nadroJ
CF Legend
So I finally visited the elusive Wicksteed Park today and stopped off at Billing Aquadrome on the way home for a further plus one.
So, anyone reading this today knows it's been hot and as a result Wicksteed was fairly busy, but I feel this added to the atmosphere. As we pulled into the car park (paying the burdenous £6 car park charge <//3) we saw a huge field filled with picnickers and sunbathers, groups of families dotted around everywhere enjoying the sun =]
First impressions of the park were good, the grounds were well kept and quite beautiful to look at - the attractions are kind of placed at each corner of the park , there are 4 different sections: The Arena which has 2 creds, some go karts, a log flume and some other flats, The Lakeside which has a boat on a rope, some paddle boats and the SBNO Nautic Jets, the Fairground which is where most of the rides are, some carousels, a pirate ship, astroglide, etc and The Playground which was a really nice looking kids play area.
So we made our way firstly over to The Arena and bought our wristbands (£13 each, which isn't too bad considering how much there is to do) and got in the queue for the smaller cred in the area, The Ladybird. The ride op was a really bubbly friendly girl who offered to take our photo when she saw we were taking one of ourselves. It was a fun little ride, nothing to write home about, but yay, plus one! After this we jumped off and went to join the queue for the small log flume, which was hiding a quite vile queue behind its' station. It was really hot at this point and everyone else wanted to cool down so we ended up leaving the queue and went and joined the back of the queue for the park's biggest ride, the Pinfari Rollercoaster. As it was quite busy the par were running a three train operation, something I was quite impressed with because smaller parks usually just sit and watch the queues build. In minutes we were on and despite it looking quite vile the ride was actually really smooth and fun! From here we also got a nice view of the campsite which was surprisingly empty considering how many people were in the park itself!
After this Sam wanted to do the go-karts so we went and queued for those. The track circled the little area in quite a cute little way but the ride itself was poo, the karts all went the same speed so instead of a race it was more of a leisurely convoy around the area, lol.
Once the go-karts were out of the way the plan was to get an ice-cream and walk over to The Lakeside, but the little shop didn't take card so we had to trudge over to the entrance (everything is in the corners of this field remember, so getting from one place to another is a fair walk, especially when you're hot and hungry for ice-cream) in order to find a cash machine. Once this was done Sam got a rhubarb flavour ice-cream which was nom, we sat on a bench in the shade of some trees and cooled off for a bit before getting our final cred of the day, the Circus Clown, yay! Howard the ride-op was really fab and made the ride really fun for the little kids and even helped us out when Sam got stuck in the seat (ha). The coaster itself is really cute, looks really well kept and there's circus music playing and everything <3
Astroglide called next and as we went through the gate the mat-lady told us we could have 4 goes, but in this heat walking to the top of that slide 4 times just wasn't going to happen. The top of the slides had a strong smell of semen which was quite gross, and suspicious seeing as the only ride-op up there was male. We assumed he'd had a slow morning, got in our bags and away we went!
After slides and stuff riding got a bit much in the heat so we walked over to The Lakeside to sit on the grass by the water and relax. After chilling for a bit and fearing for our lives as some menacing swans were staring at us, we went over to the boat-on-a-rope to cool down a bit more. The ride is OLD, opened in 1926, which made me all excited in a geeky kind of way <3 Sam didn't know what it was and was quite horrified to see that we were to sploosh down in a real pond, with weeds and everything, ha! We got nicely wet which helped to hold the heat off a bit and headed over to the paddle boats. However, they were in the process of bringing more boats onto the lake because of how busy it was (again, good operations) but it would be a half hour wait, which we couldn't be bothered with so we decided food could happen.
On the walk over to the small pub in the middle of the field we passed the Nautic Jets which looked like they would have been awesome and a cute train which circles the park. Food was good, a fiver for a Ploughman's lunch really isn't bad and it was nice to sit inside a bit to cool down. Once food had happened we went back to the Fairground to purchase tat and pick and mix before returning to the oven of a car and driving to Billing Aquadrome.
This cred is in the grounds of a camp site and as I pulled up there was a sign saying 'no pass no access'. Bugger. But the man realised we were just there for the day and let us in anyway. I toured the park once looking for parking and it did look alright, but there weren't many people around considering the weather and how busy Wicksteed was. Oh well. We went over to the empty looking funfair and bought our tokens to ride the Caterpillar, yay! Like Brean, the ride ops operate mutliple rides at one time so we had to wait for a bit before somebody came to operate the cred for us. By the time he came over it wasn't just us queuing so we didn't feel too sad and pathetic <3 We got 3 circuits lol. Like Wicksteed, the staff were really fiendly and approachable, something you don't get a lot from people who work in fairs, I've found. Anyway, after literally 10 minutes in the place we got back in the car and headed out.
I would definitely visit Wicksteed again, it seems like the kind of place where CF could have a lot of fun. It reminded me of what Lightwater Valley would probably be without The Ultimate. Very clean, friendly and efficient!
Have some photos:
So, anyone reading this today knows it's been hot and as a result Wicksteed was fairly busy, but I feel this added to the atmosphere. As we pulled into the car park (paying the burdenous £6 car park charge <//3) we saw a huge field filled with picnickers and sunbathers, groups of families dotted around everywhere enjoying the sun =]
First impressions of the park were good, the grounds were well kept and quite beautiful to look at - the attractions are kind of placed at each corner of the park , there are 4 different sections: The Arena which has 2 creds, some go karts, a log flume and some other flats, The Lakeside which has a boat on a rope, some paddle boats and the SBNO Nautic Jets, the Fairground which is where most of the rides are, some carousels, a pirate ship, astroglide, etc and The Playground which was a really nice looking kids play area.
So we made our way firstly over to The Arena and bought our wristbands (£13 each, which isn't too bad considering how much there is to do) and got in the queue for the smaller cred in the area, The Ladybird. The ride op was a really bubbly friendly girl who offered to take our photo when she saw we were taking one of ourselves. It was a fun little ride, nothing to write home about, but yay, plus one! After this we jumped off and went to join the queue for the small log flume, which was hiding a quite vile queue behind its' station. It was really hot at this point and everyone else wanted to cool down so we ended up leaving the queue and went and joined the back of the queue for the park's biggest ride, the Pinfari Rollercoaster. As it was quite busy the par were running a three train operation, something I was quite impressed with because smaller parks usually just sit and watch the queues build. In minutes we were on and despite it looking quite vile the ride was actually really smooth and fun! From here we also got a nice view of the campsite which was surprisingly empty considering how many people were in the park itself!
After this Sam wanted to do the go-karts so we went and queued for those. The track circled the little area in quite a cute little way but the ride itself was poo, the karts all went the same speed so instead of a race it was more of a leisurely convoy around the area, lol.
Once the go-karts were out of the way the plan was to get an ice-cream and walk over to The Lakeside, but the little shop didn't take card so we had to trudge over to the entrance (everything is in the corners of this field remember, so getting from one place to another is a fair walk, especially when you're hot and hungry for ice-cream) in order to find a cash machine. Once this was done Sam got a rhubarb flavour ice-cream which was nom, we sat on a bench in the shade of some trees and cooled off for a bit before getting our final cred of the day, the Circus Clown, yay! Howard the ride-op was really fab and made the ride really fun for the little kids and even helped us out when Sam got stuck in the seat (ha). The coaster itself is really cute, looks really well kept and there's circus music playing and everything <3
Astroglide called next and as we went through the gate the mat-lady told us we could have 4 goes, but in this heat walking to the top of that slide 4 times just wasn't going to happen. The top of the slides had a strong smell of semen which was quite gross, and suspicious seeing as the only ride-op up there was male. We assumed he'd had a slow morning, got in our bags and away we went!
After slides and stuff riding got a bit much in the heat so we walked over to The Lakeside to sit on the grass by the water and relax. After chilling for a bit and fearing for our lives as some menacing swans were staring at us, we went over to the boat-on-a-rope to cool down a bit more. The ride is OLD, opened in 1926, which made me all excited in a geeky kind of way <3 Sam didn't know what it was and was quite horrified to see that we were to sploosh down in a real pond, with weeds and everything, ha! We got nicely wet which helped to hold the heat off a bit and headed over to the paddle boats. However, they were in the process of bringing more boats onto the lake because of how busy it was (again, good operations) but it would be a half hour wait, which we couldn't be bothered with so we decided food could happen.
On the walk over to the small pub in the middle of the field we passed the Nautic Jets which looked like they would have been awesome and a cute train which circles the park. Food was good, a fiver for a Ploughman's lunch really isn't bad and it was nice to sit inside a bit to cool down. Once food had happened we went back to the Fairground to purchase tat and pick and mix before returning to the oven of a car and driving to Billing Aquadrome.
This cred is in the grounds of a camp site and as I pulled up there was a sign saying 'no pass no access'. Bugger. But the man realised we were just there for the day and let us in anyway. I toured the park once looking for parking and it did look alright, but there weren't many people around considering the weather and how busy Wicksteed was. Oh well. We went over to the empty looking funfair and bought our tokens to ride the Caterpillar, yay! Like Brean, the ride ops operate mutliple rides at one time so we had to wait for a bit before somebody came to operate the cred for us. By the time he came over it wasn't just us queuing so we didn't feel too sad and pathetic <3 We got 3 circuits lol. Like Wicksteed, the staff were really fiendly and approachable, something you don't get a lot from people who work in fairs, I've found. Anyway, after literally 10 minutes in the place we got back in the car and headed out.
I would definitely visit Wicksteed again, it seems like the kind of place where CF could have a lot of fun. It reminded me of what Lightwater Valley would probably be without The Ultimate. Very clean, friendly and efficient!
Have some photos:
