JoshC.
Strata Poster
We all know the story. Covid has made international travel near-difficult to impossible, depending on the country and time of year. So out of a need to get creds, a UK trip was in order.
It's funny, I've never actually done a UK cred run trip before. I've managed to do most of the major British parks, but one which hadn't been ticked off yet was Fantasy Island. It's never been high up on my list, mostly because I'm really not a fan of seaside resorts or parks in general. But you know, needs must. Padding the trip out a bit meant we also added in Wicksteed Park and Alton Towers either side of a trip to Skegness, which would include further trips to nearby places to pick up a few more creds on the cheap. So it's not much, but it's something I guess...
Day 1 - Wicksteed Park
Setting off around 8am from Surrey, we got to the park at 10am. We didn't know what to expect in terms of busyness or anything, and the website was very...uninformative. But of course, we needn't have worried - the park wasn't that busy, and we were able to pick up our wristbands easy peasy.
Like many, the first time - and main reason - I heard of Wicksteed was because of their old Waterchute attraction. Not knowing where exactly it was in the vast land of the park, we headed towards the in-sight Thrill Zone where, you guessed it, the park's more thrilling rides are. With the masses (if you can call it that) heading to the park's headline coaster, we went to the park's log flume, Rocky River Falls:
For a simple log flume, it was quite fun; couple of nice effects and a suitable level of wetness too.
Next up was the park's headline coaster, Dinosaur Valley:
Bog standard Pinfari which has been rethemed recently to include the dinosaur figure and boards. Surprisingly, it was running all 3 trains, which meant despite the earlier influx, it was walk on.
Profiling on the drops was a bit awful...felt like it has been designed with set squares. Made the ride pretty much not re-rideable.
With that done, we ticked off the park's dodgems (which had a strict no bumping rule which everyone was pushing the bounds of) and Ladybird Coaster (a small Zierer Tivoli). We then went to the park's new for 2021 ride, Galaxy Invaders:
It's a tacky-looking, spinning, swinging...thing from SBF. I don't like those sort of rides, so unsurprisingly I didn't like it. The setting was incredibly long, a good 3+ minutes, which didn't help either.
A quick ride on the Paratroopers and we set our sights towards the Waterchute. We found our way over to it, but sadly it was closed because of a plumbing problem. A bit more wandering, a quick trip on the car ride, we found our way to the park's old fashioned train ride. Was a very nice, long circuit which gives great views of the land around the park.
A quick bite to eat (cheesey chips, which was some decent fries with some unmelted, pre-grated cheesed unceremoniously bunged on top), and we headed over to the park's final coaster, Clown Coaster. But tragedy struck...
It was closed!
We were warned that the roller coasters may shut because of the weather when we picked up our wristbands, and because of the rain earlier, the track was classed as too wet. Other two creds had been fine, but this one was not.
With the weather dry and improving, we held out hope that things would be okay. We killed some time doing the indoor slides (featuring my first vertical drop slide, which was fun and slightly nerve-wracking in equal measures), the high ropes course and spending some time in the animal enclosures. Everything included in our wristband of course, but it was worrying to see the ticket prices of some of these attractions...especially the Meerkat enclosure, which one could walk through in 15 seconds. Obviously the pricing is there to push the wristbands, but still.
Polly wanted a cracker; I wanted a cred.
After we had killed this time, Clown Coaster was open and ready for us. One ride (and interaction with an incredibly enthusiastic staff member) later, we had all 3 creds ticked off!
But there was still a problem...that damn Waterchute! We trekked back to the other side of the park, and the mysterious plumbing problem had been fixed, and the ride was open!
Sadly it was hard to get a good angle of the ride
It was a fun little ride, made slightly more special by its age and history. Nice to have it under one's belt and all that.
This bought us to about 3pm, and that stretched out the day enough. As such, it was time to go and make our way to Peterborough, which was the rough halfway point between Wicksteed and Skegness.
So, final thoughts!
Wicksteed was a nice enough park and the location really is lovely and quaint. We stretched the day out much more than necessary, in part because we just wanted a calm day, and in part because there's not any other decent cred pick ups nearby (which don't require kids to get). The rides are bang average, but hey, it was a +3.
As for stuff related to Covid: there was hand sanitiser about, and mask wearing was recommended in all indoor places. Majority of people were pretty good with it.
After arriving in Peterborough, we still had some extra things planned. We found an indoor, UV lit golf course, which weirdly had 15 holes, and was a bit meh (and a little on the expensive side). More excitingly, we had an escape room booked at Escape Peterborough: The Cabin. It sounded like it was going to be a slightly dark / scary room, but it was fairly standard and had no horror element to it. Room itself had some good puzzles and looked pretty nice, but was let down by the fact it had no audio, creating a very dull and lifeless atmosphere.
In any case, we escaped with 6 minutes and 58 seconds, which was good...but in hindsight, probably should have got out with closer to 15 minutes left!
And so that bought an end to Day 1! Coming soon: Skegness, and parks filled with tat and rubbish...Yay?
It's funny, I've never actually done a UK cred run trip before. I've managed to do most of the major British parks, but one which hadn't been ticked off yet was Fantasy Island. It's never been high up on my list, mostly because I'm really not a fan of seaside resorts or parks in general. But you know, needs must. Padding the trip out a bit meant we also added in Wicksteed Park and Alton Towers either side of a trip to Skegness, which would include further trips to nearby places to pick up a few more creds on the cheap. So it's not much, but it's something I guess...
Day 1 - Wicksteed Park
Setting off around 8am from Surrey, we got to the park at 10am. We didn't know what to expect in terms of busyness or anything, and the website was very...uninformative. But of course, we needn't have worried - the park wasn't that busy, and we were able to pick up our wristbands easy peasy.
Like many, the first time - and main reason - I heard of Wicksteed was because of their old Waterchute attraction. Not knowing where exactly it was in the vast land of the park, we headed towards the in-sight Thrill Zone where, you guessed it, the park's more thrilling rides are. With the masses (if you can call it that) heading to the park's headline coaster, we went to the park's log flume, Rocky River Falls:
For a simple log flume, it was quite fun; couple of nice effects and a suitable level of wetness too.
Next up was the park's headline coaster, Dinosaur Valley:
Bog standard Pinfari which has been rethemed recently to include the dinosaur figure and boards. Surprisingly, it was running all 3 trains, which meant despite the earlier influx, it was walk on.
Profiling on the drops was a bit awful...felt like it has been designed with set squares. Made the ride pretty much not re-rideable.
With that done, we ticked off the park's dodgems (which had a strict no bumping rule which everyone was pushing the bounds of) and Ladybird Coaster (a small Zierer Tivoli). We then went to the park's new for 2021 ride, Galaxy Invaders:
It's a tacky-looking, spinning, swinging...thing from SBF. I don't like those sort of rides, so unsurprisingly I didn't like it. The setting was incredibly long, a good 3+ minutes, which didn't help either.
A quick ride on the Paratroopers and we set our sights towards the Waterchute. We found our way over to it, but sadly it was closed because of a plumbing problem. A bit more wandering, a quick trip on the car ride, we found our way to the park's old fashioned train ride. Was a very nice, long circuit which gives great views of the land around the park.
A quick bite to eat (cheesey chips, which was some decent fries with some unmelted, pre-grated cheesed unceremoniously bunged on top), and we headed over to the park's final coaster, Clown Coaster. But tragedy struck...
It was closed!
We were warned that the roller coasters may shut because of the weather when we picked up our wristbands, and because of the rain earlier, the track was classed as too wet. Other two creds had been fine, but this one was not.
With the weather dry and improving, we held out hope that things would be okay. We killed some time doing the indoor slides (featuring my first vertical drop slide, which was fun and slightly nerve-wracking in equal measures), the high ropes course and spending some time in the animal enclosures. Everything included in our wristband of course, but it was worrying to see the ticket prices of some of these attractions...especially the Meerkat enclosure, which one could walk through in 15 seconds. Obviously the pricing is there to push the wristbands, but still.
Polly wanted a cracker; I wanted a cred.
After we had killed this time, Clown Coaster was open and ready for us. One ride (and interaction with an incredibly enthusiastic staff member) later, we had all 3 creds ticked off!
But there was still a problem...that damn Waterchute! We trekked back to the other side of the park, and the mysterious plumbing problem had been fixed, and the ride was open!
Sadly it was hard to get a good angle of the ride
It was a fun little ride, made slightly more special by its age and history. Nice to have it under one's belt and all that.
This bought us to about 3pm, and that stretched out the day enough. As such, it was time to go and make our way to Peterborough, which was the rough halfway point between Wicksteed and Skegness.
So, final thoughts!
Wicksteed was a nice enough park and the location really is lovely and quaint. We stretched the day out much more than necessary, in part because we just wanted a calm day, and in part because there's not any other decent cred pick ups nearby (which don't require kids to get). The rides are bang average, but hey, it was a +3.
As for stuff related to Covid: there was hand sanitiser about, and mask wearing was recommended in all indoor places. Majority of people were pretty good with it.
After arriving in Peterborough, we still had some extra things planned. We found an indoor, UV lit golf course, which weirdly had 15 holes, and was a bit meh (and a little on the expensive side). More excitingly, we had an escape room booked at Escape Peterborough: The Cabin. It sounded like it was going to be a slightly dark / scary room, but it was fairly standard and had no horror element to it. Room itself had some good puzzles and looked pretty nice, but was let down by the fact it had no audio, creating a very dull and lifeless atmosphere.
In any case, we escaped with 6 minutes and 58 seconds, which was good...but in hindsight, probably should have got out with closer to 15 minutes left!
And so that bought an end to Day 1! Coming soon: Skegness, and parks filled with tat and rubbish...Yay?