Tag: England

Racing on the Minifigure Speedway

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Legoland Windsor

I haven‘t been to Legoland Windsor in ages. During the time since my last visit, quite a few attractions opened within the park – most of them unique to this Legoland park.

Lego Ninjago World

Lego Ninjago The Ride

Lego Ninjago The Ride is the first interactive themed ride where passengers use only their hands to aim. The ride system uses a series of sensors to detect the movements of the hands. Depending on the height of the hands and the angle to the sensor, the hand movement is interpreted and a coloured dot appears on the screen so that you know where you are currently aiming. The whole process is not very intuitive and so confused hand-waving is actually a good way to score a lot of points. You can refine your movements on the many screens you pass. All in all, Lego Ninjago The Ride is a very solid and fun attraction.

Lego Mythica

Since the second Lego movie was unfortunately a flop, the Merlin Entertainments Group decided to create the Lego Mythica brand for Legoland Windsor instead of a themed area based on the film. The Lego Mythica themed area includes the Flying Theater Flight of the Sky Lion, the two very fun family freefall towers Fire & Ice Freefall, and the redesigned Jet Ski attraction Hyda’s Challenge.

Flight of the Sky Lion

In true Lego style, the Flight of the Sky Lion takes you on a colourful adventure through the different realms of Lego Mythica. There is a lot going on during the wild ride, especially as every creature wants to start a fight with you. The ride itself looks good, has some accelerating movements and tells an easy-to-digest story – but that’s about it. If the queue is short, a ride on Flight of the Sky Lion is an easy recommendation.

Lego City

Lego City: Deep Sea Adventure

The Lego City: Deep Sea Adventure dark ride combines two of Merlin Entertainment’s core brands: Lego and Sealife. The ride through the aquarium is therefore quite impressive and a cool way to watch the goings-on in the large water basin around you.

Haunted House Monster Party

While Legoland Billund surprised everyone by creating a scare attraction with a cluster of small drop towers, Legoland Windsor took a more family-friendly approach by inviting everyone to the Monster Party. Here, guests enter a large room that turns upside down. Of course, this is only an optical illusion, as the ride itself only tilts back and forth by about 30°.

The Haunted House Monster Party is a nice addition to Legoland Windsor and a unique Mad House with a very cool vibe. Hopefully we will see this attraction at other Legoland locations in the future.

Duplo Valley

Duplo Dino Coaster

The Duplo Dino Coaster is the smallest roller coaster at Legoland. It has an oval layout with gentle drops and turns. The ride itself is fun and a great way to start your rollercoaster career as a toddler.

Bricktopia

Minifigure Speedway

High above Duplo Valley is the large family roller coaster Minifigure Speedway. The ride features two dueling tracks, each offering a forward and backward ride. Both tracks consist of a series of tight-radius turns with a gentle hill in between. Although the ride itself is very family friendly, the new Zierer coaster still packs a punch, especially during the backwards ride.

The Minifigure Speedway is a great addition to Legoland Windsor and a very special first for roller coaster manufacturer Zierer. It would be great to see similar rides at other Legoland locations around the world.

Pictures Legoland Windsor

Conclusion Legoland Windsor

It is good to see that Merlin Entertainments is still investing in some of its parks. Although the presentation of the rides could be a little better – the Legoland Speedway and the Haunted House Monster Party in particular look a little uninspired and drab – the additions over the last 10 years add a lot to the line-up of this popular theme park. It will be interesting to see what the future holds, especially as a large plot of land, once occupied by the Vikings River Splash rapids ride, is set to become available soon.

 

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Legoland Windsor

An Icon of the Pleasure Beach

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My last visit to the Pleasure Beach was in 2016, so I was very excited to finally ride the park’s newest addition, the Mack Rides roller coaster Icon. For the 2022 season, the last car of one of the trains was replaced by a car offering a spinning pair of seats, thus creating the Ensō experience – a nice feature which comes with a heavy price tag.

The ride on Icon starts rather slowly as we are approaching the launch position. Starting from a standstill, we directly approach the lift hill support structure of the Big One roller coaster whilst racing over a huge camelback hill.  After a steep curve resembling an inclided loop tilted to the left, we make our way towards the courtyard of the Steeplechase roller coaster. After diving under the old horse ride coaster, we take some quick near ground direction changes, before we finally gain a bit of altitude and cross the track. Right above the visitors, we now take a well ballanced heartline roll – something you would not expect from a Mack Rides roller coaster. After making our way below the huge camelback hill, we dive down into a tunnel which leads directly into the second launch.

After being accelerated the second time, we gain up some height in a non-inverting Immelmann turn. This element rides itself rather odd, yet if gives you some views onto the park. A very funny right-hand bend follows, which leads into a very hill and dale section of the layout. After going up and down for quite a while, we now race over a weirdly banked speed bump, leading into a sequence of very short swifts to the right and to the left, where one of them unnecessarily crosses the Big Dipper roller coaster. After that, we are done and quickly approach the station. 

Icon has a very strong first act and a weaker second one. It’s funny that the ride is actually at its best, when the constrains due to the limited space were most severe. On the rather large plot of land where the second part of the roller coaster runs, the ride is quite repetitive. Especially the end of the ride is unfortunately not quite as successful. I would have liked to see a series of straight camelbacks here that would really knock your socks off, instead we swerve continuously from the right to the left and vice versa. Icon is therefore not my favourite ride at the Blackpool Pleasure Beach, nor comes anywhere close to the first double launch coaster the Pleasure Beach is offering since 1979. Anyhow, it is still a fun ride and a nice addtion to the fantastic rides at Blackpool Pleasure Beach.

Pictures Blackpool Pleasure Beach

 

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Blackpool Pleasure Beach

A visit to Botton’s Pleasure Beach

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The small amusement park Botton’s Pleasure Beach directly on the beach of Skegness offers a small selection of selected rides as well as the typical English mixture of amusement arcades, fast food and midway games.  

In addition to the typical English flat rides, the Pleasure Beach impresses with its two swings, Pirate and Freak Out, as well as four roller coasters. The smallest of these are called Big Apple and Runaway Train.

Big Apple and Runaway Train

The Big Apple family roller coaster has been in the park since 1987 and is a classic Big Apple from the Pinfari company, who designed the Italian long-running coaster in the 1970s with a pretty apple. The ride with its waves in the upper section and the rapid descent is still fun today, although adults are reluctant to squeeze into the cars.

The ride on the Runaway Train, on the other hand, is not quite as exciting. The ride, built by Meridian Ltd, was designed around its only ride element. After the ascent, the train makes a circuit of the station before the helical descent follows. As on the Big Apple, you pass through the layout several times.

Rockin Roller

The Rockin Roller is located on the roof of the Riverboat Arcade. The layout of the small spinning coaster from Fabbri offers a number of tight curves that send the cars into a leisurely spin. In between, the whole thing is loosened up a bit by smaller drops. The ultra-compact ride fits perfectly on the available floor space and is a flagship of the amusement park due to its exposed layout.

Queen Bee

The Queen Bee family roller coaster is also located on the roof of an arcade. The ride on the small suspended coaster is very similar to that of a Big Apple, except that there is no track crossing and instead of the small waves, there is a dip to the side. The ride, built by Pinfari, is a curiosity in itself and that alone makes it worth visiting Botton’s Pleasure Beach.

Pictures Botton’s Pleasure Beach

 

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Botton's Pleasure Beach