It wasn’t so long I was writing a post about Shockwave, how it was an under appreciated gem of the UK coaster line up and how I adore it, even with its faults.
Now Drayton Manor have announced that Shockwave, in its current stand up form will be no more starting next season and I thought I’d like to say my part on this.
As I mentioned in my other blog, I really do like Shockwave. I like the sensation of riding standing up, I like the noise and the thrills. I think it fit nicely into Adventure Cove, the area they built around it and it looked great with the station refresh.
But converting it to sit-down only will kill it for me! I know the park is going down a family friendly route but top level thrills are part of a family line up, at least in my opinion! The best parks are those that cater to everyone and Drayton Manor had plenty of variety back when Pandemonium was still there.
You had Apocalypse, Shockwave and Pandemonium right at the top of thrills, then Air Race and Maelstrom the next level down. Then there’s Accelerator, The Bounty Pirate Ship, The Rapids, Drunken Barrels, Sherrif Showdown and The Haunting next. Then you have Thomas Land for younger kids (and adults alike).
Now there’s only Shockwave left at the top of the pile and taking away it’s stand-up train will be a big loss to it. I’d be more than happy if it ran two trains, so they can use the same layout but allow younger audiences to ride it, and still offer a top level thrill for those who want that too.
I don’t feel like this is the best decision, but it is decided and we’ll just have to move on without the stand up trains. What I’d love to see though is either Floorless trains, so it remains a unique ride in the UK, or even better, spinning trains.
I’m not entirely sure whether putting spinning trains onto Shockwave will keep it at the 1.2m height restriction the park is going for, but it would definitely be a worthy replacement for the stand up trains in my opinion!
I’ll keep an open mind about what Drayton Manor does with Shockwave but it’s a real shame that it’s going and I hope they can capture at least a small amount of what made the original so special when they change it.
For now at least, Shockwave still stands and will do so until season’s end, so we’ve got until October 27th to enjoy what we’ve got before it is no more!
I’ll be riding the life out of it when we go for the Vikings event later this year and that will be the final farewell from me. Expect a lot of posts about it on that day!
This is also my 100th post and I think it’s somewhat fitting making such a special milestone a blog about such a special coaster!
Our final stop on our weekend away was to Pleasurewood Hills Family Theme Park in nearby Lowestoft.
Unlike Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach, we were allowed to record on rides here and simply had to visit reception for them to check out equipment out. This is the first time I’ve had to do this, and I wish more parks would do this to make it easier for us! (looking at you Merlin…)
After we’d gotten sorted and we got our wristbands, we headed straight for the parks biggest attraction, Wipeout.
The Vekoma Boomerang
Wipeout used to belong to The American Adventure park before it closed down. A park I wish I’d had the chance to try in its heyday. Now all I can do is follow the attractions that used to be at the park to at least ride them in some form! Wipeout is one of these.
This is the first full size Vekoma Boomerang we’ve both tried, as all the others have been smaller junior boomerangs without inversions.
The ride does feel as old as it is, but that’s to its credit as it makes some really excellent noises as the motors and parts clunk and bang into action.
Though quite small in terms of footprint and height, the ride has plenty to offer for an aspiring thrill seeker. There’s plenty of force and through the entire layout, you’ll be inverted 6 times. 3 on the forward run and 3 on the return journey.
There is a bit of roughness to the attraction but it’s not unbearable like some of Vekomas other offerings!
Egg-Spress, is it Egg-scellent?
After Wipeout, we headed down to try out Egg-Spress, a Zierer Tivoli Large with a standard layout. It’s identical to Treetops at Oakwood. The ride is good for younger enthusiasts and is certainly better when you’ve got two of you in the car together as you can get thrown about a bit! Not one of the more enjoyable ones for me, but not terrible either!
While we were down this end of the park, we had a go on one the parks two dogems. This one is called Bumpercar Garage and had brightly coloured cars themed to 1920 model cars. The ride was alright, nothing sparkling but it was the more fun of the two dodgem rides the park has, I’ll elaborate later!
After the dodgems, we headed up to the top section of the park and were intending to go on Wavebreaker, the parks dinghy slide, but it stipulates that both of us would have to go in a boat together and with our bag, it wouldn’t have been comfortable so we instead boarded the Pleasurewood Hills express.
The Express takes you around the whole park in a big loop which was great to get our bearings and find some of the bigger named attractions, as well as have a nice sit down!
After we’d had a ride around the full park, we had a go on Safari, a tracked ride that takes you passed wildlife scenes. I don’t like to be too negative on things but this ride is in desperate need of some attention! Many of the scenes are looking very dated and worn and other than a few static scenes, there not much more to see on this. Shame as it occupys a good plot of land and has a nice layout. It could be quite good given some investment.
Zamperla finally made me ill.
Next up was a Zamperla Kite Flyer called, Kite Flyer, very inventive! This attraction can be best described as a wave swinger that you ride laying down. The gondolas feel very similar to Hero at Flamingo Land, and given that they’re the same manufacturer, it wouldn’t surprise me if Kite Flyers were a test bed to see if their version of a flying coaster would work.
Anyway back to Kite Flyer. The ride started of ok, if a little awkward to get into, but very soon into the ride, I started to feel quite ill. I’m not really one for massive spinning rides anyway, but this is the first time since starting this blog that I’ve gotten off a ride and felt really ill from it. I would assume it’s the laying down position or something but I didn’t enjoy it at all unfortunately!
After Kite Flyer, I needed a bit of a breather so we had a sit down at a near by picnic area and had a drink. While we were here we both remarked on how there are plenty of places to sit and you can pretty much see a toilet block from anywhere in the park as they’re that numerous!
We had a wander up passed the arcade and noticed Rootin’ Tootin’ Gun Trail, which is an interactive dark ride so we headed in for a go.
This ride is very similar to Sheriff’s Showdown at Drayton Manor, but with the ride system of Tomb Blaster. This was a great ride and has so much potential that is let down by the scoring system.
To be blunt, it didn’t work! When we got off, we were both eager to see who had won, as we have a good laugh with the completion on these attractions, but we were disappointed to find it doesn’t work.
The cars don’t feature scoreboards so the only way you’ll see your score is outside as you exit the ride. We watched the board and it didn’t change no matter how many people went through, which is a shame!
From Marble Madness to Hyper Drive….
After I’d started feeling better, we had some dinner that we’d brought along and then went on Marble Madness. I was quite looking forward to this as it used to be at Flamingo Land, until it was replaced by Hero.
The ride is decent, not quite as violent as other wild mouse coasters, but definitely not as fun as Gerstlauer bobsleds. Though Hero is a completely different ride, and garners quite a bit of hate, I would definitely say I prefer that to Marble Madness. Neither can top Cobra at Paultons Park though and that is a modern version of Marble Madness!
There isn’t much theming about the coaster, something that it shares with Wipeout and Cannonball Express, but it was fun enough, just not quite as fun as I’d have liked!
Speaking of Cannonball Express, that was our next stop. Despite knowing in advance that this ride was down for maintenance, I still wanted to go and see it as there aren’t many Schwartzkopf coasters left, let alone unique ones like this one.
I will get back down here to have a ride on this as it looks like a great attraction, just a mess of track, twists and turns and thrills. I hope it doesn’t disappoint!
After we’d taken some photos, we wandered back up to the food plaza and had a go on the parks second dodgems ride, Hyper Drive. This was a bit disappointing too as there were only 4 cars actually functional out of around 10 so throughput was quite low. Plus the cars didn’t really have any gusto about them and felt very old, very tired and slow. Hyper Drive this is not!
Next we headed back over towards Kite Flyer and a ride on the parks Chairlift Attraction that takes you from one side of the park to the other which takes around 15 minutes in total!
Though very slow, the views are good and it’s quite pleasant to sit for a good amount of time and just take in the views of the park. There are only two stations, one by Kite Flyer as mentioned and the other is down by Egg-Spress, so it takes you over a lot of the kids rides and past Wipeout too.
After wandering around and taking some more photos down by Egg-Spress and Wipeout, we called it a day and started our trip back home.
My thoughts on Pleasurewood Hills
The park is owned by Looping Group, the same as Drayton Manor. Now Drayton is seeing a lot of investment at their property so I’d hope that Pleasurewood Hills eventually gets the same.
That’s not to say the park is bad at all, but it does have some issues that could do with addressing. Primarily, it needs some investment into proper theming for some of its attractions. Rides like Wipeout don’t have any theming at all, and others, like Egg-Spress have some but it feels like it’s had to be done on a budget.
I also noticed large parts of the park that were fenced off and had old attractions just left there being unused along with ride vehicles and other props too. I believe the was a go kart track at one point and surely this area is big enough for a decent new ride?
Marble Madness also seems to overlook a storage area full of old props and caravans and the area is quite untidy too. This could be easily remedied by putting up themed boards around Marble Madness, so not only does it hide the maintenance areas, but also themes up a ride at the same time!
The left hand side shows how much of the park is disused
I’ve been quite negative so far with my thoughts, but there is plenty to be positive about too! The park has so much space it can use, and a lot of it is quite nicely landscaped too. There’s a decent mix of coasters too, especially since the parks main focus is families with younger kids. Wipeout is probably a little out of place in the line-up, but it gave me a good reason to visit!
All the staff we spoke to were pleasant ad there are a great selection of rides for a younger audience. As I mentioned at the start, the process of having equipment checked was professional and handled well too!
There were certainly the makings of some good themed areas too, especially around the log flume. The bright colours are very reminiscent of Adventure Cove at Drayton Manor, I would love to see more of this around the park.
There’s a lot of potential with this park, very much like Flamingo Land so hopefully Looping Group invest some time and care into Pleasurewood Hills and bring it right up to the forefront of family parks in the UK.
This will be my first full resort review of Drayton Manor, my thoughts of the park and what I’d like to see moving forward.
Drayton Manor is a large theme park located near Drayton Bassett, Staffordshire, UK. The park has a hotel, zoo and a theme park with over 40 different attractions to enjoy.
I’ll do a separate review of the hotel and zoo as they warrant their own blog post, so for now, this will be all about the park.
I like Drayton Manor. It doesn’t have the thrills of Thorpe Park, or the beauty of Alton Towers, but it has its own identity and is definitely worth a visit to collect some credits!
The parks signature attraction is Shockwave, the UK’s only stand up rollercoaster, and also the only one in the world to feature a zero-G roll. It opened the same year as Nemesis at Alton Towers and Big One at Blackpool Pleasure Beach, and yet I rarely hear anyone talk about it!
It’s a shame, and I will go into more detail in another blog about Shockwave, but for now, I like it. It’s unique, it’s fun, it’s a bit rattly and rough in places, but it’s a good classic coaster.
Shockwave is now located in the brand new for 2021 area, Adventure Cove. This new area saw a refresh and reopening of Splash Canyon, now called Adventure Cove River Rapids. Without being too dramatic, but I’d go as far as saying that this is the best river rapids ride the UK has. It’s bright and fun, the soundtrack is funky and the ride incorporates a few special effects here and there which is rare to see on UK rapid’s rides these days.
Also new to the area is Wave Swinger, a Zierer Waveswinger offering both single and double seats. If you’ve been on a Waveswinger before then this doesn’t really do anything new, but it does give a nice view of the new area and its a pleasant little sit down after riding Shockwave or Air Race.
Speaking of Air Race, I’ve yet to get on it, so I can’t talk much about it, but it does look like fun! The same can be said for Maelstrom, the parks Intamin gyro swing. Maybe next time!
The final ride in Adventure Cove is Storm Force 10, a 500m long, 3 drop flume ride. I’ve ridden it once on the very back of one of the boats and you will be thoroughly soaked on this one.
I’d argue that this is the best water ride in the UK as it’s the only one I’ve been on that I had to get changed after riding! The first and last drops are fine, giving you a light spraying but nothing major, it’s the second drop that does the work.
The thing about the second drop is that it’s taken backwards and the back of the boats is flat and not very tall, so when the boat splashes down, it flops into the water rather than gliding over the top, causing a large wave to engulf the boat. Those at the back will get soaked through so bring a change of clothes, just incase (and I’d advice everything from socks and shoes, to underwear). Great ride though!
Next there’s Thomas land, a themed area dedicated to everyone’s favourite, number 1 engine! There are loads of rides here for the the whole family and all are themed around Thomas and Sodor. All in, there are currently 20 different rides and attractions within Thomas land, including a rollercoaster, a fully themed train ride, and plenty of Zamperla junior rides.
Highlights for me are the Troublesome Trucks Runaway Rollercoaster, Cranky’s Drop Tower, Captain’s Sea Adventure and the Thomas and Friends Exhibition.
You could easily lose a day just doing Thomas Land attractions, as most have good throughput, with only Troublesome Trucks and Engine Tours (the themed train ride) having really long queues throughout the day.
Once you’re done in Thomas Land, you would then start heading towards the back of the park. On you way you’ll pass the Carousel and guest services, before coming to a small pirate themed area.
The pirate themed area has a little theming here and there but not quite as much as other themed areas and includes 3 rides. The rides here are a Pirate ship called Bounty, a Seastorm ride called Jolly Buccaneer and a dodgems ride.
I’ve not ridden Bounty or Jolly Buccaneer, but I’ve been on similar at Chessington World of Adventures. As for the Dodgems, I’m not entirely sure why they decided to theme a dodgems around pirates, but it’s something at least!
After the pirate area, you’ll reach Accelerator, a Vekoma Junior boomerang with a racing theme. This is the original prototype Vekoma built, which eventually led to Velociraptor at Paultons Park being built, which I found interesting to know!
The theming is good as the queue line takes you through a garage testing performance cars, and there is plenty to look at here. Though I do think I prefer Velociraptor at Paultons Park to Accelerator, I do like the effort they put into theming the attraction, and the ride itself is good too.
You’ll also find the 4-D cinema adjacent to Accelerator, which for this year is showing Thomas & Friends 4-D Bubbling Boilers. When we went, the 3D effects weren’t working, but we got the same show as intended, just without the 3D glasses.
It was a decent time, not mind blowing or anything but still a pleasant show to experience.
Moving past the 4-D cinema you’ll find the Haunting, Sheriff’s Showdown and Drunken Barrels. All three of these have something good to offer, so I’ll start with The Haunting.
The Haunting is a walkthrough attraction and Vekoma Madhouse ride themed to a haunted vicarage. The queue was a bit long for this one, but when we did eventually get brought in, we were shown a video setting the scene. The story goes that the vicarage is supposed to be haunted and we’ve been brought in to see if we notice any paranormal activity.
There are two areas next, a corridor with lights and effects that leads into the second area, a square room. Here the attraction really shined for me as I really wasn’t expecting what happens in that room. I won’t spoil that part, but it’s not too scary or anything, just very interesting and really well done!
The room then leads into the ride section of the attraction, the lapbars come down and the ride begins. I’ve ridden both Hex at Towers and Haunted House Monster Party at Legoland, and personally, I feel The Hauntings Madhouse section is the weakest of the three.
It’s still good and give you the same feelings as the other two do, but there were a few synchronisation issues that I noticed that spoilt the illusion for me.
Next along is Sheriff’s Showdown, and interactive shooting ride themed to the wild west. I like this ride, and I think Merlin could do to take some notes from this for Duel and Tomb Blaster.
Unlike Duel and Tomb blaster, Sheriff’s Showdown is more than a pleasant drive through a themed shooting gallery as many of the targets cause things to happen when shot. Be it shooting out lights, or causing cans to fall which are really nice touches and gives the ride character and reridability. Sheriff’s Showdown is definitely a highlight of the visit!
Drunken Barrels is the last ride along and is a teacup style ride themed to Oktoberfest. Each rider sits in a barrel with up to 5 others, and as with other teacup rides, you can decide how much or how little you want to spin. The big difference here is that the entire platform tilts and raises you up to a 45 degree angle, which is both fun to ride and great to watch from off ride too.
The show building is themed excellently and the ride is also indoors so it’s great if the weather isn’t quite so good too!
After coming off Drunken Barrels, you’ll see a toilet block as well as Apocalypse, the parks thrilling drop tower. At the time of writing this I believe that Apocalypse will be leaving Drayton Manor at the end of the season, which is a real shame as the ride is excellent.
It consists of 5 drop towers all together, two are sit down and two are stand up and the final one is a stand up floorless tower, the first of its kind. I’ve managed to experience both the floorless and sit down drops this year, both are excellent, but the floorless one is in another league.
I used to really detest drop towers as they were a bit out of my comfort zone, but having tried a few this year, I can honestly say I see the appeal and I’d love to have a go on the really tall ones!
At the foot of Apocalypse is Pandemonium, a Fabbri swinging inverter. This was my first go on one of these and thought it was a great experience, I did suffer quite badly with my shoulders digging into the restraint when we were held upside down. I don’t recall this being an issue on Rameses’ Revenge when that was at Chessington, so I gather it’s Fabbri’s restraints.
Next is Flying Dutchman, another Wave swinger, this time manufactured by Intamin. The key difference between this and the other one in the park, is this one has you say in little boats, and it doesn’t tilt. It’s quite a relaxed ride, and really should be in the pirate themed area!
Finally there’s the Buffalo Rollercoaster off to the side. I don’t have much nice to say about this one I’m afraid! The theming is ok, but the ride itself is quite dull!
The coaster is powered by what looks to be two drive wheels and a hamster as it has little force at all and doesn’t really do much for me! I know it’s a junior ride, but I’ve been on plenty at Adventure Island, Chessington and Alton Towers, and all of theirs have a decent helix or something!
I’d love to see this themed up more, a few little airtime hills added and it sped up just a little. Still keep it as a junior coaster of course, but give it something for you to remember it by!
There is also a lovely train ride that takes you around Adventure Cove, the lake and behind Shockwave but I felt that this was criminally underused as more than half of the ride has you looking at nothing but behind the scenes parts. Shame really!
I’d love to see Drayton add a new modern thrill coaster to its lineup, maybe next to Buffalo Rollercoaster or to replace it entirely. I never got to ride G-Force when that was at the park, but something along those lines would be great!
Since Apocalypse is up for sale, maybe move the rides around at the back of the park and create a new themed area there. Incorporate Sheriff’s showdown and a few new junior and thrill flat rides, maybe even have a new version of the Buffalo Rollercoaster for this area!
There is plenty of potential at Drayton Manor, and with it being sold to Looping Group, hopefully they’ll invest money to make a good park, into a great one!
loopsandlapbars.com 