Mincing in the Middle East - Part 4: Sparky's VR Adventure

[HeartlineCoaster]

Conveniently I was required to be in Abu Dhabi for 3 days for work, so I jumped at the opportunity to have a bit of fun beforehand. This wasn't somehwere particularly on the cards for me in the near future, but I'm very glad to have been now. The whole place far exceeded my expectations in pretty much every aspect and I'd happily go back for more.

First day was a bit of a marathon. Had an overnight flight with 0 sleep, being surrounded by the Chinese who kept their lights on the whole time and were having their usual loud conversations. No escaping them.

Landed first thing in the morning and sorted out the hire car. Through more luck than judgment, I had timed things just right and this was the first day of celebrating the end of Ramadan, so didn't have to worry about not eating and stuff. It also seemed to have a positive impact on the parks, everywhere was super quiet.

This was first made eerily obvious as I hit the dusty trail and perhaps saw about 10 cars total on the first hour of the journey. Bombing down a 4 lane motorway in the desert with absolutely nothing in sight. I like this already.

IMG Worlds of Adventure

Pulled up outside nice and early, believe I was the 3rd or 4th car on site. There's some sweet Mack goodness to admire on the way in.

Free parking, but unfortunately none of it is covered here, so the car and anything in it is gonna get an absolute roasting.

Eh, can't be that bad.

Largest indoor theme park. That's convenient.

Hung around the entrance area for a while until they let us through to the turnstyles.

From there, they did an opening ceremony to a crowd of about 50, which involved some mediocre dancing to the tune of Let Me Entertain You. Everyone rushed forward to meet the bloke from Adventure Time, while I headed off to the rides.

Ooo it's a nice place. There's definitely some magical vibe going on with the indoorness, which the pictures won't do justice at all. Everyone's really friendly and it all just looks great, particularly the jungle/dinosaur area being in half dark all the time. I was concerned about bad locker rules or something, but the staff girl told me nah, no need to bother with that nonsense.

Got the Eurofighter out of the way first. Ugh, Rage clone.

Actually better than I remember it, only recall liking the way it hangs in the loop, but the rest of it is rather forceful and fun for what it is. Mirrored too, I'm sure that's what makes the difference.

Ended up losing my way in the jungle bit looking for the next cred and found myself in Avengers land instead. Spiderman then.

Queueline here is particularly impressive, going through some dingy alleys and themed rooms, before passing under a darkened tease of part of the ride.
Didn't expect much from this as, you know, clones, but I really enjoyed it. Starts with a flashy strobey underground tunnel pumping tons of mist into your face before dropping out into the quick outdoor section.

There's a transition from there where it lets you know it's a ride not to be messed with as it plunges down into the depths of the indoor themed bit which is full of skyscrapers. Depending on your direction of travel and intensity of spin, this can be a real surprise and some of the following turns can be crazy forceful. All ends a little too soon, but really good stuff.

Still in cred mode, powered back over to Velociraptor, which was hiding at the back.

Some of this queue looked rather good as well, though it just turned into plain walls after that. I like the trains with their yellow and red dinosaur skin look, shame I didn't manage to get a picture. Got straight on and made myself at home in the sexy bucket seats again. Being spoiled with them this year.

The pre launch section is rather cool, passing through some jungle and more mist being pumped out at you. There's a big screen on the right, on which some dinosaurs start making a scene, prompting you to leave quickly. The door to the outside opens a little early in all this and sunlight pours in to ruin the effect of the screen somewhat, and you're off.

Ahhhh! 40 degrees. The cooking effect from the sun isn't noticeable while you're moving fast, but as soon as you hit the brake run you can feel the burn and being a vampire, I'm thinking 'gotta get back inside, gotta get back inside'. Ride is fun of course, being yet another Blue Fire.

Not sure what they were going for with the outdoor bit. There's a random greenhouse chucked in amongst some palm trees and some dust. Better than nothing.

Each of these parks I was in super cred mode to begin with and it was never fully justified. This was all knocked out in about 45 minutes. Time to relax.

Did the dinosaur dark ride thing. It was quite good, the queue has some story building if you spend any time in it and there's some impressive physical theming inside but it got a bit screeny at the end and the vehicle movement was a little awkward rather than thrilling.

Think the Avengers one was next. I was rather excited for this, being a fan of the cinematic universe, but maybe that hurt it for me, as it's not directly from that media source. Wasn't particularly impressed by it, all felt a bit been there, done that with lots of recycled tricks in almost the same environment as its competitors (Spiderman/Transformers) unlike, say, Fantawild ones.

This thing was the busiest thing all day. Queued a whole 10 minutes or something. Half dark ride, half suspended monorail over the park, it wasn't without its charm. Don't particularly like the brand though.

I liked Gumball. Got a little preshow to set the scene and tell me what it even was, cos never heard of it. It's a fun shooting ride, the type that seem to be becoming my favourites with the mixture of physical targets, screen based blastings and crazy unpredictable scores.

Hulk was up and running next. Another preshow to set the scene, before strapping in to the huge circle of seats. I was expecting it to be a rather relaxed affair, having only sat in something like this before for a slow Chinese fairytale, but it really gets up a good spin, there's a lot going on and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Believe that just leaves Ben 10 5D. More preshows, which the locals had run out of patience for and were all intently staring at the door to the theatre rather than watching.
Vicious thing! The seats on this give you a right good kicking, which I wasn't expecting at all. Brought back memories of the John Cleese ride with its intense car crash moments.

Rounded the day off with a few re-rides, but got rather exhausted towards the end of the 36 hour day. Nearly died a few times on the way back to the hotel, quite literally being half asleep. All for a good cause.

Great park then, liked it a ton more than I expected. Very relaxed atmosphere and good selection of rides, while not suffering from being an RCDB clone fest. Remarked while I was there that I thought it would be the 'bad' park of the trip. The bar has been set high.

 

[Dubaidave]

Great report. It’s always nice to see someone else’s perspective. I often feel I’m a bit biased living here. Glad you enjoyed.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[HeartlineCoaster]

Fortunately no early start was required for today, so managed to sleep for 1000 hours as well as find time to slither to a supermarket for supplies.

On the way I encountered this.

I had thought about making time for going in, but parks and sleep were the priorities for now, so settled for a few snaps from the outside.

Time to hit up Dubai Parks & Resorts. They've got some odd parking here, the signs keep conflicting and switching between VIP parking only and ALL parking. It wasn't just me who was getting confused by this, as by the time i reached the ticket barriers, some people were causing a scene and trying to reverse out of there rather than pay the displayed prices on the booths. I carried on anyway and asked them about 'normal parking'. It's still in the same area and costs £4 rather than £20 and just isn't advertised anywhere for whatever reason.

You don't get to park in the shade (sorry car), but you do get to wait in a tent for a little train to take you to the parks. While waiting they give out free water and ice pop things, then the train proceeds to bypass the VIP section while they stand staring in shock. Great stuff.

The only park open this early is:

Legoland Dubai

I try not to actively seek out these places any more, but as it was open for 3 hours outside of Motiongate and part of a cheaper deal, be rude not to get the creds wouldn't it.

Actually quite liked the place, mainly because it was completely dead and there's far worse places to kill a couple of hours.

The central hub of the park is the indoor miniland, but while everyone got caught up in that, I powered straight outside to the Kingdom area. How predictable.

Oh look, one of those Dragon things again.

Staff were super friendly and exctied to see the first customer of the day, rather than hating their life like most Legolands. Something I noticed both here and in other parks in the country is that the staff are really good with children, which I can't say I've ever noticed in any other place.

Same old dark ride section, just a little newer looking. Same old ride outside, closer to Malaysia than Germany in smoothness thankfully. Job done.

Apprentice had fired up by now, so got that knocked off as well. Again, very friendly for some strange bloke riding a kids coaster at Legoland on his own. No judgment here.

This was my first experience with outdoor park sections here and I found myself darting between shade spots as quickly as possible. Quite fun really. Might as well tick off the dark rides.

Oh one of those again. The really really short one that's just a circle layout. Played a game of how many different effects can I spot and set off, good little sit down.

Always cautious of these now, after powering into Billund's expecting it to be a ride and finding out that it wasn't.
This one is, and I think I liked it more than Windsor, due to having a sub to myself.
Still feel like it needs a little more spectacle though. When the dramatic music hits and it says welcome to the city of Atlantis, there's just a small lone pyramid with some lego knobs on top. I want some huge epic set to look at. But it's Legoland.

Well that's the park done in 40 minutes. Time to chill in Miniland.

Yay miniland pics. These are probably the best parts of all the parks, because they have all their unique builds relevant to the location. Wish the same creativity went into the ride lineups.

This was an Eid thing where you can build your own lantern for the display.

Stuff vs Burj

Lotte wins of course <3

Burj vs Burj

Got lost in there for about half an hour. Still not enough time killed. There was a sandwich board up advertising the 4D showtimes. Fine...

Ended up with the obnoxious Nexo Knights one again. Marginally better than having to suffer through the one based on the movie, but ugh. Best part was the audiences over the top reactions to all the 4D bits. I remember being wowed like that the first time in Disney, age 12. What happened.

Another sandwich board made it clear that I also had time to try the Ninjago puppet stage show.

Ok, I'm intrigued.

Was actually pretty good. It ain't no Lion King, but it was rather clever and refreshing to me at least.

So there we go, a reasonably happy experience at a Legoland park. Off to the next park.

Maybe next time.

The Riverwalk area between the parks is really nice, aside from the lack of shade. Kept up the vampire routine and powered swiftly to the park entrance a little too early.

There was a small group outside also waiting, and they began doing bag checks early so we could move forward to the turnstyles. After a short while they stopped this and just let the crowd build up outside, confused, resulting in a rather awkward 15 minutes of either staring down the staff at the turnstyles, or at the guests behind who felt like they were missing out (hopefully the VIPs again).

Motiongate
The call comes in. And we're off. All that time I'd been having a bit of a tactical think, so super cred mode again, I knew where I was headed.

Straight into the massive Dreamworks building.

Via Toothless of course.

Now is not the time to appreciate this magnificence.

They do have locker rules here, but they're free (for an hour at a time) and automated and minimum hassle. So that's a win. Got a great queue here (theme of the day), circus style, that passes through a little runaway cart thing with lots of imaginitive posters on the walls.

Can't help but think of Karnan when i see those infinity trains now, which makes me fearful in a good way. Something tells me this won't quite be the same.

Pretty much the same turn into a dark ride section and hold before the launch as ol' Blue Fire the previous day. I don't know my Madagascar, so something about the animals and the bad guy and time to escape the circus. Launches through a psychodelic tunnel and into the main darkened ride area. It's good fun, but you can feel like it's holding back a little, being aimed at such a family market with the IP. There's hills in there that could kill at higher speed, but it doesn't quite want to.

Also has a few effects that light up as you pass by/through and a tiny 'outdoor' section into the area outside the ride entrance for guests to get a little offride glimpse, in the same vein as Spiderman the previous day.
Ends on the brake run with an angry bear in the cart, those penguins and a statement along the lines of 'people in love are never happy', which made me laugh every time.

Time to make the most of that locker. In my narrow minded view, I'm powering off to Dragon Gliders next and BOOM.

I'm taken aback. That's a bloody spectacular area I've just walked into. I wasn't prepared for this. Found myself just meandering around in amazement for a while, rather than going into the ride. I already love this IP, love the films, and they've done it so much justice. And the staff guy is wearing a themed costume. And completely out of character for myself I have to tell him how amazing that is. Ahhhhhh!

Queue is really detailed and atmospheric, with a bit of Gobber action on audio, some posters and drawings teaching you about dragons, animatronics, screens and effects.

On to the ride then. I didn't quite 'get' Arthur. It was all a bit something and nothing, like a cool concept but poorly executed, maybe that's just IP bias.

I get this, it's just done right. 90% dark ride and 10% coaster. There's a fantastic mix beyond physical stuff and screens, including some clever projections and story-telling shadows. It has a fresh story, going on a bit of an adventure with Hiccup and Astrid. Stumble on a mean icy dragon, have a bit of a fight with it. Survive. Return to Berk for a bit of a celebration which is when the ride just opens above the main offride area again.

And that works so well. So many little easter eggs around in the form of the catapult sheep everywhere (21 sheep salute).
And then the ending hits, where they've captured that relationship between Hiccup and Toothless perfectly in a single animatronic and a sound clip.
And then Gobber's voice: 'Not at all what I expected, look at you... still alive'. Again, made me laugh every time.
Perfection.

No time to let that sink in, back out into the sun. More Mack goodness afoot.

I was a little confused as to how this was a concept. I don't like the Hunger Games, so much as respect it. Seen the films once and sort of enjoyed them, but can't stand to see them again.
So how is a Mack Launch going to be a high speed train into the city?. A train which in the film they amusingly claim does 200Mph like that's some mind blowing futuristic achievement. For a train.

It doesn't make sense, but they've done a reasonable attempt. The queue is full of boarding procedures and announcements, lots of posh luggage around and a glimpse into one of the trains with posh food inside. By the end of the ride (the brake run) they've made it feel more like the city, with a subtle change in architecture and some billboards and stuff.

So what's in between? Got in the back first, with personal recommendation from the staff bloke who says it's the best seat: good in the spike. It is good in the spike.
The launch that doesn't make it is rather amusingly slow, as the loop is so close to the launch track and it only goes a quarter through it, but as with the others it's the backwards one that catches you by surprise.
Loop itself is lovely and floaty, there's a few twists and turns and one really sharp twisty airtime hill which is probably the highlight of the ride. I've said before that Mack always nail their inversions and the other one is really good, but then it's all over a bit quick.
Solid fun, but nothing spectacular.

Smurf Village Express was next. Had it in my head that it was a Vekoma Junior (a likely assumption) but definitely thought to myself while riding 'this seems better somehow'. Oh yeah, it's a Gerstlauer. They always nail their family stuff.

One more Gerst then and it's a slightly custom Bobsled thankfully. No more than a one and done though. Not sure what the theme was inside, then it's just concrete outside.

Sat behind a couple of Indian blokes who after making such a huge fuss about getting on it, rode it with the most amusing unphased stances. Clearly just a +1 for them as well.

Well that's all the creds knocked out in 45 minutes, better go check on my locker.

Went to Kung Fu Panda from there. Another really, really nice area in the Dreamworks bit. Sadly the ride was down all day, but could have been worse.

Shrek it is then. Less than 0 expectations for this, cos ugh, Shrek. Absolutely loved it.

It's just a retelling of the first film, but with the premise of Shrek and Fiona putting on a puppet show to retell the first film. This is styled really cleverly in a wonderful dark ride full of great detail.
Got some fancy splitting off from your neighbour car into 2 lane path sections chucked in, and then one at the end which, not sure if it was just the difference in scale or something, the 2 cars end up side by side going into a big church scene that actually 'wowed' me. Then the dragon eats the short bloke (in hilariously low budget puppet show style) and the wedding happens, the cars turn round on the spot, and the guests in the pews change. Great stuff.

This was a bit of a mixed bag. Though it was a Soarin' ride for whatever reason. Then inside it made me think it was an immersive tunnel. Then it was just a simulator in a curved screen.
Similar with the story. Thought it was gonna be as described in the preshow, just a nice sightseeing flight over the capital and some districts. Then there's a signal breaking through and rebels talking, oh maybe they're gonna chuck that in a bit. Then the ride is mostly that chucked in, bit of a high speed flying chase through the city in a sub par simulator and nothing like it promised.
Was better in my head I think. Soarin' over some fictional lands. Would have done the job better.

Positives though - another nicely themed queue with stuff about all the different districts, and then an actor as one of the nasty security blokes (peacekeepers?) sneaking up on people after the preshow and scaring them silly.
Also the sign outside said 30 minutes, I asked if that was because it runs time slots, or from an actual queue. The response was 'mmmmmm a bit of both'. Then it was walk on.

Ghostbusters. Again, rather good. Slightly too much screeny for the shooty bits, but very nicely themed. Ended a bit abruptly. Didn't take a picture?

The list just keeps going. Hotel Transylvania. No idea what this is. Absolutely loved it.

Another pseudo-trackless dark ride, the highlight of which is a huge open hallway with tons of crossed pathways and just cars everywhere goign in all directions between scenes. On the first go I was all alone and it just filled me with childlike excitement and glee.

Second go was ruined by having a couple of british tourists behind me constantly moaning about how bad it all was. Really?? You don't know what good is. Can't take them anywhere...

I normally skip drop towers unless I think they're of particular interest, but it was so quiet everywhere I thought I might as well have a go on theirs. 60 minute queue. Nope.

Hung around outside Underworld 4D, wondering whether it was actually open. The show time board was outside, but awkwardly blocking the door, and the exit shop was all boarded up with a sign saying closed.
It was open. Yet again, very nicely themed queueline. Preshow was a bit awkward, standing around watching a screen of clips from the movies? And some story about a vampire.
Actual experience was rather bizarre. Obviously it's more dark and graphic than your average 4D show. I liked the beginning with someone getting shot through the head synced with a water effect to the face, but it never got better than that. The rest is done from a POV perspective of the vampire bloke getting into fights and stuff, though the seat movements fall way short of what's going on. Need the Ben10 hardware.

Smurf dark ride. Had too much good stuff going before it. It was alright. Did the job.

Think that was everything covered bar the rapids, which I had planned to vampire later. With a couple of hours to go until sundown, decided to go chill in the Dreamworks area again.

Had a very nice tofu & noodles thing from the Kung Fu Panda area (my kinda scene). Still a strong showing from the park food around here.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs was alright. Couldn't work out who made it. It had some interesting pacing, moments where it would almost come to a standstill before rushing off again. Not sure if they were planned or not. Mildly wet, but not brutal enough for my taste in water rides. Had possibly the weakest queue of the park, being just cattlepens and a couple of TV screens.

Dragon Gliders broke down for a bit unfortunately, but then it got dark and I had some night rides on CBT instead. It fixed itself before the end of the day so I managed to finish on that high.

All in all, another great day. Properly impressed with this park and the bar has been set even higher now. Watch out IMG.

I'll leave you with the park's best pun.

 

[Jarrett]

That lighting on Capitol Bullet Train is beautiful! I actually did a proof of concept for the Hunger Games park in RCT so it made me really happy to see a TR of how the real thing came out. Shame to hear about the simulator though, I always thought a tour through the districts would be a good ride for that franchise but it sounds like they Merlined the concept up a bit. Great photos though!

Great report so far, these parks all look great. Love the little Eid lantern at Legoland, not been to one of their properties but that makes this one look really nice. IMG also looks beautiful with that roof! Can't wait to see more.

 

[gavin]

Sadly the ride was down all day, but could have been worse.

Yeah, it could have been worse if you had to waste your time riding it; it's s**t.

Pretty much agree with everything else you said really, especially Shrek and Dragon Gliders, which I honestly thought were the two best things there.

 

[Hixee]

I had thought about making time for going in, but parks and sleep were the priorities for now, so settled for a few snaps from the outside.

Missed out there, I'm afraid - make sure it's added next time! It's wonderful.

Enjoying reading this. I always feel a bit bitter about Motiongate opening a week after I left (having been there for about four months), but you're among the many who have really rated Shrek and Dragon Gliders, which feel like they would make the trip worthwhile. And the +whatever is there now too.

 

[HeartlineCoaster]

I actually did a proof of concept for the Hunger Games park in RCT

Which RCT? I'd be interested to see that.

Missed out there, I'm afraid - make sure it's added next time!

Yeah, for whatever reason I was originally treating this as a one and done trip and I was intending to cram everything in.
Took me less than a day in the country to think nah, I already love it enough to come back here.
So I slowed down a bit and didn't do the stuff that I thought I might not enjoy as much on my own. Next time!


Didn’t quite know how this day was going to pan out, but I had the combo ticket for the water park and they opened an hour earlier. Cred time.

Yas Waterworld

Caved and went for a locker on arrival, mainly to protect the precious paper park ticket.

Once again I was overly early and spent a good 15 minutes milling around at the door. Everyone else’s excitement was building. I wasn’t so sure.
No pictures unfortunately. Not the type of person to feel the need to wear a phone in a plastic wallet around my neck like a few others I noticed here.
(If you look closely, you can spot the track in one of the pictures later. There's a little game for you).

Walked to the cred as fast as my inappropriate footwear would allow and navigated the stairs with some difficulty.

Kinda liked it, if just for the relative uniqueness of it. Even just having bare feet made it a new experience for me. It’s got the sexy Vekoma SFC trains, 2 lifts and a bit of fun through the layout. Also like the barrels on the front of the train that get refilled with water each time it sits in the station.

Nearly left at this point, but figured there was still time for something else. Ah, might as well. I know I don’t trust myself to be flailing solo in a tube, so I’d rather do something where you get to sit in a dinghy. Selected the big 6 seater one (Falcon’s Falaj?) and struggled up even more stairs to the top. Glasses and footwear in hand, I can’t really hold on… well, this will be an experience.

Christ it was intense. I might be converting to this stuff at some point. Took less than 3 seconds of it tipping backwards before I was completely soaked, couldn’t see and was in hysterics, from there it was just a brutal alternating succession of crazy air time that shouldn’t happen and vicious walls of water to the face. It all ended in a blur and you have to jump out into a waist deep pool to escape the insanity. Almost as wet as Valhalla that.

Hmmm. I need to leave now and the shorts I’m wearing all day are somewhat… soaked. Stood around in the sun for a while, carefully toeing the line between drying off quick and getting sunburnt. Then proceeded to the exit.

Got the car rather wet and drove round to the mall car park, parking next to what I thought was a Ferrari (appropriately). Apparently it was a Corvette. They’re not going to let me in now.

Ferrari World

You know what time it is. Super cred mode. Straight to Rossa, no time to think.

There was a little time to think actually, they were running it super slow and apparently it was just teetering on the edge of being too windy to run it. Never mind that, let’s get it over with.

No one was being brave enough for the front, so slithered up to the opportunity. Goggles biting into my face, staring down the launch track. Meh.

It is fast, I’ll give it that. Sooo much face wobble by the end of the straight, I’m rather thankful for the trims to be honest, felt like I was about to lose a cheek.

Speed isn’t everything though, I wasn’t particularly blown away by the rest of it. It impressed me, it’s fast and ridiculous, but doesn’t offer much else. I admire the limits being pushed and the highlight was probably seeing the water sprays on the wheels during the brake run.

On closer inspection, the layout is bigger Rita…

Took another go in the back later on and that basically just ruined it. Staff woman did say ‘no one ever asks for the back’ and now we know why.
Rode really awful in all the corners, like, really, brain shakingly awful. No thanks.

On to better things?

Flying Aces was probably my most anticipated ride of the trip. This had the opposite effect.

Didn’t really get the fuss about these things on the first lap, felt like a lot of pointless meandering and not much going on. Gave it a couple more goes during the day. Yeah, not bad. It’s a grower. I’ll come back to that.

Fiorano GT looks like a harmless bit of fun. It’s pretty decent, again if only for being somewhat unique. The lack of banking in the corners give it a bit of extra kick as well as a more genuine feel for what it’s trying to achieve, which I appreciate.

Never quite seemed to be racing though, always ended the same. Wonder if the launches are overly intelligent to make it that way.
Also the restraint having the same hoopy handle as Maurer’s spinners, just unnecessarily in a really awkward out of reach place amused me.

Turbo Track to round off the creds. Everything was walk on at this time, so that’s another set finished in 45 minutes.

Bit something and nothing really. Very faffy loading procedure for a ride that’s over in 30 seconds. Went backwards to start off, but that didn’t even help to give it any noticeable air time or anything.

Felt like it barely made it up the spike as well. Certainly didn't see much.
Think someone else already said this, but good use of space and that’s about it.

Ok, I’m not feeling this park as much. As with the Spanish place, it’s all a bit Ferrari up its own arse, which isn’t the best vibe. Wonder if the dark rides will fix that.

If you start with Speed of Magic. Noooooooooo.
Starts off with a kid on a bed playing a game with this cartoon guy called Nello and he’s a rather unpleasant character. Encouraging kids to act like they’re the best at everything and everyone else sucks. Cool.
Gets pissed off with the game (rightly so), then Dad walks in. I’VE JUST BOUGHT A FERRARI MATE. Best Dad ever (right?). Here’s the keys. Nello steals the keys. Gotta play the game to get em back boy.
Sigh.
As a simulator it ain’t that great. Don’t really remember much beyond obnoxious shouting from Nello as he drags you around on strings through the jungle, ice, lava, desert? Then FUTURISTIC FORMULA 1 and you beat him in 5 seconds. You got lucky punk.


In total contrast to this, Benno’s great race is really good. An inventive twist on shooting dark ride where a rabbit is racing the feds (beaver?) through Italy, the ‘gun’ is a spanner and you have to help him along the way by breaking boxes, cutting spiders webs and putting bees in jars. Great stuff.

Think it was Pizza after that. When in Rome. Again, quality food, reasonably priced. UAE you're killing it.

Oh there’s that other dark ride of the factory tour. Didn’t rate it, wasn’t particularly interesting and a bit more ‘look how great we are’.

Did the cultural maze full of quotes from Zayed himself. This being the year of Zayed. That was more interesting.

This dumb thing still isn't ready and it's all @Matt N's fault

They had lots of decades of music stuff going on around with local DJs which was quite amusing. 80s one with Rubiks cubes, graffiti and 2 blokes having a dance off. 70s one with disco people trying to grind against you. 60s one with hula hoops.
Then the 90s one. Had this beatboxing guy who was very good at his job. Then he announced a skateboarder, BMX guy and someone on rollerskates. World Champions in their field he says. They messed up so many times that it got rather embarrassing and I left (not sure why I was watching in the first place).

Well if that’s the tone being set, I’m gonna find out if they do handstamps. They do.

Went out into the mall to find the bonus cred in FunWorks. On the way there was this exhibition about the new park I missed by a month. They were getting people to pre-book for cheap, so I had a little nose around and got given a WB passport thing in which you’re supposed to fill in your details. Good for the crate I guess.

Fun Works

Yolo Works then. Bad staff, bad guests, awful ride. A stain on this country. Didn’t take a picture in my disgust.
Suffers from the same problem as halfpipes in that you don’t want to be facing 90 degrees to a snappy launch mechanism with an OTSR in your face.

Had some more food in the food court place and a bit of a sit down. What time does the park shut? Got 11 in my head. Looked it up. 8. What’s the time? 7:15. Ah...

Forcing down the rest of a sandwich and half a litre of sprite while powering back through the mall, hope I’m not gonna regret that.

Ferrari World

Flying Aces at night. Oh man this thing came to life. Warming up is apparently still a thing when it’s 40 degrees to start with.
It did things to me. Things that I’ve not felt before on a coaster. Dangerous things. I grew to love it, character and all.
The queue is amazing, but if anything it's jarringly loud. Wouldn't want to be stuck queueing in that rocky bit with the planes going over. Thankfully they let me run through the fastrack entrance every time, once I got into marathon mode.

The lift is just ridiculous. Love those minimalist supports. Such a great sense of purpose as it pulls you up whether you like it or not. Was just laughing with glee at it and after a few laps it turned into one of those magical moments.
Great first drop, non-inverting loop is fun, but this is all stuff I’ve seen before.
It’s the little things that set it apart. The speed hill chucked in which is killer. Then this upward bank into an air time hill which throws you completely sideways instead of up for no good reason. It wasn’t doing that earlier.

The snappy twists in the second half, if you’re in the front or back wing seats, they’re just brutal in the best way and it only got better and better the more I rode it. Fantastic.

You’ve saved Ferrari World.

 

[Matt N]

Sorry... I thought it would be ready by now. It's been announced for nearly 4 years! Is this going to be the new Orphan Rocker?

Looks like you had a nice trip, though. Great reports, also!

 

[rctneil]

Great reviews of the parks. Enjoyed reading it, especially as i'm considering a visit at the end of the year. Quick question, what method of getting around would you recommend? Is hiring a car and driving recommended or should I just use taxi's and the metro etc?

 

[HeartlineCoaster]

^Car was very easy, convenient and cheap. As long as you're reasonably comfortable with that sort of thing, highly recommended.

 

[Pear]

Sucks that Mission Ferrari wasn't open. I won't be going there for many years and I still don't think it'll be open by then!

 

[caffeine_demon]

You missed bollywood?

 

[gavin]

You missed bollywood?

Missed nothing.

 

[HeartlineCoaster]

With all the big stuff successfully ticked off, there was time for a brief stint of mopping up. Sat navs here are pretty terrible, as nowhere has a uniquely identifiable address and it has to rely on names only. It didn’t know any of the smaller parks existed, so to find some WiFi and work out another plan of attack, let’s go to somewhere it has heard of:

Burj Khalifa

Didn’t know how or where to fit this in amongst all the rest of it, so just winged it and turned up first thing hoping to book a time slot. Luckily it was quiet enough to go straight in however.

So up we go.

Decided to just do the cheaper deck as again, got to save some things for next time. Wasn’t particularly blown away by the height here, maybe it isn’t helped by the surroundings and a lack of a sense of scale.

The nearby area was significantly more sparse than I had imagined. Have some views.

All in all, just your standard observation deck stuff. Next.

Got lost in the mall on the way back to the car and walked past something that stirred a reaction in my head.

VR Park Dubai

Fairly sure I saw that name the previous night when scrolling through Coaster Count. Sure enough, they’ve got a bonus cred.

I had done all my planning through coast2coaster and it isn’t currently on there, so would have missed it all together. But here we are.
Slightly more significant than your average bonus +1 as well, being a Gerst spinner. Shame it’s VR, though the name of the place would imply that that’s kind of the point.
Ride was alright, I think. VR wasn’t good, emulating being flown around the city in a ‘drone’, with poor graphics and a very poor matchup between the camera rotation and the on-ride spinning. Didn’t try anything else here, needed to get back on track and, you know, VR.

Armed with some names of landmarks near to the parks (mostly supermarkets and hotels), tried the ol’ sat nav again. It knows a small shop on the other side of the road to this massive mall (which it doesn’t know) that houses the park (which it doesn’t know) and there was some dust by a bridge nearby on which people seemed to be parking. That’ll do then.

Adventureland

This place looked the most intriguing (and significant) of the lesser parks around. Stopped off for some food in the mall first and sat watching the powered coasters buzzing around the entrance facade which faces into the food court area. I like that.

Went to the ticket window to purchase a prepaid card, asking for the 3 coasters. The response was: ‘I don’t know how much things cost, you’ll have to go and look first’. Sounds fun.

Had a wander, did a quick bit of maths and went back. Was able to provided a very precise number, but it all got complicated with bonus deals and stuff. Never mind that, just want the creds.

Knew the place had the 2 powered coasters, but had no idea they were stacked on top of each other so creatively. This crazy station building houses both, the red one being up top and the yellow one below. They share the same entrance and are labelled the ‘slow train’ and ‘fast train’. Chose to start with the slow, though the staff guy kept insisting the fast would suit better. Don’t worry, there’s time for both.

Forest Train is indeed slow for the most part, mincing around some inside theming and across the lower half of the outside of the park, but it picks up some good speed on the way back into the station and takes the final corners fast enough to cause damage (and continue for a second lap).

Kukulcan is a bit faster and more intense for a ride of its nature and has many amusing low clearance moments.

Rocket Cycles was last. Usually expect to hate these motocoaster things, but it wasn’t too bad at all. The lift is another entertaining example of their use of space in here, with the rarely seen 90 degree corner halfway up it, like an RCT throwback.


That was fun. Time for any more?
It was a hotel address that got me to the general vicinity of the next place, but parking wasn’t quite so obvious. Eventually stumbled on a patch of tarmac with a hut in the corner that cost a couple of quid for an hour. That’ll do.
On walking to the mall (which it doesn’t know), there’s a massive car park (which it doesn’t know) right outside. Ugh. At least it was the same price.

There’s another cred across the road from this mall, but the place was fenced off and deserted. Spite.

Sparky’s Al Ghurair

Rocked up to this place with very little time left. Straight to the desk. How much for the cred? Some complicated explanation about prepaid cards again. Sounds good, just take the cash.
In the midst of this, a very friendly local woman decided to give a card away to save me some deposit money.
I didn’t have the exact change and the ticket woman didn’t have the correct change to compensate. I said don’t worry about it, keep the extra, but she was either very insistent on being helpful or didn’t want to get in trouble with the accountant. She began calling over multiple members of staff as well as other guests to root through all their wallets and pockets for some extra change.
This was getting out of control. Seriously, don’t worry about it. Ran off to the Rol(l)er Coaster.

This thing was fun. More weirdly shaped lifts to fit it into the building and some inconsistent spinning action. Made for an interesting experience.

As I went to leave past the ticket desk, she had the correct change lined up for me on the counter. How lovely.

Time for work.