Rich & Kir's Swedish Pride Adventure

[Richard]

So this year I decided the place to be for coasters is definately Sweden, so we decided to visit Gothenberg & Stockholm. Not alot of planning happened apart from the flight, but hey ho, we boarded out flights and set off.

 

Day 1 - Liseberg

 

So we arrived in Gothenberg late Tuesday night, we headed straight for our airbnb, thankfully Viktoria had an amazing place and managed to confirm before we arrived (just about). She left us plenty of candles and lots of pictures of herself and her immensly attractive boyfriend, this provided us with some lovely dreams.

 

The next morning we got up and swanned straight down to Liseberg, which was situated right by our apartment. It's abit of an odd entrance really from what I'm used to as it piles straight out into the street. This was also the point where we realised the swedes are all incredibly beautiful and tanned (who'da thought). Anyway, images...

 

As you can see the place was PACKED, we strolled around abit realising that today will be a day of queuing. We minced in and saw Helix's first corner straight away. It's incredible how it's settled into it's surroundings when its only a few years old.

 

 

The first view of Helix, it looks quite sweet and untheatening here... untill you walk abit further

 

After a mooch and noticing the queues would all be atleast an hour we decided to start on Balder

 

 

Opinion on Balder - I've never ever experienced air-time like it!! It's definitely an intense ride and I can't praise Intamin enough for making such a relentless long ride in such a tight imprint. I'm sure plenty has already said about this coaster as it's pinned as one of the best wooden coasters in the world. It wasn't quite my cup of tea though, as much as I enjoyed the thing, I prefer a little more variation. Here's Kir & I battling the air-time.

 

 

So we left satisfied and the park was filling up even more, so we walked around abit (the weather was scortching) and after getting in a good view of Helix's immense layout we decided it was time to brave that queue.

 

 

The queue is crazy! It had all the ingredients to be tacky, but somehow Liseberg have created a really fun compact labyrinth. You struggled to figure out where you're going next and the IMAScore music is just perfect, it sets the tone beautifully, despite the theme being a little..confusing. (is it themed to mathematics?)

 

 

Opinion of Helix - I will start by saying, this clearly steals my top spot. I may not be as well travelled as other enthusiasts, but I've rarely come into a breakrun clapping and shouting involunarily. I will break the ride down though, as it's progression is it's high points

 

So the first element, a little tame, a little forgettable, but enjoyable. Then you pick up speed and hit the first launch, it's relatively weak, but fun all the same.

 

The second inversion makes for a great starting point, it reminds me of Nemesis' first inversion as you suddenly see the rides layout upsidedown high up in the air. Then you hit the first air-time hill, it's fair powerful and it drops alot more than you expect if you've not seen the layout before. It's at this point both me and Kir started reeling off the "wows".

 

The pretzel is powerful and provides a great view, this is when you realise this coaster is a little relentless. The air-time hill following is pure ejector and the pull out into the zero-g provides alot of force. Then a perfectly paced zero-g and again more positives.

 

Then you litterally SNAP into a helix, which again pummels more positive force before a small corner into the second launch. Next second, you're miles up in the air-upside down, looking out on gothenberg and the screaming swing way below you (awesome feeling) before you fly right back to the pathways. Now the next element we have dubbed "The hill", it's the most intense part of the ride, god knows how it hasn't flung the fearless children of sweden to their deaths. The view, the force, it's perfect.

 

Obviously after this the ride has a small breather before the finale role, which actually felt awesome (not usually a fan of these) and it's over. I've never been speechless in a break run, but I just didn't realise what had happened! It's not as tame as people had told me, the thing has some real force, and air-time that matches if not succeed Balder's

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After that crazy queue and ride tbh, I'm not sure what we did, the park was getting busier by the minute and we just accepted that we'd be queuing for everything, you can see here how crazy even the pathways got

 

 

I do know we decided to do Kanonen & Lisebergbanan. Kanonen looked disgusting but on the front row actually rode pretty well! a nice mix of elements, just a little ugly. And it wasn't worth the good 2 hour queue we did, plenty of pokemon were caught though. Lisebergbanan was immense, a great faily ride with some surprising force and a decent length, with great views of the rides.

 

 

 

Considering we did 11am - 11pm, we didn't actually get in many rides. But the atmosphere was amazing, and their new area was pleasant. Talking of atmosphere though, I HATE drop towers (because they scare me) but I managed to do it. The view was amazing and it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it'd be, infact it was pretty pleasant.

 

 

So Liseberg, it's an incredible place! You can tell there's alot of love for it from it's owners and the guests. I probably wouldn't advise going when we went as there was noway of avoiding queues, Helix still had a decent 90 minute queue at 10pm. The whole place looks amazing, and it had a great atmosphere. I also love the way the actual hill is the main feature of the park and half the rides take full advantage of it, some absolutely brilliant design.

 

Anyway, after a looong day, we went back to Viktoria's and started planning our next day, a trip to Stockholm.

[gardyloo!]

Liseberg seems to deliver consistently even if the lines are >90 minutes.

Just out of curiosity, if the lines were all over an hour, why didn't you opt for the skipe the queue pass thingy? I heard that if you order online, you'll even get to skip 3 rides for free.

Awesome trip report tho so far! Really curious what kolmarden looks like outside of wildfire.

[rcjp]

Nice report! I'll be going to the park on the 25th and while I'm very exited I'm also a little worried about the queues as on that day the park only opens at 3 p.m and I can't really find that pass thingy on their website. I suppose I'll have to be there early and try to get a few rides on the main coasters quickly.