Chessington opening day

[jokerman]

First day of the main season at Chessington today, and since tomorrow is my birthday, I was there.
Anyway, arrived at about 10:10, got in at around half past, and went to Vampire, where the queue hadn't been opened. They couldn't tell us what was wrong, or why we had to wait, but at about 10:50, it started testing, and by 11:10 we were allowed in, and we got on the first train of the day.
Next up we went to black Buccaneer. Couldn't get as far back as I would have liked, but still fun.
Next up was the Dodgems, which provided us with the only breakdown we experienced all day. The PA system broke, so they couldn't give the safety announcments, but it was fixed quickly.
After that, my memory goes a bit blurry, so I won't attempt to give an order for the rides, just a count:

Vampire - 4
Dragon's Fury - 4
Rattlesnake - 1
Dodgems - 1
Billy's Whizzer - 1
Tomb Blaster - 1
Dragon Falls - 1
Bubbleworks - 1
Black Buccaneer - 1
Penguin show - 1
Aquarium - 1

I think that's it. Good points of today, we managed to miss most of the long queues, and the pizza buffet place was excellent, even if they did try to sell us annual passes.

Unfortunately, the new part of the sealife centre hasn't been completed yet which was disappointing.

A very good day, and I will be going back there soon hopefully.

 

[peep]

Was it quite busy? What did you think of the new queueline for Vampire?

I'm going tomorrow and reading your report of today just makes me even more excited.

 

[Nemesis Inferno]

Not too suprised that the staff didn't know the problem, we're told not to tell guests or give times... Thought that was common knowledge?

Today was fun, I got Will to go on Griffin's :lol:

 

[Will]

^
Yeah, I stuck my nose into the park for all of 70 minutes this afternoon, due to extreme boredom... Planned to harass Benin for a while, but he was actually doing work, so I wandered off, in case he attempted to make me ride Griffin's again - it wasn't much fun, and all the families attempting to ride were clearly thoroughly unimpressed by my attendance :lol:
I also went on Dragon's Fury for the first time since GhosterForce, and was actually very impressed by how well it was running - I find Fury variable at best, but today it was very much on form, and, despite how busy the park looked, I only queued around 10/15 minutes for it, and while I didn't ride anything else, all queues for major rides looked about the same.
Vampire queue line fences have been painted purple, and do look a lot better for it, but that wasn't enough to tempt me into the line, so don't know if anything else looks any better down there - various other places around the park look their usual mess (thinking particularly of Beanoland), and most looks almost entirely as it did at the end of last season - though that's probably to be expected
On another note, after my moan about getting rid of food outlets last year, I have to say the chicken place near Rameses did look very tempting, so I look forward to trying that out in the next month or so. Pizza and pasta similarly interesting, but I'm not much of a fan of either food...
Hadn't been to the zoo since the end of last year either, so thoroughly enjoyed half an hour or so wandering around there, not least as the leopard (which looked thoroughly unimpressed with life, it must be said), which I don't normally. Similarly, the lions were not just lazing around, but were for once engaging in an activity that wasn't eating, sleeping or mating - perhaps, after the closed season they were intrigued by a sudden increase in the number of people gathered around the glass, for all guests were subject to close scrutiny by said lions, as they stood alongside each other, looking downright formidable, but making for a rare and somewhat awesome photo opportunity (had I had my camera).

There was also Sealife centre, which I walked through fairly quickly, as it was busier than I like it, and because I wanted to observe the new bit - and I have to say, thoroughly impressed by Amazonia - the scenery and theming beats almost anything I've seen in British aquaria (and I've done several), and I'd be very happy if the rest of the centre was of anything like that quality. There was just one small problem - while the new section looked great, I couldn't help noticing there weren't any fish in it - a few fairly bland brackish water species towards the end, something equally dull on the other side (and some fairly awesome poison dart frogs... which I couldn't see, because the awesomely themed new area is also rather too small for high visitor numbers) - and 2 or 3 empty tanks in between. Essentially, I'd give Amazonia around 9 for presentation, and less than 2 for content - it is a poor representation of its name - a fabulous array of aquatic life can be found in the Amazon, with aquarium staples like Piranha, big catfish, Pacu and Arowana to name but a few - instead, what is promised for the currently empty tanks? Cardinal ****ing tetra and Freshwater Angelfish - both of which also happen to live in my fish tank at home. Nice one, Chessington...
I admit there's an argument that they couldn't do a lot with the minimal space that section takes up, but it would have required next to no effort to improve upon the current line up - not impressed. No, I still haven't forgiven them for losing their gibbons in May 2007, but I'd still probably better end these moans here, since neither are of significant concern to most on these forums :lol: That said, if this is intended as an advertisement of the Sealife brand, then they could do with making it more convincing - I'm already disappointed they've got control of the London Aquarium, which was great before Merlin, but poor on my latest visit...

Once more, I digress. I think that may be because after Sealife, it started raining, then hailing then being yucky, so I went home :lol: It wasn't bad (but for the content of Amazonia), but this was only meant as a flying visit - looking forward to going back for a day with people, and it being better That said, if you're thinking of a trip to Chessington to see if anything's changed - don't bother. HOWEVER - if you want to go to a Southern Merlin park where the rides are running - look no further.

 

[Ian]

Yay! An almost flawless opening for a UK park!