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I notice that AlexB has also posted a visit, but I have not read it yet. Will be interesting to compare after. I got an Annual Pass for Xmas, but I wasn't planning on going back until another new attraction would open after SV and ST. But, a welcome gift regardless. It must be very different for someone who's not a Park enthusiast (ie on Forums or Social Media pages) going back the first time after 2016. For me, I've been here the whole time so I know what's changed (mostly) since I was last a passholder here (I instead had VRTP passes mainly because of DCR, but I digress). I arrived at 10:30 on Sunday and made sure to check out the skyline from the carpark with Buzzsaw gone. For me, I was still surprised that the top part of ToT's track is still there. I guess leaving it is easier than removing it (sounds familiar regarding our Parks...). I guess though unless you look for it you won't notice it. ST's MCBR looks a lot longer to the eye, but it does have to fit the whole train. The trains roll onto and along it pretty quickly anyway so it isn't that important, but it does stand out when looking at the skyline. The spike and loop, however, are much more eye catching. The entry staff were all very polite and helpful, with the one on my gate taking a moment to explain the Apple Wallet feature of the Annual Pass (I got it as a gift so didn't read the welcome email). Thinking back, Sky Voyager's building did not stick out like a sore thumb, although again I'm quite familiar with the changes over the last few years. It's possibly because of the lack of bright colours, despite the fancy architecture. The eye is still drawn to the Globe, Candy Shop and weenies of ST and GD. Naturally I went straight to Steel Taipan. The precinct was nicer than I was expecting. When the greenery grows in a bit more I think it'll do fine. I went to take a few pics and the gate to the former Buzzsaw was open. This area must not be getting any love from the grounds people. Could certainly do with a tidy-up. The old entry to the Buzzsaw gift show (behind the wood fence in the pics) just has a speaker and sound system on wheels plonked down in the doorway. Could do with another look at that area, DW, even if it's now blocked off by the old timey photos stall. Going by comments I've seen around, I thought that this view of the launch plant rooms was going to be a big detractor to the ride, but it really isn't. The view up from the carpark looks over the top of these, and unless you're going out of your way to be in this spot (down an obvious dead-end path), you'll never see these buildings as ST's launch and queue fence block the view of these buildings. Being a single rider, ST was a walk-on. With two trains running, standard queue barely had to wait 15 minutes to ride... and this was the first sunny day after many of bad weather. In school holidays. Hmm. Anyway, good for me. I posted about my rides on ST in the reviews thread. Very enjoyable ride. Staff are in the honeymoon phase with it and it's going great. Their enthusiasm helps make the ride experience great, even the one in the control booth / on the PA. I hung around in the ride area to watch a few cycles. Cool to feel the rumble under you when you're under the first hill when the 3rd launch makes it over. Nobody was in the Tail Whip seats that I saw for 3-4 cycles. I then moved over to Sky Voyager. Having never experienced the original videos, I can only comment on the current ones. The short one in the main queue room with the luggage was fine, and the advertising that has the changing colours certainly works in getting your attention away from your phone. Whoever came up with it, kudos. The indigenous welcome video is a nice idea, however it does need subtitles. The main ride info video isn't too long, which is good. Funny enough, too. Reminds me of some of the classic Virgin Australia / Air NZ safety videos. My first ride was upstairs centre, as sorted by the rideop. The ride appeared to be run by only 3 staff - one upstairs, one downstairs, and one operator. Ride Cycles felt slow, I wondered how much faster it was in earlier days with more staff on the load/unload part, especially if people weren't filling the middle seats. I really enjoyed it, having long forgotten about the mentions here of water spray and smells, they were a nice addition and compliment the video. Surprised that DW itself doesn't make an appearance, but I think that's been spoken about here before? I exited the ride and made my way over the the train station to check out Baldwin. On the way, the barbershop quartet were singing happy birthday to a woman in a wheelchair. They really made her smile, which was nice. I missed them over the years. Goldie less so (for me, YMMV), but he always had a crowd. Next I made my way along the path towards Giant Drop, past some kids throwing rocks around under ST's Twister Horseshoe section (really, DW - grey walls and rock gardens?), and up onto spaghetti junction. Now that the train no longer comes this way, nature is healing... This area offers a good view of the ride, no wonder the construction thread posts and social media channels had photos from here a lot. My plan was to ride the oldies on another visit, and I wanted to get rides of ST/SV this visit, and get a feel for the park. I wandered down the ramps instead of the stairs, and found the RHLR area in this state: ...certainly not the most scenic part of this theme park. Oof. Also, I wonder what's living in that hole? The new owner of this part of the park that's been sold off? j/k DW need to either hide this are better, plant new trees like they've done closer to Corroboree, or put in a new attraction quickly. Otherwise, this area of the park is a major detraction. Rocky Hollow Train Station must go. As should spaghetti junction. The GD queue could easily be re-done on the western side of the ride. Corroboree was pretty much as it was all those years ago. The nocturnal animal exhibit was always a favourite of mine on a warmer day, and I'm a bit disappointed that it's closed. If it's a health concern I will understand, but if it's because they have chosen to discontinue it, I'll be disappointed to learn that. Without many international tourists this part of the park is very quiet. The Koala photos area had nobody there apart from staff, who were happy to chat with the occasional guest who wandered in. Corroboree feels a little overgrown at the moment, but I guess it does need shade for animals and guests. The Cassowary area is always nice to walk though, and its obvious rainforest setting offers a respite from the sun. The area from the barnyard animals, past the Billabong Train Stop and the Restaurant itself, is a dead part of the park (apart from the many turtles that want to come say hi if you get anywhere near the railing). I didn't know that Big Red Car had closed. It certainly needs replacing if so. I know that the ABC Kids area is very important to families visiting the park, but I'm of the vintage that fondly remembers old Rivertown. Tiger Island's bamboo-walled walkway under the train line tries to hide the ToT building looming behind it, but without luck. That should come down. Broken record time - I guess leaving it there is cheaper than removing it. Pulling it down would open up some much needed room for a Dreamworks expansion down the line. This said, I guess the path to Tiger Island already has mushroom to grow. Ahem. Kittys being kittys in hot weather, were doing all they could to keep cool. I made my way over towards the Gold Coaster, as this part of the Park always used to feel unsettled to me. The area that had trolls / Kevil / Flowrider / WW internal entry - and Google Maps show Thunderbolt's station still there? I think it needs opening up completely, maybe a dark ride could replace all of this area? This said, workshops still operate in the old Thunderbolt footprint. Speaking of... What is this blue vehicle? Is it a diesel tug for Perry/Baldwin? Shockwave feels like it's hidden away now, I'm not sure what has changed in that area since I was last a pass holder. Also strange to be in Ocean Parade and not hear wipeout. Um, nice seating area? By this stage it was getting very warm and humid - and the apparent respites were the magic show (which doesn't interest me) or Sky Voyager. So I joined the 30 minute queue in the luggage room. Guess that's a good thing about less staff on the ride - you get to cool down while waiting. I managed to make it onto centre lower level this time, and the ride was much better. Upstairs the top of the screen is much more noticeable. Something I did on this ride was to look at the gondolas alongside ours - the view is pretty cool. I then rode Steel Taipan in row 10 on the non-Tailwhip train (incredible!), and had to wait a bit for to decide if I wanted another go so soon. Hmm - maybe I'm not the coaster head I used to be, or maybe that row really packs a (good) punch? At least there were riders doing Tailwhip at this part of the day. Sat down for a B1 at the Ice Cream shop to decide if I wanted to re-ride ST. Considering how filling they are, the answer was certainly 'no'. By this stage it was almost 4pm, and I had planned to try and beat the weekend traffic returning to Brisbane. Turns out that there was no weekend traffic returning to Brisbane. Ahh, school holidays. I found myself thinking on two occasions (when at ex-Rocky Hollow and when near Billabong) that DW should select people at random and tag along with them with a clipboard (tablet) to get a guest's perspective. Do any parks do that around the world? Anyway, if you want to ask a question of someone who hasn't been since before that thing in 2016, fire away.

The thing is, couldn't something like the putt putt go in any reasonably sized retail tenancy? Could even go across a few floors. Plenty to pick from in Surfers. Like the current site has the shed taking up a tiny bit of space and is otherwise gravel. It's not even an efficient use of the land. Clearly apartments are a better use of the site. They could have even put mini golf in the new development in one of the tenancies if they really wanted to.

The crane is there to help lift the huge amounts of public pressure to open by Easter.

I know there's a few threads around touching various topics here, but I didn't feel like posting snippets to half a dozen different threads so here's a trip report. Took my wife and 5 year old to Dreamworld on the weekend to catch the fireworks, Cosentino and get a ride on Taipan. We arrived after lunch, as due to the park's late operating schedule, we didn't feel rushed to get there early. It was overcast and drizzling from time to time, which kept a lot of the crowds away, but fined up in time to catch the fireworks at the end of the night. We started out heading for MDMC - Master Five is bold enough now to try riding sidecar, so we gave it a go. We noticed the ride operator was spieling quite often that the MDMC harnesses are 'quite restrictive' - something i've never noticed before - and after half an hour in queue, I couldn't get the harness down far enough - something i've never had issue with before - despite previously having had issues with Claw and GIant Drop - MDMC has never been an issue for me. The operator's offered no more than an apology - and while I didn't expect anything else - We've previously experienced operators at Village not only recommending alternate rides, but also calling ahead to the ride allowing us to use fast track entrances and not have to wait again - so while as I said - I didn't expect anything, because of our prior experiences with Village this felt like a bit of a negative. We then headed up to catch the Cosentino show. It was the first time i've seen him perform anywhere, and after experiencing Millennium Magic several hundred times, and being a big fan of magic and illusions both on TV and on stage, I must admit my expectations were high (although tempered by the fact that it was a temporary, not resident show). Honestly, I shouldn't have bothered. The cattle pens they've put together to hold people waiting for the show are entirely out of place. I found myself wishing for the fluoro green tape of movie world compared to these. Once inside, seating was crammed together. There was no effort made to even appear to be socially distancing the crowd, or to wear masks, although someone at the door was confirming people had 'checked in' to the venue using the QLD covid safe app. The venue was packed out. Folks were standing in the aisles, and instead of perhaps a PA announcer or pre-recorded announcement about keeping aisles clear, staying seated etc like any other theme park show in the world, a supervisor with a walkie talkie walked along the back row literally BELLOWING at everyone still standing that they needed to sit down immediately. (Sidenote - for show venues, Ushers\Hosts should have earpieces so the loud walkie talkie noises don't distract from the show.) As for the show itself - honestly, there was no pacing. Cosentino doesn't really have the stage presence to keep my attention and after the first act I was ready to leave. I did stay, thinking perhaps it was a one-off but nothing changed my opinion the rest of the show. Very disjointed, the transitions just didn't flow. There were times he just stood silent on stage, and based on the fact he cracked a joke immediately afterwards, the impression I got is he was stopping to think of something to say. The stage had two giant screens, which I thought might be used for close-up video shots of the illusion for the benefit of the crowds seated towards the rear (especially since the seating was not elevated, and my 5 year old had to basically stand on his chair to see anything) but alas, the screens were mostly used to put static colourful imagery on display similar to the stage lighting, save for the final act where it was used to play a video to introduce the illusion and attempt to make people think it was a really super dangerous stunt. For me - if you have to resort to a pre-recorded intro piece to present your headline illusion instead of doing it on stage and in person, give up. Safe to say I was not a fan of the Cosentino show. This wasn't helped by the fact that post-show, he and his entourage headed out into the park going on the rides. Now sure, VIPs get the treatment, and its one of the perks of being a 'celebrity' and every park the world over does it - but this guy had about 12 people doing the rounds with him, and they were being front-lined on every attraction - including attractions he wasn't even riding on. I absolutely acknowledge the park's right to do this for a VIP and it likely is just a case of sour grapes and having a sook, but thats my feelings on it and i'm just expressing them - it isn't really much different to Ride Express in a way, so... *shrug*... maybe we just lucked out following the same route his entourage did. It rained a fair bit between about 3-5. We got a few kids rides in and wandered the park, stopped at the tigers and everything was fairly pleasant. I saw a staff member - pretty clearly and executive \ supervisor walking the park stop and pick up a fair bit of trash around tiger island, and it occurred to me that it was a fairly rare thing to see, in my experience, so Kudos to them for leading from the front. Taipan went down for a short while - not sure if it was just the rain or whether they were having other problems, and they did have a maintenance guy on station with a ladder, but i don't know. I finally got to ride it later on, getting somewhere around the middle of the train. The harness system was interesting - needing the RFID tag to confirm the seatbelt insert was new to me, but despite the seat being practically the same as Rivals, it was a far more comfortable harness fit. Operations were efficient, but not with any particular urgency - I did notice and enjoy the fact that the load gates seemed to be opened earlier while folks were still unloading, and for me this small efficiency sped things up for the cycle time which I appreciated. I've never done a blue fire clone. The first launch was calm, the reverse launch was quite something to make you sit up and take notice and the final launch topped it off nicely. The ride experience was enjoyable, but didn't feel 'balls to the wall stupidly intense' like on Rivals. the first half was just "fun" with the second half increasing the intensity with the last roll before the brake run hitting the peak thrills right at the end. I honestly would have loved to have seen about another 50% more circuit after that final roll, but for what it is, it was a really nice, fun ride, that doesn't require you to take a few moments at the end to concentrate on trying to breathe again and i'd give it a solid 7/10 every day. I did another two cycles that afternoon - both spinning, first with a friend and second by myself. With a friend, the spinning seat is an upgrade (as you'd expect) and elevates a fun moderate thrill into a fun high thrill. Definitely have a weight difference between riders to experience this the best though as I watched another group of riders who were all fairly evenly matched not get much spin at all as they were too close to evenly weighted. I'd give spinning with a friend a solid 9/10 Going solo however, that is the real experience. Solo spin hands down is for me the most insane thrill on the coast. Compared to my first spinner, the mid-course platform was chalk and cheese - a couple of slow rotations as the train passed over it versus Zipper-Ride-level intense spins and the amount of spin you get through some elements was just crazy. I'd put solo-spin in my top 5, but I don't think it tops the likes of Tatsu or X2, and my favourite all time is still gonna be Space Mountain - but i'll give it a 9+/10. We didn't do much else because of the weather. Tried the fried chicken pieces at kenny's (had wanted the schnitzel, but stupidly the menu confused us and we ended up with pieces) and they weren't bad. Not KFC flavour, but definitely less greasy. Red Rooster does fried chicken now and i'd rate it above their efforts, so somewhere between RR and KFC isn't a bad place to be. We didn't finish the serving, which was generous, but I would have liked something fresh - like the coleslaw that comes with the schnitty - to be on the plate with the pieces just to help cut the grease a bit. Service was fast and blessedly clear of the flies that always plagued the pizzas. Beer was cold and wet and that's a good start. We hung around for the fireworks. Taking the opportunity just before 7 I joined the Taipan line while we waited. The crew started spieling at about 7:10 that the ride must be shut down by 7:30 for fireworks safety, which is understandable if you're in the fallout zone, but considering the exit ramp for the ride is the closest to the exclusion zone and people were standing there to watch the show, I feel like they could have done this better to permit rides to continue to operate like other parks i've seen do. (Giant Drop during the fireworks would have been lit.) Putting that aside, If it wasn't possible to operate during the show, I feel like there could have been a better system to manage the queue (or the queue should have been clearly signposted as closing at 7pm, and a staff member posted at the entrance to enforce this) - Had they done so, they would have cleared their queues with time to spare and not had to disappoint a load of folks who had entered the queue more than 30 minutes before 'closing time'. Most parks i've been to keep rides running until the queues are cleared. Even if they couldn't run during the fireworks, it would have been good guest relations to guarantee everyone in the queue a ride, and run it a few times post-fireworks to clear it out. For a lot of people there, including someone I saw who had a Tailwhip wristband sold to them who was unable to use it (and based on the shop being closed post-fireworks, i'm not sure if they were able to get it refunded), it was a poor ending to a wet but otherwise enjoyable afternoon. It possibly might have contributed in some small way to reducing the congestion at the carpark as the entire park emptied out in one go. I thought the fireworks were a nice touch. Little dude got to see his first big fireworks display in the flesh and loved it. The old-school dreamworld Jingle was an awesome touch and the accompanying music plussed the show instead of just 'boom, bang, ooh ahh'. I'd love to see the park do this more often, but with better thought put into how they manage rides and queues, exclusion zones and the like. We didn't do a lot - as I said at the start, mainly it was for fireworks, cosentino and taipan, and I feel overall like we had a good day. Room for improvement, certainly, but it was a much nicer experience than on my last visit more than a year ago. We bought the experienceOZ passes when they were on special a while back, and while we're glad we bought them, and enjoyed our day, we probably - even in retrospect - wouldn't have paid full price for passes at this stage, but can definitely see the park's trajectory has reversed and things are looking up. I'm keen to see what they make of this in the next 12-18 months, and really hope they don't rest on their laurels.

I've re-read my last post. I dunno, seems aggressive.

Do you mean at Mermaid Beach on the GC Highway? It is a really good set up down there, but I wouldn’t say it’s superior in every way. It’s less themed, and it doesn’t have any indoor courses for extremely hot or rain effected days which is a massive plus for families

I feel like everyone has lost the plot a little bit. It's mini golf. Who cares? Like yeah these little family diversions are nice and all but 🤷🏻‍♂️ If you're that sad about it there's a course that's superior in every way down the road in Miami

Bang on got it in one mate. I know It wasn't directed at me, but I identify most with 2004'ish post-Claw dreamworld. Yes, it had lost some of it's early day 'sparkle' but for me that was peak DW (and i still remember the bus-stop 'adverts'...)

Hmm, I'll have to get back to you on that @Slick. Right now, what I think I might be fond of/identify with, is a combination of many years of memories from the late 90s through to the early 10s. Because I have a pair of rose-coloured glasses to look through, I can say "it was better". People who are only getting to experience DW for the first time now, might in the future say better (or worse). But, being a member of a forum such as this exposes you to a lot of negatives at the parks (or even just nit-picks) from other peoples' points of view, not your own. But, you bring them with you when you visit, and you may not have even noticed them had you not read about it beforehand. An example, the re-do of the Ice Cream Shop. Had I of not known that the renovations would change the building from this to this (last pic in that article), I'd really have not noticed due to the time gap between visits. Something I'll add to my visit report - I was surprised that the "garden" near RHLR, on the way to Corroboree, was fenced off. I thought it was accessible, and to me would have served as a nice place to pause to remember those lost (or affected by the accident) back in 2016.

Agree solo spinning Taipan. Assuming you are a larger build as well due to your harness issues on other rides.... But that solo back seat on Taipan.... Amazzzzzinnnggggggg

They should probably also look at getting a family log ride attraction

If only they’d also included a worldwide pandemic into their plans…. sometimes you just gotta roll with the punches.. I’d also give them a little more credit than classifying Leviathan as being “half-complete”

Just tacky.