Rasti-Land 2015 Trip

[tbszgr]

Official Park Website: https://www.rasti-land.de (German only)

Backstory to this post: About a decade ago I discovered both the TPR Website and this fairly small park in Germany: Rasti-Land in Salzhemmendorf, Lower Saxony. It is a family-owned park, opened in 1973 and has been steadily expanded since. When I visited the park, I did take pictures and thought about posting them here, but never actually got around to actually doing that. Since that park still doesn't exist in this forum, here are pictures from my 2015 visit.

To start with, the park is a little out of the way, I passed a village and my satnav led me along a road which didn't look like it would lead to an amusement park until it told me to turn right.

Yeah... right. Well, at least I was pretty unquestionably in the right place. After this short tunnel, you have free parking and depending where you found a spot a bit of a walk to the entrance.

Now that looks a bit more park-y. Pretty much right after the entrance, you find the first example of nice and possibly DIY landscaping.

Also one of the first rides you see is this, which seems lifted pretty much straight out of RCT:

Monorail!

It is partially elevated, so you have a good view through parts of the park and a short "dark" ride section, I think in this building. One of the things you see from there is this kiddy-sized merry-go-round...

... accompanied by similar fun-sized flat rides.

like this ferris wheel (mini version)

and another merry-go-round, this one probably with seats swinging out as it spins (didn't see it in action).

Also on the way, you see more things which could come out of RCT like those tracks (the park wasn't particularily full, so there wasn't much happening on those tracks)

Continuing further into the park, there is a nice and quiet boat ride with fairy-tale themed animatronics (no pics of those though)

The current moving those boats is generated by a paddle wheel right next to the station, also the boats are lifted out of the water by a conveyor belt to allow easy boarding and leaving.

There is also an old tracked car ride which has been modernised into a photo safari.

All nice and quiet, maybe a little too quiet but eventually you enter...

...the realm of T-Rex. That's more like it. This is a rafting ride

with dino-themed landscaping

Gives a bit of a Jurassic Park vibe

...a breakthrough of genetics...

But it's not all just landscaping, at the bottom end of this helix ramp, there was quite a bit of Skloosh! action. And if you aren't wet enough...

...this water battle ride is right next door. Of course, not all big attractions are water-themed.

For example, there is this nice and nicely pink Vekoma Junior Coaster (apparently their first one)

It was pretty hot that day, so even a little mental cooling was welcome. This is the station to a powered bobsled ride.

Also quite fun as you get to control your own speed (within limits).

Some more DIY landscaping. At some point it was rainnig a little, just enough to drive up humidity but not enough (yet) to drive down temperatures.

Here you can do a bit of climbing while attached to a safety harness. This was briefly closed due to the drizzle, but I either got up and back down before or it reopened when I got there.

Continuing with somewhat smaller attractions again...

...there is a small drop tower...

...Bumper Boats...

...and a small "steam" railway (smelled and sounded like powered by a two-stroke engine).

Of course, grilling and two-stroke exhaust from that go-kart track go wonderfully together.

Going a bit back towards water, we find the classical combination of...

...a swinging pirate ship...

....and a pirate-themed dark ride.

The Park also has a nice assortment of slides.

Dry and enclosed as part of a playground.

Dry, open and standalone

and a few moist slides

the slide boats run on water, but the tracks are confined enough that you shouldn't get really wet. This does however not appply to...

Skloosh! 2, an unfortunately not terribly photogenic log flume.

Finishing with the water is this spinny thing

The boats don't just spin around the pirate, they also go up and down on a track (and they can also spin backwards).

This was one of the last rides I rode that day and I hope these pictures gave you an indea about this small but nice park. Even back then there were more rides I didn't take pictures of and since my visit they built several more, including three rollercoasters (Holta di Polta, Strohnado and Verrücktwärts).

In summary, this is a really nice small park with rides for all ages and almost all types of riders (except hardcore thrillseekers) where you can easily spend half a day to a day, so maybe think about a visit when you are in the general area of Brunswick/Hannover. If you come from further away, you should combine your visit to the park with other places as the park on its own isn't so much of a reason for extended travel (unless you are REALLY desperate for coaster credits).

EDIT: BTW, Strohnado seems to be same model as the hamster wheel coaster from this TPR IAAPA 2021 video, although from on-ride videos the spin cycle of Strohnado seems a lot tamer. German Wikipedia calls this a Mixed Coaster by SBF Visa, they also produced the other two new coasters.

[Nrthwnd]

Great TR of a park I've never heard of! Thanks for sharing your trip there.

[BobloLives]

Love the cameras (I think they are, anyway) mounted in the front of the vehicles for the car ride -- neat idea

[tbszgr]

Yes those are cameras, kind of the point of a photo safari. You can also take them out of the mounts like a camera (they remain attached to the car with a cable), although they don't take actual pictures, this is basically an outdoors shooting "dark" ride.

[cfc]

Thanks for the report. I've never heard of this park, either, but Germany is full of hidden gems. Plus, I'm always happy when a little park has a dark ride.