Fun House

The Maus au Chocolat

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The Wintertraum event at Phantasialand

Winter openings are a wonderful opportunity to get to know familiar parks from a different point of view; discounts from annual ticket holders might help a bit. Since the number of amusement parks that are open at this time of year is limited, only a few destinations are available during the Christmas season. Phantasialand has been an integral part of the club of the few for many years now and was therefore our goal of desire, after all, we also had to ride the quite new dark ride Maus au Chocolat. Something which I was not able to do last year despite having won tickets in a Maus au Chocolat competition.

If you enter Phantasialand you will notice that most of the construction sites of the past are no more. Although the new Intamin Flume Ride of Chiapas will be built this year, this construction site does not fall into the catastrophic picture of last year. Without the many construction sites, Phantasialand is like a completely different park.

Hotel Tartüff

Since the last visit two more attractions were added, which also need to be tested and both are located in the Berlin theme area. First of all the great and crazy Hotel Tartüff. If you want to send your mind to relax, the hotel offers a great mixture of a crooked house and a fun house. Unfortunately, the highest slide has already been closed, the stairs are equipped with disadvantageous railings, and many things are rather repetitive. The special ideas of the house are all well implemented, however the special thing to offer a perfect experience is missing – Villa Fiasco in the Dutch amusement park Toverland has such an experience.

Maus au Chocolat

During the last visit only the façade of the Maus au Chocolat dark ride could be admired at the central square of the park. Now, you can also walk through the waiting queue, which is nicely decorated and offers a lot of room for very long queues. As soon as you have put on the 3D glasses and start to experience the three-dimensional world, you are ready to go. Past beautifully arranged scenes before and after the interactive mouse hunt in front of the screens, the ride slowly but surely runs through the entire building. The interactive part comes in a sufficient quality, but the shooting mechanism is annoying, which consistently excludes repeated rides, unless the right tactics were found. Nevertheless, the interactive dark ride Maus au Chocolat is not bad at all, but the ride duration is just way too long.

Interestingly all roller coasters could convince during this visit. The temple of the Nighthawk went as fast as a couple of years ago and wasn’t as slow as on the last visit, Winja’s Fear offered the well known fun with a very pronounced spin and Winja’s Force is able to do something. It should also be said that the ride on Winja’s Force was subject to the additional factor of a deeply terrified mother who shouted at her daughter all the time.

One Little Moment and Crazy Christmas

The entertainment of Phantasialand consists of four productions during the winter opening. Probably the worst show of all times was one of them. After shortening the show One Little Moment by a good 30 minutes, the spectacle, freed of any story and logic, is actually suitable for good fun. However, the fact that the singer actually couldn’t sing and only the main actor enriched the show with his brilliant voice and his generally nasty – albeit true – comments doesn’t make the show necessarily worth seeing, but this also applies to every other amusement park show.  The show Crazy Christmas in the Wintergarten theatre did not only shine with a lot of cheesiness, it also featured the bald head of a very faithful park fan painted with children’s make-up. The glitter head was our highlight and the vaudeville show was quite passable. The stage design known from the show Sieben also shone like a kebab stand at Christmas; nice and colourful.

Die magische Rose

The evening show Die magische Rose, offers a simple story in which an old, shabby looking lady tries to bring roses to the people and is treated very badly by the same people. Only a young woman is able to help and brings the light back to the people who have been driven into darkness. The costumes are looking very nice at first, but when the light is switched on they shine in a wonderful glow, which together with the fireworks creates a great atmosphere.

Conclusion Wintertraum

In winter, Phantasialand is a different world, which you should experience as an amusement park fan. The park performed very well during this visit, which is why I look forward to my next visit; after all, contrary to the general trend, a brand new log flume is being built, which will also break all available records at once.

 

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Phantasialand

Schützenfest Hannover (2012)

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After a few years of missing the aim of a large scale funfair, the Schützenfest Hannover is back in its former glory. With Berg & Tal, Olympia Looping, Kinzler’s Break Dance, Wildwasser, Flash and the new ride of Köhrmann, there is a lot of stuff to do for every enthusiast. I really enjoyed this years edition and was glad to spend a visit with my French guest parents.

 

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Lower Saxony

Great hours above the rooftops of Barcelona

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Parc d’Atraccions Tibidabo

On the Tibidabo – the local mountain of the city of Barcelona – beside a church and a television tower, there is the Parc d’Atraccions Tibidabo; one of the longest-running theme parks in Europe, which unfortunately is only an insider tip.

The ascent and descent on the Tibidabo are quite steep or even adventurous with the car, which is why it is worthwhile to climb the mountain with other means of transport, especially as these are deducted from the entrance fee and thus the possibility to have a closer look at the Catalan capital city is kept open.

Hurakan

If you enter the Parc d’Atraccions Tibidabo through the lower entrance, you will find yourself next to the beautiful HUSS Top Spin Hurakan, which offers a decent ride; unfortunately the water fountains were not used. If you look up you can see a Zierer wave swinger circling about you.

Tibidabo Express

Continuing straight ahead you will find yourself in front of the first roller coaster, a Zamperla Powered Coaster called Tibidabo Express. The ride is quite strange, as it features an atypical layout without any helices. The funny zigzag track combination provides a very special ride. The tunnel at the beginning of the coaster makes the ride a bit more fun. Also the staff tries to create as much atmosphere as they can.

Castell Mysterios

After leaving the ride, you will unfortunately find yourself further down the hill, but you can visit the Castell Mysterios, an old walk-through ghost house with plenty of fun house elements. Unfortunately, it is somewhat too dark in here, such that you don’t necessarily know where to step. Nevertheless, the ride is off but awesome, which is also underlined by its musical background and should therefore be visited.

Muntanya Russa

The next highlight and our goal of desire is located at the highest point of the lowest level of the Parc d’Atraccoins Tibidabo. After an almost exhausting mountain ascent, passing some children’s rides and a boat swing, we find ourselves in the oval-shaped waiting area that spirals upwards. After having been assigned a place, we can start our journey on the Muntanya Russa.

After having climbed the lift for a few meters, a fantastic first drop takes you into a wonderful right-left curve, which you can experience much more slowly at Phantasialand’s Temple of the Nighthawk. The following spiral is superb and a bit more powerful, whereas the upcoming straight is more for recreation and for the view down into the valley, however it introduces the grand finale. The roller coaster itself is, like all other Vekoma MK-900s, very good, but not as intense and fast as Efteling’s Vogel Rok roller coaster. The great location and layout can compensate for that.

La Mina d’Or

A few meters further down you find the log flume ride La Mina d’Or by Reverchon, which – in contrast to other flumes by this manufacturer – offers a great, but also quite odd, costum built layout. The staff deserves a lot of recognition, as they ask politely if it would be so okay before they put a stranger in your boat.

Avio and Talaia

The rest of the Parc d’Atraccions Tibidabo is located on building levels that can be reached either by stairs or elevators. Last possibility is supervised by staff, which also serves as the control between the actual park and the Skywalk named public area. The nostalgic rides are located up here, two of which are particularly interesting. First of all, there is Talaia; basically the prototype of all modern propeller rides with the only difference that this system rotates much slower and thus allows a wonderful view over the park and of course Barcelona and thereby releases much more adrenalin. The other main attraction at this level is the self-propelled airplane called Avio. Unfortunately, the queue on the day of the visit was far too long and therefore I decided not to take the ride.

Museo d’automats

One level below there is way too empty place of the former roller coaster Montaña Rusa, as well as the entrance to the Museo d’automats, which is definitely worth a visit. Here, you will find not only a detailed model of the park, but also some quite interesting devices from long forgotten times. A real treasure trove, especially for nostalgics.

Miramiralls

Another pearl of the Parc d’Atraccions Tibidabo is the mirror maze Miramiralls, where the term maze does not fit very well, as it is more of an exhibition – indeed a very good one. Nearly everything you can do with mirrors is brought up.

Magatzem

The monorail dark ride Magatzem takes you into the world of magicians and witches, which is beautifully but strangely designed. A squeaky voice explains the whole thing, however without knowledge of the Catalan language this doesn’t help. At the end of the trip a surprise awaits you, which from my point of view just caught the right person.

Krüeger Hotel

Another floor below you will find a bumper car, but also the infamous Krüeger Hotel, a maze with outstanding quality and really dedicated staff. After the whirstbands has been marked, it’s time to visit the hotel.

After you were welcomed in the hotel lobby in a very nice and above all surprisingly frightening way, you pass through some hotel scenes until the horror movies take over. The Krüeger in the name of the maze is quickly explained by the appearance of Freddy himself. There are several scenes that are very amusing, in fact everything is designed to a very high level. The actors do their best and they constantly run after you, which is especially frightening in the last part of the maze, considering there’ s a life-size Chucky standing up and chasing you.

The Krüeger Hotel was the first Maze I truly loved. The scenes are awesome, everything is well lit and the maze is full of surprises.

Besides other children’s attractions and a 4D cinema, the park doesn’t offer much more, nevertheless it left a very good impression on me. All rides are very well maintained and they look as good as new, which strangely caused the other fellow travellers some concern, as they had the accident of the Fabbri Air Diver in the back of their minds and often blamed the park for it.

Pictures Parc d’Atraccions Tibidabo

Conclusion Parc d’Atraccions Tibidabo

No other Spanish park had as much charm as the Parc d’Atraccions Tibidabo and no other park had such a nice staff as this park has. They also take care of the improvement suggestions of the customers – as long as they are meant seriously – and reply in a very personal email. I don’t know any other park taking so much care about it. The park will certainly see me again someday.

 

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Parc d'Atraccions Tibidabo