MLDesigns
Hyper Poster
Hi all!
I believe this is my first entry here. I just got back from a wonderful week in Europe, and after some inspiration from @toofpikk 's awesome thread, I'd love to recap everything here! As the title suggests, this trip consisted of my first visit to Finland and Poland, and featured these parks:
-Linnanmaki
-Sarkanniemi
-PowerPark
-Energylandia
-Legendia
Let's get into it.
DAY 1
After an overnight flight from with a quick change of planes in Reykjavik, I arrived in Helsinki mid-afternoon. Unlike my recent adventures on any American airline, Icelandair was right on time and even ahead of schedule. Anyway, upon arrival in Helsinki, I took the escalators deep underground to the airport rail station to face a new challenge: an American's first time taking on public transportation!
Luckily, I had a local friend that helped me out with the logistics. I quickly learned Helsinki is incredibly easy to navigate via public transit. (I assume this is the case with much of European cities, just haven't had to do it yet!) Hopped on the train, and a quick ~40 minute ride later, I arrived at Helsinki's Grand Central station.
A quick walk around the corner and my hotel awaited, the Scandic Grand Central Helsinki. A really gorgeous place. On the expensive side IMO, but when considering an included breakfast buffet & the super convenient location, I was perfectly content with it. After getting settled, I hopped on a city tram and headed over to the first stop, and one of the main reasons for the trip: Linnanmaki (and more specifically, to no surprise, Taiga)! I tried to plan it out for Taiga to be my #500- but being at #490 before the trip, I would have needed to do at least 2 credits before the trip and do everything at Linnanmaki before doing Taiga. Couldn't make that work, so that idea was DOA.
Upon arrival at Linnanmaki, the first ride I hit was the new Intamin Gyro Swing, Swingi. In my mind, it's absolutely the best pendulum ride on the market. Love them so much. The OTSLB restraint is very free, and it ran a great cycle (I think it was 5 full-height swings!), it's just the best.
Next up was the first coaster of the day, and my first Maurer Skyloop, Ukko. Rode in the 'big boy' seats in the back of the train, it was a wild sight looking up at that lift! The ride itself really wasn't horrible, aside from those dam trains. Total yuck. Luckily half the ride is just a valley, cause anymore movement and that restraint may gave given me an uppercut to the ribcage.
At this point, I debated doing a lap around the park, but quickly decided to get on with the main event: Taiga. It was on one train for my whole visit, but it never got more than a 10 minute queue. A quick walk through an empty queue, into the station and to the front row queue I go.
In a word, the ride is simply perfect. It's an absolute masterclass of a layout. An incredible range of forces, great pacing, butter smooth, and an awesome hillside setting; all twisted & perfectly intertwined. The first launch is punchy and routinely gave me 'the butterfly' feeling- I forgot that was a thing! A bizarre outward-banked inversion follows, providing some great hangtime. A dive to the right takes you to the lowest point of the ride, then a sideways hill and 2 turns bring you back up.
Launch #2 then takes you up and over the tophat, providing a wonderful view over Helsinki. Dive down and you enter a fantastic stall overtop of the Mack 'thing'. The rest of the ride is just incredible. Great positive forces, great airtime, and a fantastic triple-S-bend-and-drop combo follow. Another side banked hill and a left-hand corkscrew wrap up the masterpiece of a layout. Really can't praise this ride enough... it's that good.
After a few rides on Taiga, I then took a lap around the park grabbing credits:
Linnurata eXtra - optional VR on this, I tried it and took it off halfway through. Cred's a cred. Pretty cool to fit a custom coaster inside an old water tower.
Tulireki - The only surviving Mack E-Motion coaster. What a bizarre piece of junk this is. So awkward and clunky, big jolt on the first drop. Can we get a big Gerstlauer Bobsled in its place?
Pikajuna - A 3-lap powered coaster. Good views of Taiga.
Salama - A neat Maurer spinner, though it didn't spin all that much. Seems like every time you get spinning, the layout is designed in a way that it immediately cancels it out. Still fun though.
Vuoristorata - Brakeman ride! A cool classic. One good airtime moment beside the station, sit in the front for this!
Closed the night out with more rides on Taiga. Then hopped on the same tram back to the city center hotel, and was asleep within a few minutes of hitting the pillow. The long journey was already worth it from how incredible Taiga was, and this was just the beginning. A lot more trip to go!
I believe this is my first entry here. I just got back from a wonderful week in Europe, and after some inspiration from @toofpikk 's awesome thread, I'd love to recap everything here! As the title suggests, this trip consisted of my first visit to Finland and Poland, and featured these parks:
-Linnanmaki
-Sarkanniemi
-PowerPark
-Energylandia
-Legendia
Let's get into it.
DAY 1
After an overnight flight from with a quick change of planes in Reykjavik, I arrived in Helsinki mid-afternoon. Unlike my recent adventures on any American airline, Icelandair was right on time and even ahead of schedule. Anyway, upon arrival in Helsinki, I took the escalators deep underground to the airport rail station to face a new challenge: an American's first time taking on public transportation!
Luckily, I had a local friend that helped me out with the logistics. I quickly learned Helsinki is incredibly easy to navigate via public transit. (I assume this is the case with much of European cities, just haven't had to do it yet!) Hopped on the train, and a quick ~40 minute ride later, I arrived at Helsinki's Grand Central station.
A quick walk around the corner and my hotel awaited, the Scandic Grand Central Helsinki. A really gorgeous place. On the expensive side IMO, but when considering an included breakfast buffet & the super convenient location, I was perfectly content with it. After getting settled, I hopped on a city tram and headed over to the first stop, and one of the main reasons for the trip: Linnanmaki (and more specifically, to no surprise, Taiga)! I tried to plan it out for Taiga to be my #500- but being at #490 before the trip, I would have needed to do at least 2 credits before the trip and do everything at Linnanmaki before doing Taiga. Couldn't make that work, so that idea was DOA.
Upon arrival at Linnanmaki, the first ride I hit was the new Intamin Gyro Swing, Swingi. In my mind, it's absolutely the best pendulum ride on the market. Love them so much. The OTSLB restraint is very free, and it ran a great cycle (I think it was 5 full-height swings!), it's just the best.
Next up was the first coaster of the day, and my first Maurer Skyloop, Ukko. Rode in the 'big boy' seats in the back of the train, it was a wild sight looking up at that lift! The ride itself really wasn't horrible, aside from those dam trains. Total yuck. Luckily half the ride is just a valley, cause anymore movement and that restraint may gave given me an uppercut to the ribcage.
At this point, I debated doing a lap around the park, but quickly decided to get on with the main event: Taiga. It was on one train for my whole visit, but it never got more than a 10 minute queue. A quick walk through an empty queue, into the station and to the front row queue I go.
In a word, the ride is simply perfect. It's an absolute masterclass of a layout. An incredible range of forces, great pacing, butter smooth, and an awesome hillside setting; all twisted & perfectly intertwined. The first launch is punchy and routinely gave me 'the butterfly' feeling- I forgot that was a thing! A bizarre outward-banked inversion follows, providing some great hangtime. A dive to the right takes you to the lowest point of the ride, then a sideways hill and 2 turns bring you back up.
Launch #2 then takes you up and over the tophat, providing a wonderful view over Helsinki. Dive down and you enter a fantastic stall overtop of the Mack 'thing'. The rest of the ride is just incredible. Great positive forces, great airtime, and a fantastic triple-S-bend-and-drop combo follow. Another side banked hill and a left-hand corkscrew wrap up the masterpiece of a layout. Really can't praise this ride enough... it's that good.
After a few rides on Taiga, I then took a lap around the park grabbing credits:
Linnurata eXtra - optional VR on this, I tried it and took it off halfway through. Cred's a cred. Pretty cool to fit a custom coaster inside an old water tower.
Tulireki - The only surviving Mack E-Motion coaster. What a bizarre piece of junk this is. So awkward and clunky, big jolt on the first drop. Can we get a big Gerstlauer Bobsled in its place?
Pikajuna - A 3-lap powered coaster. Good views of Taiga.
Salama - A neat Maurer spinner, though it didn't spin all that much. Seems like every time you get spinning, the layout is designed in a way that it immediately cancels it out. Still fun though.
Vuoristorata - Brakeman ride! A cool classic. One good airtime moment beside the station, sit in the front for this!
Closed the night out with more rides on Taiga. Then hopped on the same tram back to the city center hotel, and was asleep within a few minutes of hitting the pillow. The long journey was already worth it from how incredible Taiga was, and this was just the beginning. A lot more trip to go!