DaptoFunlandGuy

Ok so we were a bit stuffed after two days straight at parks, we took thursday off and decided after consulting the weather report to do Wet n Wild on friday. We packed off again at 9.20 to arrive at about 9.45. WnW's gate system is a little inadequate for the amount of guests they had on friday, and one can imagine during summer how much busier it would get. something could be done to improve this... So we headed off for the wave pool to grab some deckchairs and pick up our free tubes, courtesy of the 3 Park Superpass. then we realised that $6000 worth of camera equipment wasn't suited for the astroturf poolside, so we grabbed a locker. THIS is probably the best idea i've seen in a while.... $7 for a waterproof wristband that opens your locker.... no more lost keys! woo hoo! Ok so WNW is a waterpark... and its a hot day, so no-one's going to complain about a few queues right? yeah well i still would have liked to... Queue length on pretty much everything was just way too long. Calypso Beach and the Wavepool were pretty much the only things we could just get straight into. sorry but standing on a large tower in bathers freezing in the wind for a 20 second waterslide is just not my thing... we ended up on twister, riptide, and we rode mountain river and mountain falls once each... we caught a final ride on terror canyon II, just as they had shut down terror canyon 1 for some reason...and that about sums up wet n wild... good for a sun tan and that was about it... So how did Wet N Wild fare? Quality of Rides, Shows and Attractions: 8/10 Quantity of Rides, Shows and Attractions: 8/10 Cast Service: 6.5/10 Capacity and Staffing Levels: 4/10 Overall: 6.5/10 Comments: the park in itself is great. if you were the only person in the park and had free reign of all its attractions, i think it would be great... but it is not capable of handling a large crowd and allowing everyone to ride everything... i suppose for safety reasons, you can't really increase capacity or speed of operations on the slides, but it would have been nice if the queue lines were shorter. some staff did not meet the standards we had come to expect after SW and WBMW. not badly, just general blase' feelings we got from some of them, like they didnt really care and were only there for the paycheck... all in all we still enjoyed WnW, but it couldn't rate up there with SW and WBMW, and that is still taking into consideration that they are different parks. i enjoy water parks and water slides... but this just didnt do it for me, for capacity mainly... DreamWorld will follow tomorrow... and boy is it gunna be a long one... Cheers, Alex.

well i have to say, more than 90% of the staff i addressed by their name were happy and pleased. some even spoke about it, happy that somebody actually used their name and how nice it was to hear. Ian i can't say i saw you. the only photographer i saw was Des. i had to teach him how to use a disposable waterproof camera to take our photo at shark bay, and his finger came out across the lens...

ok so day three in QLD - September 15, we headed out to Movie World. We had picked up a smart pass, booked our coach and made our way to movie world by about 9:45. Got through the gates, organised ourselves and decided on heading into the Movie Magic show for the first show of the morning. I've seen the show many times but for the other three of our group, it was their first. My GF got picked to play the "Suicide Girl" climbing off the top of the WB building. The Foley stage got goofed up badly by the guys they picked, and soon after we were out and looking for more... it was time to head for Lethal Weapon. We cruised through china town and headed for the observation area. two of the guys decided it was a bit too much for them, and me and my GF headed into the queue. the queueing time was about 10 minutes, with 1 op in the front booth, one in the back, and one up front on the other side, 2 or 3 cycles before we got on the front row. only the red train was in use, the blue train was parked in the shed. Yet another amazing on-ride video from lethal, which i'll post shortly, while more handycam stuff from the ground, Lethal Weapon continues to live up to my expectations of a top thrill coaster. I try to single out one cast member when i visit a park to make special mention, and this time Lethal Weapon's operator - Seth - takes the grand prize. Seth sang, danced around, took out his microphone and ran up and down the opposite side of the queue line talking funny and making jokes. A man of a thousand voices, seth did some great impressions of many of the simpsons characters and many more. he made the wait time seem like seconds, and was very much into being part of the show. Seth gets top marks on service and going that extra mile. We headed off to Wild West Falls after lethal weapon which also had a very reasonable queue line. 10 Minutes later we were all loaded on and off on our adventure...lol. Once again another wonderful ride, some great theming and overall an experience that was reasonable enough for everyone to enjoy. Disappointing to see the lack of theming in the final lift hill. no sparks or anything like that, the top of the hill at the turntable has been themed to look like a cross roads in a mine tunnel. its just sheets of corrugated iron with a mirror that you face as you come up the hill. poor lighting and strobe effects are meant to give you the idea that it blows up after you've turned towards the drop. a very disappointing effort at retheming the ride. Next we took on Scooby Doo. The queue in here was about three rows back into the "ante room", with a posted approximate wait time of about 10 minutes. Sure enough, 12 minutes later we boarded the coaster, with our motion-sick companion JOINING US! *OMG*. Some of the theming in the first part of the ride is getting a little dusty and old, but with the theming it almost fits, and didnt detract from the ride experience. all of our group enjoyed scooby, and we rode a couple of times on scooby during the rest of the day. The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. we caught the Police Academy stunt show, the looney tunes river ride, part of the matrix stunt show and part of the batman stunt show, before riding on the batman adventure towards the end of the day. We also caught a second ride on Lethal, where a second video was taken from the rear of the train. Two disappointments were had at WBMW... the first was the Matrix Exhibit... yes its a walkthrough and yes it has a lot of work put into it, but the combination of lack of excitement from the staff, and... really... the boring nature of it all was a disappointment. Matrix gets two thumbs down... and this from a person who does like the matrix. the second was the crap we saw at all the parks.... FRUTINA. at WBMW, we queued for 15 minutes to get a cold drink, only to find that they all tasted like crap. the scariest thing of all was that all the parks had this glop for sale, and i fail to see how they could get repeat sales from it given its taste... YUK So how did Movie World fare? Quality of Rides, Shows and Attractions: 9/10 Quantity of Rides, Shows and Attractions: 8/10 Cast Service: 10/10 Capacity and Staffing Levels: 10/10 Overall: 9/10 Comments: we could not really fault movie world with anything although a few minor things cost them points. Its so hard to give so much detail in a park like this because theres so much to talk about. We had an encounter with Austin Powers while we were eating, and while its not the best costume, he did a great job of staying in character. Top marks for movie world.... our number 1 ranked park from our visit. More to come later on... stay tuned for WnW next... Cheers, Alex.

no rabid i can't say that i did... then again i have no idea what you look like, so... maybe i did?

So begins the first of my reports on our Gold Coast Experience: We were staying just of Tedder ave, so we caught a cab to Sea World on our first full day in QLD (14th). We arrived at the gates at about 10:15 and we found the front gates to be moving quite reasonably, and before long we were on our way with our newly acquired 3 park superpass (such a great idea). We strolled along the pathway (such a choke point) up past the seal show and made our way towards our first stop - Corkscrew. As mentioned previously, one of our guests suffers severe motion sickness, and for a laugh on our way up to corkscrew, we jumped on the carousel in Cartoon Beach. After cleaning our hands from the dirt and grime on the poles, we continued our way to corkscrew, stopping at the soon to be replaced seal exhibit. We then headed over to corkscrew, and decided to hop the pirate ship first, to allow our not-so-brave rider a chance to "build up" to corkscrew. No queue line, we jumped on and it wasn't long before our companion was turning green... so ends his ride experiences for today. Next onto corkscrew. a minimal queueline saw 3 of us board corkscrew only two cycles after joining the queue. Corkscrew was running 2 operators, so the wait wasn't long, while our fourth volunteered to videotape the ride from the ground. Today was my first chance to test out my new lens extension for my portable recorder. this was the first of the two videos I have on corkscrew, and is taken from the rear car. Next we headed off to Bermuda, where a reasonably lengthy queue line was moved through rapidly by a team of about 5 or 6 operators, and we were in pre-show within 10 minutes of joining the queue. We have more handycam video of Bermuda, with night-vision for the spots you can't see. (handycam shots may take a while to get online - i dont have a capture card). The theming seems to be getting a little dilapidated inside bermuda, and one does get bored of the same audio recording. perhaps a little redubbing or a slightly different variation of the story could lighten it up some? Straight after, we headed for viking's revenge, where a slightly longer queue line saw us on within 20 minutes thanks to 4 wonderfully nice ops. Sea World's cast cannot be faulted and an entirely enjoyable day was had by all. After Viking's, we grabbed some lunch, and then followed the "suggested itinerary", catching the seals, the dolphins, strolling by shark bay, polar bear shores, catching a cruise on the monorail, back on the skyway, and catching the final ski stunt show of the day. another old favourite, which is starting to become a little tired, and could use a little change in story line to freshen it up a little. So how did Sea World fare? Quality of Rides, Shows and Attractions: 7/10 Quantity of Rides, Shows and Attractions: 8/10 Cast Service: 9/10 Capacity and Staffing Levels: 10/10 Overall: 8.5/10 Comments: Cast throughout the park were wonderful in all our dealings, quite friendly. we made efforts to address them all by their first names where we could and they were very surprised and happy when we did so. next time you're in a place they wear name badges... try it... you'll be amazed. Capacity was perfect for our visit, with the right balance of staff everywhere we looked. sea world's only downfalling is that the theming they have done in the past (read: bermuda mostly) have not been kept up to standard and this cost them some... Its now 2am, ive spent 9.5 hours travelling since i left my hotel, and im off to bed. this is my first TR so i hope you found it interesting (make a comment, ill read it before i post the rest) look out for TR's on Movie World, Wet N Wild and DreamWorld tomorrow afternoon evening. Cheers, Alex.

Wait a minute... say that again... "Alex is right" lol its not often i hear that. im sure SW will look at another mechanical attraction in the near future... give it one or two years... we shall see. It will definitely have me back there again.

i agree with both sides of the argument (impossible?) The new seal enclosure will enrich the current experience already felt at Sea World. i also agree that the park could do with a new non-animal attraction. Look at what dreamworld is doing - it has tigers and the AWE to try and balance out its GA demographic. it is also trying to compete with Warner Village by offering an animal experience as well. Warner don't need to dump new rides into SW because that is why they have three parks. But anyway... yes, seaworld could benefit from a new ride. as discussed in another thread, where would it go? there is very little room left in the parks grounds to fit another ride, unless it were to weave in and out over the pathways etc. yes it works in other parks, but that isnt what seaworld is about. the only thing that really wanders over the pathways is the monorail, which is more for the views from the monorail than a lack of space thing. (i considered the skyway but it doesnt really go over the pathways much). Let them build a new seal enclosure. after swimming with the sharks today, I am very impressed with what SW is doing with their animal exhibits, and this is for the benefit of the keepers and the animals as well as the GP. a new thrill ride would draw crowds, but the crowds that it would draw would depend on the adrenalin rating of the ride, and the wishes of most of the people here would be a top thriller, which targets a very small market. one of the people i travelled up here with suffers severe motion sickness, and couldn't even handle the seaworld pirate ship. he still paid more than $200 in admission to visit all 4 parks during our stay. he enjoyed the animal shows at SW, the movie magic and stunt shows at WBMW, he enjoyed the wave pool and calypso beach at WnW, and the big brother house at dreamworld... thats it. no more.. not everyone is an adrenalin junkie. a top thriller is a great boast for the park that owns it, but its a very narrow market when you consider the demographic that the 4 parks are attempting to target... and that is 4 year olds to 94 year olds... and older if they're game... See y'all when i land in Sydney... Alex.

Ok - well now that we have recovered from Dreamworld, and we have also done a Shark Snorkel today (recommended - it was great) I have completed my notes on our trip. I will be typing up a full report on each park when i return to sydney (friday morning approx) however to summarise: Ranking: 1. Movie World - service was great, queues reasonable, and overall an entirely enjoyable experience - our group gave it a 8.5 out of 10 2. Sea World - as above, a fraction less in the service department, overall a wonderful experience... on BOTH days, an 8 out of 10 3. Wet n Wild - queues lengths were a bit long, but as it was the first day of school holidays it was to be expected. its been 10 years since my last visit so WnW has improved enormously, WnW scored a 6.9 out of 10 from our "panel" 4. DreamWorld in last place scored a dismal 5 out of 10. Backing up Richard's comments on capacity, we found the majority of Dreamworld's rides had too long a queue, and staff were hardly as friendly or helpful as those at Warner Village. Dreamworld would have scored a 4, however the addition of the Claw picked it up some. After my last visit, DW had high standards in my opinion, only to be let down with the addition of a large crowd (my last visit was on a weekday, with forecast for bad weather). Not only is their capacity shocking, but our group experienced more than TWELVE separate instances of QUEUE JUMPING, with one COUPLE eventually smuggling in over 10 people into the queue of Cyclone. The Claw is well worth the visit if you haven't been in a while, but it was disappointing given my previous experiences at the park. Look out for a full report on friday. Cheers! Alex.

Well after a completed week here at the Sunny Gold Coast we finally had our first sunshower, and other than that no rain in sight. We have so far covered the Warner Village Parks and DreamWorld is set for tomorrow... Thanks for all the updates on the Claw Richard, its been exciting to keep in touch and see the progress and tomorrow I will be there to see for myself. TR's will be posted on all the parks on our return to Sydney, and overall so far every park has more than an 8 out of 10. I have a few photos here and there but nothing too spectacular, however - I will be posting On-Ride Videos of a number of the big coasters when i return. A new innovation since I did Demon and Bush Beast, I have to offer a thanks to the guys at XDA www.myxda.com who were able to provide a lens extension, for safety, enabling me to carry my portable video recorder on a secured fastener around my waist, and film the ride using an optical cable attached to my wrist. no music, and plenty of loud noise on these videos, but still amazing to watch. The List So Far - Corkscrew Lethal Weapon Still to come - Tower of Terror Giant Drop Cyclone In Doubt - The Claw. Can't wait to get back to my broadband connection as dialup sucks! See you all when i get back, Alex.

So very sad to see what has become of beastie. the rust on the lift hill almost brought a tear to my eye. The train looks so rundown too. some of my first memories of Wonderland are on that ride. Out of curiosity, I recall when i was young that the lift hill track was sunk below the walkway on either side... kind of like how it is at the station but lower... when i was about 5 or so, i recall being able to reach over the side of the train and touch the wood... does anyone remember that? any other pics floating around we haven't seen yet Bus?

Paul i think thats a well established fact by now... http://www.parkz.com.au/forums/sh...p=4098#post4098 http://www.parkz.com.au/forums/sh...12555#post12555 From what i have gathered bus was a long-term operator with experience on most if not all of the attractions at Wonderland...

I have to say... that shot of ToT "160Km/h of blur" or something like that... is just awesome. the shutter speed on that (and your timing) is incredible...

Ok as we near my departure i have a few dates... if anyone would like to arrange to meet up at any of the big 4 parks... email me or send me a PM I will be at the Big 4 on the dates below... Seaworld - September 14 and 22 - Shark Snorkel on the 22nd Movie World - September 15 and 20 Wet N Wild - September 16 only Dreamworld - September 21 only - and RIDE THE CLAW!!!

or... take the 2 station idea, and chuck in a turntable as well... so you go out and back, move to the side, the other car goes out and back, and while they're up there, the car turntable turns the car backwards, waits for the other car to return and then launch backwards....?

ouch. damn that changes a few plans for my trip.... i spose i can get the same sorta thing at WnW and DW so i suppose its ok... lol... no swimming at SW now... that was released a while ago its a wonder nobody has picked up on it until now?

i think SDSS was a number of factors. the nets were getting old and needed constant maintenance, it was loosing popularity because they weren't packing HB like they were in the late 80's and early 90's. and after over 15 years of sliding i think the slides would have been getting a bit worn... i think there were a couple of minor injuries, i dont think anything too major, but apart from bam-bam's ball bash and the paddleboats, an operator could intervene in case of emergency. with those three rides, it was not possible for an operator to just e-stop and offer assistance... so i suppose it was probably a liability concern.

Kenny.... $63 per person for 150 people is almost $10,000. if we're talking four rides - thats average of $2500 per ride which isnt cheap considering those rides dont require high theme output (like bermuda that would be pumping out fire all the time for example) and it includes finger foods... for 150 people, finger foods would probably cost about $600. so DW is definitely expensive in comparison to sea world. the most expensive thing there is the dolphin cove show, and if you consider how many people are needed to run that show behind the scenes and on stage, plus the rubber duck boat operation, plus you are putting the dolphins into a show that isnt part of their routine as well.... to keep their disruption low, and not overfeed them as well, it would take a few days to adjust the animals diets and routines so as not to disrupt them... (my opinion only)

Joz - think Wonderland... they obviously couldn't afford to pay to renew it, or WB wanted too much. thats why Wonderland ditched lost HB and entered into Marvel's array...

Wonderbuzz.... are you Brendan the Audio guy? used to work in retail and koala photo spot?

ahh good to see some of those flats in their original positions in old HB. Judy's Jetliners i think was similar to captain caveman's clippers (galleons). See how many we can remember from wonderland AND their original names... im not going to count the beach.. Bush Beast, Snowy River Rampage, Ampol's Antique Autos, SkyRider, Ned Kelly's Getaway, Funnel Web Spider, HMS Endeavour, Tasmanian Devil, Dragons Flight, Bounty's Revenge, Jousting Ring, Wizard's Fury, The Demon, Space Probe 7, The Zodiac, Captain Caveman's Clippers, Dick Dastardly's Flying Circus, Fred Flintstone's Splashdown, Boo-Boo's Balloon Race, Scooby Doo's Silly Stix, Beastie, Bam-Bam's Ball Bash, Judy's Jetliners. There were also rides named for - Pebbles Flintstone, Dino Flintstone, Jabberjaw and a few others im sure, that i can't remember. I can't place a name for the Carousel, and what was later called baby-bumpers. Can anyone help with the rest? and if you're not sure what they were, any i've named i know, so you just have to ask... ok long one... im shuttin up now. >>>Edit>>> and also the paddleboats that i can't remember either...

"time to say goodbye to Tom and Jerry, and other Warner Bros. Characters" this is what is captioned under a picture on the "movie park" link belgian posted... i might be misreading the concept here, but - unless im mistaken, aren't Tom and Jerry both Hanna Barbera Characters and not Warner? just thought i'd ask...

to take Richard's point on "RCT style thinking" - what would be the ramifications of SW taking a coaster out over the lake inlet on the western side of the park? i mean right out over the fence? They have the jet ski hire at Nara and at the park, so they have rights to utilise the inlet for recreation, how hard would it be to get permission to whack a few supports out and over, say 10 15 metres out from the shoreline? Run the body of the coaster in over the jet ski hire and the little swamp area that they were storing a shark in until about a year ago, bring it over the stunt show lake and have launch area etc on the eastern side of the lake? and before anyone says a jetskiier would hit it the pylons in the inlet... it would obviously be well indicated protected. just curious...

I have to ask on a completely unrelated note Dj, whats wrong with Staging Connections?????

Ill agree with WonderBus there.... Wonderland was constantly being hired out for night functions. they used to have an entire website and brochure pack set up for the purpose. I did a couple of those functions as photographer demon-probe photos etc. A park can make a lot of money from these functions - take your normal function costing for food, venue, staff, alcohol, and tack on a charge for the hour-to-hour operation of one or more attractions on top... its worth the expense. Wonderland used to hire out their rides after hours on an hour-to-hour rate, I cannot recall the exact figures on here so these are BEST TO MY RECOLLECTION FIGURES - Bush Beast - appx $700 per hour Demon - appx $1300 per hour Probe - appx $1500 per hour Snowy - appx $700 per hour all the other flat rides attracted nominal fees ranging from about $350 - $500 for things such as skyhawk and endeavour to $500-$600 for bounty's revenge or Zodiac. They offered packages utilising one theme or another - billabong grove, goldrush (and sundowner theatre or goldrush theatre), the beach and sundowner, transylvania and lakeside, botany bay and outback restaurant or Hanna Barbera Land and its surrounding area. I can't recall the pricing for each world but it was hefty... they still had quite a lot of bookings though...

I have a faux-brick contractor next door to me - the "spreading of the sand" is a gritty gravel type substance used to "rough up" the surface to allow for grip while walking. As far as the theming, im no expert, but a tropical beach area on a remote island (think Survivor 1) you had beach in one point, and jungle area 10 metres to the side. I think theming like this while not perfect is ok, and kinda fits a theme of some strange exotic animal escaping from the jungle to capture beach-goers on the sand with its huge claw and drag them into the jungle... I think if dreamworld is committed to this theme, the 2d painting behing the claw will be moderately temporary until they can cultivate a real live jungle bush surrounding. I will be there on September 19, so i can't wait to see claw in its full glory..