Part 6: Parc Astérix (July 2nd 2017)
After being part of the forum for 5 years, I was really excited to finally join a CoasterForce meeting! Experiencing a park with so many other goons feels truly special and I was looking forward to see the faces behind so many forum users.
I wanted to take some pictures and videos of Pégase in the morning. I managed to to that, but as you can see, the weather really made it tricky. The coaster looks nice even with the poo weather though.
The Temple de la Méduse, which contains the backwards trick element, is left with some very obvious unfinished theming. That's a little disappointing, especially since Parc Astérix can really do fine theming when they want.
Even though I arrived early at the park, taking all this footage meant I ended up late to the appointment of 10:15 am. The stress of not making it in time, the weather and being stuck at the entrance line with a bunch of noisy school people actually killed my mood for a while. Adding to that, the school pupils's adult accompanist would't let me though the security gates because I ended up in the middle of their group, despite there being clearly no sign of a specific "group" entrance thing and the school kids themselves line-jumping me. Very irritating and very French-y to do, but I managed to talk my way though anyway. Oh well...
I quickly ran towards the new Pégase area where we would meet only to find no one there yet :eek: Since it was 10:35, I was worrying that the group actually left me behind x)
Whilst I was alone, I took the opportunity to take some shots of the scenery. Some French jokes and context setting explaining for you guys! "Kiosque Journaux" means newspaper stand, and the Goudurix headline here is about the comic character that actually appeared before the namesake coaster, although the wink is obvious. Then you have the fake photo booth named "Pikasos", a pun on Pablo Picasso of course. I don't know how well-known Picasso is in Britain, but he lived in France for decades after fleeing the Spanish Civil War and is arguably among the more recognized artists here.
Le Cheval de Troie was moved a little to make way for the new Pégase Plaza. The old flat ride makes a nice complement to the 2017 coaster! It's a shame that Astérix doesn't add more thrill rides to their line-up, but the Park is likely to improve on that in the next years.
After a short wait, I met CFers at last! It was a cheerful moment despite the poor weather After some debate which included noticing that Goudurix already had an outrageous hour wait, we chose to start our credding adventure with la Trace du Hourra, which is themed around prehistoric cavemen.
It opened in 2001 as the tallest and longest Mack Bobsleigh and still holds the record to this day. Despite this, the ride felt fairly short to me and a bit uneventful except for the significant amount of vibrations and side-shuffle the trains goes through.
Understandably, ticking off all the credits was the priority so we headed next to SOS Numérobis, the local Zierer Tivoli which was relocated to the Egypt section to provide something the kids could ride while the older uns could enjoy the B&M Invert nearby. In the rush of things I did not take a picture (what a miss!) but here's a an on-ride POV instead. I hope you don't mind me chatting a bit with Sandman during a third of the ride!
Having recently ridden Black Mamba and The Monster, I was curious to see how would OzIris compare. My first ride, towards the back, was honestly underwhelming. It was mostly forceless and a little uneventful, even though the core layout is really good. The drop is nice and the elements order is fairly original for a B&M. I got another ride later which did the coaster more justice.
Say hello to the camera guys!
The group proceeded to cash in the Pass Rapidus on the park's flume ride, Menhir Express. It's among the more soaky flumes so I sat out to take some pictures of the park instead.
Kudos to all of those who also braved the not-so-warm weather and rode Le Grand Splatch (yes, the park spells it that way...) too!
Walked around meanwhile. The middle of the park is actually the quietest part. It has a kiddy zone as well as the Village Gaulois, which is an imitation of the Astérix village prominently featured in the comics.
Astérix's best buddy, Obélix was also there!
The Carousel is among the more uniquely themed. How often do you get to ride the derrière of a fat Gallic guy in an amusement park flat?
Joining back the group for the awaited ride on Pégase Express! I got to say Astérix put a fine effort with the station scenery. Lots of cool details including the fake train schedules board which contains a lot of jokes. Too bad the GP kept photobombing me when I tried to take a picture of it!
I actually waited this meeting to ride Pégase Express for my first time. It's a fun family coaster with some really good moments, but also some noticable flaws. The ride ops make a loud and cheerful countdown right before the launch out of the station, which is in fact pretty fun to hear and really adds to the excitement. The layout begins in medias res with the aforementioned launch along with a couple of turns before entering the first lift hill - which really slowed down the pace for me. I would have loved to have another launch to keep the momentum going, especially since there's not much theming around that lift. After that, the train goes through a series of mostly uneventful twisted hills and one little camelback which provided no airtime at all. Decent speed though.
Onto the second lift and then the infamous Temple that launches backwards. The medusahead animation is decent, yet I couldn't help but notice the metal sheets making up the ceiling of the building. That unfortunately was a big immersion-breaking shortcoming. Thankfully the launch out of there led to a backwards airtime hill, which despite the very slow speed seen off-ride, is actually decent fun! The rest of the layout kinda blurred to me, but it's a series of surprising fast twisted hills. The best part of the layout and one that makes me think Astérix + Gerstlauer could have produced an even better coaster if they dared to spice it up just a little more like on the final section. I still like Pégase Express though, and I think it's a successful addition to the park.
Le Vol d'Icare received a completely new track and... it doesn't show. The old/new Zierer still feels outdated and mundane except for the few jolts throughout the layout, including the turn after the first drop. I've known much worse and more uncomfortable "family" rides nevertheless.
I skipped Discobélix both because I'm not that fond of Disk-O rides and because I wanted to have more pictures of Tonnerre de Zeus. Turns out I wasn't able to get nice enough views of the woodie anyway, because it is mostly hidden in the woods. I should have known better about my home park
Tonnerre de Zeus was my first wooden coaster, and left a memorable impression when I discovered it as a kid back in the early 2000s. However it left me a sour taste on my last visit - I could only remember violent shaking, underwhelming pace and no airtime. This time it was noticably better as I went for the front row The drop is actually decently impressive even though I've been on much scarier woodies since (El Toro? Balder anyone?), and the following layout is particularly long and ridden with small humps, vintage laterals and banking and tons of headchoppers. It's not as intense as the modern RMC/Intamin coasters, but has a classic out-of-control appeal due to its significant shuffle. The vibrations did not get to the point it is unbearable however.
Because it isn't included in the Pass Rapidus, Goudurix ended up being the longest wait of our day. That's pretty hilarious actually! That queue time is in fact unusual, because one train was in maintenance. I never got over a 20-minute long line over the last decade. But heh, at least I got to talk Chinese knock-off SLCs and Spinning Wild Mice (Mouse?) with the (un)lucky few CFers who tried them during the queue!
And after what turned out to be a 50-minute wait in reality, I went aboard at the front. I guess you want to know my opinion of this legendary awful old Vekoma, so here it is: it is truly bad, but I think there's even worse coasters in the world. The headbanging is brutal in many places including any inversion minus the vertical loop, and the final helix provides some unpleasant laterals too. There was some distinct rattle at the bottom of the shallow first drop as well.
I think the layout is in essence very good. Unfortunately, it was implemented by Vekoma in the late eighties, when no-one in the world (except perhaps Schwarzkopf) actually designed a good multi-inverting steel coaster. It's like a rookie gymnast in his first year trying some fancy somersaults, the end result gets very nasty!
We uninamously decided it was needed to get back to a good and smooth coaster so OzIris was a natural destination. It was there that I had a chance encounter with Deanrell, who is the biggest coaster Youtuber in France! His commentary is more on the cringy, overacting style, but he's a really nice fellow and very knowledgeable about coasters too. I never met him before, however he gave me some good advice for this CF Live meeting and was happy to see him He posted a very insightful video comparing OzIris with nylon and polyurethane wheels:
Deanrell, with his partner AlpinaCoasters joined the group and we went inside the OzIris regular line together as we wanted to get front row. I ended up talking more with them rather than taking pictures and chatting with CFers which I feel a little guilty about I didn't want to be that guy who stays with his fellow Frenchmen but I guess the excitement to talk coasters with someone I follow on Youtube and just met was too much for me!
We then rode OzIris at the front together. To my surprise, Deanrell did not indulge in his usually over-the-top screaming, perhaps knowing my more understated style of on-ride recording and commentating. I have to say this front row ride was miles better! I really felt the graceful, floaty side of this Invert. It's a totally different take on the Inverted coaster type that B&M went for, and I have to say it works very well when you seat in the front seats.
After my morning ride I considered dropping OzIris below Batman: the Ride clones because it ran quite weak, but that later front ride did the complete opposite on me and I was tempted to rank it above The Monster considering how enjoyable that lap was. It shows how sometimes giving a second chance to a coaster is worth attempting.
So my current B&M Inverted ranking stays as follows:
1 - The Monster (Walygator)
2 - Black Mamba
3 - OzIris
4 - Batman: the Ride clones (SFGAdv + La Ronde)
We grabbed another ride on Trace du Hourra since the ride ops forgot to tick our single use fast passes the first time. Boy this Bobsled gets rattly in the afternoon! The entire lap was shaky like a drill. Not like I did not expect it, but I think that could have been a decent and fun family coaster if it wasn't for this notorious discomfort.
By this point it was already 6pm and I had to take my bus shuttle back to Paris. We said goodbyes at the end of the Mainstreet and I really appreciated the warm, cheerful atmosphere of my first CoasterForce meeting! The start of the day was a bit sketchy due to the rain, but the weather improved as the day went on and by late afternoon we enjoyed a regular warm sunny summer climate. Meeting many members of this forum made me really happy, and though I wish I could talk to some people a little more, it is a very good reason to meet them again