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China - March 2018 (Day 10 – Suzhou + Summary)

Hixee

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Day 0 – Travel & Arrival

After many years of fantasising about it, I decided to finally get on with it and go and see what all the fuss is about. I decided to go for a trip based out of Shanghai, spending about 50% of my time there, and the other 50% heading inland towards some other notable creds.

Due to me being a bit tight, I didn’t fly direct to Shanghai and instead went via Beijing (half the price…!). All fairly painless really, although was feeling pretty tired by the time I got to the hostel in Shanghai.

The hostel was decent, but actually only felt like a part-hostel. There were a number of the traditional 12-16 bed dormitories, but most of the building was actually private rooms with private bathrooms. It was one of these I’d gone for – can rarely be bothered with the dormitory type rooms anymore.

A quick bite to eat, and then it was off to bed. I was hitting the ground running the day after, so needed to rest up.

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Here’s a quick shot of the outside of the hostel.

Jet lag was a bit of a bitch the first night (in fact, for the first few nights of this trip – the first time I’ve ever had issues with it really, which is a bit strange), so I wasn’t able to sleep particularly well and ended up being awake far too early to head to the park. Instead I decided to head out for a quick look at Shanghai in the early hours. Fair to say it was rather nice, and certainly quiet – very different to how it would be any other time of day!

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The Pudong skyline.

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Looking along The Bund.

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This report will likely take me a few weeks to get through, but hoping that starting here will give me some encouragement to get on with it!

Disney next…
 

Hixee

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Sunrise pics are a bit different to the usual ones from around there ; good work! :)
Thanks. :) You'll see some more of the "typical" shots later on, too. :p

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Day 1 – Shanghai Disneyland

Right then, let’s get to it. First up, Disney.

Any easy (albeit it reasonably long) ride on the metro from where I was staying (fairly central) and I was at the park’s station. Took the advice of the announcement on the train and picked up a ticket for the return trip – turned out to be a good idea as it was rammed later.

The entrance to this park was a bit strange for one so new. They had hundreds of meters of temporary barriers set up channelling people in to the first queue (for the security checks). Fine – I thought – they must take it all down at the end of the day so people can flood out of the park. Turns out that’s not the case, they were all still there when I was leaving. Why haven’t they got something a bit more permanent installed then? Just made the whole thing look a bit scruffy, which is a shame, because once you’re in the park that’s not the case at all!

Anyway, first impressions over it was time to join the scrum of a queue for the security check.

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Crikey.

I’d pre-bought my ticket online, although seemingly so had everyone else as the actual ticket booths had no queues. Once I got to the turnstile (just showed my confirmation number) he gave me a ‘proper’ ticket and let me in.

Tip for anyone going – download the app and scan your park ticket (QR code) as soon as you can. It lets you manage your fastpasses and stuff all through the app. You can reserve your fastpass spot right away, which is much easier than making the mad dash to the physical fastpass machines. I did this and bagged the massively popular Soaring for later in the day.

So, here’s some pictures of the entrance and approach to the castle:

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I haven’t been to a Disney park in… 15 years (!), so there was something quite ‘magical’ about the approach.

As I’d reserved a Soaring fastpass for much later in the day, I decided to head clockwise around the park, with TRON cred anxiety taking hold a little bit. Walked towards Tomorrowland and was instantly impressed by the feel of the place – the huge canopy and the noises from TRON set a lovely atmosphere.

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Buzz Lightyear was on the way to TRON, and was listed as a walk-on, so I headed in to that first. In simple terms just a dark shooter, but I really liked the way the targets were presented and the accuracy of the blasters. I was much less inclined to just spam the trigger, and instead actually focused on trying to hit the smaller (and more valuable) targets. Excellent stuff.

Next on to TRON. The queue was listed as ~10 minutes – perfect! Headed in to the queue and walked through the launch room just as a train was entering. Wow, what a fantastic build up to the coaster! The lights, the sounds, the trains, all of it works so well. It was a very impressive section of queue. I took some better photos later, so you’ll have to wait for now.

Then it was through to the station itself (it was indeed about a 10 minute wait), which also had a lovely aesthetic. I particularly liked how the lights on each bike ‘energised’ individually when the restraint was closed. A small, but nice, touch. Again, better pictures later.

On to the ride itself then. The launch was good, more powerful than I was expecting (especially towards the end), made better by the launch room and associated lighting and audio effects. The outdoor section was nice, but the indoor section is where this coaster was really excellent. The mirrors, screens, theming objects, all made this really impressive. My only criticism is that it would have been nice for there to be a little more of the coaster given over to the interactions between your train and your rivals. There were a couple of wonderful scenes (especially the mirrored wall), but it would have been cool for them to play up on that a bit more. Still, a great coaster.

They were running it pretty well (I suppose as expected from Dinsey), so there were plenty of trains going round for me to take some pictures of.

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On the way out I wandered through the catch-ily titled “Chevrolet Digital Challenge” and did their motion-capture thing. Meh…

Made my way round to Seven Dwarfs, as the next major attraction and final cred. Unfortunately, the single rider queue was closed, and the wait time was approaching 60 minutes, but the queue wasn’t too bad and kept moving steadily. Their estimation was about right, however, and an hour later I was on the ride. Another coaster that looked lovely, rode really nicely and was all in all a great ride. It did feel quite short, but it was high quality, so…

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After taking some more pictures, I moved on to Pirates of the Caribbean – another hotly anticipated ride for me. On the way, walking past the queue for the teacups. Might be the longest queue for the teacups I’ve ever seen!

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Why would you do this for the teacups?!

Now round to Treasure Cove, which has a lovely entrance looking over the lake, and a nice approach up to Pirate of the Caribbean.

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No pictures from inside Pirates, but holy ****. That ride…

I mean, in all honesty that’s probably the best non-coaster I’ve ever ridden. The scale, the detail, the quality, all of it is incredible. I can’t really find the motivation to write a huge detailed review, there’s almost too much for me to be able to discuss, but I think everyone who’s ridden it (or maybe watched the POV) will agree it’s spectacular.

By the time I was finished with Pirates (and a bite to eat at one of the small food stalls), the stunt show was nearly about to start, so I took a bit of time off my feet for that. On whole, pretty good. I have to admit it was a little slow going at first (admittedly maybe in part due to it all being in Chinese so the longer sections of dialogue seemed to drag on), but the final few stunts – especially the indoor wind tunnel stunt – were really impressive.

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From Treasure Cove I continued my walk round the lake to Adventure Isle. I liked this area of the park – I liked the tropical feel to it all. I’d decided to get a fastpass for Roaring Rapids (the queue was getting up towards 90 mins, but I did want to give it a go), so headed that way next.

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Unfortunately the ropes course thing was closed, but it looked excellent!

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Roaring Rapids was pretty good. Not too much splashing, I have to admit, but the landscaping and theming details were really nice. I also liked the final big drop – they’re always surprisingly scary!

I had a little bit of time before my Soaring fastpass time slot, so headed towards the castle to try out the “Once Upon A Time” Adventure ride (short queue) and the maze while I waited. Both reasonably pleasant attractions, but I can’t say I’d do them again. Both just felt like lots of walking – I’d already done loads of that – maybe just not my thing.

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The castle looks great.

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The park was very busy – don’t know if that’s normal or not. Shanghai is massive, so I guess it must be busy often.

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Slightly terrifying.

Perfect timing, my time slot at Soaring had just opened up.

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Thank goodness I got the fastpass! 165 minutes!

Soaring was excellent – as I had expected. The quality of the screen, the movement and the smells were all really well executed. These rides always impress me in their scale, although I often don’t love the ride experiences themselves (they don’t ‘wow’ me), but I have to admit this was one of the best ones. I’d say it was marginally better than Voletarium, but possibly only because of the absence of the robot and Eurowings! :p

I headed for another ride on Pirates (single rider again), which was again excellent. A little bit of stacking in the ride though, we did stop in the battle scene for a minute or so for some reason. Still, top quality stuff.

Then it was a quick ride on Peter Pan (thanks to another fastpass slot allocated through the app), before heading back to Tomorrowland.

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This coaster looks so good.

This time I got some better shots of the launch room and station. I think you’ll agree this looks fantastic, but without the sound and dynamic lighting it doesn’t really do it justice.

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A back row ride this time, which was better than nearer the front. It’s amazing seeing the whole train twisting in front of you, especially with the lighting on the trains. It also gives you a bit more time to react to all of the various off-train effects throughout the ride. Really wonderful stuff.

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I spent 10-15 minutes here taking a break and getting plenty of pictures. Quite pleased with some of these.

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This turned out to be one of the hardest to get!

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Finally it was time to go and get a spot for the closing firework show – Ignite the Dream.

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Ah Disney. So iconic.

Now, the firework show. I’m going to add a few caveats here – it was very good. Very, very good. But… but… I have to admit some (not all) of the projection mapping was a bit crap. Some of the scenes didn’t work terribly well projected on to the highly irregular architecture of the castle. That being said, the music and fireworks were very impressive, and the finale was great.

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This was during a Pirates of the Caribbean bit, simulated cannon-fire where they just seem to set fire to the whole thing.

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Part of the finale sequence – wonderful!

After the show had ended I joined the droves of people leaving the park. Thankfully managed to avoid getting caught up in too much of the crowds, and thanks to having my metro ticket already I skipped straight past the growing lines at the machines. I happened to end up being on a train that was nearly empty, a welcome break from the busyness of the end of the day.

Back to the hostel and almost straight to bed. I was exhausted!

Shanghai Disneyland: As I said above, this was my first Disney park in a very long time. I was very impressed, really. They really are a standard above most of the rest of the parks in the world, and this one was no exception. The layout was good, it was easy to navigate and the rides are all high quality.

TRON Lightcycle Power Run: By far the best coaster at this park. Not that Seven Dwarfs isn’t great, but TRON really is brilliant. The way the theming and effects work together is highly commendable and it makes for a great ride experience.

Pirates of the Caribbean: This might actually be my favourite ride in the park. It’s probably the best non-coaster I’ve ever done. If you have the opportunity – go ride this ride.

That’s about all I can be bothered to write for this park, so hopefully been engaging enough! Next up: Happy Valley.
 

vaugc002

Mega Poster
Your photos are amazing! Especially the night shots of TRON. I've always through that coaster looked great so glad it lives up to expectations.
It really does look like a very pretty park tbh
 

Coaster Hipster

Giga Poster
Amazing photos! You say it doesn't do TRON effects justice, but I feel it's pretty close. The atmosphere looks really impressive :) Looking forward to the rest of your report!
 

HeartlineCoaster

Theme Park Superhero
Pirates of the Caribbean: This might actually be my favourite ride in the park. It’s probably the best non-coaster I’ve ever done.
Completely agree. There's very few non-coaster things I'd sit on all day, but that's definitely one of them.

Some really lovely photos in there, how much time do pictures usually take out of your day?
 

Hixee

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Some really lovely photos in there, how much time do pictures usually take out of your day?
The short answer - not as much these days any more. I've been doing this for a little while now, so I usually have a decent feel for how to get what I'm after. I've also no shame in admitting that almost all of these photos go through a brief session in Photoshop for final colour correction too. I rarely feel like I'm 'wasting time' getting the shots, but then part of the enjoyment of this hobby is taking the photos too, so...
 

HeartlineCoaster

Theme Park Superhero
I generally walk away disappointed with mine, but equally wouldn't want to walk away thinking about 'wasting time'.
Good to know that there's a balance to strive for.
 

Hixee

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I generally walk away disappointed with mine, but equally wouldn't want to walk away thinking about 'wasting time'.
Good to know that there's a balance to strive for.
Maybe "wasting time" wasn't the best choice of words - I suppose what I meant was that I don't mind taking a bit of time out of the day for the photos. To me, it's part of my day out, not a distraction from. That said, I don't find it takes up a significant portion of time these days.
 

Hixee

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Day 2 – Happy Valley Shanghai

Wasn’t quite so much of an early start for me this morning, which meant I wasn’t wandering around Shanghai in the early hours! Instead it was on the train to Happy Valley. Doesn’t quite have its own stop, but does have a free shuttle bus from a nearby station (Sheshan on Line 9, for those that are interested).

Got to the station and followed the signs to the bus stop (pedestrian bridge over the main road) where there was a bus already waiting. Driver was milling around outside, and a couple of people were on the bus, so happy days. Shortly after we were on our way to the park (~10-15 minute drive).

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I got a park ticket easily enough, and waited in the ‘non-group’ line for them to open the turnstiles. There were lots (and lots) of schoolchildren waiting in the ‘group’ line, which did make me a little apprehensive about how the queues would bear out. Soon enough we were being let in – lots of schoolchildren faffing, so that made me feel a little better!

None of the rides were running right away (park opened at 9am, rides start opening at 10am), so I took a bit of time milling around taking pictures and getting familiar with the park layout. They seemed to jump the gun a little bit and opened the woodie 15-20 minutes early, so once I saw it running I headed that way.

On to the coaster, then. The queue took a little while (thanks to one train operations and the exercise routine), but after a little while I was there. On the whole, the coaster was pretty good. The airtime was pretty solid throughout, and I liked the layout. It did feel a bit like it was suffering from wear and tear, with some sections of the track feeling particularly violent. Still, it was a great coaster and a good one to chalk up.

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By the time I was off the woodie, the rest of the coasters were running (or at least, those that I’d spotted in the queue or from the lift hill). Next up – Diving Coaster.

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Shorter queue for this one, but still felt slow – no exercises this time, but still only one-train operations. I’ll stop pointing that out at this point, as with the exception of the small spinners, everything was just on one-train ops. Tedious.

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Testing…

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On the coaster soon enough, and on the front row. These coasters are pretty good crowd pleasers. I can see why they’re popular. I’ve done a few now, so knew what to expect really, and I liked the height, speed and smoothness of it all. Watersplash was also as impressive as ever!

Grabbed a few more pictures (with operations like this you have to pick your vantage point for maximum gain from each train), then headed on towards the Mega-Lite.

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This picture was from later on in the day, but including it here.

I continued round the park towards the Mega-Lite. Didn’t look promising – sign out the front of the ride stating something about regular maintenance and “13:00” – hopefully it’ll open later. I was a bit anxious really, as this was definitely a highlight for me (too basic to have done Piraten yet, so this was set to be my first, and hotly anticipated, Mega-Lite). Oh well, guess we’ll have to see what happens at 13:00. Next up was in to the “Happy Ocean” area of the park, with the smaller coasters in the park. On the way, however, some nice park scenery:

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Two kiddie creds (Coastal Ant and Crazy Elves) next. +2.

Family Inverted Coaster was next – the strange B&M family invert. It sure does look a bit funky. There’s something about the shape of B&M track that means my brain was expecting it to be on a much bigger coaster, but when you actually get up close and realise it’s a small coaster it’s a good perspective trick! Same thing happens with the trains really, they do look like the standard trains for the most park.

Strange aesthetics aside, it rides very well. It does feel slightly more cumbersome than its competitors, but the first drop and first corner felt much more intense too. It’s obviously very smooth, and the twisting/helix section is nice, as is the final dive into the brakes. On the whole, pretty excellent really. Plus, a huge hit with smaller kids, who were running to do laps of it. I suppose at the end of the day, that’s all it really needs to do! Felt quite smug too, as I thought I had one of those unique creds, but I’d forgotten about the one opening in Beijing. :(

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The surprisingly intense first drop.

Moved round to the mine train walking past the flying island on the way:

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Mine Train Coaster was also surprisingly intense, but I can’t say I really loved it. Drops were good, helices were intense, but it wasn’t particularly interesting. Anyway, it was about lunchtime and that was all the creds done (except Mega-Lite), so thought I’d slow down a bit now, grab a bite to eat and ride the flying island. They always provide good views of the park, and this was no exception.

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The mine train.

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The family invert.

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Mega-Lite over in the distance being all spiteful.

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Wood Coaster – Fireball, in artistic mode.

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Just as I was coming down on the flying island (too low to snap the appropriate picture), a train full of riders crested the lift hill of Mega-Lite – jackpot! I made my way back to the coaster, and sure enough it was up and running. My crude translation of the sign earlier was right. Cool, pleased with that.

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Another ‘artistic’ one.

Best vantage point of the coaster was from the exit path, and thanks to the small trains (and I assume late opening, meaning people were keen to ride) they were able to fill them reasonably well and get the train dispatched quite frequently.

As for the ride itself – I was very impressed. The airtime is very good throughout, it’s smooth and in places very fast. I can see why these are popular coasters with enthusiasts! I rode four times back to back, sampling seats spread throughout the train, and have to say that the back was slightly better than the front – simply a bit more intense.

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From there I decided to hit up some of the non-coasters alongside grabbing re-rides on the bigger ones that were left as I made my way towards the park exit.

I did the haunted house – it was rubbish. Just a [very] low budget walkthrough.

I did Soaring Dragon – it was better, but still not amazing. A flying theatre with a decent movie, but less than brilliant seat motion. Although maybe everything would be a let-down compared to Disney the day before!

I did Splashover – it had a very short cycle. Just about the only thing I remember about this top spin. Yay.

A couple of rides on the B&M and the woodie to close out the day, seeing as they were essentially walk-ons at this point (all the school kids had left).

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Well, that was Happy Valley then. Got on the bus easily enough (followed signs from the park exit), and back on the train in to central Shanghai.

Happy Valley: On the whole this park reminded me a bit of a Thorpe type park – it has some bigger thrill coasters, with a few flats here and there, and mild theming throughout. Credit to them, the coaster selection (the woodie, Mega-Lite and two B&Ms, supported by the mine train and kiddie creds) is a solid line up. Most of the park felt reasonably well kept, with only a few bits feeling run down, and it wasn’t too busy in the end either. All in all, a good day!

Once I was back in central Shanghai, I decided to head out along Nanjing Road. Essentially the Shanghai equivalent of 5th Ave or Oxford Street, it’s filled with shops and lights. All pretty impressive, I have to admit. Was a nice end to the day, before I headed back to the hostel to try and catch up on sleep!

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Finish with a fancy one.

Next up – last park day in Shanghai, some +1s and some general sightseeing.
 
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Hixee

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I'm curious to how you'd compare Intamin Mega-lites to the Chance Hyperlite.
Actually a good point - they are both in the same category.

The Intamins are much smoother, they flow much better and have a much more "controlled" feeling of airtime. The Chance models feel much more erratic and less refined. Lightning Run verges on uncomfortable, but I think not because the airtime is stronger rather that it's less well executed. I think another iteration of the Hyperlite would probably refine the design to the point of it being a better model, but at the moment I prefer the Megalite.
 

Hixee

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Day 3 – Jin Jiang Action Park, +1s & Shanghai Tourism

Today was planned to be another Shanghai park, followed by a bit of Shanghai sightseeing. A short day in terms of the creds, but I was expecting it to be a fairly busy one!

First up though, creds.

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Another straightforward ride on the metro to Jin Jiang park (for what it’s worth, leave the station, use the underpass to cross the highway, walk through the little park and somewhere along the way you’ll spot the GIB/Ferris Wheel), and a fairly straightforward ticket system. Can’t remember the specifics, but it was a ‘per-ride’ type system (with discounts for buying a multiple ride ticket of various sizes) with the option for an unlimited. I was only interested in the creds, so picked up a six-ride ticket.

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It was before even buying the tickets that I resigned to the fact that the GIB wasn’t going to open. There was a sign out the front saying temporary maintenance was taking place on a few rides, one of which was “Giant Inverted Boomerang”. Figured that meant it would be down all day. They were testing the lift mechanisms at various points, but the trains seemed to only be partially assembled from what I could see, so yeah… spite.

Anyway, might as well get the rest, I suppose.

First up – the spinner. I was expecting this to be really ****, and it actually wasn’t. Trackwork wise a little rough round the edges, but the spinning was excellent. Much more than the standard Maurer/Zamperla offerings, at least.

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Wandered round to Karst Cave Coaster next – first rider of the day and only rider on the train. Reminded me a bit of the powered coasters at Adventureland in Dubai, with high speed laterals and strange straightaways and even some interesting theming (in this case a big cave with lots of multi-coloured lights). Only afterwards did I realise they’re all Zamperla powered coasters, which explains their similarities!

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The moto coaster was testing still at this point, so I figured I’d go for a ride on the ferris wheel. Picked up a ticket (it’s not included in the standard ride pass) and headed on. Views were pretty impressive, I have to admit. I haven’t done many of these large wheels, and I’m always pleased with how high they are. It also offered a nice vantage point over the park and surrounding housing areas.

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Nothing to do with the ferris wheel, but features the heavily spiteful shuttles.
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As I was coming back down, the huge pumping station on the rapids started up. To many, maybe not a particularly exciting event, but I’d never actually seen a rapids start up before. It was pretty cool to see the first wave of water crashing down the empty channel. Interestingly though, they then dispatched a raft, with riders, almost right away. The raft was going through the first set of rapids before the water had even wetted the last section of rapids. Obviously no real reason why that would matter, but it did stand out to me as an amusing moment.

Seeing as the GIB was spiting, I figured I’d take a ride on the aforementioned rapids. They were okay, pretty fast and span a lot, but weren’t very wet. I was the only one in the boat though, so maybe if the boat had been heavier that might not have been the case.

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Took another ride on the spinner, before heading over to the moto coaster, which was now running with riders. Painfully slow dispatching, but got there eventually. I’d never ridden one of these models before, and I have to say the launch was unexpected. A slow pull at the start, but ramped up quite significantly on the last part. Apart from that, it’s pretty crap, but a decent enough crowd pleaser, I suppose. I took two laps to use up the final two on the ticket.

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Jin Jiang Action Park: In short, a basic +3. Whilst disappointed about missing out on the GIB, I can’t imagine that had it been running I’d have been in love with the place. It’s going for a different market to the parks I’d been to so far, which is fine, but I’d only ever go back to get the GIB.

From Jin Jiang, I planned to head into central Shanghai for some [mostly] non-park related activities. Getting off the metro at People’s Square killed several birds with one stone – I could check out People’s Park, get the cred at People’s Park, check out the Urban Planning Museum, and pre-buy my ticket for the Pearl Tower. Ideal.

People’s Park was pleasant enough. Lively, bustling, filled with locals playing various games (mahjong, dominoes, some card games I didn’t recognise). Plus, the cherry blossom was starting to come out, so looked rather nice too.

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Oh and there was also a +1.

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Next to People’s Park is the Shanghai Urban Planning Museum. Sounds like the most exciting thing to do in Shanghai, right? Well, to be fair it was actually pretty good! I’d planned on visiting this anyway (ticket was only a few quid), but by buying my Pearl Tower ticket here – saving the horrendous queue at the base of the tower – they threw in the museum ticket. Good stuff.

To someone who does a lot of work on the built environment it was interesting to see how Shanghai is controlling their growth and planning their city to provide transport, facilities (both practical and recreational) and housing for their millions of citizens. They have 10-year plans governing almost all of the city’s growth, which mandates the amount of schools, train stations, hospitals, etc and all of their proximity to one another. Credit where credit is due – communism does get stuff done!

On the second (or third?) floor, they have a huge scale model of central Shanghai, which is rather fab too. Apparently it’s updated regularly as well!

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From the museum I headed over to the Pearl Tower (quick couple of stops on the metro), on the Pudong side of the river. On exiting the metro station you’re faced with a rather impressive skyline.

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An impressive array of current, or once, record holding buildings.

Just round the corner is the Pearl Tower.

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Probably one of the most iconic pieces of Shanghai architecture.

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The ‘standard’ ticket lets you go to both the upper and lower sphere (the “Space Module” right at the very top is a hefty mark-up), however as far as I could work out they only let you in the lower module once you’ve done the upper one. Oh, and you have to come all the way back down to ground level from the upper sphere and get in a separate (albeit cool, glass) lift to go back up to the lower sphere.

Joined the sizable queue for the upper sphere, but mercifully it moved reasonably smoothly and took about 45 minutes before I was in the lift.

The views are, unsurprisingly, pretty good! The glass was well cleaned, so photos out (both looking out over the city, and looking down through the glass floor) came out pretty well. I’ll do a bit of a photo dump now.

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Looking back across the river to the Bund.

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Depends what your head for heights is like on the glass floors.

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I tend to be okay with it once I’ve stepped out the first time – but it’s always a good laugh seeing those aren’t.

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I particularly like this downwards shot.

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Final one of my feet. I did take some pictures of myself, but have avoided posting those for now. ;)

After a few laps of the sphere, snapping loads of pictures and admiring the view, it was all the way back down, into a different lift, and back up to the lower sphere. The views aren’t nearly as impressive from this level, but it does only have netting (rather than windows), meaning you get slightly better photos without having to worry about glare quite as much.

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The middle floor of the lower sphere also as the “VR Rollercoaster”. Sadly not included in the normal ticket, but I couldn’t go all this way and no do it, so handed over the cash (about £8 if memory serves) and boarded. All in all, the VR was a bit rubbish. Wasn’t synced very well, and didn’t quite give the sense of height I think they were going for. That said, the coaster is fully enclosed and so it’s not like you’d have anything much to look at anyway!

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From there I headed back down the tower and did the short hop on the metro back to the Bund side of the river. On the way, wandering around some of the elevated walkways below the skyscrapers which give some great views.

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Back on the metro. The three-day pass I had was worth its weight in gold!

I took a walk out along the Bund to see some more of the “famous” view of Pudong. The place was absolutely heaving! It is an attractive skyline though. I particularly like how they have no hesitation in continuing to use the river as an arterial shipping route, with large (some would say unsightly) ships regularly making their way up and down the river. It makes the whole thing feel quite alive and goes to show how rapidly this area has developed.

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A heavily processed one.

That night I’d booked tickets to see a show at the Shanghai Circus World called ERA – Intersection of Time. Of the two shows they offer, this one sounded more like my cup of tea as it was a more acrobatic/stunt show type circus (I’m lead to believe their other offering is a bit more traditional animal show). It was also on after dinner, rather than mid-afternoon, which suited me just fine!

On the whole the show was very impressive! Definitely a cut above the standard theme park stunt show, with some seriously impressive acts. Highlights included a man with a pot on his head, some huge see-saw based acrobatics and an eight-motorbike ball of death at the end. For anyone looking for something to do of an evening in Shanghai, I can highly recommend.

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Fancy bike riding.

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Massive acrobatics.

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Ball of death finale.

And that was that! It’d been a very busy day with lots of moving around, but it’d been a lot of fun!

Next up, a day with no creds at all! Although hopefully some interesting pictures to look at to keep you reading! ;)
 

gavin

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So the shuttle loop at Jinjiang was down as well? Annoying. Those things are quite fab, but seem to be disappearing now.

That one's cool since it runs parallel to the main road. Weird experience really.
 

Hixee

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So the shuttle loop at Jinjiang was down as well? Annoying. Those things are quite fab, but seem to be disappearing now.
Yeah, unfortunately. RCDB has had it listed as SBNO for about a year now, I think. I had a quick look at it, and the train appeared to be in pieces sitting in the station, so didn't look like it was only a short term closure too.
 

gavin

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Yeah, unfortunately. RCDB has had it listed as SBNO for about a year now, I think. I had a quick look at it, and the train appeared to be in pieces sitting in the station, so didn't look like it was only a short term closure too.
Isn't it an original Meisho as well, as opposed to the SBL copies floating around? Neither company have many of them, but the Meisho model have all but disappeared now I think.
 

Hixee

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Isn't it an original Meisho as well, as opposed to the SBL copies floating around? Neither company have many of them, but the Meisho model have all but disappeared now I think.
I believe so, but that's only according to RCDB - I don't have any other source for that. Are they just too hard to get replacement parts for, meaning they can't be kept running as easily?
 
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