Thank you

[AUSTHEMEPARKS]

Lol, I've been on a few wacky worms in Italy, fortunately coasters like iSpeed and Katun and the general wackiness of Italian parks made it worthwhile - I mean mixing an ancient Egyptian theme with the Terminator, that's wack.

Finally I get to go to Italy for the first time this year so WACKY WORM CREDS!!!

[Noxegon]

Finally I get to go to Italy for the first time this year so WACKY WORM CREDS!!!

Try to catch up :-)

http://www.bannister.org/coasters/parks/sp_bigapples.htm

[AUSTHEMEPARKS]

Try to catch up :-)

http://www.bannister.org/coasters/parks/sp_bigapples.htm

the one in Koki Park is so kewl!

[pazzap]

Noxegon, I never cease to be amazed by your adventures to get credits. Glad you had a great time downunder.

I went to Luna Park Melbourne in January and I didn't think it was especially bad, just extremely light on for anything to do.

I had a look at my coaster counter list and I've been to 130 parks that have coasters, but I can't say I've been to Conneaut Lake level park yet, just some parks that were rather short on attractions. Castle Park in Orange County struck me as being rather ordinary because 2 of the 3 coasters weren't running. Hades at Mt Olympus gave me a mugging of the kind I've never experienced on a coaster before, though the park had some fun stuff.

Hades pre 360 treatment or Hades 360? Not that I know if there was any extensive re tracking done along with adding the inversion.

Were all the woodies at mount olympus rough? I really don't like "too rough" woodies, and the worst I ever went on was Hercules at Dorney park, like an idiot in the back seat. I had a 24 hr headache afterwards and put my back out for a week, was stuck in bed in the hotel. Horrible experience, so glad they replaced it with Hydra.

Next year I am doing a mega 3 months usa 3 Europe dedicated theme park trip, will have a car in USA and drive all over like I did last big trip, and am planning to do the avalanche woodie in wisconsin after SFGA (gurnee), as it's only a 3 hr ish drive. Since it is more or less next door to mt olympus i wondered whether the woodies at Mt olympus were worth riding. I keep reading that they are all more or less very rough, so just curious as I presumed you would have ridden all of them whilst there? Cheers and thanks.

[Noxegon]

Does anyone have a good close-up of the front of the train on Arkham Asylum (or indeed any seats/restraints) that I can use in my trip report?

[Noxegon]

Okay, disregard the above – I used a Scooby Doo shot instead.

Movie World is done:

http://www.bannister.org/coasters/trips/2015/0216.htm

[Brad2912]

Great review!

Only thing I wasn't sure of was you mentioned jungle theming on Wild West Falls prior to the initial small lift hill?

Edited March 22, 2015 by Brad2912

[Noxegon]

Ugh. That's obvioudky wrong, and a victim of the editing process. I'll fix it tonight.

[downunder]

Hades pre 360 treatment or Hades 360? Not that I know if there was any extensive re tracking done along with adding the inversion.

Were all the woodies at mount olympus rough? I really don't like "too rough" woodies, and the worst I ever went on was Hercules at Dorney park, like an idiot in the back seat. I had a 24 hr headache afterwards and put my back out for a week, was stuck in bed in the hotel. Horrible experience, so glad they replaced it with Hydra.

Next year I am doing a mega 3 months usa 3 Europe dedicated theme park trip, will have a car in USA and drive all over like I did last big trip, and am planning to do the avalanche woodie in wisconsin after SFGA (gurnee), as it's only a 3 hr ish drive. Since it is more or less next door to mt olympus i wondered whether the woodies at Mt olympus were worth riding. I keep reading that they are all more or less very rough, so just curious as I presumed you would have ridden all of them whilst there? Cheers and thanks.

To clarify, Hades 360; the inversion was the only smooth part. The ride was absolutely horrifying in 2012, my coaster count is at 615 according to coaster counter, and Hades 360 was by far the roughest coaster I have ever been on by a country mile. I'm not exactly soft either, so I can't say I was being overly sensitive about it. The shame is when I first rode it back in 2007, it was absolutely brilliant, back row at night was mind-blowing.

The other coasters at Mt Olympus weren't super rough last time I was there, nothing exceptional as coasters, except the last drop on Cyclops. I actually like Mt Olympus personally, there's cool go-kart tracks, and lots of them, the ten foot wave pool, indoor and outdoor water parks. It was fun, though it is out of the way.

Avalanche was a bit rough, much better front row. It's a funny little park, Timber Falls.

[Noxegon]

Dreamworld is done:

http://www.bannister.org/coasters/trips/2015/0217.htm

[Noxegon]

Sea World is done:

http://www.bannister.org/coasters/trips/2015/0218.htm

[iwerks]

The Battle Boats would have gotten you very wet. Did you see Affinity?

[Noxegon]

No – we were going to but bailed due to weather.

[Noxegon]

Ginger Factory is done...

http://www.bannister.org/coasters/trips/2015/0219.htm

...and that's the end of Australia. Last two trip reports from this trip are from New Zealand, when I get around to writing them.

[Noxegon]

...and my last two reports are done:

http://www.bannister.org/coasters/trips/2015/0220.htm

http://www.bannister.org/coasters/trips/2015/0221.htm

Thanks again to everyone who helped with our trip.

[pin142]

Thanks for the reports. Served as a good warning for what I experienced in Melbourne. Always good to get the view of someone who isn't a local on the parks and what they liked and disliked about them.

[AUSTHEMEPARKS]

Rainbow's End looks like a great park. I think I heard from someone that it's smaller than luna park sydney. Is this true?

[Noxegon]

Physically it's roughly double the size of Luna Park Sydney – though the rides are more spaced out. Something like one quarter of the land is occupied by the Kart track.

Both parks are clearly visible on Google Earth so you can get a good idea from there.

Edited April 13, 2015 by Noxegon

[Noxegon]

Megan has posted our Alice Springs day.

http://pirouettes.org/?p=1170

[joz]

Always good to read more! Still can't get over that hire car thing though, utter disgrace.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Supply and demand Joz.

It's not like you can go down the road to get a better deal... down the road is a REALLY long way.

logistics of getting the cars out to those spots, having them serviced etc, plus being a tourism hotspot - the pricing seems to be about what i expect.

No doubt their costs are higher for many things too - including insurance - with every second dingbat rolling it, or driving at night and plowing into a roo. Obviously Nox was sensible about it - but the bottom line is that there are many stupid people out there, and unfortunately, all the smart ones have to pay the stupid people tax - because you can't make stupid people wear signs that say 'i'm stupid'. (Bill Engvall is hilarious).

Edited May 14, 2015 by AlexB

[joz]

Nope still a disgrace no matter how much you try and justify it. $700 for a rental car for 3 days is properly mental.

[Noxegon]

It was two days, not three. The breakdown of the amount was (in AUD) –

- $201 base rate

- $200 one way fee

- $36 premium location surcharge

- $75 other taxes/fees

- $0.30 per kilometre driven after the first two hundred.

- $1.94 per litre of fuel in the only station in the area

The one way fee was to be expected, and I don't resent that for a moment. However, it should have included enough kilometres to cover that journey; even if we'd driven straight from from one airport to the other we'd have run up an additional $78 in distance charges before we started. Additionally, Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park is not a small place; I suspect we'd have blown through the free kilometre allowance even if we'd hired from Ayers Rock Airport.

For purposes of comparison, we drove a rental from Sydney to Melbourne over three days that cost us, including fuel, AUD $350.

I reckon that the whole Ayers Rock expedition cost us roughly the same as our long haul flight bookings from Europe, and the experience wasn't even close to being worth it.

Edited May 14, 2015 by Noxegon

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Yep - the one way fee basically covers their cost of shipping it back or (as is the case frequently) the discount they give to the next customer booking a one-way in the reverse direction. You can actually get some seriously cheap rental (and camper) deals from some suppliers if you're flexible with dates - they'd much rather you drive it back and pay for the privilege, than having to ship it themselves... so the prices are ridiculously cheap for the return journey (because the first guy already got reamed).

I also don't take issue with the premium location surcharge - that, like the airport - is to be expected as costs are higher to maintain that particular location.

'taxes and fees' make it sound like it's outside their control - but businesses in Australia are required to include "taxes and fees" in their "base rate" under consumer law. I'm curious to find out whether this conformed to the law on this issue - even international flights quoted by Australian Airlines must be an 'all inclusive' base price, and not slug you for additional 'departure fees' or 'airport taxes'.

As for the mileage rate - I totally agree with you - Knowing full well most customers are going to exceed the mileage to get ANYWHERE - it's clearly a rort. That sort of cost should be included in the base rate and therefore not subject to change... every rental car i've ever hired (in Australia and OS) has always had unlimited kms included (or at least a crazy high figure like 500km/day) - and these are the same companies you considered based in Alice.... so that is definitely taking advantage of the situation.

As for the fuel - whilst it was a cost - it isn't really something that can be attributed to the 'hire car' cost as it makes it seem like the hire car company charged more than they did for the service. As for the high price - yes it was much higher than Metropolitan Perth - but given the location, a higher cost of fuel delivery is to be expected, isn't it?

Don't get me wrong - i still think the high cost was quite rich - on that i totally agree - but a lot of it is to be expected in the situation, isn't it?

[Noxegon]

Expected, yes. Accepted without complaint, I think not.

It's also worth noting that the car was an antique by the standards of rental cars; it had an enormous dent in the roof and over 100,000 on the clock.

Assuming most of those were done at $0.30/km, I think the cost of the vehicle would be well and truly covered.

Edited May 14, 2015 by Noxegon