Heading back towards our base in the Gold Coast it was time to stop off at Dreamworld. This park is about 10 minutes away from the Movie park and Wet & Wild and it's this one that's home to one of the tallest coasters in the world; Tower of Terror.
Like Green Lantern at the movie park, it's the new coaster that has been put at the front of the park. This is Buzzsaw, a Maurer Skyloop coaster. I liked the wood plant theming on the station.
Like Movieworld the park was pristeen, this one however wasn't as busy. We'd bought a queue jumping pass in advance just in case but with so few people the park kindly offered to refund it.
First up then Buzzsaw and I've ridden just one of the half dozen or so in existence and that was just last year in Germany. This is the second one then and it was running a kinder program with just lap rather than the 2 I'd had before. Later on in the day I noticed that they were mixing the programs up, some were getting the 2 laps and others were getting just the 1. That seemed a bit odd, almost as odd as the feeling of being held upside with nothing more than a wide lap bar. Good ride that I enjoyed even if other people didn't (they're not fans of the hangtime :D )
Well having been on the run for so long I stumbled into this park not realising a warrant was out for my arrest. Fortunately Mad Mal was able to pay the ransom and be on his merry way.
There are a number of rides in the Gold Rush western town including the superb drop tower, which at just under 400ft high is currently the tallest in the world. It's about to lose it's record to one in California, but I'll hopefully be riding that in the Summer. The flume and rapids both looked really good and just behind the Rapids, although not accessible is the former Australian Big Brother house, which admittedly is of no use to anyone.
The next rollercoaster was the tyre launched bike coaster named after Mick Doohan, who I'm assuming is a famous Australian bike rider. This was a little bit odd as although I've ridden similar before these featured a different launch system (tyre not LIM) and even more strangely a bike that you have to pull overyourself to get into. Being practiced in yoga is almost a pre-requisite to being able to board. Still we got in and the ride was a lot of fun.
Little tip for scarily close up photo opportunities go up the queue line and take the photos from there. You're not allowed cameras on the ride but if you don't go that far then you can't really be told off.
In the UK we're not allowed to feed the pigeons. Even the pest birds are cooler in Australia!
One section of the park had been closed pending a retheme to the Dreamworks movies.
This unfortunately meant that the childrens inverted coaster was closed to us. When it reopens it'll probably be called Kung Fu Coaster or something like that.
Next coaster of the day was the big one Tower of Terror 2. This is a launched coaster that shoots you to 100 mile an hour and up the drop tower. There are only 2 of these in the world, this one and the other in California. When I rode that years and years ago I was a little disappointed that it didn't make it to the top of tower, and this ride was the same. I guess it's just too expensive to run at full power. However this one is now a little bit different in that you're shot out of the station backwards and are face-down during the tower section. It's a really weird feeling travelling at speed in reverse but it works and I still enjoyed the ride despite not making it all the way up the tower.
So I'd done the top 10 tallest rollercoasters in the world at last, although I realise that in 2012 there are two new ones entering the list, one in Canada and one in Spain.
The swing ride Claw is very well themed. I especially like that one of the themed supports is going through a car. A very nice touch indeed.
Similarly the off-axis Top Spin is nicely themed to surfboards stuck in a beach. I don't know the real name of these rides and am sure someone will correct me.
Even the tied up shark seemed happy to be here!
No, you cannot sit on this bench. It's mine, all mine I tell you! Speaking of mines, this park has an indoor mine train coaster that has lain dormant for 5 years now an obviously wasn't running on our visit. I wonder if they're attempting to pass the Orphan Rocker's record?
The food court, usually the messiest bit of a park was immaculate too. I'm really liking this park indeed! It's just a shame it's so far away.
We'd seen big lizards on this trip but this one was the biggest yet.
Flow riders seem to be quite popular attractions and although the water park was next door it was still very popular here in the main park. I wonder why they chose to put it in here?
We were going to give this a go but heard that the Predator was in a foul mood today and playing for real, so we decided to give it a miss. Our insurance would cover us for spine removal for a start!
The final coaster of the day was an oversized corkscrew coaster called Cyclone that had a very weird layout. It's much taller than most corkscrews and features a high up lap where not much happens followed by a half cobra roll and loop to finish. Very bizarre indeed. Even more weirder we subsequently found out that this coaster used to reside at Luna Park Sydney where it must have stuck out like a sore thumb. They definitely made the right choice in getting rid of it. When riding this be prepared to walk up lengthy spiral ramps to get to it. The station is high up.
A very nice pun to leave us with.
Dreamworld is a nice park indeed. It's a big park and has rules but they're not so arsey about it than Movie Park, down the road was, at least they don't seem to be using rules to make money. They allow us to leave things in the station for example. Tower of Terror despite not being as high as it could be was still a good ride but be warned the restraints are tight on this one, and I also managed to rip my back getting out (not their fault, I couldn't see how it happened but I my t-shirt was blood-soaked for the remainder of the day)
No comments:
Post a Comment