What's new

Germany July 2017 - Hansa/Movie/Phanta

peep

CF Legend
Saturday 15th

Just a travel day where I met up with Mike and we got a flight from Stansted to Hamburg. Pretty non-eventful. The hotel was right near the train station and we struggled to sleep due to a loud bar/club that was blasting music till 3am. Urgh.

Sunday 16th

After getting something to eat at the station we got the short train out to Hansa Park (like a 10-15 minute walk between station and the park). The weather was a little overcast and miserable and throughout the day it occasionally rained which was disappointing. Didn't ruin our day though. Heads up about an awesome train and park ticket offer. On the ticket machines just put in hansa park and you'll get a return train ticket plus a voucher for park entry for like the same price as the train journey. Crazy awesome deal.

pokWe0Dxj


polb1Nvwj


I thought everyone would head straight to Karnan (and boy was that tempting) but thought it might be better to go straight to Fluch von Novgorod. Only been waiting since like 2009 to ride it. We pretty much walked on which was fab. The queue line was well themed, the steepness going up into the station is bit random though. I loved the ride, that rolling launch is amazing and the indoor bit after the lift hill is disorientating and fun. The animatronics in the ride were a bit weird though, one of them had a terrifying face, maybe the projection was messed up?

pnZqe4Vhj


poUoPFAjj

Loved the subtle movements from these scarecrows

pnbdFlIFj


pnoAL5FMj


pnjr6J7Vj


pnsloUvJj



It was then round to their latest Gerstlauer beast, Karnan. Photos just don't do justice to this insane tower. I think the theming looks a little better than in photos but just the scale of it just blows my mind. Yet again the queue is really well themed, lots of screens showing a documentary on the history of the castle tower (with some hilariously bad re-enactments - Mike even spotted a modern football goal in the background of a medieval sequence). There's even several pre-shows during the queue - which magically moves in time with the shows (which also slightly highlights the atrocious throughput of this ride). The first room with the projection mapping works really well but I was more impressed with the very subtle effect in another room of having animatronic legs slightly moving on this ladder to give the impression the guy on the screen next to us was really there looking at stuff above us.

I nearly lost it after we were batched. There's a library room and the documentary video continues where the man "discovers" that the library shelves open to reveal a fantastic place to store loose items. Just the effort to somehow tie in the place for your bags just makes my day. After sorting that out we then enter the next room where I proceeded to loose it. Without any ride attendants guests fill up 4 rows, each row has 4 symbols on the floor, once everyone stands on a symbol and epic soundtrack and light sequence begins and it has me HYPED. It then stops and a row of floor symbols light up, then a door opens with a lit symbol above it. This amazed me on so many levels, mainly that people were following what was going on with ease and later I realised that this seat selection process was completely random. Want the front row? Better cross those fingers because it's completely down to chance! Sometimes I'm easily amused, this is probably one of those times but I absolutely love this entire concept. I think it's hilarious but also amazing because it really added to the experience, similar to how the Oblivion queue videos really hype up the ride.

podCdbqrj


pnqEve5Yj


So, the ride has lap bars which is nice but this totally suffers in the same way that Skyrush does. So much pressure on the thighs that it can be quite painful by the time you get back to the station. It also makes the vertical lift hill bloody terrifying. Going 200+ ft high, vertically, with just a lap bar is just insane. I felt like I was ever so slowly slipping further back and that was just unnerving. So the indoor lift hill area contains a secret so I'm going to discuss that in a spoiler box...

As you're rising to the top there's an incredible IMAscore soundtrack that is really good at getting the adrenaline going. It just keeps on building and building and then it stops and the train drops all the way back down to the bottom of the lift hill. It's insane and absolutely brilliant. I can't help but feel sorry for those already scared of rides breaking down though.

The first drop is then absolutely incredible, probably the best in Europe? (although Lost Gravity and GeForce are pretty great). The speed and forces as you're at the bottom and going into the first non-inverting element is intense and just awesome. That whole crazy looking structure is actually really fun and the speed it takes it at is perfect. The rest of the ride is just really fun, I had a massive smile on my face the whole way round. There's a moment of intense and short ejector air time about a third way through which is surprising and awesome. I also love that you hit the brake run and then these huge doors open to reveal a huge heartline roll. It takes it really slowly which creates more hangtime than I'm happy with (similar to the jojo roll on Hydra) but it's still a brilliant and ridiculous way to end such a ludicrous coaster. If you can't tell already, I love Karnan.

pnRH42pdj


pnT39Zfhj


pn2RerPHj


Next up was the wild mouse, it started to rain a bit when we were in the long queue for it. I was amused that the theming and way it was all set up was very similar to how Chessington's Rattlesnake was set up. Even has an animatronic band. The ride was as bland as you'd expect from a wild mouse.

pmG3fnlYj


It was then time for Midgard, the family Gerst. I love the theming on this and yet again the park's love of storytelling has provided the ride with a terrible throughput. We certainly queued for this a lot longer than we expected to. Even got spited by the evil (animatronic) kids in the queueline.

pnxNHg87j


The theming on this ride is really fab though, the effect at the top of the lift hill works extremely well. The ride is quite fun and very smooth, just a solid family coaster.

pmdsztKXj


pmgtxBUAj


poaglwwSj


I took some more photos of Karnan. We even went up the massive mine tower which provided some excellent views of the ride.

pobncAlgj


pockj6MSj


pmVjyJA7j


pnRxytknj


po7jT1DWj



After some wandering we stumbled across Space Race. Intrigued we headed inside to discover some excellent old school space theming. The queue was awesome, lots of random broken interactive things as well as a spinning tunnel. The ride was a dodgems and there was a game, on the walls were the planets and you had to "hit" them to gain points. At first most peeps seemed to be playing the game but we all soon realised it wasn't working. Oh well, neat idea.

pnLDpuJ0j


pmvelDO1j


pozkXC5gj


We then queued up for the mine train with a silly name. Seeing as it goes through the loop of the Schwarzkopf I was praying we'd duel and it did! As we went through the middle of the loop the Nessie train inverted over our heads, it was a really great moment. The rest of the ride was very mediocre. It was then right round to Nessie, the queue and station area felt very 80s. Such a contrast to the newer heavily themed rides. Aside from the drop and loop it doesn't really do much, still fun and very smooth but it doesn't do much with all the speed it has.

poVM1x9ij


pn65cFIzj


pnEJAprDj


pmLxOnp2j


We then decided to take a break and have some lunch. We had a bit of a tight schedule in the evening so we wanted to find a decent large meal and we managed to find one in the Western area. The food portions were huge and at a reasonable price (especially considering theme park prices).

pnpmbstbj


We then went to tick off the brand new kiddy cred, Kleine Zar. It's really cute, it even has it's own IMAscore soundtrack.

pm1j8vOyj


pmQrrSSyj


pmOCOsotj


We then took a little ride on the fairytale boat ride next to it. It wasn't very exciting, but it was good to let our food settle a bit longer before going back on the big coasters.

pmPIEz36j


pmlks24hj


It was time to re-ride Novgorod. It was a bit busy this time, gah throughput on this is pretty terrible, being in that tight little corridor with a sharp incline with lots of people is rather frustrating. Still a great ride though.

pmuXpqVkj


Then back over to Karnan. The queue was super long but we managed a front row! That first drop is even more ridiculous in the front, urgh, wish I could just sit on this ride all day.

pmwAhHMsj


pnLkwRhKj


por2Nzpyj


pojmu123j


pmATKQaMj


pnEZt1Uzj

Annoyingly you can't see what's on the TV, I still love this really subtle effect

poDpDJbGj


I was quite verbal on this ride and ended up with a bit of a sore throat like an idiot. Went to get a drink (side point - the park only sells non-bottled drinks which is slightly frustrating if you just want a bottle of water in your bag) which led to being a bad idea as our next ride was their brand new Gerst skyfly. Bad idea, bad idea. When we finally got on and I managed to get a spin I instantly regretted everything. That was one whole bag of nope, I had to really stop the spinning which is a shame because I quite enjoy these rides but it's my own fault.

podM6zeuj


We had another go on the amazing Karnan. As we got into the gift shop the heavens well and truly opened, we spent ages going from one under cover area to another. We then ended up seeing some "special effects" show. I think we were both expecting a stunt show. What we actually got was like 10 minutes of insane lasers and loud music. I mean, it was actually really good (well for someone like me who likes cool lighting tech) but it just was not what we were expecting. Very random. We then had to make our way to the train station (trains are not common on this train line).

pokH1u71j


I really liked Hansa park but mainly just for the stuff they'd added over the last 8 years. There were lots of randomly themed bits and bobs and then vast areas of generic 70s/80s buildings. We both quite liked the old school kids area (where Zar and the boat ride were). They really need to do something with the Spanish area though, it awkwardly sits between Karnan and Novgorod and only has a few random interactive bits and the laser theatre. There used to be one of those Schwarzkopf cred-but-not in the area but that was removed a few years back (building still there). The staff were nice enough (apart from grumpy bag man at Karnan - did not like me faffing with my camera) but the drinks thing got really annoying and the ride throughputs were atrocious, I'd hate to visit on a busy day. I'll still happily return at some point though, because I need more Karnan in my life.

We then had some minor travel woes that kept escalating and resulted in just a very tiring and not-fun evening. Our train from this remote train station was a little late but our connection in Hamburg was already quite tight. Luckily we weren't alone so once in Hamburg there were like 20-40 peeps running like madmen through the station. Only to get to the connecting train and being full of confusion. The train wasn't just a little bit delayed (I think we'd have been truly screwed if this was the case) but the nice ICE train was replaced with an old IC E train and had less seats. This resulted in utter chaos, lots of asking in mild panic wtf to do. In the end it was a case of somehow walking through each carriage until we found a space/seat. Luckily we did but it must have taken us like 15 minutes to do so. I hope I never have to do that again. We finally arrived in Essen like 15 minutes late (which was not bad considering) and checked into our nice hotel next to the station. That bed was much needed.


Thanks for reading, the next part will be up at some point this week.
 

jayjay

Giga Poster
Yay, Hansa is so fab! I think you hit part of what made Kärnan my favourite - the whole build of anticipation through the queue and the flashy batching room puts you in a great mood before you've even sat in the seat. Good to see the theming continuing to grow too! Looking forward to seeing it all again in October (and looking forward to the rest of the report too).
 

Hixee

Flojector
Staff member
Administrator
Moderator
Social Media Team
Nice report - I was pleasantly surprised by both the Gerstlauer's, and Karnan is really, really great. Absolutely bonkers ride.

I get the impression from your report that they've sped up the drop sequence? Or does it still sit there for a minute or two at the top and bottom?
 

peep

CF Legend
I get the impression from your report that they've sped up the drop sequence? Or does it still sit there for a minute or two at the top and bottom?

Nah, it's still very faffy. I still don't really know how they do it, would love to see a small youtube video on the mechanics of it and the reason for the faff.
 

Pink Cadillac

Giga Poster
This trip report makes me want to go to Hansa Park so badly. How did you find the rest of the park (outside of the ride line up)? Is it nice? Any good theming?
 

peep

CF Legend
How did you find the rest of the park (outside of the ride line up)? Is it nice? Any good theming?

It's nice but I felt like there wasn't a lot? There are quite a few little things for kids to mess around with (one of those large bouncy mounds sits underneath Karnan for example). I sort of thought there would be more flat rides and even the ones they have are a little plonked wherever? A lot of the park certainly feels more like a forest setting than I was expecting, it's a nice place to walk around.

The theming is mainly just ride specific. The Western and Spanish areas are nice though but they don't really contain much to do.

After what they've been adding though I'm very excited to see what they do in the next 5 or so years, felt like they had a lot of space to play with.
 

HeartlineCoaster

Theme Park Superhero
I get the impression from your report that they've sped up the drop sequence? Or does it still sit there for a minute or two at the top and bottom?
It felt even longer to me after the modification, perhaps because the drop is quicker but it takes the same length of time for mechanism stuff to catch up with you.

It's nice but I felt like there wasn't a lot?
Definitely noticeable on a revisit. Couple of hours in had me thinking that's everything done now, Karnan til my legs give in.
 

Coaster Hipster

Giga Poster
Really good report! It makes me hope I can really take part in GhosterForce this year. Karnan is really growing on me with the ongoing great reviews :) Oh and those fries look delicious :p
 

Mysterious Sue

Strata Poster
I was already pumped for Karnan and Novgorod but your photos make the whole park look gorgeous (especially that very green one of Midgard - so cute!).
Glad the two of you had a good time, despite the train faff.
 
Top