Mackem Lad
Mega Poster
I took a trip to Camelot Theme Park for the first time since I was a wee nipper on Tuesday, so it was pretty much a new park experience for myself. I've heard many bad stories of Camelot; how it is an awful park that looks very run-down, but nevertheless I headed to the park with an open mind!
Fortunately I had complimentary tickets from the park which was great, and to be honest I doubt I would have visited had I not. £20 admission seems very steep what the park offers, particularly when you consider the park is family oriented. When you take into account Pleasure Beach are offering £20 wristbands at the moment, it's not hard to pinpoint the reason why people are avoiding Camelot as it doesn't exactly seem value for money.
Upon Entry
Anyway, we (myself and Sean) arrived at the park just after 11am and we were greeted by a full car park, and a further 3 full overflow car parks. Looks pretty busy!
Upon entering the park I was very impressed with the medieval / castle entrance, you can clearly see that the park once had an amazing theme and it looks like it's been taken care of. Unfortunately I did find the theme weakened the further you ventured into the park, which was a great shame because you can see the place has massive potential. The thing I also loved about Camelot was how it felt much like a park, a kingdom infact. There's a lot of wooded areas that give the park that intimate atmosphere.
Knightmare
First ride of the day was Knightmare which is obviously the park's signature attraction and the one I was most looking forward to after hearing very positive reviews. Looking at photos, I've always thought Knightmare looked a little lost and didn't exactly go with the area well, but I couldn't have been more wrong. The ride looks fantastic as you approach it and I love how the ride extends over the area below.
We queued just over 10 minutes, which was a surprise considering how busy the car park looked and how crowded the park was as we made our way to the ride. After being strapped in with the ridiculous seatbelts - they really do slow down the loading times which leads to trains stacking, we were off up the spiral lift hill, a rather unusual experience. The ride doesn't feel all that high at that top, but the first drop was fair nevertheless. The turnaround and airtime hill (which offered pretty much nothing) is incredibly jolty, but I'm not one of those who is particularly bothered by that sort of thing. Back to the "main" side of the ride, we were thrown down the much talked about physco drop which I thought was good but as with the whole ride, not great. It certainly didn't feel like 5Gs to me! After the twist and turns that follow, which were more fun that I imagined, the ride comes to end.
Overall I thought Knightmare was a good coaster, but not as good as some people make out. It's certainly nowhere near one of the best coasters in the UK in my opinion. What you see is what you get would be the best way to put it.
Whirlwind
We then took a little walk down to the farm, where I was almost attacked by a goat when I went to film it, which passed another 10 minutes (you might guess we were trying to make the day last as long as possible). Back up to the theme park now and we headed to the park's other major coaster, Whirlwind.
Whirlwind has been accredited as being the best spinning coaster in the UK, and I have to say those claims ain't too far off! After a 15 minute queue, we were on the ride which provided an absolute barrel of laughs. The thing is absolutely wild and there is never a dull moment, it uses its pace extremely well. It also spins quite a lot so as you can imagine how is was a very disorientating ride! Crackin' little coaster that gets the big thumbs up from me. Is it the best spinner in the UK? I'd say as a ride it was on par with Dragon's Fury, but unfortunately is slightly travelling look just makes it short. A bloody good and valiant effort though! It's a shame I only went on it once TBH.
Jousting Show
We caught the 12:30pm performance of the jousting show and I have to say it was fantastic. A very professional performance and something Camelot should be proud of. By far the best live show in the UK. The lead-up to the knights themselves was dragged on a little but the jester had some decent jokes amongst the shameless pluggin' for £1.50 inflatable hammers and a £5 DVD of his magic show! Great show though once it got into the swing of things, there was a lot audience interaction which was great to see! The show lasts about 30 minutes and encourage anyone who visits to see it! Having said that, Sean was falling asleep and moaning as per usual - so he will now be known as Sir Moanalot!
Lunch
After the jousting show it was time for a spot of lunch! Again, this is an area that reportedly let Camelot down, but to be fair it was better than what people make out. Prices may seem expensive but to be honest I've come accustomed to such prices at theme parks now that I just see it as the going rate. Sir Moanalot decided to get something from Wimpy and I headed to the chippy for sausage and chips! The quality of food was fine, although the sausage tasted ever so slightly mushy inside and the coke had too much soda water in comparison to the flavour. Nevertheless, I'm not one of those who are too fussy when it comes to food quality - I'm not expecting The Ritz afterall!
Other Attractions
We did most of the smaller rides during the day. I'll keep these brief. Dodgems were okay, they were on the slow side and the tyre around the car was slightly deflated with took out any "ump" in the bump. Log Flume was decent, the mountain theming looks really good and the drop was fair. Dungeons of Doom, a ghetto ghost train, was one of those rides that you just love for being so bad! What theming there was inside was actually decent, all the figures looked quite cool, but unfortunately these were sparse and sections were brought together with black sheets with witchcraft symbols spray painted on. Go Karts were a separate charge attraction (£3.50), but we didn't pay for entrance so we thought why not. They were quite good actually, the track and karts were in good condition.
Dragon Flyer
Following this we decided to ride Dragon Flyer - a ride that is given much spotlight because of it's unusual method of getting a ride going - a diesel engine! The queue line is very nicely shaded and again creates a slightly magical feel - if only they had some music to go with it! The ride itself is a decent enough, yet strangely doesn't feel too much like a rollercoaster, moreso a raised railway that goes about 20mph! I did take quite a beating on this ride though, I wonder if that's why the ask the smaller people to sit on the right otherwise they'd probably come back looking like 12 rounds in the ring with Mike Tyson!
Going Home
At this point, around 3:30pm, Sir Moanalot was starting to (yup, you guessed it) moan that he was bored. I did manage to persuade him to take one more ride on Knightmare before we headed home. This time we sat right at the back, as opposed to the front row on the first time, and the ride didn't feel too much different. The physco drop was slightly better as you were whipped over and around but the rest was pretty much the same as the first. I still maintain my opinion that it is slightly overrated.
We left the park just after 4pm and I felt like we'd had a good day out, no need to ask how Sir Moanalot felt! As we exited we notice a sign saying "See you again soon" - the question is, will we see Camelot soon? Going by Tuesday, it's hard to see how the park is financially struggling. At £20 a head, they can't be doing too bad.
Will I be back any time soon? Probably not. Camelot is most certainly one of those parks that need to be visited in a large group as there just isn't enough to do! Had it not been a fairly busy day, we'd have no doubt been bored just after lunch.
I didn't take any photos unfortunately, which explains the lack of them in this report! I did take some video footage though, but not sure there is quite enough to make a decent video!
Thanks for reading.
