Yorkshire Tripper III Trip Reports!

[Pierre]

the ride ops are back to the pointless practice of re-checking every restraint once the train arrives back in the station before releasing them

One comment that has always annoyed me. The guys have obviously been trained to do this process for a reason. Who are we to say its pointless??

To be honest it sounds like a typical 'off-peak' day at Flamingo Land. I find once the schools go back the park is very much in wind-down mode for a couple of months. I remember visiting with Slayed one Friday before a live and the ops were just laid on the top of Navigator sunbathing topless...

Anyway, look forward to the reports, sounded like a really fun day at Lightwater as always happens with CF. Raybould should have brought a uniform in his bag to wear on the new ride that would have been **** quality.

 

[MouseAT]

the ride ops are back to the pointless practice of re-checking every restraint once the train arrives back in the station before releasing them

One comment that has always annoyed me. The guys have obviously been trained to do this process for a reason. Who are we to say its pointless??

The fact that no other SLC team seems to do this? The fact that it's extremely inefficient and unnecessary? The fact that they never used to do it? The fact that it slows down operations on a one train ride where they don't even bother batching or using air gates any more?

I understand now why Jerry had such contempt for the place.

The weird thing is, in the morning, the ride ops weren't messing around with the re-checks. At the end of the day, it was a different team who were wasting time by doing them.

 

[Mushroom]

^^ Naaah =] I didn't even ride it yesterday. Its lame and just a +1 (which I got =p)

Here are my photos from the day:
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set= ... 759&type=1

 

[Manderr]

Andy, you missed off the all important part where the Kumali ops actually called us all a "bunch of f@@king geeks"...


Aside from that, I really enjoyed my first Live in two years, was so good to see everyone again. I'll post more later / tomorrow when my sleep deprivation has been recovered from.

 

[MouseAT]

Andy, you missed off the all important part where the Kumali ops actually called us all a "bunch of f@@king geeks"...

I didn't miss it off as such, I just didn't hear it myself, hence I only said that Kumali "apparently had extremely offensive ride-ops".

Ironically, I don't find the comment offensive, at least if applied to me. I'm a professional geek, and proud of it. What I find extremely offensive is that the park apparently considers this to be an acceptable attitude for their staff to have.

 

[T0M]

They have some right ####s working there. Some of the staff smoke in the ride booths. Management and team leaders (if applicable) have much to answer for.

Then on the other hand I once forgot to buy a Kumali ride DVD, e-mailed them and someone walked over to the booth, checked the system for the code I remembered from memory and came back to me with a description of the riders (to see if I was correct) and then said they would post it out to me if I wanted to make a card payment. That's pretty exceptional, so they have some good people there!

 

[Mysterious Sue]

The Kumali ops were ridiculous! So rude!
And the ride op on the Go-Gator called me a man :evil:

 

[furie]

And the ride op on the Go-Gator called me a man :evil:

So not as rude as he could have been then?

Loving the reports, they're so colourful and filled with pictures showing the energy and fun of the weekend... Or they're a link to a massive amount of photos I don't want to traipse through.

How about a selection of photos that sum things up a bit..?

 

[Mysterious Sue]

Sorry furie, I didn't take any photos this weekend as I've completely busted my phone.
(I have bought an exciting new camera, but haven't figured out how to work it yet).

I doubt many people will have taken pictures considering the threats of excessive rain and the promise of loss of camera and limb on T'ultimate!

 

[Dave]

How about a selection of photos that sum things up a bit..?

Getting around to that, downloading/uploading various pictures and videos etc.

 

[furie]

Sorry furie, I didn't take any photos this weekend as I've completely busted my phone.
(I have bought an exciting new camera, but haven't figured out how to work it yet).

I doubt many people will have taken pictures considering the threats of excessive rain and the promise of loss of camera and limb on T'ultimate!

At least one person took some

(I didn't mean you anyway, I'd already had a pop at you m'dear ).

 

[Mysterious Sue]

I suppose you've heard what happened to the 3D camera. It was pretty funny watching it unable to cope with T'utimate's forces. Sod water in my eyes - I was concerned about a 50mph GoPro suddenly obscuring my vision!

 

[furie]

I've not heard much so far...

 

[Mysterious Sue]

Basically, the gaffa tape failed on the first run, and the camera was swinging violently from side to side. It managed to stay attached though!!

 

[Nic]

^ I didn't think it was that dramatic? I thought it just pivoted round on the (firmly secured) mount, meaning we got a nice view looking out to one side of the train? I could be incredibly wrong though as I wasn't sat at the front on that run. I didn't think you sat near the front at all during the day?

 

[Mysterious Sue]

Yeah, I was second row from the front during that run! Maybe I exaggerated a bit, but we were all bracing in case we had to catch it lol!

 

[Nic]

Just for Phil, the one photo I took inside a park all weekend:

Good job Will wasn't there...

 

[MouseAT]

I suppose you've heard what happened to the 3D camera. It was pretty funny watching it unable to cope with T'utimate's forces.

That was quite amusing. I'd quite like to see the footage from that run (if it still exists) for the comedy value alone.

 

[Ian]

All of the photos I took on my compact camera were of rides, so they're pretty boring. They'll be coming to a park guide near you soon. The other photos I took I tweeted and I imagine you've seen them already.

I suppose you've heard what happened to the 3D camera. It was pretty funny watching it unable to cope with T'utimate's forces.

That was quite amusing. I'd quite like to see the footage from that run (if it still exists) for the comedy value alone.

If I get round to it, I may put a small clip up where it goes wrong, but there's no chance of uploading the whole thing...the file is massive. And btw, Andy, I'm sorry to hear that the fleece may be retired. Please bring it to the next Live and we can all take turns wearing it and then bury it in a sad ritual somewhere. RIP The Fleece

As for the Ultimate POVs. The good news is that the second attempt worked well. The 2D version looks great (as I'm sure peep will justify when he checks his camera). Despite it being mounted, it perfectly captures the rough charm of Ultimate. Mounted POVs can sometimes be too smooth and the ride loses character, but not on this one! The 3D one has finally been rendered (it took AGES on my crap PC) and is currently being uploaded to YouTube. It's a massive file and says it still has five hours left to upload. However, I won't release it until I'm happy it works properly and the 2D one is uploaded too (possibly tomorrow evening). Anyway, enough about POVs, I'm starting to bore myself.

Once I've caught up on the admin stuff, I'll do a high/lowlights report.

Big cheers to Nic for the organisation, Simon at LWV for the laughs and perks and everybody else for humouring me with the sports day, The Fab, Amazin' Flamingoland Quiz Thing and the general silliness.

 

[Nic]