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Celtic Coastering - Day 2: Coastering

Rob Coasters

Hyper Poster
Huh? Me leaving the UK? That's... unheard of. Last time I did that was in 2018 on a trip to Tenerife where I went to the greatest waterpark ever, then sacrificed a Zierer to go back a second time. Worth it, I genuinely do not regret it one bit. If it was a Tivoli though, then different story. Who's to convince me otherwise?

Anyway, that Wales trip was doing a bit of foreshadowing that I was ready to start travelling hardcore once again, and where better to start than Ireland? Close by, should be easy enough to get around, massive wooden roller coaster. What's not to love? Might be better than silly old England from day one like Wales, though I still haven't figured if I just like new things and I have a "newness bias". Most likely.

A ride in the car to Stansted later, our flight departed at 10ish. I expected hell, hours of security queues... but we blitzed right past it with no lines and I was finding myself through the airport and where I needed to go with EASE. While waiting for one of the group to browse a shop we exited early we had a glance at the departures board.
"Reus"
"Cologne"
"Billund"
"Vienna"
It hit me like a truck. These places are REAL. I cam get on Polar X-plorer or whatever if I just do this trip again just a different language. It's all... right here. "Luxembourg".

Anyway, the flight was fine, short but fine. As someone with a dodgy eardrum the descending process filled me with considerable pain, but swallowing an endless stream of Starbursts allowed them to 'pop' which in turn allowed me to survive and appreciate the final moments of landing without having to fight for my life. The ear pain is something I've managed to circumvent on the flight home by moving some neck muscles in a specific way and breathing out hard, in order to 'pop' them before the descending process started which led to a painless end to the weekend jaunt.

Our destination was Dublin Airport and our trip but our b&b for the next two nights was located in Drogheda, north of Dublin. So one quick bus later we were there, passing by an indoor waterpark and not much else that I can remember. And outside of the bus station we were starving so headed to our first Irish building...

...a McDonalds. Seriously. Planning on a five minute in-and-out collection of two cheeseburgers and a milkshake, we headed in.

Unfortunately, the newly developed handful of delivery services turned the McDonalds experience from a short stop into a long and frustrating affair. They used to have your food ready more-or-less immediately after order, but the congregation of eager delivery drivers makes that no more. Soon our stuff was ready though, and while people do write this place off as awful, I have got to admit that was a pretty God damn good cheeseburger.

Following the good food and our stomach requests completed our next course of action was to head over to a taxi rank to gain a cab to our b&b. Our initial thoughts were to swing by a pub that had a friend of a friend, but the need to disembark ourselves from our rucksacks were higher priority. Stumbling into a taxi building as it became our home for the next fifteenish minutes.

Soon came, so we unloaded at the b&b only to taxi it back down to town shortly after to do some exploring and private matters.

We've stayed awake for the liftoff, now we'll never believe the sights. The Sights, the sights. Cousteau and Cicero are nowhere to be seen though, but perhaps Mr. Magpie was. This building if my mind serves me correctly is known as the "cup & saucer".
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We were greeted with this view of the town, I've decided to show the photo where I intentionally turned the camera to block out said McDonalds from eye view.

EDIT: Oops.
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Behind St. Mary's Church is the Viaduct, which I jokingly said to myself as "the X2 of Drogheda". See if you can figure out why before I spoil the answer in like three images' time.
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We've been in this little gated area for a while now, but the gate will shut in four minutes. Better secure our freedoms then.
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Finding ourselves en route to the church I sported a scary dark alleyway... better go down it. Clearly I wasn't supposed to be here but it's... right there? Plus, I've been giggling at this sign I found there for the past few days.
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The scale of this church is not to be messed with...
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I got distracted by a rusty boat...
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...Viaduct. If your answer to why I call this the X2 of Drogheda is "because its construction bankrupted the manufacturer" then congratulations! I'm not sure what to give to the winners, maybe I'll give away free yellow squares, I've got ten spares. Let me know if you want one; I'll edit this post promptly to reflect any taken squares. Be sure to let me know quickly... first come first serve. And yes, you can take as many as you want. Split or steal?
🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨
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This more modern-looking bridge reminds me of SOMETHING, a bridge of course, but I can't put my finger on what exactly. London & Australia come to mind...
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After this crossing we came down to St Peters Church where we saw A REAL HEAD and some fascinating religious stories. No photos from inside, a decision I personally made myself, and no photos from outside because the heavens opened. "Driest day in Ireland".

Of course we saw the friend of the friend, then off to bed. Big day tomorrow, but 'twas a big day today too.
 

Benenen

Hyper Poster
Goodness have I been excited for this report! Looking forward to reading the next bit. Glad your revelation in Stansted departures happened but if you become a balla jet setting cred collector next year I will miss the detailed reports of ambitious UK kiddy cred runs.
 

Rob Coasters

Hyper Poster
Goodness have I been excited for this report! Looking forward to reading the next bit. Glad your revelation in Stansted departures happened but if you become a balla jet setting cred collector next year I will miss the detailed reports of ambitious UK kiddy cred runs.
Oh the kiddie cred runs are far from over... my expectations in this country continue to lower further and further as time continues, there's always something new around the corner when I get desperate enough. *emails Gullivers*

Of course I gotta balance it out with good rides too at some point down in mainland EU... I'm not against the idea of deciding my next park with a roll of the die on RCDB's random generator... ;)
(provided that said park has enough to warrant a trip)
 

Rob Coasters

Hyper Poster
^ Something I forgot to mention above is The Peacock, which is a fantastic food-serving pub with an incredible steak sandwich.

At the time of visiting, this park was in its identity crisis phase where it's basically called both Emerald Park and Tayto Park at the same time, but the entrance said Tayto Park so that's where I'm going with that.

Following Hixee's advice to sleep before a theme park trip, I was rolling into the day on a cool eight-and-a-something hours of shut eye.

9:00am
"What breakfast would you like?"
"Full English would be good----oh my GOD I MEANT A FULL IRISH I'M SO SORRY I'M NOT USED TO THIS"
"Hahaha it's fine, happens all the time"

It was delicious. Where's the taxi then to the bus station? Oh, it's right here.

A quick wait for the 105 bus, no, COACH to Blanchardstown later...
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WOW

After entry, we immediately headed for the bathroom before ticking off the park's Zierer Force. The entryway shows a funny departures board...
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...but if you're a binger of my trip reports you may realise that me not typing this ride by name yet is a bad sign. Yep - our initial impression of this park is the coaster breaking in our faces and the queue being evac'd after a test run. I've managed to evade two rides of this type so far, but finally the turns have tabled; the Force had evaded me now. Repeating to the people "ride's broke" like a crashed Nintendo DS game reversing back through the queue towards the entrance, we decided to try our luck with the other junior coaster instead.

In front of what I nickname 'the Ukraine zipwires' due to their colour scheme is their new-for-2022 coaster, #149 Dino Dash (woo). When this was first announced I kind of boo'ed the park for just getting "another family coaster". The Zierer is RIGHT THERE. And when I got on... I realised how horrifically wrong I was to make fun of the park for that.
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DINO DASH IS FANTASTIC. Instantly cementing itself as one of my favourite family coasters, this hilarious traversal through the trees is a blast in the back row with surprising turns and a first drop that pulls you hard. Coupled with some great hills and even some surprises throughout: at the beginning is a dinosaur that sprays water at you and at the end is a dinosaur that sprays water at you. Then it all happens again. We were all in hysterics as my parents proclaimed it as their new favourite roller coaster of all time. Coaster ranking gets tough here when a coaster that you genuinely enjoy all of only barely places outside of the top fifty. The competition is tough, to say the least.

While waiting for our photo to print I spotted Power Surge through the trees, I'd been highly keen on trying out one of these but it seemed to be cycling quite slowly, and definitely could have had more potential. I obviously don't know though, maybe it would've been good fun.
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More or less, all of the flats were on my radar, but I sadly managed to get absolutely none of them done due to future happenings, and this is where #150 Cú Chulainn comes into play.
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If you've seen my signature or comments in ranking threads in General Discussion, it'd be pretty obvious where I stand with this ride. I'll cut to the chase immediately and proudly proclaim this as my favourite roller coaster of all time, but halt! This didn't happen immediately.
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The queue was walk-on and they were allowing rerides, so my first ride I was parked second from the back. In perhaps my new favourite trains, the awesome Timberliners, I was ready to go. And my God, that pull over the first drop in the back rows is simply incredible. It's a powerful start to the ride into the camera and a short tunnel into a hard-hitting double up, and the ride officially begins. A series of left turns turns you round just over 180 into my actual favourite part of the ride, an S bend consisting of two sharp quick downwards turns as you weave under the structure. It throws you hard, and this leaves me in endless laughter every time.

The "inversion" took some getting used to as it was a bit of a strange feeling as I'd never gone over like 45 on a woodie before but I got used to it and got round to quite liking it over my seven rides. Left side seats over right side seats.
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The ride then continued through some brilliant elements including a double down and the finale helix before dropping into a tunnel, then back up into the brakes. Breathless. Back on we go.
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Had to tear myself down the exit stairs after four rides as I had credding to do. (why do I do this to myself)

#151 Flight School decided to reopen, no longer Spite School (or Flight Spite), so attempt two. Will the Zierer Force stack up against the legendary Tivoli?!

After one ride in the front with a metric ton of legroom to the point where our legs were outstretched (lol), probably not but I'll leave some 'maybe' room as this is a relatively small model of Force. The turn right next to the station provides decent force and there're funny S bends after, then it's two helices before we're back in the station for lap two. Again I'll forgive them for building Dino Dash, that's far superior to this but I still enjoy both coasters. I do know how to make it sound like I dislike a coaster when I think it's perfectly fine, ahahaha.
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The voyage down to the Junior Zone led me to this spiral... hill... thing. It's completely pointless with views that I haven't decided how good they are yet, and takes at least a few minutes out of your time, but it's a workout filled with laughs getting up and down.
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In my defense I also thought he had his hand out like mine. I like this dude.
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Steam Train Express was on the way, and while quite the short train ride it still provides a decent little sit down while still moving.
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Here it is. #152 Ladybird Loop is significantly better than Great Yarmouth's thing because it has an actually, quite decent effort put into its theming. Don't worry about that clearance, the gate moves before things start.
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And after watching other members of my group ride the carousel, we stumbled through the disorientating Vortex Tunnel before heading back to the Thrill Zone, taking a few detours in the process. The zoo consisted of highly amusing animals including but not limited to porcupines, macaques, black ducks with red beaks, free-roaming peacocks (who were actually by Flight School), leopards, lemurs, tiny foxes... here're the birbs.
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The last two rides of the day were #5, #6 and #7 on Cú Chulainn, but I got distracted by Spiting Voyage who was out of action for the cold season. And after reading good old witchfinder's recent trip report here, it's clear to understand why. It looks like a soaker.
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Construction for the new 2023 coasters had nothing special, just groundwork with your basic construction vehicles. Didn't spot any track or supports, there wasn't anything note enough to take a pic.

Enough distractions. Wooden roller coaster.

Something I used to do in my downtime is do these "fake rankings" where I copy my current rankings then add random coasters into where I think they'll place, sometimes rides I haven't even watched a POV of. I decided Cú Chulainn was fitting right in at #3, below Olympia and above Icon. So this is where my expectations were, not the best thing I've done but still good. So after four rides throughout the whole of the train I was pretty contempt with placing it at... #3. Exactly where I expected it to go.

This is when I realised that this was the wrong thing to do. Midway through my fifth ride, I realised "wait this is literally just bigger & better Megafobia" and that's when I knew it was #1. It's Megafobia but smoother. Megafobia but the back row doesn't jackhammer to hell. Megafobia but with more airtime. Megafobia but longer. Megafobia but with TUNNELS. It's been RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME this whole time, and my initial ranking of #3 is just because I wanted to be correct with the expectations side of things. I realised I needed to stop with the fake rankings, as going into stuff with an open mind à la Speed is by far the best way to go.
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(How many lift hill photos are we at now?)
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Thankfully I had time for two extra rides with confirmed knowledge that it's my new favourite, before we had to leave for the bus back to Drogheda at 3:30pm. We got loads of merch, we were all given a free packet of Tayto crisps when we walked through the exit turnstiles, it was a great end. The sacrifice of the flat rides for the CREDS and the CHULAINN is something I'd like to rectify on a future visit as I'll certainly be back, but I have no regrets of anything today. Rock climbing, zip lines, skywalk & climbing frame were all closed but to be fair everything was walk on, and they most likely needed the staff for other rides.

Our return in Drogheda was extremely brief, as twenty minutes later we were on another bus (the D1 or D2) to see the Irish coast outside of a plane. Our choice was Bettystown as it was closest and had a direct connection. Unfortunately for my group...
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And unfortunately for me it was "probably" closed as it was approaching 6ish pm now, radio silence from the area, and I couldn't be bothered to check the actual grounds anyway, so we just chilled at the beach and had a great meal at the adjacent restaurant, Reddans Pub & Grill. And when I say we "chilled" at the beach, I mean the winds were absolutely howling and we were out of there within minutes. We chilled, it was freezing. But at least we got there at all, which is what matters the most!

We also got a close-up of X2 on the way there through the dry weather:
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And here's the end of the Ireland.
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After an exhausting day we returned to Drogheda, met back up with the friend of the friend at the pub, and relaxed as a live band played in the background. I called them legends when they left, I got to hold their guitar, I thought about terribly playing the Moratorium version of Dreamer's Hotel (trust me I listen to other bands too) and decided it was the better option to just pose.

The walk back to the b&b was a nice closer to the day as it gave us time to reflect on how we've done so much in such a short time of being here.

One day remains... and edit: I've decided not to post day three due to it being a more personal one, but I hope you've enjoyed this quick report of Ireland.

Back to good old England then? Click here to return to my home country for a southern funfair.
 

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