Farup Sommerland (Fonix + SFC!) 12/07/22

[Gazza]

 

Farup Sommerland Tuesday 12/07/22

https://www.parkz.com.au/attraction/farup-sommerland

The Monday I went to Legoland I stayed in Aarahus that evening. In Aarahus they have Tivoli Friheden, so i went there for couple of hours and indeed rode Cobra 4 days prior to the accident, but I might just skip over that park for the time being.

The following day I went to Farup Sommerland, which is right up near the northern tip of Denmark (Only a couple of km from the coast in what seems to be an area that everyone goes for their summer holidays, (like Lakes Entrance or Forster) 

The park is quite a long rectangle shape, in an area of woodland with several small lakes. Entering the park is like going to an old Drive In theatre, where you drive in and pay at a series of booths, with the car park inside the compound. This means you can come and go from your car to get stuff out of it, and the park is pretty open about this, and has huge bbq areas, so already you can see the mindset of the park is more about hosting a day out than squeezing every penny (Or Kronor in this case)

but that said the F&B offerings were good too, with a mix of sit down and takeaway places.
Most of the park had this rustic forest theme, so a lot of rough timber looking buildings, barrels, crates, logs and rides themed around forest animals. If you wanted to sum the park up, its this:

 

It’s summer peak but wait times were still fine, worst I waited was 30 mins for Fonix in the middle of the day.
I wont really do a play by play because I did certain things a few times anyway and it was a long day.

In terms of strategy, the park has a wait time app. I think the only thing I gleaned from it checking in the days prior was that the spinning coaster Flagermusen seems to get long waits, so I think I started out with Fonix, Flagermusen and Orkanen and then from there just floated around doing stuff.

So, onto the rides.

Fonix x5

Really bloody good. Next gen Vekoma is as good as people say. It just has a really solid layout that has a heap of elements and nuances crammed into it, so literally not a single dead spot and heaps of cool elements.

The station is quite aesthetically pleasing with stained timber and steel, banners, stained glass etc.

A steep first drop gives heaps of air, followed by that cool 'stall loop', which provides extended floater at the top. 

Things get frantic with sideways airtime on the following element, and then a heartline roll that feels as crazy as the one on steel taipan, but add in a real pull to one side. Yet more airtime with a double down and twisted hill, then a smooth corkscrew through the station.

The remainder of the ride is yet more airtime and twists, so heaps of excitement. The final turnaround has a 'wave turn' which is like a turnaround that has a inward bulge/bump built into it, so you get a cool pop of air going around that too.

Fast pace, decent level of intensity, always perfectly comfortable...Hope we see one in Australia.

Flagermusen

Standard Reverchon spinning coaster. Head on down to the Ekka this week or up to Aussie World if you want to know what these are like

 

I did like the misty cave at the entrance, so bonus points for that.

Lynet x3

A Gerstlauer launch coaster with compact little 6 seater cars. Bit of a crash compare to Fonix. On paper it sounds good, quick launch, top hat, airtime hill, zero g roll, a few turns and a corkscrew, but Gerstlauer tend to do quite harsh transitions and coupled with the hard restraints, it takes away some of the re-rideability. Eg if there is airtime you are slammed upwards, if there is a corkscrew you are slammed sideways. When you consider what every other manufacturer is achieving, it's dissapointing.

 

The queue line was just full of barrels and crates....t h e m i n g.

Orkanen x2

So im sure many of you are anticipating this one considering what's coming to Gumbuya and Movie World. Happy to report its a good ride, with zippy pacing, but that's perhaps its only downfall, since its a short layout taken fast, so its over and done with quite quickly.

Going up the lift hill I had a giggle at the automatic lawnmower doing its thing under the ride.

Decent first drop, a very short tunnel and then into a suprisingly forceful overbank. You then speed down a bit of a straight with a tiny bit of airtime, then two tight helices that are actually a bit dizzying. The pace continues with a u turn and a little twisting dip in a dark tunnel, and then the ride is over. The last turn is so dynamic i unintentionally swung my leg up and you can see why Vekoma suspended coasters have warnings about keeping your lets down!

The theming looks nice too, a lot of old boat shed type stuff so a high level of detail, even if it's just 'junk'.

So for sure, looking foward to having this in Australia since its one of the best family coasters designs out there and very comfortable.

Falken x2

A wooden coaster that's fine as long as its going in a straight line. When it does the turnarounds at the end of the course it shakes like crap.

The layout almost felt a bit RCT. On the straight bits it had drops and airtime hills, which were well executed. The turnarounds were pretty standard banked turns, with the final helix being a bit of an endurance test.

Pindsvinet

Standard model Zamperla kiddy coaster like the one at SW, but with a super excited looking hedgehog on the front of the train. This had birch trees growing close to the layout you could easily reach out and whack if you wanted.

Mine Expressen

Standard model Vekoma roller skater like Roadrunner, but with a bell that jingles the whole way around. What made this one cool was that there was a ramp that went up to the 2nd floor for no reason, then ramped back down to the station, so they built it purely to make the queue more interesting and to give good views of the load station. I like it.

The setting was nice too.

Saven x3

They have another Vekoma family coaster but this one is a boomerang model. Unlike most boomerang models, they've stretched the layout out, so its a few hills and gentle turns in a row, so it slaloms over and under pathways, and even has a water splash effect.

Its 'fun' though, a bit more spirited than a regular family coaster, and looks damn nice too.

Raevens Hule

I like funhouses, and this one was done like you were in the underground burrow network of a fox, but you'd hear sound effects of buzzing flies and farts (foxes are dirty animals?) has all your usual funhouse stuff like moving plank floors and spinning tunnels. It has a really good final room built at a tilt (like young einsteins) and it genuinely did throw your balance off a lot.

I wish we could have these in Australia.

Skattejagten

A great place to f yourself up. A very long ropes and obstalce course that had everything. Cargo nets, bridges, rafts you had to haul yourself across....a full sized pirate ship! Would take a solid hour to do if you did it honestly and did every obstacle, but would also be exhausting. Many obstacles were over water, so you can fall in if you fail. Totally unsupervised so relies on the common sense of guests, but nobody was doing anything stupid except for one bloke taking his dog through it.

My favourite bit was the bouncy platforms.

 

Farup Rafting

A rapids ride by ABC engineering, but it didnt really do anything noteworthy. A standard layout through generic woodlands. They did have a few water jets on timers so occasionally rafts would be in the firing line, but a lot of the time they were shooting at nothing.

Probably the longest wait of the day.

Motorbollen

I've never done this ride type before (Or maybe I have, since I've been on the Wasp at Aussie World, but this is nicer)

Its like a more mechanical version of a flying scooters. You sit in a motorbike, and when you twist the throttle, the arm your bike is on swings out all of a sudden, creating the sense of a speed boost (because now you are going further/faster since you're following a larger circle)

Skovturen

Did it for the sake of it since I wandered over to get a pic and it had no line. I was attracted to it because it had one of those "arrows with distances pointing everywhere" type signs, and noticed they were all theme park related (Eg Distance to Legoland, Liseberg, Vekoma HQ"

All the theming was fairly 'pleasant' and 'cute', including a recreation of the burrow home of the park mascots.

Toget

Needed to sit down towards the end of the day, so did a lap around on this. Mostly follows parallel to regular pathways, i think the only place it got off the beaten track was when it goes down the back of Mine Expressen.

Traestammerne

(Literally "Tree Stem" ) A log ride (Which as I discovered many parks in this region have this layout). Almost felt like a bigger version of a travelling flume they had themed up a bit to make it fit in better. Didn't really have any wow moments, but definitely leaves you damp (lucky I did this at the end of the day)

I think the one thing I missed that I wouldn't have minded doing was the 4D Cinema, because they were playing planet SOS and I haven’t seen that for years.

The park also had several separate boat rides (Canoes, paddle boats, motorboats etc), one of which was right in amongst Skattejagen but ran out of time for that in the end too.

Overall a really friendly, enjoyable park.

The staff were good, they got stuff done and kept the lines moving without being drill sargeants. There was one guy single handedly running Falken for example, and he was running it efficiently without stress.

Overall staff were happy to joke around it seemed, were good with kids and seemed happy.

Likewise good staff on Fonix, and i ended up on the last train and they gave us a 2nd lap when everyone started chanting "En til tur...en til tur"

I did also like how the park seemed mostly focus on creating an atmosphere of a good day out. Heaps of people having BBQs, you could bring your dog, but at the same time the regular food outlets were well priced and had plenty of customers too, so i guess its all about making everyone "fat and happy".

And lots of kids play areas too, so for them it would be heaven.

 

I ate at the Chinese place, and had a Fransk Hotdog at some point. I also tried a local specialty, "hotsnacks", these are like warm versions of those wierd salted snacks you seem to only see for sale at IGA, except i accidentally ordered the wrong size and had to bin half of it:

Also they had a ride called Nut Swing

As for how to improve it. Maybe more 'medium' sized rides, since it seems like a lot of kids flats even though they have the audience for more medium sized ones. Could also do a dark ride.

Coasters are well covered in every respect, but I guess they'll keep building bigger.

Definitely head up here for Fonix and a great day out if ever in Denmark.

[Guest 239]

10 hours ago, Gazza said:

The queue line was just full of barrels and crates....t h e m i n g.

Makes me miss the old days of turbines at Dreamworld

Great overview! I never knew nothing about this park but I absolutely LOVE parks that look like they're within forest similar to Kings Dominion and Busch Williamsburg. Thanks for sharing!

[New display name]

10 minutes ago, Guest 239 said:

Makes me miss the old days of turbines at Dreamworld

Come on!   DW had a mix of mushrooms too.😐

[Guest 239]

1 minute ago, New display name said:

Come on!   DW had a mix of mushrooms too.😐

Oh god, I forgot about the old log flume theming! I have a POV lying around somewhere of that ride back in 2014. 

Don't forget the random dinosaurs in the river rapids!

[Dean Barnett]

I love how these parks had areas you could cook your own food.. and playgrounds. Cheap addiction for parks in Australia which will please both kids and families. I can't see them letting you cook your own food here though. 

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Wonderland had it in Billabong Grove, and i'm pretty sure the waterparks on the GC allow it too. But yes - when you've been giving away the gate for so long, you can't afford to allow outside food into the park because your $8 profit margin on 30 cents of syrup for a soft drink is where you make your money back.

[Naazon]

13 minutes ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:

Wonderland had it in Billabong Grove, and i'm pretty sure the waterparks on the GC allow it too. But yes - when you've been giving away the gate for so long, you can't afford to allow outside food into the park because your $8 profit margin on 30 cents of syrup for a soft drink is where you make your money back.

WnW for sure offer it. We like having a few sausages for lunch there