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JoshC.'s Road to 300 - Copenhagen and 300 !

JoshC.

Strata Poster
My recent America trip was, amongst many other things, meant to be where I hit 300 creds, quite easily too. As explained in my Trip Report though, that wasn't meant to be, with me ending up on a palindromic, but otherwise unsatisfying, 282 creds instead.

Fortunately, I have enough other trips planned / in the works that I should still hit the next hundred milestone this year. These trips are scattered and not particularly big, so I figured I may as well create a thread to house my trip reports for the rest of the year.

The post-America Road to 300 started 4 days after I had landed back. I had just moved to Portsmouth, and there were a couple of little piers with creds within a (long, but scenic) walk. So I mopped up the creds at Clarence Pier (Mad Mouse, an SBF Zyklon and Tidal Wave, an SBF spinner) and South Parade Pier (Happy Caterpillar, a Wacky Worm). This was a number of weeks ago now; I think you can see why I've barely bothered to mention it here.

But the Road to 300 continued yesterday, with something a bit more substantial...
Legoland Billund
I've been toying with a Denmark trip for ages (the first time was 2018), but this was my first time on Danish land. But this was not the mega Danish trip I had hoped for all those years ago...in fact, it was just a day trip. A mixture of time, wanting to keep costs low but also wanting a trip meant that a couple of weeks ago I had a "sod it" moment, and booked the flights.

The flights were from Stansted, flying out at 7.30 and landing at Billund airport at 9.50, with the return flight leaving at 22.50 and landing at 23.30. With Billund being a 10 minute bus journey to the park (according to the online timetables), and being open 10am-8pm (with rides closing at 6pm), I felt that was plenty of time to do the park, explore a tiny bit of Billund and have a reasonably relaxed day. These flights were also cheap enough; I got them for just under £30 return...not the cheapest Ryanair flight out there, but good enough.

I also lucked out quite a lot with the trip in terms of keeping costs low. I was able to secure a free ticket to the park (thanks to a friend who works at Merlin) and a friend offered to drive me to Stansted from Surrey, and pick me up, meaning I didn't have to pay for parking. So the cost of travel for this trip was the flight, and petrol costs (plus a bit extra to the kind friend who did driving at unfriendly hours!), plus whatever the bus would end up being...

Flying to Billund was stress-free and simple. First time at Stansted since pre-pandemic, but nothing has really changed. Billund is quite a small airport, so the security queue was swamped as 3 flights seemed to land quite close to each other. But still, 25 minutes later, I was through and into Billund. This is where I hit a little snag: the next bus from the airport to the park was in 20 minutes time. Given the 10 minute journey and the cost, I ultimately decided to do the half hour walk from the airport to the park instead. It's dead easy. I also fully appreciated the 15 degree weather in Billund, given the ridiculously hot temperatures the UK is having right now.

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A little before 11am, I had arrived!

As I mentioned, rides closed at 6pm, with the park (namely Miniland and some food places and shops) open till 8pm. So that left me 7 hours to pick up 4 creds, get whatever else I fancied, then an extra bit of time to explore Miniland if I didn't get the chance to otherwise.

Looking at the app, the queue times weren't awful (nothing above 30mins), but the pathways around the entrance were HEAVING. This is where a lot of the young kids rides are too, so I expected a lot of young families to be the theme of the day as a result. In a strange move for me, I didn't head to a cred first, and instead went to Viking River Splash, the park's rapids. Why you ask? Well, they caught my attention because of the huge drop you see...
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(of which I've had to steal a photo of because my photos of it are too large apparently)

It had a short queue (advertised 10 minutes), so thought why not. And it was a decent little circuit. Sparse on theming, but a decent set of rapids all things considered. The drop looked very much for show (I didn't see anyone coming off particularly wet), but that obviously lulled me into a false sense of security, as I got soaked. Damn.

Now it was time for creds. First up was X-treme Racers, the Mack Wild Mouse-esque ride. Advertised a 15 minute queue, and it was bang on 15 minutes. It's a fun ride, but does die away towards the end...
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I kept moving this way around the park to what was my most anticipated ride at the park, Polar X-plorer (side note: this park loves to be edgey with its "X-"s, doesn't it?). I knew what it was, so no surprises there. Again, the advertised queue time of 20 minutes was surprisingly accurate, and I managed to luck out with a front row ride. And I have to say, I was impressed. I didn't expect anything much from the coaster section, but it was really cool, whippy and just all round good fun. The indoor section is fun and neat (could be a bit darker in there, but maybe they don't want it too dark at risk of intimidating younger kids?), but that is basically the end of the ride, and the return to the station is a bit awkward and slow, especially in comparison to the rest of the ride. Going past the penguins is fun though.
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I wanted to carry on the cred theme, but Dragen was closed, and Flying Eagle was posting a 40 minute queue. So it was time to tick of some dark rides, and I went for what I guess was my second-most anticipated ride on park, Ghost: The Haunted House. I'd heard some neat things about this, and the exterior looked really cool. I sucked up the 30 minute queue time, and was in quick enough. The experience starts off with exploring (or should I write x-ploring?) the spooky house, including some interactive bits and a very long, and well done, mirror maze. It cumulates in a drop tower like experience, which can only really be described as a giant frog hopper. Honestly, the ride experience is a bit underwhelming; they certainly could have had a bit more of an exciting drop / shot n drop tower, especially given the theme and set up. And it was a bit frustrating to see it was only running one of the two towers. But all in, it's a really cool overall experience, just let down by the actual ride.
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One thing which irrationally annoyed me was the English voice of the ghost just before you board the ride. It was just...very annoying.

At this point I was ready for lunch. But the park had other ideas. Though the queues were long for the rides, that was nothing compared to how heaving the pathways were. And the queues for the food stalls were huge as well. I mean, I guess it was peak lunchtime hour at this point, so I shouldn't have been surprised. But they were just VERY long. I decided to push lunch back till later and brave the queue for Flying Eagle. It was still advertised at 40 minutes, so I didn't see it dropping, but at least from experience I knew the park's advertised queue times were accurate.

Indeed, 40 minutes later I was on. And for a little Zierer, this is alright. It's well presented, has some nice audio effects subtly going off in the background. And the ride has a couple of nice moments, especially a nice twisty bit just before the waterfall turnaround. Nothing more than a nice +1, but still, it's good when these things are nice.
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The queues for food were still very long, so I delayed lunch back even further for the now-open Dragen. It had a 45 minute queue, but oh well, needs must and all that; let's tick off all the creds now. I didn't actually realise this was a powered coaster (I should probably do a bit more research before going on trips...), but no matter. The indoor section is cool, the outdoor section is meh. It was only running one train (rcdb says it can run two, don't know if it actually does? Today would have been a day where it was welcomed). No photos of Dragen; it's very well hidden behind the castle, and the castle itself doesn't have quite the same grandeur as the Windsor equivalent.

My stomach got the better of me and made me seek out lunch (it was gone 2pm at this point, I'd had breakfast at like 4am...think that was fair). I waited about 15-20 minutes at the Fish and Chip place for a nice meal. It was here that made me remember Denmark is price (circa £13 for a meal which would probably be around £9-10 at Windsor), and kinda made me wish I packed a lunch. But I guess I should spend some money at this park...

It was time to tick off a few of the 'calmer' rides now. I did Ninjago The Ride, which seems to be exactly the same as Windsor's, yet feels shorter. I was surprised it was entirely in English, when all the other rides are largely Danish / dual-language (or even trio-language with German), but heyho. The Ninjago area is much more spacious and pleasant than Windsor's:
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I had planned to do the Atlantis by Sealife experience, but it seemed to have a long wait, and was - according to signage - a 25 minute long experience? Nah, let's skip that. I wanted to do the log flume, but it was apparently a 60 minute wait. Nah, maybe not. Instead, I wandered to the other side of the park and did Temple, the park's Egypt-themed shooter.

It's an omnimover, which is pretty cool, and means the ride doesn't seem to get a queue (never went above 5mins). The theming and effects are pretty cool on this tbf. But it is one of the most frustrating shooters I've done because the guns / shooting system are terrible. You shoot a target and hit it. It doesn't register. You do it again. Nothing. You seem to have to get it absolutely spot on, which is incredibly annoying. Really did not enjoy it as a result.

BUT, in saying that, this has a really cool on ride moment where you go through a tunnel of lights (which may or may not be targets, I don't know) whilst your little car spins. No one seems to speak about the spinning rave tunnel of Legoland Billund, but it needs to be spoken about. That was FUN.
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Have a rubbish photo of a rubbish shooter

I then decided to do something a little bit...out of character. I opted to do a spin-n-spew like ride. Ice Pilots School is the park's set of 5 Kuka robo arms. You choose a setting, choose what you want the ride to do, et voila, you get a minute of your self-crafted demise. Watching this made me feel nervous, but I am a sucker for doing something new and different. When it came to choosing the setting, you get a choice of 5 levels: 1 being the tamest, 5 being the most extreme. I was going to go for 2, but again had a "ah sod it" moment and braved a 3. I immediately regretted it looking at my options: all of the potential "moves" it could do looked horrific. I chose SIX at random, and shortly after I was off. And...it wasn't horrible. I did quite like; that whole sense of satisfaction of doing something you don't like type deal. At the same time, it's not something I'm in a hurry to do again, and I don't want to know what levels 4 and 5 are like.

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I was a big fan of presentation of it too. It looks bland, but the minimalist approach, coupled with the lighting and subtle audio makes it feel slightly intimidating - in a good way - and pretty sleek.

The day was winding to a close, many long queues meant it was gone 4.30pm now. I still wanted to try out the park's flying theatre before doing re-rides, so I headed to Emmet's Flying Adventure, which was another long 40 minute wait. I liked the set up to this, and the humour of the pre show. In general, I think I prefer this section of the experience over Windsor's Flight of the Sky Lion. However, the actual film itself was a bit less interesting and - more crucially - less enjoyable. I have felt a bit of motion sickness on Sky Lion before (which, for reference, was my only other flying theatre), but this was much worse. I came off feeling pretty "bleurgh" and needing a bit of a sit down. So yeah, not a fan of this.

In general, I much prefer Windsor's Mythica World over Billund's Lego Movie World. Mythica feels much more polished in general, and Sky Lion is a better attraction on the whole over EMA. Side note: I look forward to seeing if/when Billund get a full on Mythica area, and what they do with it.

I had wanted to get a re-ride on Polar X-plorer, but it had a long queue (40 minutes, and it looked it) and the queasy feeling didn't make me feel mad keen on waiting. The log flume was still a long wait too. So after a quick break, I decided I'd head over to Miniland, but quickly detoured onto the queue-free Pirate Boats, a slow moving boat ride, which my stomach could handle. It was decent, and had a nice indoor section. Recommended.

I then had a mooch around Miniland. It feels smaller than Windsor's one (and probably is), but it does back a lot in. There's also quite a few interactive exhibits, which I liked. Maybe Windsor has loads of interactive bits too, but I'm just familiar with them. Had a good, but short, wander round, before checking out the Lego Shop, which was unsurprisingly rammed.
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I had hoped to sneak a ride on Billund's newest cred, but it was broken down in this position. Gah, spite. Would hate to be evac-ed from there though...

So that ended my time at Legoland Billund. A couple of broader things I wanted to bring up:
-The park could definitely benefit from more audio. Many of the queues have nothing, and it does come through and feel a bit flat. Polar X-plorer was the main one which comes to mind. I wonder if it's a decision made in mind of the target audience, and trying to not over-stimulate children? Or if it's a Danish thing? Whatever it is, it was a shame.
-The staff. All of the staff were FANTASTIC. Everyone is so friendly and helpful, and seems to really enjoy working there. I had plenty of staff interact with me, but not being overly pushy / trying to force it. There was just a fantastic vibe about the whole park as a result, and it's something really refreshing to see. Whatever they're doing, they're doing it right.

With plenty of time before my flight, and the weather being pleasant, I had a wander round Billund. It's a quaint but ultimately boring little place, but I managed to find a cheap-ish supermarket to grab some snacks for the flight. I'd hoped to find something for dinner, but nothing jumped out at me, so airport restaurant it was. A chilled out walk back to airport, going through one of the most pleasant security processes I've ever had and I ended up at Sunset Boulevard, which is apparently a chain of restaurants in Denmark, for an okay-priced dinner before my flight. The flight back was pleasant enough, and going through Stansted was equally smooth - what a day!

So yes, Legoland Billund is a lovely little park. It's a nice +4 with a good collection of other rides. It definitely feels like it has a broader target market over Windsor too, which is cool. The staff are lovely too (as, tbf, are all Danish people it seems). Billund as an area is pretty cool too.
Whilst I'm sure it make more sense to try and turn this trip into a larger trip doing the "Western side" of Denmark, if you ever are after a day trip abroad cred run, Legoland Billund isn't a bad shout!

And as for the Road to 300? I'm now on 289...hopefully my next trip abroad in the next couple of months will tipple me over the line, so watch this space...
 
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HeartlineCoaster

Theme Park Superhero
It was only running one train (rcdb says it can run two, don't know if it actually does? Today would have been a day where it was welcomed).
Can confirm it has run 2, it's the only powered I've ever seen do that besides Casey Jr.
Witchcraft is involved.
 

Matt N

CF Legend
Can confirm it has run 2, it's the only powered I've ever seen do that besides Casey Jr.
Witchcraft is involved.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t the Suspended Powered Coasters (e.g. Arthur) run multiple as well? Or are you referring exclusively to “traditional” powered coasters?

Back on topic; epic trip @JoshC.! I admire the dedication of getting Legoland Billund done in a single day; it must have been one tiring day!
 

HeartlineCoaster

Theme Park Superhero
Correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t the Suspended Powered Coasters (e.g. Arthur) run multiple as well? Or are you referring exclusively to “traditional” powered coasters?
You're absolutely right, those Mack (and Beijing Shibolai) suspendeds completely slipped my mind so yes, "traditionally".
 

Hixee

Flojector
Staff member
Administrator
Moderator
Social Media Team
I always admire a day-trip park that involves getting on a plane. That seems to immediately add more hours (and stress-hours) than I think I'd ever be willing to expend. Fair play.

Actually all in all sounds like a nice trip. I tend to avoid the Legolands 'cos I'm just so convinced it'd be a burden (children), but maybe this +4 will be worth it in the inevitable Denmark trip next year.
 

JoshC.

Strata Poster
So I don't intend to turn this thread into a personal "My Last Cred Review" thread, but heyho, I'll stick some thoughts here.

Went to Paultons yesterday, and got Farmyard Flyer, which is #290. Lots has been said about how well this ride has been presented, and it has been presented well. But, it rides terribly. Specially towards the end of the circuit, it's jolty and uncomfortable. It was the only coaster my 7 year old brother didn't want to reride at the park.

I don't think I have too much to add about Paultons that I haven't already said. It's something I do yearly with my little brother, and he loves the park. Tornado Springs is a cracking area. Storm Chaser is a good headliner for the park. The park desperately needs a dark ride and a decent water ride (this was highlighted more by the log flume being closed all day). I don't get the fuss over Flight of the Pterosaur. I think the Dinosaur Tour ride is slightly under-rated and is a ton of fun.

The park was quiet, no ride (including the untouched Peppa Pig World) had an advertised queue above 30 minutes. I never queued for anything longer than 15mins. Got several rerides, include 6 on Storm Chaser and 5 on Cobra.
I know UK parks are traditionally quieter at the start of the summer holidays, so I wasn't expecting it to be busy. But I was expecting it to be a bit busier. I hope for the sake of the park they are getting healthier numbers for the rest of the summer.


As for what's next on my Road to 300? Well, I'm still keeping that a mystery, primarily for *suspense*, but also because I still haven't booked it yet. If I do go ahead with what I'm planning, it will be a +10, which would of course see me hit exactly 300...risky business that.
 

JoshC.

Strata Poster
As for what's next on my Road to 300? Well, I'm still keeping that a mystery, primarily for *suspense*, but also because I still haven't booked it yet. If I do go ahead with what I'm planning, it will be a +10, which would of course see me hit exactly 300...risky business that.

So, here we are more than a few months later, and this didn't happen.

A quick recap of what happened. I had planned to go to Copenhagen and the parks there during the August bank holiday. Unfortunately in August I had to have a minor surgical procedure on my neck, which meant that plan went out the window. And then the remainder of 2022 was filled with much uncertainty and troubles in life (including quitting my job, being diagnosed with depression and moving house). So a trip to get the 10 creds I needed just wasn't going to happen.

But for those who follow the Milestones thread, I finally completed the Road to 300 last week, and it happened to be at Copenhagen.

First thing first, to address a point that the nerdiest of goons might have picked up... There's two parks in Copenhagen (Tivoli and Bakken), and they're only a +9, and not the +10 I alluded to. So even if that trip did go ahead, I would have ended it on 299...how frustrating would that have been!?

Despite all the troubles I faced in the latter part of 2022, I still managed a couple of new creds which I haven't talked about here. So let's briefly go over them...

F.L.Y. (#291)
For the first time since January 2020, I made my way back to Phantasialand in September 2022. Fly had become a mythical sort of thing to me, so to finally get on it was exciting! The ride itself is fun, a very satisfying length and throws some unexpected moments for a flyer (airtime?! a really cool second inversion?). It's nothing special as a coaster in its own right and not in the upper echelons of my count, but still enjoyable and a worthwhile investment all the same
Rookburgh looks stunning too, but almost verges on being too realistic.. It transports you into a whole new world and it feels incredible. But is it the most exciting or interesting theme park land to be in? I'm not so sure.

I stayed in the Charles Lindbergh Hotel and really enjoyed that too. Definitely helped me appreciate Rookburgh for everything it offers.

So yeah, Fly. Fun ride, amazingly themed, but doesn't quite tick the boxes for me.

The Time Machine (#292)
A jaunt up to Winter Wonderland, and this was the only new cred I got there. Meh.

The Ride to Happiness (#293)
I put my lack of any healthy sleeping habit to use and did a day trip to Plopsaland for one of their November Wednesday open days. The park was dead. Ride to Happiness was open though, albeit slightly interrupted by the weather.

I had a few rides, and they were very hit and miss. The first was fantastic. The latter ones were rough and, simply put, not enjoyable. It's a chaotic experience in the best way possible, and the onboard soundtrack is fab. But it's difficult to know what sort of experience you could get...a smooth and enjoyably chaotic ride? Or a rough and uncomfortable battle? Who knows.

I have theories. Maybe it was on the wrong wheels for the weather (assuming it has different wheels for the weather). Maybe it was just because it was cold in general. Maybe it was the weighting on the cars. Maybe I was just a miserable sod and even a Winteraum night ride on Taron would have been disappointing to me.

Whatever it is, I can only say that Ride to Happiness was a bit disappointing with it's lack of consistency. I hope to re-ride (maybe one summer) and see if there's any differences. But for now, I can't match what 95% of goons say and put it in my Top 10%.

---

And that's where we were at at the end of 2022. 7 to go to get 300. I'll save my actual Copenhagen trip report for the next post.
But for now, I leave a cliffhanger: which "launched spinner" have I ended up preferring...the near-universally loved Ride to Happiness, or Bakken's near-universally hated Tornado? The answer may surprise you!
 

JoshC.

Strata Poster
And finally, I get round to writing this...

So, as said, my journey to Copenhagen finally happened last month. As has been the norm with my trips, I wanted to minimize costs, so I made it a short two day trip: fly out on a Thursday morning, fly out Friday evening. This meant, in the event that the parks were busy, I could do one each day and still have plenty of time to spare. I realised that I needn't worry, and with the flight times, I could have even squeezed this into a day trip, but I'm happy I didn't.

Anyways, my Ryanair flight in the morning was delayed by 2 hours. Originally they blamed the France air strikes at the time, and were encouraging people heavily to sign their petition against the knock on effects of the strikes. The on board crew however said it was a technical delay and nothing to do with the strikes. Bit cheeky. In any case, the flight over was fine, and security at Copenhagen was efficient enough.

The plan of action was to tick of Bakken first, then head to Tivoli. This meant I could enjoy Tivoli in the evening, even if it did require some double-backing on the train.

Bakken
Getting around Copenhagen and the surrounding area on train was super easy. The Rejseplanen website had everything you'd need. Getting from the airport to Bakken included a metro journey and then a train journey, which took about 45 minutes. A 10-15 minute walk and I was there.

Being a free-to-enter, pay-per-ride system, I opted to get Bakken's 'fun card'. This worked out as the cheapest, and easiest, way to get all the creds. I booked in advance, and collected on the day.

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The Bakken clown unnerves me.

There was only one choice for the first ride of the day...Tornado. The Intamin spinner has a reputation for being awful, so I figured let's get it out the way early. I boarded and the staff member gave me a pitying look and said "brace yourself yeah?". I didn't need telling twice. I braced myself up the lift hill, which is more like a launch. Okay, this is alright I thought. Then you reach the top and a flat section of track, where all of a sudden the car seems to go faster, and you're launched straight into a corner. I don't know what exclamation left my mouth at this moment, but for the rest of the ride I was speechless.
And not in a good way. Whoever thought launching a spinning car into a basically unbanked 90 degree turn was a good idea needs to sort out their priorities. I just couldn't comprehend what happened, and the rest of the ride was spent bracing myself. In fairness, the rest of the ride wasn't awful (in fact, it's a fairly decent layout for a spinner!), but you just can't enjoy it out of fear for what could happen.

Very much a one and done type.

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I did not approve.

Next up was Rutschebanen, the park's woodie. I'd heard mixed-to-negative reviews of this since they got rid of the brakemen, and I totally see why. The ride lacks any real flow. It's not the most comfortable either, meaning you trudge along just wanting to get off. A shame.

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With the two bigger coasters out the way, it was time to go into mopping up creds territory. First up was Vilde Mus, a bog standard wild mouse which was fine. Then the Intamin family coaster Mine Train Ulven, which ended up being my favourite coaster on park. It's a basic mine train, but it's fun enough and does a good job at what it is meant to be. Then the longest wait for me at the park, the Zierer Tivoli Mariehønen. Proper +1 that.

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I enjoyed the lack of airgates on Ulven

I had a mooch around the rest of the park. I think I had some credit left on the fun card. But really, nothing jumped out at me. Ride queues were quiet, but the park itself was busy. It also didn't have much of an atmosphere or feeling to it, despite its historical nature of being the world's oldest theme park. It was a little bit of a dive really. So I called it after a little under an hour on park.

In fairness, I didn't give Bakken much of a chance, but I don't think I really needed to. They have 5 coasters which range from "Un-noteworthy" to "Bottom 5%", and little else. Nice to tick off, but it's going to take a lot for me to ever want to go back.


Tivoli Gardens
A 20 minute train journey and a quick check in at my hotel a stone's throw from the park, and I was at Tivoli Gardens, the much more anticipated park. I'd arrived at 3ish, and the park closed at 10pm, which gave plenty of time to enjoy it and get all the rides done.

Unsurprisingly, the park was noticeably busier, and many of the rides had full queue lines (though these queue lines are reasonably short, so this wasn't a big deal). I'd bought the "Tivoli Extra" entrance package, giving entrance, unlimited rides (including access to their year-round scare maze), unlimited ride photos, a go on one of their games and a meal. This was slightly eye-watering in price (just over £50), but worked out as good value - entrance + rides (not including the scare maze) is about £40, and food in Denmark is expensive.

Now creds. I sat at 298 after my jaunt to Bakken. After much debate, I decided to make their woodie #300, so I headed towards to the other major coaster for my first Tivoli ride...Dæmonen. I'd had pretty average rides on my two previous B&M floorless coasters (Hydra and Medusa), so didn't have the highest hopes. However, I really enjoyed this. I got a wonderful back row ride, and the compact layout works well, the ride flows nicely, and it just hits the spot. It's not winning any awards, but it is enjoyable. Frustratingly, the operations are awful - it is painfully slow to load, and the trains stack regularly for a long time. Wasn't the greatest first impression.

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It looks very pretty at dusk too

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Can't forget to get my all inclusive (terrible) photo now


Next up was the other highlight...Rutschebanen. I don't think I've ever ridden two different coasters of the same name in the same day before. I didn't make a #300 sign (I vowed to not do a sign for my 300th after the photo for my 200th was so hilariously awkwardly bad). Anyways, this was a woodie with a brakeman, as well as lots of indoor / dark moments. I've only ridden one other brakeman coaster before (the amazing Vuoristorata at Linnanmäki). Now then, this was good, but not great. I'd heard many wonderful things about this, and had high expectation due to my love of Vuoristorata. But they fell a little short.

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Feel free to pretend there's a "300" sign here

I can't really put a finger on why, as it has all the makings of something which is great fun, but it just didn't tick the box for me. It makes me wonder why Vuoristorata hit the spot so well for me now, as in reality, there's only minor differences between that and both the Rutschebanens (Rutschebanenen? Rutschebaneni? Rutschebanener? who knows). But in any case, it was a decent coaster to make my 300th, though part of me wishes I'd gone for the better ride Dæmonen to take the honours.

I then took the chance to ride the nearby Minen, the park's...check notes...indoor, boat-based shooting dark ride. A shooter in a boat? Okay. This was actually pretty cute; decent theming and audio and a good layout. The gun system was a bit dodgy, and no scoring system takes away the fun of it somewhat. But all in, this was actually pretty fun.

It was back to the creds now, and these were little more than +1s. A long wait and I was on Mælkevejen, the park's powered coaster. This was actually pretty fun and speedy for what it was, and being based above pathways was pretty cool. Then, finally, another kiddie Zierer in Kamelen. What a way to start of the quest to 400.

With stomach grumbling, I went to the Tivoli Food Hall for dinner. The Food Hall is attached to the park, but technically outside it, so you need to get your hand stamped to re-enter the park. Loads of options here, all of which accepted the free meal voucher from my ticket bundle. I went to Chicks by Chicks; unsurprisingly a chicken (chick) place...where all the staff were women ("chicks"?). My free meal would have cost me about £12-13 quid, so I was definitely getting my money's worth with the voucher.

Back on park and I headed over to Villa Vendetta, the park's year-round scare maze. This had quite a long wait, but that was down to them only batching people in their individual groups (which tended to be 2s). Excited by the thought of a solo run, I was disappointed when they decided to switch to batching larger groups when I was about 3-4 groups away from the front. Still, this was a fun, well-themed maze of decent length. The scares were minimal and pretty tame, but it held a really strong atmosphere throughout.

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Scare maze entrance 101

After that, I'd ticked off all the attractions I wanted to do really. Many of the flats were spin n spews, which I know is not for me. I was tempted by Tik Tak, the spinniest and spewiest of them all, because of its relative uniqueness, but opted against it. Instead, I did plenty of re-rides, a couple of little rides and soaked up the beautiful atmosphere around the park. I'd've loved it if there was a log flume of some sort at Tivoli, as that would suit the park really well.

All-in, Tivoli really is a beautiful park, with a fairly solid ride line up. Certainly not one of my favourites, due to the ride line up not suiting me exactly. But I can really appreciate it all the same. Plus, the mixture of rides and gardens in a city is done really well, and the atmosphere really hits the spot!



With one day left in Copenhagen, I looked at what I could do to fill that time. So I decided to fill that void to answer the call of Kärnan...but more on that in another post!
 

Flash Shift

Mega Poster
There is a scoring system for Minen. You can't really see it on ride to my recollection but there's a board outside the exit that displays your results. I did also find it a bit wonky though...

Your views on the top 2 coasters at Tivoli are pretty similar to mine. Rutschebanen is much better in the back and I'd say Daemonen is also very much a back row ride even if only for the surprisingly good drop. Rutschebanen was mostly high expectations, but I had the brake-man coaster at Great Yarmouth to compare it to, which is pretty damn good.

I agree on Daemonen. There isn't a huge amount to say about it, it just... works. I don't have any other B&M Floorless coaster credits to compare it to though.
 

JoshC.

Strata Poster
So I decided to fill that void to answer the call of Kärnan...but more on that in another post!

With a free day, and a late flight home, I wasn't quite sure what I'd do with myself. I looked at Bon Bon Land, which wasn't all that far away from Copenhagen by train, but it was still another couple of weeks before their season started. So instead, I went to Kärnan, but not the one the most goons think of when they hear that name...

Of course, as with basically everything at Hansa Park, Kärnan is based off a real thing - the Kärnan tower in Sweden. In short, the tower was built by the Danes as part of a much larger fortress (when Denmark effectively owned this part of Sweden), and was extremely important for defence of the area.

The Kärnan tower is open to the public throughout the year, and is very close to the coast. And, fortunately enough, it's quite easy to get to from Copenhagen:
-A direct train lasting about an hour to Helsingør
-20 minute ferry crossing to Helsingborg (the ferry boarding point is linked directly to the train station)
-A 15 minute walk from the Helsingborg port to Kärnan

The ferry is run by Forsea, you book through their app and a return ticket for foot passengers costs about £8. Ferries run every 20 minutes, so it's a super easy journey.

When I went, the tower was open 11am-3pm, and also cost about £8 to enter. You get to go into several rooms, and climb to the roof, which gives wonderful views all around.

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The tower is on high ground, so the most direct route from the ferry port requires a few stairs...

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The entrance to the tower is up these stairs. The stairs are a spiral staircase in the octagonal section to the left.

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The Kärnan tower is about 35m tall...just a bit smaller than The Oath of Kärnan's tower, which stands at about 73m...

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The first room you can go in has some replica chairs. I remember this being one of the first scenes you pass through in the queue line for the ride.

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You even get to sit in said chairs. Exciting!

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Anyone for a game of Räv?

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The theatrical lighting here isn't as good as at Hansa Park. Almost like this an historical monument and not a theme park!

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A view from the top, towards the sea. You can see Denmark in the distance, and Helsingborg's port in the foreground.


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The view over Helsingborg.

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The view down

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And because you haven't had enough views of my wonderful mug, one final selfie.



The rest of the day was spent mooching round Helsingborg and Copenhagen, nothing noteworthy. But the trip to the Kärnan tower was an absolute highlight. I'm not big on doing touristy stuff and visiting historical monuments to be honest, but I did enjoy this. Plus the geeking out at seeing the direct similarities and inspiration Hansa took from here was naturally very cool too. Would highly recommend!

A fun little tidbit too was that it was a year to the day that I had ridden Kärnan that I then visited Kärnan. What will I do April 7th 2024 I wonder?
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And that's the trip! I'll do a little post-trip 'round up' (though there's not much to round up) in a future post - including goon facts about my first 300 coasters I worked out whilst at the airport!
 

TilenB

Strata Poster
Nice report, Josh! I went to the Copenhagen parks last October and both Tornado and Tivoli's Rutschebahnen were down for maintenance. Hearing they're **** and somewhat underwhelming respectively manages to soften the blow a bit, hah.
 

JoshC.

Strata Poster
And some post-trip round-up bits:

Cred count pre-trip: 293
Cred count post-trip: 302
Best new park: Tivoli Gardens
Best new coaster: Dæmonen
Worst new coaster: Tornando
Biggest surprise: Dæmonen
Biggest disappointment: Rutschebanen at Bakken
Highlight: Kärnan!
Lowlight: Ryanair delays :(


And whilst I was killing time waiting for my flight, I looked at some fun and pointless facts about my first 300 creds...in particular, their names:
-The letter "e" is the most common, appearing 213 times
-The letter "q" is the least common, appearing twice

After appropriately translating names into English, there's also the following...
-26 (8.6%) have the word "coaster" in them
-13 (4.3%) have the word "dragon" in them
-13 use the words "flight" or "fly"
-9 (3%) feature the word "train"
-8 (2.7%) begin with the word "The"
-7 (2.3%) feature the word "snake", or the name of some snake
-7 also feature the word "dino", or the name of some dinosaur
-6 (2%) use the words "speed" or "rush"
-5 (1.7%) feature the word "loop"

As you can tell, I was really rather bored.
 
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