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Crazy Caterpillar Chase

.Ac.

Mega Poster
After having so much fun yesterday ( Sat 27th July ) on the wacky worms at Lightwater Valley ( Little Dipper ) & Ocean Beach ( Big Apple ), Me and Fi decided we needed more Crazy Caterpillars coasters in our life and so headed for the south coast, In particular the stretch between Hastings and Portsmouth.

On the basis that Portsmouth parks stayed open much later than Hastings we decided to start the cred run of shame in Hastings and head westerly across the coast during the day.


Park 1 - Flamingo Park
Being the tight people we are, we decided to park in Morrisons for free and walk down from town to park. Walk wasn't to bad and only took 15 / 20 minutes however this decisions latter came back to haunt us, but will touch on that latter.

Moving on to the cred, Caterpillar was your bog standard wacky worm that was showing it age however it was the best value for money on the day at only £1.50 for 3 laps and had the most enthusiastic ride op of the day. Saying that it was first train of the day so no doubt his spirits probably dropped come closing time.
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By time we had done cred just after 11am, walked back to the car and done the decent thing and been an actual customer of Morrisons we made our way to Brighton at approx 11.40 with ETA of 1pm in Brighton.

Park 2 - Palace Pier
A common theme of the day was the fact we don't like paying for parking, so we hunted out any possible free spaces even if they meant a scenic walk to the creds.

Brighton was no exception to this and we entered up parked in Brighton Marina, 2 Miles down the shore line from the pier.

It be fair to say parking in Brighton is not the easiest or the cheapest place but our choice turned out to be the right one as we didn't see a single space at all along the full 2 mile stretch of promenade we walked.

Walk took about 30 minutes each way and it was nice way to soak up atmosphere of the bustling seaside town.

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On to the Creds, we started with Crazy Mouse, a spinning Wild Mouse that actually spins! It was fab and i would happily had another go if it wasn't for fact of the time schedule or the cost ( £5 a go without a wristband ).

The experience was made whole much better as we got to listen to the two people reactions that were sat next to us in the same car.
As much as it fun to ride with like minded enthusiastic it also cool to hear screams of fear the entire way round the circuit as well.

Other Cred on the peir is Turbo, a Pinfari Looping coaster.
I got to say we neither really enjoyed the ride, for the simple fact that restraints don't make for comfortable ride, due to the fact they don't lock down very securely. As a result the ride is quite bumpy and painful. Actual Layout ain't to bad for size of the footprint but i wouldn't exactly choice to re ride it again, weather i was paying £5 a go, or not. Only other issue was loose bag policy on this coaster, due to the fact that there is two train station ( one for loading and one for unloading )it means loose bags are left in the queue line, which seems quite unsafe on reflection.

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We got back to car approx 3pm, after taking 30 mins to walk to peir, 45 Mins on the Pier, 30 mins Walking back and further 15 minutes faffing in Asda getting a cold drink and some more money out, Next stop was Harbour Park in Little Hampton.

Park 3 - Harbour Park
We arrived at Harbour Park just before 4pm and unlike us we actually paid for parking, Shocking behaviour i know.
It cost us £1.50 for 1 hour parking, car park was located across the road from the park main entrance.
Once all present and correct we headed in to check that cred was open and up and running.

Ocean Coaster is just standard Wacky Worm coaster with cool looking train.
The ride was bit over cautious with trims brakes, having them on downward incline slope as well as each time your flew through the station.
Cost was pretty much standard affair with price of £2.50 for 3 lap special.

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Once we done our ride, it was time to move on to park 4 and another wacky worm, this time in West Sands Funfair.

Park 4 - Westsands funfair
After leaving Littehampton at 4.15pm we headed for Selsey and Westsands Funfair, with predicted ETA of 5pm and the park closed at 5pm so it was going be tight.

Sadly it turn out to be to tight, although we made it to West sands by just before 5pm, the sat nav had taken us to wrong entrance of the holiday park complex and some 1/2 mile away from the fun fair and cred.

There was no way we were going to make the cred in time, so sadly decided to abandon the effort and move onto the next park even though we came so close.

In hindsight if we hadn't wasted the time early in the day in Hastings, or been over optimistic and gone to Hastings in first place we could of probably got the cred but hey you live and learn and move on.

It gives us an easy +1 for the future if we ever require one.

Park 5 - Funland Amusement Park
Funland is only short drive from Selsey and when we arrived at 5.30pm, the price to the on site parking was being reduced from £3 to Free. What a result :)

Funland looks a cool little amusement park, with rides priced fairly reasonable, If we had more time or was passing by i would happily consider spending some more time here just for fun ( Who would thought it, having fun at a fair ).

2 Creds on offer here are Funlandasaurus & Runaway Mine Train, both coasters are reasonable priced at £1.50 and £2.00 respectfully and are easily enjoyable and rerideable.

Funlanasarius is well themed kiddie cred with 3 or 4 dinosaur scattered around the layout while Runaway Mine Train was respectable Wild Mouse coaster with trim break that don't want to kill you like some other out there.

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Moving on to final location ,Portsmouth.

Park 6 - South Parade Pier
Happy Caterpiller was next up, a new for 2019 attraction.
Yeah for another wacky worm.

Parking again couldn't be simpler, it was free along the whole of the sea front after 6pm.

As for the coaster, it came in on the cheap side at £2 for 3 Laps and featured some good views from end of the pier as well as some cool looking illumination scattered around the track, although sadly they weren't on though :(

The coaster rode as you would expect any wacky worm to ride, but hey it was another +1 to the count.

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Park 7 - Clarence Pier ( Last Stop ).
Final park, as the weather was so nice and still had some time before Clarence pier closed, we decided to walk from South Parade Pier down to Clarence Pier.

It saved worrying about moving the car and meant could enjoy the evening fresh air.

As with south parade pier, the creds here were also new for 2019.

A Spinning Coaster ( Tidal Wave ) and Cyclon Coaster ( Mad Mouse )

To be honest the spinning coaster didn't really spin which was a disappointment, although it was still a step up from a Wacky Worm and standard figure 8 eight layout for spinning coasters.

Mad Mouse was enjoyable and comfortable enough ride and was one of the better coaster we did on the day in question, however it really didn't offer much more than couple of drops and downward helix on reflection.

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Neither of the coaster were exactly cheap, priced at £4 each to ride.

Hope you enjoyed the report, i only wrote it so i got 10 more points in the League of Goons over FI

Regards Alex.
 
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Hixee

Flojector
Staff member
Administrator
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You keep telling yourself that. Whatever helps you sleep at night. :p
 

Thekingin64

Strata Poster
Been considering a similar trip myself for a while now but in the opposite direction (Portsmouth-Hastings) including Paultons day beforehand. Glad to know it is doable in a day, thought it would have to be split over 2 due to the distances between each one.

Like you, I'll be looking for as much free parking as possible as well so thanks for the tips!
 

.Ac.

Mega Poster
Been considering a similar trip myself for a while now but in the opposite direction (Portsmouth-Hastings) including Paultons day beforehand. Glad to know it is doable in a day, thought it would have to be split over 2 due to the distances between each one.

Like you, I'll be looking for as much free parking as possible as well so thanks for the tips!

Tbh you could prob do Portsmouth to Brighton ok, imagine getting hasting cred be a bit of a push tbh.
 

GregBoxall

Roller Poster
Been considering a similar trip myself for a while now but in the opposite direction (Portsmouth-Hastings) including Paultons day beforehand. Glad to know it is doable in a day, thought it would have to be split over 2 due to the distances between each one.

Like you, I'll be looking for as much free parking as possible as well so thanks for the tips!

If you're down that way it's worth the extra day for Paultons, its a decent family park with 5 credits. There's some pretty big changes coming to the park next year with Tornado Springs.
 

Thekingin64

Strata Poster
If you're down that way it's worth the extra day for Paultons, its a decent family park with 5 credits. There's some pretty big changes coming to the park next year with Tornado Springs.

Tornado Springs is why I've pushed the trip back until at least next year. It looks fantastic and do not want to miss it.
 
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