ERT on Colossos!!!

I told you, there was no one at the park!

Noted!

You gotta love free ERT!

Y U So disappointing?

Konga!!!!

Nhammmm

Olympia Looping, we finally meet!

simon8899 · May 14, 2012

Thanks for the update!

On Colossos: I've heard from some poeple that the coaster isn't running fine when under 15 °C - normally the airtime is insane. But even when I rode it once after a shower it was - well - more harmless. This coaster likes it warm and dry...

On Heide-Park: IMO Colossos is by far the best coaster. Further down of course Krake and Desert Race - but both are midrange coasters. On the Vekoma's I'd prefer Big Loop over Limit any day. And on adding a B&M Flyer: I believe it when I see it. And even if they do it hope they wont add a lightweight version like they did with the Krake.

On Olympia Looping: Yes those shoulder clamps are tricky when not used to them. You have to keep your back stretched and straight all trough the ride - most importantly in the compressions - so those things dont come down. It's a little like on the back stretcher in the gym. And "having room to move" is exactly wrong - the clamps must have a tight fit when pushed down in the station, otherwise they've momentum when comming down. Olympia Looping is a very powerful coaster and isnt for those lacking spine...

I don't know if this coaster would be fit receiving lapbar-only trains as some support beams are really close...

Mrenata · May 23, 2012

Day 14: Plopsa Indoor Coevorden and Slagharen

On my way back to AMS Airport, I stoped at two small parks along the route: Plopsa Indoor Coevorden and Slagharen.

Plopsa Coevorden is the smallest of the Plopsa's. The rides are pretty much the same ones found at Plopsa Hasselt but they also have a nice auditorium. I was surprised to see that many people on the park on a tuesday morning. I wonder if they ever thought about opening a Plopsa Indoor on a large city like Amsterdan, Paris or Frankfurt. It would be a huge success!

Slagharen is a short drive from Plopsa, less than 15 minutes. I wasn't gonna visit it, since it's an almost unknown park, but thank god I did! What a nice park!

I had no idea that Slagharen was that great. I mean, it's a small park, bigger than Klotten but smaller than Geiselwind, but there's something really special about it. They have a rare to find Fabbri drop tower, a even more rare Schwarzkopf Looping Star coaster plus a lot of interesting flat rides.

I really felt in love with Slagharen, it became one of my favourite parks in Europe. Thank god I decided to visit it, it was the perfect end to this wonderful trip!

This trip was one of the most special ones for me. Those 14 days in Europe were amazing and I got to know so many things that just a few people in the world are blessed to see.