Photo TR: Canobie Coaster's World Adventures

[Canobie Coaster]

^ Thanks!  I imagine one on the German fair circuit would have a wilder program.

[DBru]

Sarkanniemi was crazy packed on my visit, as well. Such a gorgeous setting for a park, though! I loved your aerial photos. I didn't have time to do the observation tower because I made the interesting decision to do ALL off Sarkanniemi AND Linnanmaki in one day (but I still waited 45 minutes for the kiddie coaster because I'm that kind of person).

I agree that Tornado is a gem. I especially loved the tunnel after the vertical loop and the first barrel roll! Maybe I'm just jaded (and also a giant Intamin fanboy) but I enjoyed it far more than the Batman clones.

[Canobie Coaster]

^ I was planning a full day at Sarkanniemi originally, but my 7 hours at Linnanmaki 2 days prior wasn't enough time to get rerides there.

Tornado was a bit better than Batman clones for me.

[hansa]

Those Take Off rides on German funfairs probably do give a more powerfull ride, but i'm not used to flat rides anymore

[Canobie Coaster]

I wish it rode like one of those.

[Nrthwnd]

^ Those were three of my favourite parks, on past TPR Scandinavian tours ('09 + '14). Power Park I especially enjoyed, truth!

Not as busy there when we were there, with everything open and operating for us.

Thanks for your TRs and views of where you visited in Finland!

* Forgot to ask! Was the all-wooden 'village' still in back of Power Park? It was for a kids' fantasy movie and they kept the set there, afterwards.

* And the Take-Off I remember riding there in Sarkanniemi Park, was pretty intense. At least for my "tender age" lol.

Taken 6-26-2014. Behind Thunderbird.

[prozach626]

That twisted hill on Junker looks insane.

[Canobie Coaster]

On 2/13/2022 at 2:35 PM, Nrthwnd said:

^ Those were three of my favourite parks, on past TPR Scandinavian tours ('09 + '14). Power Park I especially enjoyed, truth!

Not as busy there when we were there, with everything open and operating for us.

Thanks for your TRs and views of where you visited in Finland!

* Forgot to ask! Was the all-wooden 'village' still in back of Power Park? It was for a kids' fantasy movie and they kept the set there, afterwards.

* And the Take-Off I remember riding there in Sarkanniemi Park, was pretty intense. At least for my "tender age" lol.

Yup, the wooden village was still there!

23 hours ago, prozach626 said:

That twisted hill on Junker looks insane.

It's a good element, but there are several wilder ones on the ride!

[Canobie Coaster]

Plopsaland de Panne

The flagship park in the Plopsa chain made major waves with their new-for-2021 addition.  Ride to Happiness is easily the best Mack coaster, but it seems like a weird fit for the park.

Plopsaland's main audience is families.  Studio 100 is analogous to Nickelodeon, so the IPs the park is based upon are targeted towards kids and tweens.

So this park is sort of a dream for coaster enthusiasts.  In general, the more extreme an attraction was, the shorter its wait would be.  I visited on a day when the park hit capacity (albeit covid capacity) and Ride to Happiness had a max wait of 20-30 minutes.  Meanwhile the water rides and Roller Skater had waits exceeding an hour most of the day.  There's a reason I do not have every credit from this park.  There was no way I could justify waiting 70 minutes for a junior coaster when I could ride one of the world's best coasters 3 times in the same time period.

Ride to Happiness is exceptional.  The spinning is faster than that of Time Traveler, especially at the end of the first launch.  The ride has the two of the world's best inversions.  The super-slow jojo roll is insane, getting 5-6 seconds of sustained hangtime while slowly spinning.  Then the flying snake dive has similarly crazy hangtime while navigating a super disorienting element in a spinning car.  The coaster also has some great airtime, particularly on the broken up top hat.  The lone dead spot on the ride is that turn before the second launch.  The rest of the ride is complete perfection between the elements and spinning.  And you also have some mesmerizing theming plus my favorite on-board audio of any coaster.

Anubis is a good Gerstlauer launch coaster.  It's basically Six Flags Over Georgia's Dare Devil Dive, except the beyond vertical drop is replaced with a very strong LSM launch and a great top hat.  The inversions are pretty good and I love the ride's wooded setting (except when it comes to getting photos).

Two rides you need to hit early are Heidi the Coaster and Viktor's Race.  If the park is open late (like it was for me), these two rides will close early due to noise.  Heidi also is the major coaster that gets the longest line.  Heidi is essentially a clone of White Lightning, but it didn't seem to ride as strong.  I only got one ride though towards the middle of the day, but it was smooth.  And it did have a neat little dark ride scene before the finale.

Draak was a Mack powered coaster.  I got lucky and rode it after a breakdown because this was another ride that had a sizable wait.  It was pretty tame, but that's what it's supposed to be.

Beyond the ride lineup, Plopsaland has great theming.  I wasn't familiar with the IPs, but the rides and midways looked great.  They were colorful with plenty of things to look at.

Belgium got an incredible boost to their coaster lineup in 2021.  Unfortunately, I missed Kondaa due to the flooding, but Ride to Happiness (while an odd fit) is a world-class coaster.  And the rest of the park is quite nice too.

 

[Nrthwnd]

7 hours ago, Canobie Coaster said:

Yup, the wooden village was still there!

Great! I asked, because when TPR was there in 2014, I had the good fortune to run into the actual owner of Power Park and his father, who was there for a visit, just after I had walked through the village. That's when they told me of the history of it all, which was really cool to find out. And a definite great memory of visiting that park,.

[Canobie Coaster]

I love when park owners are walking around like that.

[Canobie Coaster]

Bellewaerde

This hybrid animal and amusement park surprised me.  I wasn't expecting the park to look as nice as it did going into my visit.  The park was very green and shady.  Plus several rides were themed and incorporated animals into the experience.

The park was also much busier than I anticipated.  Many attractions had hour long waits just 2 hours after opening.  I was fortunate I arrived at opening to knock out the major rides.  I had to skip two credits for this reason.  But it wasn't just the coasters that got busy, several of the water rides and safari rides did too.

 

From a ride perspective, I was most surprised to see the park still had an operating Huss topple tower in El Volador.  And it was the prototype no less!  The ride did have a delayed opening due to mechanical issues (surprise surprise), but I was glad to get back on one even if the ride experience isn't too great.  This ride really is a lot more impressive to watch than it is to ride.  And Bellewaerde placed this ride perfectly on this elevated structure and added fountains.

Wakala was my favorite coaster there.  This Gerstlauer creation offers a dynamic ride experience with some fun twists and turns plus a short backwards bit at the end.  It rides like Firechaser Express if you take away the little pops of airtime, which still makes it an above average family coaster.

Huracan was a hybrid dark ride and roller coaster.  The indoor sets in the main dark ride bit were larger than expected and pretty cool.  The coaster bit had a few moderately forceful drops and helixes, but there wasn't too much theming during this part.

The park has one of the older Boomerangs and it was riding pretty smoothly all things considered.  That allowed me to appreciate the forceful ride without getting my neck chopped.

The most puzzling coaster is Dawson Duel.  Take your average mountain coaster.  Now remove the mountain and make guests walk to the top instead of riding up.  The descent also removes the levers, so everyone goes the same speed.  This ride was a big disappointment.  Not only does it have a dreadful throughput, but the downhill course was quite weak between the lack of good elements and odd placement.

Bellewaerde  is an excellent family park combining a unique mix of rides and animals.