davidm
Strata Poster
Such a bad goon am I, that I had not had anything planned for this year (work has been a bit ugh to be honest as my boss retired and we
have to cover his work too now, but that's hardly an excuse is it?). Anyway to try to spur me into action I booked some random time off work
when I was not so busy, and some late-booked (so not bargain) travel plans were concocted to pick up some continental stuff that I had been
sleeping on for the past couple of years (also bad goon) plus an interesting new Intamin...
So flew off from Manchester to Brussels one Tuesday afternoon in late July - Brussels Airlines who were a new carrier to me, they were OK but
what's the point of checking in online when you still have to Q thru the same line people are checking in in at the airport just to drop a bag
off? Probably blame awful MCR airport more here though - used to be a good airport 20-odd years ago, now its all a bit horrible.
Anyway, flight fine, pick up (expensive) hire car, negotiate Brussels ring road and park up in Brugges for the evening.
Had got into Brugges late afternoon, but the "Beer Experience" was still open for an hour, so headed into that - was pretty OK to be fair,
did not have high expectations, but the museum aspect of it was quite good...
and you could buy a combo-museum-and-beer ticket which was not bad value for a tourist place and have 3 nice beers in the bar afterwards.
(Rodenbach Grand Cru - awesome - plus a Brugges Tripel - which was not so great - and a Trappist quadrupel from Bierbrouwerij De Koningshoeven which was better)
Set off to find a beer and burger (achieved) and a few more local beers (failed) - lots of places closed on the Tuesday evening despite the lingering tourists and the brewery I was trying to find seemed to have disappeared. So I gave in and called it a day.
Anyway Brugges is all quite pleasant...
...but we are not really here for pleasant euro-touristing are we?
--
Next day, fairly poor hotel continental breakfast and a reasonably simple drive later;
Well timed drive too as only a few minutes handing around before they opened the walkways and the amassed throngs (it was pretty busy already)
could head around to the rides.
So obviously one of the continental rides I'd been sleeping on was Ride To Happiness and obviously that was where I, and all the other
crowds, were headed to first. A Q built up outside the station, but the ride did not open (or even test) for quite a while. Contemplated
bailing after 20 mins or so of no action, but an even larger line had built up behind me by then (which was not a good sign).
Eventually (maybe 30m after opening) it started testing and then they let us in. Had a few trains wait before I was on and the fascist ride
ops would not let me ride with secured glasses on so that did not impress me either.
It was really good though - very disorientating (had not studied the POVs much) and certainly very different. But did not blow me away after
that first ride.
Had other creds to get, so better get that out of the way. As I said the park was BUSY. Probably 45m Q then for Heidi The Ride.
Which was nice enough in a White Lighting way - better than its Florida cousin though I thought - nice looking (wooden structure) and seemed
better maintained, probably not suffering from that Florida climate. I would have ridden it more than once had the line not been so awful.
I did ride a couple of other coasters, the Tivoli (I had it my head that this had had all its track replaced so would be a +1 but now not so
sure so not counting it) and then a solid hour Q (!!) for Anubis: The Ride which I like.
As you might imagine, my mood was not so great given the burdenous crowd situation - I skipped riding some stuff because of big lines (I'd
been here before, but >10 years ago) and I needed re-rides on the main attraction.
To be fair the lines on Ride To Happiness, whilst still pretty big, were moving and my afternoon rides did improve my opinion of it. But there
was no way I was marathoning it today - 3 more rides took a couple of hours to achieve.
So I really liked RtH. Very good presentation, very good looking ride, very confusing and very different. I did not love it though, top 10
percent only.
Had a bit of a drive then, had randomly booked a hotel in Amiens for that evening so once I'd found that headed off to see what Amiens was
like.
It was not great - the city centre was mostly a modern mess of buildings but there was one or two highlights.
Town hall (not pictured all the modern mess in which it sits)
Kinda cool residential building ( LINK )
But a seriously impressive, and seriously old, big cathedral
Unfortunately it being late in the day by then, it was shut so only saw the outside. There was an advertised projection mapping show (free) going
on on the front of the thing later that night - but it was absolutely pouring down by then so I did not come back to see that - bit of a shame.
I did manage to find the local "beer street" though
--
Next day, another poor hotel breakfast (perhaps indicative of the relatively cheapo hotels I'd been staying in ) but worse than that was
the weather forecast. The big rain from last night was still going and forecast for all of the morning for the area I was in and the place
I was heading for (Parc St Paul).
I replanned at that point, instead of going to Parc St Paul for the morning and heading to Parc Asterix later, I thought I'd do something
more touristy (and crucially more inside and dry!) instead - visit the historic Château de Chantilly (which I'd driven past a few times for
reasons I will explain later), and come back to Parc St Paul after I'd visited Asterix. New plan was not that more complicated than old plan -
so off I set.
Only as I headed South I cleared the rain. So I stopped, rechecked the forecast (which had improved) and replanned again!
Fortunately I was headed in the same direction at that point whether I was heading to Chantilly or St Paul anyway so back on Plan A after all.
Bit of a glorified fairground this - fairly pleasantly plopped down in a forest but lots of rides just plopped down on tarmac spread out
amongst the trees. Not awful, but not so great.
I was only really here for the woody, but...
And they did not even start running the rest of the rides at park opening so I had just to wander around (getting the layout of the park
in my head) for half an hour before anything opened.
Wild Train was first up - might have been my first ever Pax?
it was ok.
Might have had a zen ride on the kiddie coaster Mini Mouse Cartoon, but you have no proof.
Ubiquitous spinny mouse Souris Verte was quite spinny.
There is a wacky-worm / big Pomme here too, the shame intensifies.
And I had to wait for Aérotrain to open too as there was some issue (but spotted it open so at least I did not have to Q for it)
Woody had cycled by then, but by the time I got there had shut down again and they cleared the Q - not a good sign.
Having +1'd everything else and not willing to bail on the woody while the day was still early and NOT raining I pottered about on a load of
other stuff for a while.
Reasonable (if low budget) haunted walk through (spooky themeing outside pictured)
No-one gets to ride this ; SBNO for years and just walled off.
Notacred (but quite well presented in a dinosaur themed area)
Got wet (did start to rain too, but only a little)
I had never even seen one of these for real - fantastic, if a little dizzying, to watch.
But a bit dull to ride, shame.
But YAY, Wood Express opened.
And that was a lot of fun for a little woody.
Should be more cool little woodys I think - could see that at Paultons for instance?
have to cover his work too now, but that's hardly an excuse is it?). Anyway to try to spur me into action I booked some random time off work
when I was not so busy, and some late-booked (so not bargain) travel plans were concocted to pick up some continental stuff that I had been
sleeping on for the past couple of years (also bad goon) plus an interesting new Intamin...
So flew off from Manchester to Brussels one Tuesday afternoon in late July - Brussels Airlines who were a new carrier to me, they were OK but
what's the point of checking in online when you still have to Q thru the same line people are checking in in at the airport just to drop a bag
off? Probably blame awful MCR airport more here though - used to be a good airport 20-odd years ago, now its all a bit horrible.
Anyway, flight fine, pick up (expensive) hire car, negotiate Brussels ring road and park up in Brugges for the evening.
Had got into Brugges late afternoon, but the "Beer Experience" was still open for an hour, so headed into that - was pretty OK to be fair,
did not have high expectations, but the museum aspect of it was quite good...
and you could buy a combo-museum-and-beer ticket which was not bad value for a tourist place and have 3 nice beers in the bar afterwards.
(Rodenbach Grand Cru - awesome - plus a Brugges Tripel - which was not so great - and a Trappist quadrupel from Bierbrouwerij De Koningshoeven which was better)
Set off to find a beer and burger (achieved) and a few more local beers (failed) - lots of places closed on the Tuesday evening despite the lingering tourists and the brewery I was trying to find seemed to have disappeared. So I gave in and called it a day.
Anyway Brugges is all quite pleasant...
...but we are not really here for pleasant euro-touristing are we?
--
Next day, fairly poor hotel continental breakfast and a reasonably simple drive later;
Well timed drive too as only a few minutes handing around before they opened the walkways and the amassed throngs (it was pretty busy already)
could head around to the rides.
So obviously one of the continental rides I'd been sleeping on was Ride To Happiness and obviously that was where I, and all the other
crowds, were headed to first. A Q built up outside the station, but the ride did not open (or even test) for quite a while. Contemplated
bailing after 20 mins or so of no action, but an even larger line had built up behind me by then (which was not a good sign).
Eventually (maybe 30m after opening) it started testing and then they let us in. Had a few trains wait before I was on and the fascist ride
ops would not let me ride with secured glasses on so that did not impress me either.
It was really good though - very disorientating (had not studied the POVs much) and certainly very different. But did not blow me away after
that first ride.
Had other creds to get, so better get that out of the way. As I said the park was BUSY. Probably 45m Q then for Heidi The Ride.
Which was nice enough in a White Lighting way - better than its Florida cousin though I thought - nice looking (wooden structure) and seemed
better maintained, probably not suffering from that Florida climate. I would have ridden it more than once had the line not been so awful.
I did ride a couple of other coasters, the Tivoli (I had it my head that this had had all its track replaced so would be a +1 but now not so
sure so not counting it) and then a solid hour Q (!!) for Anubis: The Ride which I like.
As you might imagine, my mood was not so great given the burdenous crowd situation - I skipped riding some stuff because of big lines (I'd
been here before, but >10 years ago) and I needed re-rides on the main attraction.
To be fair the lines on Ride To Happiness, whilst still pretty big, were moving and my afternoon rides did improve my opinion of it. But there
was no way I was marathoning it today - 3 more rides took a couple of hours to achieve.
So I really liked RtH. Very good presentation, very good looking ride, very confusing and very different. I did not love it though, top 10
percent only.
Had a bit of a drive then, had randomly booked a hotel in Amiens for that evening so once I'd found that headed off to see what Amiens was
like.
It was not great - the city centre was mostly a modern mess of buildings but there was one or two highlights.
Town hall (not pictured all the modern mess in which it sits)
Kinda cool residential building ( LINK )
But a seriously impressive, and seriously old, big cathedral
Unfortunately it being late in the day by then, it was shut so only saw the outside. There was an advertised projection mapping show (free) going
on on the front of the thing later that night - but it was absolutely pouring down by then so I did not come back to see that - bit of a shame.
I did manage to find the local "beer street" though
--
Next day, another poor hotel breakfast (perhaps indicative of the relatively cheapo hotels I'd been staying in
) but worse than that wasthe weather forecast. The big rain from last night was still going and forecast for all of the morning for the area I was in and the place
I was heading for (Parc St Paul).
I replanned at that point, instead of going to Parc St Paul for the morning and heading to Parc Asterix later, I thought I'd do something
more touristy (and crucially more inside and dry!) instead - visit the historic Château de Chantilly (which I'd driven past a few times for
reasons I will explain later), and come back to Parc St Paul after I'd visited Asterix. New plan was not that more complicated than old plan -
so off I set.
Only as I headed South I cleared the rain. So I stopped, rechecked the forecast (which had improved) and replanned again!
Fortunately I was headed in the same direction at that point whether I was heading to Chantilly or St Paul anyway so back on Plan A after all.
Bit of a glorified fairground this - fairly pleasantly plopped down in a forest but lots of rides just plopped down on tarmac spread out
amongst the trees. Not awful, but not so great.
I was only really here for the woody, but...
And they did not even start running the rest of the rides at park opening so I had just to wander around (getting the layout of the park
in my head) for half an hour before anything opened.
Wild Train was first up - might have been my first ever Pax?
it was ok.
Might have had a zen ride on the kiddie coaster Mini Mouse Cartoon, but you have no proof.
Ubiquitous spinny mouse Souris Verte was quite spinny.
There is a wacky-worm / big Pomme here too, the shame intensifies.
And I had to wait for Aérotrain to open too as there was some issue (but spotted it open so at least I did not have to Q for it)
Woody had cycled by then, but by the time I got there had shut down again and they cleared the Q - not a good sign.
Having +1'd everything else and not willing to bail on the woody while the day was still early and NOT raining I pottered about on a load of
other stuff for a while.
Reasonable (if low budget) haunted walk through (spooky themeing outside pictured)
No-one gets to ride this ; SBNO for years and just walled off.
Notacred (but quite well presented in a dinosaur themed area)
Got wet (did start to rain too, but only a little)
I had never even seen one of these for real - fantastic, if a little dizzying, to watch.
But a bit dull to ride, shame.
But YAY, Wood Express opened.
And that was a lot of fun for a little woody.
Should be more cool little woodys I think - could see that at Paultons for instance?
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