Tag: Flat Ride

A mine blowing Experience

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Fun Spot America Kissimmee

The entrance to the park is free of charge, only the attractions must be paid. There are several options available, including a great late-entry offer, which we used during our visit.

If you enter the park through the main entrance, you immediately find yourself in front of a large lagoon, which is home to the Skycoaster. Alongside you can find two of the park’s major coasters and a very solid selection of flat rides.

Kiddie Coaster

If you follow the paths to the left, you immediately stumble across a large selection of kiddie rides. The most notable one of these is the Kiddie Coaster by E&F Miler Industries. The small coaster features an oval layout with a helix in the middle. The final curve back to the station features a bunch of waves, which overall enhance the wacky feeling of the coaster.

Mine Blower

Right next to the Kiddie Coaster is the almighty Mine Blower by the Gravity Group. This small-scale wooden coaster blew everybody’s minds when announced. The ride which became Florida’s third operational wooden coaster is famous for its barrel roll inversion over the loading station.

After a very tight turn to the left, we immediately enter the ride’s lift hill. Once at the top, another equally tight turn follows. Without mercy we then race over the crest of the First Drop. Pressurised, we cross the valley before dashing through the ride’s main element. A tight left-hander then leads us through the support structure and into a bunch of airtime hills. After a strongly inclined right-hander, we then rush towards the other side where we enter the first high to the ground turn around followed by a reasonable high s-bend hill. We then race through the support structure and experience another series of airtime hills before hitting the brakes.

Mine Blower is a very fun wooden coaster. Although the ride isn’t a particularly large one, the airtime, the inversion and the overall pacing of the ride speaks for itself. It’s also quite interesting how much track the Gravity Group was able to fit into such a small footprint.

Galaxy Spin

Passing the Vortex and Chaos go-kart tracks, we now continue our way along the lagoon. Close to the entrance, we then encounter the park’s Spinning Coaster: Galaxy Spin. This ride was once located at the nearby theme park Cypress Gardens – nowadays, Legoland Florida – and is made by Zamperla. For a ride of its kind, it features a reasonable spin.

Hurricane

As the park is split into two areas, we now visit the adjacent Old Town leisure centre. Once we reach the end of the main street, we encounter another open area with several rides. Here, we find next to a Tilt-a-Whirl and a Paratrooper the roller coaster Hurricane by E&F Miler Industries. This is one of the manufacturer’s rare large scale roller coasters and hence worth a try!

Once we leave the station, we immediately climb the lift to a height of 52ft. After enjoying the view for a while, we plunge down a strangely inclined left-hand bend that shakes all the riders.  Back in lofty heights, we then enter a very tight hairpin turn. After the second drop, we rush through a right-hand curve close to the ground. Once we reach the other end of the ride, we climb a hill and once again enter a very tight hairpin turn. This is followed by a series of smaller drops, airtime hills and hairpin turns very similar to the second part of a classic wild mouse coaster.

The Hurricane is a very fun roller coaster. The ride is simply nuts. Especially the first two drops with their highly inclined valleys are an experience on its own. The rest of the layout is by far more harmless, yet still very fun.

Pictures Fun Spot America Kissimmee

Conclusion Fun Spot America Kissimmee

Kissimmee’s Fun Spot America is a very solid amusement park, which is a nice change to the picture-perfect theme parks by Universal and Disney. You don’t need to spend a lot of time (or money) to have a good time at the park.

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Fun Spot America Kissimmee

Home of the DrageKongen

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Since my initial visit at Djurs Sommerland, I always wanted to come back. Year after year, the park surprised everyone by its new additions, such as the overhaul of the children’s area featuring the family coaster Vilde Hønsejagt or the new themed area Wild Asia featuring Europe’s fastest and longest family suspended coaster DrageKongen and the large-scale Gyro Swing Tigeren.

Bondegårdsland

The kiddie area Bondegårdsland is home to a large selection of quality family rides, most of them by Zamperla and Zierer. The whole area has a very funny farm theme which neatly suits every ride. Vilde Hønsejagt for example features an impressive front car with a hungry fox and a very fearful hen. The ride itself is a Force Two coaster by Zierer offering a very smooth and fun ride for the whole family.

Wild Asia

The theme area Wild Asia is the makeover of the old area around the log flume Colorado River and the HUSS Topple Tower Ørnen. While the log flume got a new theme and with Long Cun Expedition a fitting new name, the rare HUSS ride sadly had to leave the park after just 13 seasons. It got replaced by Tigeren, a very wild swing ride by Intamin. Due to the open seating position, the fast acceleration and the overall very forceful ride, the ride is much more thrilling than most of the other swing rides out there.

Jungle Rally

Right next to the Long Cun Expedition, you can find the park’s newest roller coaster: Jungle Rally. The small Force Zero family coaster by Zierer features the classic Tivoli layout and hence offers a ton of fun to its riders.

DrageKongen

The mighty dragon king is a large-scale Family Suspended Coaster by Intamin. It dominates the Wild Asia themed area and offers an impressive layout containing a ton of close-to-the-ground curves and manoeuvres.  

The ride starts with a gentle tyre driven launch out of the station. After a short indoor section featuring two small hills and a right-hand helix, we reach the ride’s lift hill. On a height of 30m, we now drop down in a steep lefthander into a fog filled tunnel. A large, overbanked turn and a helix close to the ground complete the clef-like initialisation of the fast-paced ride. After a straight camelback, we now make our way towards the back of the station building in a close to the ground curve combination. Here, we take a small dip before crossing the building featuring two very impressive close call moments. Once again close to the ground, we then make our way over hill and dale, before taking a left hand turn leading into a tapered helix. Soon after, we hit the brakes.

DrageKongen is a fun roller coaster. After the gentle, but fun start to the ride, the dragon king surprises everyone by its fast-paced layout. Overall, DrageKongen is a harmonious yet thrilling ride for the whole family.     

Miscellaneous

To my surprise, the Tarzanland area next to the now demolished Jungle Safari boats ride also had to make place for the new Dinosaurland area coming in 2022. I just hope that a similar large-scale playground will find its way to the park soon.

The two flat rides Søulken and Drageskibet are also a great addition to the park’s portfolio. While Søulken is a modern Polyp ride by Gerstlauer, Drageskibet is the return of the classic Pirate boat swing by HUSS. It’s great to see Djurs Sommerland investing in such classic family rides!

Pictures Djurs Sommerland

Conclusion Bondegårdsland and Wild Asia 

I once again had a blast visiting Djurs Sommerland. The two themed areas Bondegårdsland and Wild Asia simply blew me away and I cannot wait until Dinosaurland is opening. I just hope to visit the park earlier next time.  

Djurs Sommerland

On Street Mission at Port Aventura Park

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A few years have passed since my last visit to Port Aventura Park. Apart from the two new attractions Angkor and Street Mission, nothing has greatly changed in the park since then, but a lot has changed in the resort. For example, the new Ferrari Land amusement park with Europe’s highest and fastest roller coaster was built right next door.

Anyone planning to travel to Salou by train in the near future should reconsider. Although the Salou – Port Aventura station still exists, it is only very rarely used. It is also the current terminus and is therefore only an alternative to the car for resort guests. I had planned to reach the park around noon, but thanks to numerous train cancellations it turned out to be much later. So I basically only had one evening and one afternoon to experience the park in all its fullness.

As you might expect in peak season, the park was extremely busy. Since I was still without the Express Pass on the first evening, I concentrated on some beloved classics, such as El Diablo – Tren de la Mina, before I headed to the Far West area. This area, like the Mediterrània area, had much longer opening hours, but here too the offer was very limited. Basically, until closure of the park, you could only ride the Stampida wooden roller coaster, the carousel, the break dance Crazy Barrels, the Rapid River Gran Canyon Rapids and the launch coaster Furios Baco.

While the crowds were still okay on the first evening, the second day of the visit took the cake. After my flying visit to the Ferrari Land theme park, I first went to an Express Pass sales point, only to find out that buying the €65 upgrade to Express Premium Gold was not really a good idea. Since the amusement park does not limit the upcharge offer, almost every visitor had the Express Pass, so that even with the pass, you still had to wait at least half an hour everywhere.

Angkor

Interestingly, during my visit, the Splash Battle Angkor had the longest waiting time in the entire park – even with the priority ticket, you easily had to wait 90 minutes here. The water ride is by no means exciting or remarkable in any way. The leisurely river ride is quite nicely presented, but the consistent use of static figures makes it not really interesting. Thanks to the limited number of boats, there were never any of the water battles for which this concept is actually known, which meant that the ride ended on a very dry note.   

Street Mission

The nearby Street Mission dark ride was also new to me. Set in the Sesame Street universe, we go with Detective Grover in search of the world’s biggest cookie, which went missing shortly before the Cookie Day Parade. Now the search for clues takes us through all the well-known Sesame Street locations. In the process, you meet familiar figures, as well as some that might be unfamiliar to me. The successful mix of screen sequences and three-dimensional scenes creates an astonishingly high level of immersion, which I had not expected. Coupled with the long ride time, it’s quite enjoyable and encourages repeat journeys. Well done, Sally!

Pictures Port Aventura Park

Conclusion Port Aventura Park

Port Aventura Park could not really convince during my last visit. Limited opening hours and a greatly reduced capacity in all rides despite the very large crowd in the park do not cast a good light on the park. While elsewhere in the country the parks were back to pre-crisis levels, at Port Aventura the Corona-related cost-cutting measures were particularly noticeable. This in turn meant that even the priority queues reached extreme lengths. This is a pity and therefore I have no other choice but to advise against a visit during the high season in August for the time being.

 

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Port Aventura