I randomly decided to very last minute (like 1am last night) join Neal and Not-So-Hot-Jordan at Chessington World of Fences. When I was sat on the train to Chessington I clicked that it was the half term holidays meaning many annoying school kids, what burdens. Oh well. I met up with the other two and we made our way over to the park.
We opted to take a very relaxed approach as it's a park we've done loads before. On our approach through the car park Neal decided to try and say which animal the row signs would say (so for example M is for Meerkat). Neal got most of them correct without looking, for D I decided to joke that it was Dinosaurs, this was to become a running theme for the day.
We tried and failed to get Jordan a locker for all his many bags, for some reason the machines just didn't want to take his money. Elsewhere in Market Square we noticed a queue, it was long which must mean it was for a very exciting attraction...
Jordan considered doing Ramses but when we got there he decided otherwise. Next on our agenda was Tomb which had broken down so we just continued walking onwards until we reached Dragon Falls. A lot of things in the area had been given a lick of paint.
The big picture thing along the top of the ride (before the big drop) has been replaced by a new picture.
Sitting at the front I got the most moist. Weirdly the back of my legs got soaked, like, how is that possible?
Moving on we headed into Wild Asia where we ventured into Lorikeet Lagoon as Jordan and Neal had never been inside. I think they enjoyed it.
Not happy with the size of the queues in the Asia area we continued onwards. We were going to go ride Buccaneer as that's become a rarity but it had a really long queue, not seen it like that in a very long time.
The length of the queues were become burdenous so we decided to go check out the new Amazu area. Basically what they've done is they've slaughtered half of the monkey and bird garden to build the new hotel, in the area left they've shoved a bunch of small monkeys in one walkthrough enclosure which is closed twice a day, put the Capybara in the pond area, kept the spider monkeys in the same enclosure and given the squirrel monkeys a new enclosure which is underneath the new climbing frame.
We decided to venture up into the Amazu structure because it was new.
Nom nom nom said the squirrel monkey
Randomly placed Aztec symbol
The stairs up into the structure was the first bit of fun. Look at the below photo, Neal is a tall man, look at how much he has to raise his foot to get on to the steps. This contraption is for KIDS. It's a proper facepalm moment, a bit like the Scorpion Express queueline.
There is a slide.
Most of the walkways were narrow and short, even Jordan had to crouch.
The higher viewpoint gave great views of the hotel construction which has come a long way since I last visited...
Is this how animals feel?
Loads of the walkways were closed off without any explanation. Sense would have been us asking the area attendant why but we didn't. *shrug* So basically only about a third of the new structure was doable.
The area had new signage for the animals which are nice but less informative. The leaves that reveal more info are also made out of a material which is going to last 5 seconds, why they didn't opt for a durable or a hinged piece of material is anyone's guess.
We couldn't see the (holiday) Armadillo
We were feeling a little bit hungry so decided to head over to the hotel to check out their menu. It's still not great. Our little trip to the hotel did mean we saw some more concept art for the new hotel expansion, the new restaurant looks nice and the water play area looks like it'll be great for the kids.
In the end for food we ended up walking down to the Monkey puzzle beefeater. The food was good. When back in the park we managed to turn up just as the wild wood show was starting. As it was the 2pm show Esmerlda the Binturong didn't come out so sad face.
After the show we went over to Scorpion Express as Jordan wanted to check it out. It was advertising a 60 minute queue, how obscene. The disabled entrance queue was also burdenously long. The queue however looked odd and as we thought it couldn't possibly be 60 minutes we joined the queue.
Weirdly enough, once again we should have asked staff and failed, barely any of the cattlepen was used, it didn't go into the building and over the bridge but instead into the fast track station entrance, like what?? Half the train was also being used for the disabled queue which was causing the mass of faff. It was all rather tedious.
Barely moving queues are the worst type of queue
The ride as per usual was ok, there was lots of fire still which is awesome, really didn't expect it to last this long. They've changed when it goes off though, now goes off when you're doing the first helix.
Not using the normal queue provided us with a new viewpoint.
I failed to take more photos after this (phew, says you). I believe this is when we gave Tomb Blaster another go after walking around a bit. It had a 30 minute queue, it went by quickly. My gun failed to work because it was literally in pieces and had sharp bits dangling from it. As you can imagine, I was not pleased by this. I did inform the ride operator once we got off though because I can see a kid or clumsy person proper cutting themselves on it.
We then went for a Suefari adventure. For a laugh when the poorly animated lemur asked us what animal we were looking forward to seeing Neal shouted "DINOSAURS!" much to our amusement and Gozi's confusion "well you won't find any dinosaurs here". We were finally in a gate ready to board when our truck decided it didn't like our row and was spiting. We were fine with that which made the ride host happy, clearly not everyone is so accommodating. We were finally on a truck, all sat down and relaxed, ready to go when all of a sudden everyone was told to get off! It was just being a very burdenous ride today. Turned out a fire alarm had been set off so they had to get everyone off the ride. No rush in this procedure (they must have known it was a false alarm) and we had to wait for every truck to slowly pull into the station and unload. By that time they had managed to stop the fire alarm and we were able to board into a different truck (three trucks a charm?). There was a little sock on the empty seat in front, Neal placed it on the side to see how long it'd last. Not long was the answer. It barely made it out of the station area before sadly falling to it's sad fate of mud based baths.
The ride itself wasn't that eventful apart from a sad zebra, poo and a large tree stopping us from going off-road. Into the deep and moist dark cave of sad faces it was. Neal got attacked by water.
We decided to call it a day and left the park. It was a nice sunny day and it was cool to just hang out and relax in the park on a last minute whim. Thanks for reading.
We opted to take a very relaxed approach as it's a park we've done loads before. On our approach through the car park Neal decided to try and say which animal the row signs would say (so for example M is for Meerkat). Neal got most of them correct without looking, for D I decided to joke that it was Dinosaurs, this was to become a running theme for the day.
We tried and failed to get Jordan a locker for all his many bags, for some reason the machines just didn't want to take his money. Elsewhere in Market Square we noticed a queue, it was long which must mean it was for a very exciting attraction...
Jordan considered doing Ramses but when we got there he decided otherwise. Next on our agenda was Tomb which had broken down so we just continued walking onwards until we reached Dragon Falls. A lot of things in the area had been given a lick of paint.
The big picture thing along the top of the ride (before the big drop) has been replaced by a new picture.
Sitting at the front I got the most moist. Weirdly the back of my legs got soaked, like, how is that possible?
Moving on we headed into Wild Asia where we ventured into Lorikeet Lagoon as Jordan and Neal had never been inside. I think they enjoyed it.
Not happy with the size of the queues in the Asia area we continued onwards. We were going to go ride Buccaneer as that's become a rarity but it had a really long queue, not seen it like that in a very long time.
The length of the queues were become burdenous so we decided to go check out the new Amazu area. Basically what they've done is they've slaughtered half of the monkey and bird garden to build the new hotel, in the area left they've shoved a bunch of small monkeys in one walkthrough enclosure which is closed twice a day, put the Capybara in the pond area, kept the spider monkeys in the same enclosure and given the squirrel monkeys a new enclosure which is underneath the new climbing frame.
We decided to venture up into the Amazu structure because it was new.
Nom nom nom said the squirrel monkey
Randomly placed Aztec symbol
The stairs up into the structure was the first bit of fun. Look at the below photo, Neal is a tall man, look at how much he has to raise his foot to get on to the steps. This contraption is for KIDS. It's a proper facepalm moment, a bit like the Scorpion Express queueline.
There is a slide.
Most of the walkways were narrow and short, even Jordan had to crouch.
The higher viewpoint gave great views of the hotel construction which has come a long way since I last visited...
Is this how animals feel?
Loads of the walkways were closed off without any explanation. Sense would have been us asking the area attendant why but we didn't. *shrug* So basically only about a third of the new structure was doable.
The area had new signage for the animals which are nice but less informative. The leaves that reveal more info are also made out of a material which is going to last 5 seconds, why they didn't opt for a durable or a hinged piece of material is anyone's guess.
We couldn't see the (holiday) Armadillo
We were feeling a little bit hungry so decided to head over to the hotel to check out their menu. It's still not great. Our little trip to the hotel did mean we saw some more concept art for the new hotel expansion, the new restaurant looks nice and the water play area looks like it'll be great for the kids.
In the end for food we ended up walking down to the Monkey puzzle beefeater. The food was good. When back in the park we managed to turn up just as the wild wood show was starting. As it was the 2pm show Esmerlda the Binturong didn't come out so sad face.
After the show we went over to Scorpion Express as Jordan wanted to check it out. It was advertising a 60 minute queue, how obscene. The disabled entrance queue was also burdenously long. The queue however looked odd and as we thought it couldn't possibly be 60 minutes we joined the queue.
Weirdly enough, once again we should have asked staff and failed, barely any of the cattlepen was used, it didn't go into the building and over the bridge but instead into the fast track station entrance, like what?? Half the train was also being used for the disabled queue which was causing the mass of faff. It was all rather tedious.
Barely moving queues are the worst type of queue
The ride as per usual was ok, there was lots of fire still which is awesome, really didn't expect it to last this long. They've changed when it goes off though, now goes off when you're doing the first helix.
Not using the normal queue provided us with a new viewpoint.
I failed to take more photos after this (phew, says you). I believe this is when we gave Tomb Blaster another go after walking around a bit. It had a 30 minute queue, it went by quickly. My gun failed to work because it was literally in pieces and had sharp bits dangling from it. As you can imagine, I was not pleased by this. I did inform the ride operator once we got off though because I can see a kid or clumsy person proper cutting themselves on it.
We then went for a Suefari adventure. For a laugh when the poorly animated lemur asked us what animal we were looking forward to seeing Neal shouted "DINOSAURS!" much to our amusement and Gozi's confusion "well you won't find any dinosaurs here". We were finally in a gate ready to board when our truck decided it didn't like our row and was spiting. We were fine with that which made the ride host happy, clearly not everyone is so accommodating. We were finally on a truck, all sat down and relaxed, ready to go when all of a sudden everyone was told to get off! It was just being a very burdenous ride today. Turned out a fire alarm had been set off so they had to get everyone off the ride. No rush in this procedure (they must have known it was a false alarm) and we had to wait for every truck to slowly pull into the station and unload. By that time they had managed to stop the fire alarm and we were able to board into a different truck (three trucks a charm?). There was a little sock on the empty seat in front, Neal placed it on the side to see how long it'd last. Not long was the answer. It barely made it out of the station area before sadly falling to it's sad fate of mud based baths.
The ride itself wasn't that eventful apart from a sad zebra, poo and a large tree stopping us from going off-road. Into the deep and moist dark cave of sad faces it was. Neal got attacked by water.
We decided to call it a day and left the park. It was a nice sunny day and it was cool to just hang out and relax in the park on a last minute whim. Thanks for reading.
