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A Little Piece Of Heaven (Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love Pairi Daiza) Pt II: Scenes From A Memory

Will

Strata Poster
So, as I may have mentioned a hundred times or so, I managed to defy the odds and spend New Year in Belgium. It was a trip I booked on impulse for no better reason than I found my parents were going to see friends near Lincoln and I didn't want to spend it alone. As I may have mentioned even more times, I’ve come home with ‘the ‘rona’, so apologies in advance for this report: my concentration span is akin to that of a toddler on caffeine today. If I can write trip reports of Weston super Mare, then this definitely deserves one.

All the testing done and endless documents printed or screen-shotted onto my phone, I left Stoke a little after 4AM on New Year’s Eve. I’ve always blamed other people for the fact that I’ve done every holiday (except Australia and two trips to Poland) alone since 2018, but the fact of the matter is that I DO NOT deal well with little sleep and airports turn me into the incredible Hulk, so it’s just better that other people don’t have to deal with me.

I won’t bore you with the details of the airport ritual, arriving unnecessarily early, the fish-tank at the off-site car park, the sausage sandwich I had for breakfast, annoying security by leaving an ecig in my coat pocket, strutting through duty-free with my nose in the air or which toilet cubicle I used, but I will mention that my plane was VERY quiet (definitely less than 50 on board) and that we were ‘treated’ to the dreaded fanfare signalling a rare ‘early arrival’.

Convinced my trip would be cancelled by Covid or the Belgian Government, I’d cancelled my hire car and had to hastily rebook – yet I still ended up with a free upgrade. Those of you who know me well will know how happy I was to be given a Clio. Hire cars frighten me to death – I ALWAYS manage to damage them slightly (on two occasions, just getting them out of the car park) but they’re a necessary evil. I worked out how to work the Bluetooth, satnav and contactless key (stupid, stupid invention in my opinion!!) and set the controls for the heart of De Panne.

Wind forward the clock to 1:40PM and I park up at a surprisingly quiet Plopsaland and a grey but unseasonably warm de Panne. It’s a *little* bit of a nuisance at the moment – a vaccine passport is needed to get into the park and face coverings have to be worn EVERYWHERE, but again, a small price to pay for creds, particularly if RtH was as good as I’d been led to believe.
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The entrance area was tastefully decorated as one would expect for the time of year. However, having only visited the park once before (with Neal and Stone Cold in June 2011) I didn’t know my way around and stupid_Will elected not to pick up a map, meaning my usual aimless wandering ensued as I attempted to figure out my way around, deciding which rides to do now and which to save for the evening.

The aimless wandering led me to Anubis, which said it had a 10-minute queue, so I figured this was as good a place as any to kick-off. Again, Covid has been a bit of a nuisance here – most ride queues are outdoors, with the main line instead used as the exit. This meant the line consisted of a cattlepen of Tensa barriers. Hey, ho…

I’d also managed to leave my ‘goonstrap’ in Stoke and as my current glasses are fairly loose fitting, I didn’t put up a fight when they were taken off me – a little bemused that ride staff were talking to me in German – a pattern that continued throughout the trip. My only real memories of Anubis were that I thought it inferior to Lynet (which I think of in a way comparable to the way I think of my first Clio) and that the following morning, I ended up watching House of Anubis with Neal and deciding Mick & Mara were very annoying.

Shortly into the ride, I announced ‘Oh. You’ve developed Gerst RATTLE’ and spent the remainder of the ride trying to find a comfortable position whilst ensuring I didn’t lose my face covering. Smiler-esque brain rattle aside, I concluded this was definitely still a fun ride and made a mental note to have a few more rides in the evening, whilst hoping Lynet had aged better.
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As I knew Heidi was closing at 5 and would not re-open in the evening, this was ended to be my next destination, but I passed by RtH and had a message from Nicky asking me if I’d ridden it yet. I decided this was ‘a sign’. Plus I wanted the cred and to see what the fuss was about.

To my amazement, this too had a very short queue, starting on the stairs outside the station which it took 5 minutes to ride. Unfortunately, the ride broke down for a further 10 minutes when I got into the station. Most un-Macklike, but there were plenty of things to look at and it gave me longer to get excited about the ride.

Having seen the first inversion from the station, I decided it would be a smart idea to stow my coat as well as my glasses before taking a back row seat. This proved to be a smart idea; it wasn’t as unpleasant as it looked, but it’s fair to say I wasn’t a big fan of the first roll. Hang time is not my favourite. One of my controversial views is that moreorless every company make more enjoyable launches than Intamin do (though s/o to iSpeed and Speed Monster, with a roll of the eyes in the direction of Icon) and despite being launched at a weird angle, this was no exception. The next hill is taken at a snail’s pace (‘looks slow’, I laughed to myself) – but the onboard audio kicks in and I was reminded just how much I like this, even if the music’s a bit burdenous really! After a while, you hit the second launch, and it’s at this point that all hell breaks loose and the rollercoaster rule book is torn to shreds which are then thrown out of the window in a fit of passion. I don’t really know what happens at this point, so I can’t describe it in any detail – only that I liked it a lot and assorted Belgians gave me very funny looks when I applauded on the brake run – not something I do often!

It won’t surprise you to know that the next thing I did was rejoin the queue for what I had dubbed ‘Storm Chaser on acid’. RtH may not be second coming promised by some overly optimistic enthusiasts, but I’d definitely take it over Untamed. I hope we see more of these popping up across the continent (Alton, anyone?) and I now have a little more hope for Spinny_Icon and indeed Project Exodus. To state the obvious, the spinning seats also ensure no two rides are the same – but it was just as good second time around.
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Believing I had the evening ahead of me, I reluctantly tore myself away and headed for Heidi, which is tucked away in a remote corner of the park and a surprisingly long walk. I’d underestimated the size of the park! Another thing I’d underestimated was the length of the queue. Minor moan here – I genuinely don’t see the point of socially distanced ride loading when this drops the ride’s throughput below 250pph and leaves everyone stood in a socially-distanced-but-not-really queue line together for an hour. The wait was tedious and frustrating, but I ensured I’d got the +2 I’d come all this way for (the eagle-eyed may have noticed I ‘live-updated’ my forum signature from ride exits). I don’t have anything very positive to say about Heidi, other than it made me appreciate that Wickerman is actually pretty good. However, for what I assume is the parks’ target audience, it’s PERFECT, the absolutely ideal ‘Ladybird book of wooden coasters’ if you will, upon which goons in training may cut their milk teeth. Indeed, this would probably make sense at Toverland – but I’m eternally grateful they built Troy instead.
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By this point, my body was waving the red flags of hunger, loneliness and tiredness at me, so I headed for the exit, intending to travel via a nearby McDonalds to the hotel where I might have a nap before returning for the evening. I took a wrong turn on the way out and ended up in the farm.
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I asked to have my hand stamped as I left, stating I’d be back later. ‘Evening is different ticket,’ the woman on the gate explained, examining my ticket and informing me that it allowed daytime access only. Evidently, I'd misunderstood the website. Fear and panic gripped me and I hot-footed it to guest services. Here, I spoke to three separate staff members – surely, I thought, one would realise this was the Great Will Garner – all the way from England for little old Plopsaland and take pity on me. It was not to be. ‘I cannot help you. Is sold out. We have no tickets here,’ the senior supervisor slowly explained. I nodded politely and thanked her for her time. To rub sanitiser into an open wound, I also found I had to buy a carpark ticket.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t in tears as I walked back to the car, wondering how the **** I was going to spend New Year’s Eve now and knowing there was a real difference between what my head wanted me to do and what I NEEDED to do. I decided to do the least damaging of the bad things my head was telling me to do, then drove down an upsettingly narrow road to McDonalds to find it closed – by this point I was laughing like Phoenix’s joker, trying to figure out what was going to go wrong next and checked into my hotel to weigh up my options.

Google told me there was a Chinese takeaway near my hotel, but en route, I passed what looked like a 2AM kebab house and decided grease and salt were definitely what I needed. I got a mixed grill which was a hell of a lot better than you’d get in a kebab shop in England (and didn’t make me ill!) for 20EUR, ate it in my hotel room, had a shower (wanted a bath, but you can't win 'em all) and with no regard for the fact that it was around 7:30, tucked myself up in bed.

At 11:55PM, I awoke to the sound of fireworks. I went down for a smoke shortly after midnight, was a bit scared that I think a guy across the street was firing a gun, fired a ‘look at me, I’m thinking of you at midnight <3’ text in the general direction of the East Midlands and then, filled with acceptance and gratitude, fell back to sleep. What claimed to be 'probably the World's best zoo' awaited.
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TBC…

...and if you get every reference in the title, you win... nothing ;)
 
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Will

Strata Poster
Thanks for the votes of confidence, guys, means a lot.

And so – onto Chapter 2. A word of warning – if you’ve come to this wanting to read about theme parks with rides, stop here – and I’ve never written about a zoo, so I’ve no idea what I’m about to spew onto this page, but this place deserves a lot more than a 'we went to the zoo and it rained'. I’ve also noticed I’m making a lot of typing mistakes this week – once again, blame COVID.

Well rested, I awoke around 7:30 on New Year’s Day and made my way down to the deserted breakfast room, wondering why I’d been asked to book a timeslot to avoid the crowds. Lots of food and coffee were consumed, then I clambered back into my Clio and began the 100 or so minute drive to Pairi Diaza.

I will mention that on arrival, I attempted to go into the hotel carpark, met with a barrier (when in Europe ‘eh, Rich?), reversed as badly as only I can and knocked over a sign. “…and now for my next trick,” I proclaimed as I righted said sign and, still giggling, moved to my car to the mere mortals car park. Realising how large it was, I also decided to park in a corner as far as possible from the entrance – that way, I reasoned, I’d know where it was when I had to come back to it.

Around 10:45, I re-secured my face covering (to quote Slamming Coastercore, I was ‘repping’ CF), flashed my vaccine pass and ticket at the entrance staff and I was in. Immediately on consulting the map, I realised there was no way in hell I was going to be able to do this place justice in the five hours I had available – and rather than attempting to try, I re-adopted the ‘wandering aimlessly’ strategy.

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This brought me to owls. My brother likes owls and I was especially fond of a snowy owl that came ‘bob-bob-bobbing’ up to meet me. I made a mental note to bring him here if we do another family trip to Francorchamps.

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After the letdown of the previous day (hell, arguably the previous year) I’d tried to lower my expectations ahead of day in an attempt to prevent further misfortune, but as I wandered, I quickly realised that this place was everything the brochure had promised and more. With only the birds of prey section visited, I declared that ‘this was what would have happened if the Mack family had a zoo, not a theme park’.

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A couple of members (whose names both begin with the same two letters, interestingly) have been on at me for years to visit Disney’s Animal Kingdom and over the course of the day, I decided that this was how I’d always imagined that would be. In retrospect, this was probably just COVID symptoms first beginning to rear their ugly heads, but I couldn’t help seeing things that fired off old memories.

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You're so vain, I bet you think I'm writing about you...


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Because I have a dirty habit, I was keen to find out what the park’s smoking policy was – I was actually a little disappointed to find that there wasn’t one but made sure I was a good distance from any animals or other visitors before lighting up. Even the ****ing bins were themed – and there were loads of monkey head statues that turned out to be ashtrays.

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The ‘Monk’s Garden’ area has a lot of stones engraved with what I’d usually consider to be cloying platitudes. One was something about ‘the eyes in the breasts see not’. OK then…

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"But the truth can be harsh and disturbing. In what way can that be considered beautiful"
"Well, they sure sucked the fun out of that poem..."


There’s a nice garden area with lots of fountains near the entrance – it was nicely decorated in the spirit of the season. At that moment, I realised I was never going to feel quite the same about Alton or Chester again.

There was another nice surprise now – the website had implied that all indoor spaces would be closed because virus, so I was half-expecting that a lot of animals would be off-show, but I tried the door to the tropical house which unexpectedly opened. Within were prairie dogs, crowned pigeons (the ones with the spotty legs that I always take pictures of) – and a rope bridge which brought you up to the ‘canopy’ to look down on the whole enclosure. Crossing that, I felt sorry for any guests who’d drunk the night before. The house also hosted a large café AND a restaurant so you could get refreshments surrounded by animals. However, I was wearing a face covering AND a winter coat and was ready to get out of there by this point.

It took a while to figure my way out of the labyrinthine Oasis building and I decided to head for the top section of the map.

On the way, I passed camels and penguins.
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There was also an aquarium and a koala house – these WERE closed, but no matter – I’d already decided that this – and not Kondaa – was to be the main destination on my May trip.

Following the railway track (with real old-fashioned RCT style steam train) brought me past the enormous structure of the gorilla house and into the ‘Land of Origins’ where I was greeted by some hippos. I’m not certain, but I think WMSP is the only place I’ve been this close to them before – and I didn’t really fancy getting any closer!

The rest of this area felt like I’d been turned to a cartoon and walked onto the set of the Lion King. I got particularly over-excited by the platform that took you up to giraffe head height – muttering ‘For ****’s sake, Will – they have one of these at Chessington, what’s the matter with you???’ Much of the platform was roped off for social distancing, but this didn’t stop a surprising number of families from crossing the ‘velvet rope’.

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I grabbed a coffee where I could watch a lion doing what lions do. That is to say: not very much. I loved the way these were on a large island rather than behind bars – better for both animal and visitor.

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I don’t know why, but the pelican enclosure had me in absolute hysterics, much to the bewilderment of my fellow guests. I really enjoyed the way they made ridiculous noises at eachother, occasionally engaged in mini fights – and took an unhealthy interest in my fingers when I got too close to the fence taking pictures. Again, my mind turned to @SaiyanHajime

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I hope you don't mind, I hope you don't mind...

One animal house was not a shipping container – it was a SHIP. I don’t know what’s inside though, because COVID.

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The centrepiece of the park is a Buddhist temple and, against my better judgement, I decided I simply had to climb to the top of it. At the risk of over-sharing, prior to this, I had the best themed wee of my life – the toilets at the base of the pyramid are decorated to a level Roland would approve of.

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There are white tigers in the temple and orang utans behind it. I didn’t find any gibbons, but judging from the postcard I bought, they were around somewhere. Even on a grey day, the view from the top was utterly sensational. For the second time in two days, I don’t mind admitting there were tears in my eyes – but these were tears of a very different nature.


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“If you can see any more elephants, you must be on Safari”

Via what I think must have been a fairly young komodo dragon judging from its size and level of activity, I made my way to yet ANOTHER highlight – The Land of the Cold. You may have gathered by now that there are polar bears there. There were also walruses – but these were the only unhappy looking animal I saw, meaning I couldn’t help reluctantly agreeing with a critic who voiced their opinion that perhaps marine mammals do not belong in captivity.

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The buildings surrounding the polar bear, tiger, walrus, penguin etc. enclosures are in fact a hotel, the rooms set out in such a way as to feel like they were actually a part of the enclosure – I made a silent promise to myself that one day, I would stay in this hotel. Ideally with someone with whom I could replicate the actions of the above ursines.
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It was 2:30 as I said goodbye to the tigers and I realised that I was hungry and would probably find better food here than at Charleroi Airport. The map showed a promising looking restaurant back by the main entrance – but being me, I managed to take a wrong turning and get impressively lost in the North American themed section, surrounded by bears and moose, rather than getting to the restaurant. Old_Will had a little chuckle about part of this area being themed to whisky – everyone knows the only true whisky comes from Scotland ;)

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I've heard of Goats on the Roof, but this is ridiculous...

Time was catching up with me as I continued to be lost, fittingly in a wilderness themed area, realising that none of the many paths went where I wanted them to. At great length, I found myself in the gift shop, where I proceeded to spend about £50 without realising I was doing it. (‘Merlin, take note,’ I thought aloud, ‘make your guests THAT happy, THAT immersed that they WANT to give you their money and don’t notice. THAT’S how you make the real profit!’)

The staff pointed me in the direction of the Oasis restaurant – which turned out to be back in the tropical house. It also turned out to be closed, so I made do with a coffee and a giant cookie, accepting that airport food would have to do. There were hornbills. Hornbills scare me.

Reasoning it would be wrong to leave without seeing them, I detoured past the panda enclosure. The panda looked hungover.

‘Don’t take me home, please don’t take me home, I just don’t want a PCR,’ I sang to myself as I wandered back to the car (I knew exactly where it was, remember). In truth, I knew this was a great time to leave – ‘always leave them wanting more’ as every great showman knows.

I returned the car muddy but with only the tiniest of scratches and went through the pre-flight rigmarole for the second time in 48 hours. I didn’t care though – I was in a good mood – if I was not much mistaken, I’d just visited the best place I’d been to since Australia in 2018 – and I’d most definitely had the best New Year’s Day of my life. My only fear was that the year may have peaked too soon, so to speak.

His scar hadn’t troubled him in years I even had a friend to message before I boarded my flight. Even if it was one who kind of reminded me of this bird. All was well.

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The next day, upon waking in a Travelodge in Manchester (I’d stayed over to get my PCR on Jan 2nd, which was obviously cancelled) I tested positive for COVID. A few days later, I realised that far from being the terrifying prospect I’d thought it was, a week alone could actually be quite good fun.

I don’t think I’ve written like that in over a decade.

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Nicky Borrill

Strata Poster
Great report Will, and some cracking photos, especially at the zoo.

Surprised to hear they're socially distancing when it comes to ride loading at Plopsa, there was nothing of the sort earlier in December. Seems odd when the very same evening they basically hosted a rave :/

I also 'kind of' agree about RTH. Incredible ride, really is, and it made my top 5, but I was surprised to read the other day that everyone else who'd listed it in the coasterforce top 10s had it at either number 1 or number 2!!!! Will be interesting to see where it sits in a couple of years, as the novelty wears off. I think, even for myself, the new cred novelty is a big factor, with not getting many new creds these last 2 years. But time will tell.
 
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