After our final night in Southampton Holiday inn, we once again packed the car up and left for our next stop, Thorpe Park!
We’ve visited Thorpe Park twice before and both times we’ve enjoyed it but felt that it wasn’t as good as it should have been, so this time we gave ourselves plenty of time to take it all in.
Our first visit was to Swarm. This B&M wing coaster is well themed and rides extremely well. This was only my second time riding it and Tracy’s first, and though she was terrified initially she said she’d ride it again. It does look very intimidating with the initial dive drop and elements, but much like Galactica, it’s more of a gentle giant than it looks.
After The Swarm, we went to Flying Fish, for our first ride on this junior coaster. It’s an average ride, let down a little by the landscaping and untidy ride area, but worth a ride for the credit!
Next up was The Walking Dead: The Ride, an indoor roller coaster that was closed due to the pandemic during our last visit so we missed out on it, but we have ridden it before. I like the theming and design, and I find the roller coaster itself to be quite enjoyable, especially the second lift hill scene. I’ve not heard many good reviews of the ride, and I don’t really think it needed to have an IP attached but both of us enjoy it.
After The Walking Dead, we headed to Quantum, a magic carpet style ride, near the front of the park. We queued for what felt like ages as operations were very slow, the ride operators seemed to lack training to get people on and off safely and quickly. Multiple times we saw riders loaded on and then the bars released and people moved around. We felt it wasn’t worth the queue, especially when we could have been in queue for one of the roller coasters just as long.
Following Quantum, we had a bit of a wander around, taking in the atmosphere of the park, which was quite busy. We headed over towards the Black Mirror Labyrinth, this years new attraction. We failed to realise that both this and Derren Brown’s Ghost train were timed ticketed attractions, and by the time we found out, all tickets were gone, which was a bit disappointing but not the end of the world. We rode Ghost Train in 2019 and were extremely underwhelmed by the experience.
We then queued for Stealth, the parks tallest and fastest roller coaster and a favorite of mine. The queue was slow as Stealth’s queue always is, and Tracy decided not to ride this time, but has said she’ll have a go on our next visit! As for my ride, I loved it. It was only my second time riding, and the launch is still the best the UK has to offer, and short of visiting Japan for Do-Dodonpa, I doubt it’ll get much more intense than this! The top hat offers great views of the park, as you’d expect being 205ft up, and though its a short ride, its worth the wait.
To cool off, we had a go on Storm in a Teacup, and then the Dodgems, and then had a ride on the Rumba Rapids before stopping for something to eat at Burger King.
By this time, it was getting later in the day so we queued up for Nemesis Inferno as our last ride of the day. Inferno is an excellent ride, and though I personally prefer the original Nemesis, Inferno is still worth the queue. Its jungle themeing and volcano are all great and when we rode, the tunnels mist effect was working which cools you off!
Once we’d finished up in the shops and collected all our photos from the Dome, we went to try and find the car. No word of a lie, this is the first time I’ve ever parked a car and lost it in the car park! We did eventually find it of course, so I sent the drone up for some aerial shots and then we drove off to Cobham services for our overnight stop at the Ramada.
To summarize our visit to Thorpe Park, we had a great day overall. The best visit we’ve had so far, even though Quantum was a bit of a letdown. We did also have refillable drinks courtesy of the Coca-cola freestyle system they have here which wasn’t running at its best, but we were advised when we bought our cups that they had supply issues.
Next stop Chessington World of Adventures…
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