Tag: Crealy

Blog, Reviews

2022 Season review

Loops&Lapbars

Though we haven’t had quite as many brand new attractions to ride this year, we’ve visited more parks and done more events than last year. As with last year, I thought it would be fun to look back at the 2022 season, rank the events and new attractions we rode this year and reflect on the season passed.

The Events

Over the last year we went to the following events:

  • Alton Towers Opening Weekend
  • Alton Towers Festival of Thrills
  • Thorpe Park Mardi Gras
  • Thorpe Park Carnival
  • Alton Towers Octoberfest
  • Chessington Howl’o’ween
  • Thorpe Park Fright Nights
  • Legoland Brick or Treat
  • Alton Towers Scarefest
  • Fantasy Island Fear Island
  • Legoland Fireworks Spectacular
  • Alton Towers Fireworks Spectacular

That list is just in the order we did them, not the order I enjoyed them most. The best event we did this year, at least in my opinion was probably the Alton Towers opening weekend as we saw plenty of other enthusiasts as well as sharing it with a couple of good friends too.

It wasn’t truly an event in the same vein as the others but I included opening weekend as it’s celebrated as such and I enjoyed it!

The most surprising event and probably the second best we did was Fantasy Island’s Fear Island. For such a relatively small park to put on such a good event was staggering and though not everything was a massive hit, the scare mazes definitely were!

The most disappointing event unfortunately goes to Scarefest at Alton Towers. As highlighted in my blog, the event felt a little lacking and missing something special to mark the occasion.

All the other events and visits we had were great, though I did feel that Carnival was just Mardi Gras but with a yellow overlay, but it was still enjoyable none the less!

The Attractions

There wasn’t many new attractions to try this year but we did get around all the ones we could! We managed:

  • Sik at Flamingo Land
  • Enso at Blackpool Pleasure Beach
  • Harrington Flint’s Island Adventure at Fantasy Island
  • The Guardian at Fantasy Island
  • Wild River Rapids at Fantasy Island
  • Farm Yard Flyer at Paultons Park
  • Vikings at Drayton Manor
  • Barrel Bailout at Chessington World of Adventures
  • Trawler Trouble at Chessington World of Adventures

Not a very long list but still plenty to go at!

The best this year, at least in my opinion, was the long overdue Sik at Flamingo Land. Daft name but great ride! Despite it being my home park, we only managed it once and I’ve heard it’s having a few issues as the years gone on but I’ll get back to it next year to see!

The weakest of the new additions is a tie between Enso and The Guardian, a bit of a cop out, however both had issues.

The upcharge and lack of value for money on Enso is what took it away for me. Even then, once you’d paid the fee, I wasn’t blown away by the feeling of free spinning. I followed all the advice people have me such as sitting in the right hand seat and going alone but even still I didn’t get the same levels of enjoyment out of it as other seem to!

Dragons Fury, when sat facing backwards, spins more going into the first break run than Enso did through its whole layout. That ride is probably built with spinning in mind, but it is included in park entry at least.

The Guardian was a good idea that was executed badly. Bad CGI and screen quality hampered an otherwise good idea, especially when you first enter the queue line and see all the theming and effort that’s gone into this attraction.

I’m not sure if it was budget constraints or purposeful decisions that caused the issues but they are somewhat easily rectifiable and should make this attraction live up to the expectation that the queue line builds up!

As for the other new attractions this year, there was Vikings which is a good themed area with a good new ride in Loki. I wasn’t really that blown away by it though. Thor is just another Disk’o Coaster and Jormungandr is still Buffalo Coaster with a new theme. Sleipnir is decent though, especially for younger kids.

The whole area is pleasant to walk through and features a lot of wood and some Viking theming but it could do with a bit of an expansion on the theme in my opinion! It was put together very quickly, especially when compared with some of the other new additions and in the nicest possible way, it shows! Just a bit of fine tuning, a few props here and there and it’ll be spot on.

Another surprise entry was from Fantasy Island with Harrington Flint’s Island Adventure. This was much better than expected. I’m a sucker for interactive dark rides, I think every park should have one and this one stands out from Tomb Blaster, Rootin’ Tootin’ Target Trail, Sheriff’s Showdown, Laser Raiders and Dual because of its use of both screens and physical props. The cars were comfortable and the shooting was fun. It just lacks on ride photos and the physical props adding to your score!

The New Parks

This year we visited a lot of new parks, this includes:

  • Funland Hayling Island
  • Crealy
  • Barry Island
  • Southport Pleasureland
  • Joyland
  • Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach
  • Pleasurewood Hills

I think the biggest surprise out of all the new parks we visited, for me at least, was Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach. The ride selection was great, there were very few queues throughout the day and we had a great time.

Joyland was also a wonderful little park. Though not even a half day park, it was worth our money and time, and I’ll certainly visit here every time I’m back in Great Yarmouth in future!

Crealy was a nice and tidy park, as was Pleasurewood Hills. Both have good ride line ups but in both cases we weren’t the intended audience of the parks, so it wasn’t quite as fun for us as some of the other parks, such as Barry Island or Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach.

Finally I’d like to mention both the owners of Southport Pleasureland and Barry Island for all their help with regards to filming around their parks and on the attractions!

The New to us Attractions

In this section I’d like to highlight some of the existing attractions that we only experienced for the first time this year. We tried all sorts, ranging from our first scenic railway, a 70 year old virginia reel, weird and wonderful flat rides, all the way up to two different snail attractions!

The biggest standout of the year is most certainly Roller Coaster at Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach. This is our first scenic railway (of the 2 in the UK and 7 worldwide) and is the second fastest wooden rollercoaster in the country only behind Megafobia. Though not as thrilling as Megafobia, or as well themed as Wicker Man, its definitely the smoothest woodie we’ve ridden and was a joy from start to finish.

Other standout attractions of the year include Lightning 360 at Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach, Roller Coaster, The Rocket and Ghost Train all from Southport Pleasureland and just because of the sheer amount of spinning we got, I’ll include (what I believe to be Crow’s) Spinning Coaster from Hull Fair too.

There’s one final attraction that was notable this year too, that being Kite Flyer at Pleasurewood Hills. This was the only ride all year that made me feel genuinely ill afterwards! I’m not sure if I was having an off day, the ride cycle was too long or I moved my head too fast while the ride was spinning but it really knocked me for 6.

Summary

We’ve ridden some great attractions this year. Tried some terrible ones too. Had some ups and downs, rainy days and absolute scorchers along the way. Throughout all the visits we’ve had, we’ve always had fun. Yeah Enso was a bit pricy, Sik took far too long to open and Kite Flyer went a step too far (for me at least), but each day was still fun.

We’ve shared at least 3 visits with friends and family this year, I’ve found that one of my best friends, Pedro, is a secret adrenaline junkie and both he and Tami are welcome to join us anytime they like!

I’m not sure there is too much to be excited for in terms of the UKs new offerings next year, but as this year comes to a close, we’ve started drawing up rough plans for our visit next year, with a blog to follow once we know more.

Hopefully next year will be as fun as this year has been but only time will tell!

The Awards

Best New Attraction

Awarded to the best single attraction opened during this year.

Sik

Harrington Flint’s Island Adventure

Loki

Best Event

Awarded to the events that I felt were the best from this year.

Alton Towers Opening Weekend

Fantasy Island – Fear Island

Thorpe Park Fright Nights

Best New Park

Awarded to the park we visited for the very first time this year.

Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach

Joyland

Crealy

Best New To Us Attraction

Awarded to the attraction that we experienced for the first time this year.

Roller Coaster – Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach

Ghost Train – Southport Pleasureland

Lightning 360 – Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach

Best Rollercoaster Overall

Awarded to the top 3 rollercoasters from my ranking page.

The Smiler

Stealth

Nemesis

Best Flat Ride Overall

Awarded to the attraction that I felt was the most fun and enjoyable flat ride from the last year.

Haunted House Monster Party

Detonator: Bombs Away

Zodiac

Best Onsite Stay

There were only two to pick from, but its awarded to the park with the best onsite stay we had through the year.

Thorpe Shark Cabins

Alton Towers Star Gazing Pods

Best Customer Services

Awarded to the park who’s customer services were needed and how well they handled our issues.

Alton Towers

Pleasurewood Hills

Southport Pleasureland

Best Food

Awarded to the park that I think had the best tasting food from the year.

Chessington World of Adventures (Drop n’ Chicken Nuggets)

Alton Towers (Front Lawns Catering)

Thorpe Park (Pizza Pasta Buffet)

Most Disappointing Visit

These are my least memorable visits from the year. Non were bad, just didn’t fully hit the mark!

Alton Towers – Scarefest (Lacked Ceremony for the 15th anniversary)

Oakwood (Rained off with no rainy day return)

Legoland – Firework Spectacular (Too short!)

Worst Ride of the Year

Grand Canyon – Southport Pleasureland

Kite Flyer

Rootin’ Tootin’ Target Trail

Park of the Year

Awarded to the park that, overall, had the most enjoyable visits.

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Paultons Park

Alton Towers

Thorpe Park

Blog, Reviews

Crealy for the first time

Loops&Lapbars

For our holiday this year we once again looked at a UK road trip around a few parks and though we started at Tankfest at Bovington, our first park on the trip was Crealy. I don’t feel that there’s much to talk about here in regards to Tankfest but it was a great day!

Crealy Meadows

We decided on camping for the night and then visiting the park the following day with my sister and her family. The camp site is excellent, with plenty of toilet and shower blocks for everyone to use, the pitch we had had an electric hook-up and there was on site entertainment for the younger visitors to enjoy.

One thing to note here is that the electric hook-up is designed for caravan plugs and not your standard 3 pin, we bought an adaptor off Amazon for about £9 and it suited our needs perfectly!

I had fallen ill the first few days of the trip and as a result didn’t get to see much of the site besides the shower and toilet block, the clubhouse and the inside of our tent. I was very impressed with what was on offer though, especially when we only paid £30 for the night, I’ve stopped in worse hotels!

The have an onsite shop which stocks a small variety of essential goods, ranging from chilled meat, to milk, sanitary products and camping essentials. Very reasonably priced and well stocked considering the size of the place!

Onto Crealy itself

The park is a very clean and tidy, quite small in comparison to other parks we’ve been to, and targets a younger audience than I’d initially expected! That’s not to say there wasn’t anything for us to do, but quite the contrary!

The park offers 3 rollercoasters, a few decently themed areas and a good selection of flat rides and attractions.

The Rollercoasters

For me, one of the biggest standouts of any park are its coasters and Crealy offers 3: Maximus, Twister and Shark Bay Coaster. All 3 are junior coasters, that don’t push the boundaries too much in terms of stats, but they had enough to offer!

Unfortunately when we went Twister was closed due to adverse weather. There was a lot of rain as the park opened, but it soon cleared and was quite warm and dry, but despite this, Twister remained closed the rest of the day, which was a shame as this was the one I was most looking forward to!

As for Maximus, this is a Vekoma manufactured steel family coaster with a roman theme and a mine train themed train. The juxtaposition between the roman themed attraction and the mine train is certainly unique and a little uncanny.

The theme does feel like it was added to the attraction after it has already been established, and looking at its history on Coasterpedia, this looks to be the case as it was once called Pastil Loco (which might explain the runaway mine train parts!)

The ride itself was decent, but not much force at all, and it was quite shaky in places but not too unpleasant. The ride does have a camera though which I like to see, especially at smaller parks as I like having on ride photos as souvenirs.

Shark Bay is a completely enclosed indoor coaster manufactured by SBF/VISA and has a very simple figure 8 layout. The train is themed to a shark and the attractions sits in the parks Atlantis area and compliments the area perfectly.

Though pretty much forceless and lacking any real element, the ride was still a laugh and a great entry level coaster for any aspiring young thrillseeker!

The rest of Crealy

As mentioned earlier, the park has a few themed areas, including Sooty Land, a new for 2022 area themed around the children’s TV programme, The Sooty Show. There’s also the aforementioned Atlantis, a pirate themed area (which could easily be combined with Atlantis), a very small wild west themed area and a prehistoric themed section.

The rest of the park is very clean and tidy with more play areas than I’ve seen at any other park with a total of 6 (that I could count!). There are 2 indoor areas, one being a large softplay area for kids with an arcade and the other is Atlantis, which I’ll talk about later.

After Twister, the next biggest ride is Tidal Wave, an L&T Systems log flume with 2 drops and a camera. Pleasant ride this one, doesn’t get you too wet beyond a light spraying, has a loose tiki theme and good operations!

The other standout part of our day was actually not a ride at all but a walk through area called Wilderness. This part of the park is set right back away from any of the other attractions and features a set of different bridges over a small waterway.

Each of these bridges is different and range from basic flat across bridges, to rope and chain bridges, all the way down to a a few stepping logs that were actually quite challenging for us lot to navigate, let alone kids!

Though not what you’d call thrilling, and they barely standout unless you stumble upon them like we did, they were still a nice little distraction and fun to see what bridge type comes next!

Dotted along the walk are various structures for kids to play around, and an enclosure that featured deer as the parks does have a small zoo to accompany it.

Atlantis

Atlantis is a decently sized indoor area which includes 3 flat rides, another large softplay area and a rollercoaster which can be enjoyed in all weathers.

The park has done a great job theming this up with all the walls having mural type paintings on them and the rides being well themed to the underwater kingdom of Atlantis.

It’s certainly not Tornado Springs, but it’s is still worth seeing on a visit to Crealy. The only negative, and it’s a small one at that is that there isn’t anything too thrilling in the building. A faster spinning flat ride would go well I feel so Crealy can open themselves up to a bigger audience than they currently serve.

There is a large indoor play area in here too that features netting, pipes and a small softplay area, and in the corner is a small coffee shop, so it doubles as a great place to have a break and sit down while the kids roam about. You can see them at all times from the small seating area so it’s quite a good safe spot!

Conclusion

Overall, we enjoyed Crealy, but we did feel that it wasn’t really meant for us. Luckily we did have my niece with us to enjoy the day a little more, but if it were just us two, I think we might have struggled to stay a full day. This is by no means the fault of the park, but I feel more parks should look to add rides for everyone, such as how Paultons Park have been doing.

I think Paultons is still the superior park as it has better themed areas and a better selection of rides for all thrill levels, but where Crealy shines is with its indoor areas, play parks and its camp site. It is excellently suited for a younger audiences and their families, and you certainly feel looked after here!

Blog

2022 Holiday Plan!

Loops&Lapbars

For our holiday this year, we’ll once again be doing a UK road trip! This time however we won’t be visiting a single Merlin park, instead opting for a few new places!

Even though we’re only going away for a week this time, we’ll be covering just as much distance as we did last year. we’ll be visiting Crealy, Barry Island, Oakwood Theme Park, Southport Pleasureland, Blackpool Pleasure Beach and Flamingo Land!

A map of our travels!

As well as the parks, we’ll also be stopping off at Tankfest down in Bovington, seeing what the Centre for Alternative Technology can show us at Pantperthog and hopefully going up Mount Snowdon!

I don’t know what I’m looking forward to most, whether it’s seeing the tanks on show at Tankfest, riding Megaphobia and Speed or trying Drenched for the first time, or maybe seeing what Enso has to offer at Blackpool.

As with last year, I’ll have blogs up for each day, and a final conclusion with my thoughts on the attractions, new and old! Can’t wait for the 24th to roll around now!