Slayed
Hyper Poster
Picture-laden report ahoy! (NB. I hope - hotel internet is playing up a little!).
Since we were staying in the Old Town of Sirmione, which is on a spur into Lake Garda and only 8 miles from Gardaland, it would have been downright madness not to pay a visit to the park
.
Sirmione is an absolutely gorgeous place (it's where I typed-up the Mirabilandia report), and although the drive around the lake to Gardaland took about 45 minutes because of the traffic, it was still a pleasant journey.
(BTW, I'm typing this report in a nice little lounge area in the Doria Grand Hotel in Milan, stealthily sipping from my snuck-in bottle of €1.09 Birra Morreti - it's €7 a bottle in the hotel bar!).
We got to the park about 11am, and once again it was hot and heaving! I've been taken aback by just how much the Italians love their theme parks, they clearly have a passion for them.
After navigating the car park (Italian drivers - that's a whole report to itself), we parked up in the far corner, which happened to be right next to their SeaLife - it looked a little sad and lonely stuck out on it's own TBH, and they were charging an extra €5 to go in - we didn't bother!
We made our way around to the entrance, which looked a little like this:-
Nice. Definite feeling of good attention to detail and plenty of space, plus the staff were helpful and knew some English - unlike Mirabilandia.
We bought our €35 tickets and walked in, to be greeted with:-
REALLY nice! I was starting to get rather impressed now with the general look and feel of the theming, e.g. this is a restaurant:-
Following our Mirabilandia escapade, Catherine wanted to get some non-coastery rides in before I turned all Geek - so first up we hit the spinny one, Ikarus:-
Next to it is a theatre for a Merlin (natch) Magic Show:-
Up the hill I spied some SLC-ness, which made me shudder just a little. More on that later.
Around the corner was the water ride area, which had a nice entrance:-
First up was Fuga da Atlantide - and now the photos really start. Check this theming out!
Good or what? We made our way around to the front, and as expected the locals had gone for the water rides big time:-
The good news was they were cranking out 20-man boats every 45 seconds, with every other one being fed by the "Express" fastpass on the dual-load station. It was damned hot however, and these misty spray thingies didn't really compensate for the lack of shade:-
The queue took 55 minutes, not bad! We hopped on the boat, got whisked up the cable lift and into the ride proper, with it's 2 lift hills and oodles of scenery. Prepare to cream over this for theming, I know I did! :-
It's a fun ride enhanced greatly by the theming. We got a fair amount of wettage - could have done with a bit more TBH - although I particularly liked how the boat afterwards on the first drop threw lots of water at you. Oh, and the ORP had a nice "zoom-in" facility, handled with aplomb by the staff - I'll post it up when I'm back home.
Next up was the Jungle Rapids around the corner, with a much shorter queue of 25 minutes. Yet again, some really nice theming at work here!
I didn't get the camera out on-ride, but the dark section inside the Volcano was great (all effects working), and I got drenched by a row of elephants squirting at me with their trunks! The whirlpool detailed on the park map turned out to be scenery, which was a let-down (I've been spoiled by Phantasialand), and after that the ride ran out of puff, but the first half was fab.
We grabbed the usual dodgy junk food near the SLC, and then decided it was time for me to hit the coasters! The queue times varied (15 for the SLC, Blue Tornado, 60 for Mammut), so we figured I'd need a fastpass to get through them all.
Getting a fastpass (or Gardaland Express as they call it) was very easy (unlike Mirabilandia where it was confusing as hell and required filling in a form in Italian) - quick chat with the girl in the kiosk and €10 later I had one of these:-
BUT, they've been rather sneaky - there's an "Adrenalin" one, and a "Family" one - 3 coasters on the first, 2 on the latter. Cath said she'd queue and go on Mammut with me, so we decided on the Adrenalin pass.
3 of the coasters are in one corner of the park, so we made our way over. On the way we passed 2 dark rides we'd have definitely gone for if we had more time:-
I think this a dark boat ride with what looked like nice effects.
This is their new ride for 2009, a refitting of an existing dark ride. More shooty stuff - it looked quite nice, but maybe not quite on a par with Reset at Mirabilandia.
There was also more of this:-
By now I'm REALLY liking this park. It's nice and open, well layed out, has some lovely scenery and great theming, e.g:-
Another restaurant!
We got to the coasters, and my heart fell. I knew Sequoia Adventure was a Screaming Squirrel, but seeing it brought some bile up (might have been the sausage for lunch). I HATE hangtime, and this is a "coaster" consisting of practically nothing else! I mean look, it doesn't even have proper coaster track! :-
I took a deep breath, jumped the queue, got in and braced myself. Up the hill, along the first boring flat bit and then AAAAAARRRGGGHHHHH endless hangtime, more flat and AAAAAAAARRGGGHHHHH more hangtime, what stupid ****ing idiot thought this would be a good idea! I kept bracing and eventually the torment passed. Complete toss.
Admittedly, it fits in very neatly inside Magic Mountain, but that's no excuse.
It made sense to do Magic Mountain next, so I did! And it was actually a nice ride! Good force on the loops, some slightly dodgy transitions but not that bad, nice interplay with the scenery, enjoyed!
I was kind of confused though - some of the trackwork felt Arrow-ish, and I know they've recently replaced Arrow trains with Vekoma ones (which ran fine) - but is the track originally Arrow?
Around the corner was the kiddie coaster, Ortobrucco Tour, quite long for a kiddie. I kept the camera out of sight and just got on with it!
So, 2 more left. Mammut was next:-
The queue had died down a little to 40 mins. It looked quite empty on the way in:-
But soon became this:-
Erk. Hot and sticky. It's a bit of a nightmare to photograph, as it's a jumble of queueline and shade rock and track and station:-
The ride itself was OK - fun around the scenery, surprisingly rough at times, but definitely in the family catgeory (and nothing like as good as Colorado Express at Phantasialand). I was shocked to discover it's only a year old, it looks a little worn - definitely needed more theming!
One more coaster to go, Blue Tornado, the SLC. I was rather dreading this - SLC's are rarely pleasant experiences. I flashed my pass and jumped on near the back.
You know what? It's probably the best one I've ridden! Good speed to the end, not THAT rough (couple of spikes notwithstanding), and some lovely interataction with the scenery, particularly the mist-tunnel and the ground-hugging hedges at the end which really gave an impression of speed:-
With that our day had to end (the park was open for another 6 hours though). We'd been in the park for about 5 hours, hadn't gotten everything done and needed a fastpass, but we'd had a really good time and enjoyed everything we'd ridden.
The merch was a let-down though, it's all kiddie stuff (same as Plopsaland) :?.
I was really impressed with the layout and quality of Gardaland, despite the hordes and heat it felt open and welcoming and enjoyable. It may not have a "killer" ride (like Katun) which would bring me back on it's own, but the park itself was a joy, and on reflection I'd definitely make it one of my favourites. I'll be back someday!
Oh, and Thorpe - this was a MERLIN park that was heaving, in the height of summer, was clean all day, the staff were great (even in a foreign language), had NO breakdowns and ran with the utmost efficiency - suck on that!
Since we were staying in the Old Town of Sirmione, which is on a spur into Lake Garda and only 8 miles from Gardaland, it would have been downright madness not to pay a visit to the park
.Sirmione is an absolutely gorgeous place (it's where I typed-up the Mirabilandia report), and although the drive around the lake to Gardaland took about 45 minutes because of the traffic, it was still a pleasant journey.
(BTW, I'm typing this report in a nice little lounge area in the Doria Grand Hotel in Milan, stealthily sipping from my snuck-in bottle of €1.09 Birra Morreti - it's €7 a bottle in the hotel bar!
).We got to the park about 11am, and once again it was hot and heaving! I've been taken aback by just how much the Italians love their theme parks, they clearly have a passion for them.
After navigating the car park (Italian drivers - that's a whole report to itself), we parked up in the far corner, which happened to be right next to their SeaLife - it looked a little sad and lonely stuck out on it's own TBH, and they were charging an extra €5 to go in - we didn't bother!
We made our way around to the entrance, which looked a little like this:-
Nice. Definite feeling of good attention to detail and plenty of space, plus the staff were helpful and knew some English - unlike Mirabilandia.
We bought our €35 tickets and walked in, to be greeted with:-
REALLY nice! I was starting to get rather impressed now with the general look and feel of the theming, e.g. this is a restaurant:-
Following our Mirabilandia escapade, Catherine wanted to get some non-coastery rides in before I turned all Geek - so first up we hit the spinny one, Ikarus:-
Next to it is a theatre for a Merlin (natch) Magic Show:-
Up the hill I spied some SLC-ness, which made me shudder just a little. More on that later.
Around the corner was the water ride area, which had a nice entrance:-
First up was Fuga da Atlantide - and now the photos really start. Check this theming out!
Good or what? We made our way around to the front, and as expected the locals had gone for the water rides big time:-
The good news was they were cranking out 20-man boats every 45 seconds, with every other one being fed by the "Express" fastpass on the dual-load station. It was damned hot however, and these misty spray thingies didn't really compensate for the lack of shade:-
The queue took 55 minutes, not bad! We hopped on the boat, got whisked up the cable lift and into the ride proper, with it's 2 lift hills and oodles of scenery. Prepare to cream over this for theming, I know I did! :-
It's a fun ride enhanced greatly by the theming. We got a fair amount of wettage - could have done with a bit more TBH - although I particularly liked how the boat afterwards on the first drop threw lots of water at you
. Oh, and the ORP had a nice "zoom-in" facility, handled with aplomb by the staff - I'll post it up when I'm back home.Next up was the Jungle Rapids around the corner, with a much shorter queue of 25 minutes. Yet again, some really nice theming at work here!
I didn't get the camera out on-ride, but the dark section inside the Volcano was great (all effects working), and I got drenched by a row of elephants squirting at me with their trunks! The whirlpool detailed on the park map turned out to be scenery, which was a let-down (I've been spoiled by Phantasialand), and after that the ride ran out of puff, but the first half was fab.
We grabbed the usual dodgy junk food near the SLC, and then decided it was time for me to hit the coasters! The queue times varied (15 for the SLC, Blue Tornado, 60 for Mammut), so we figured I'd need a fastpass to get through them all.
Getting a fastpass (or Gardaland Express as they call it) was very easy (unlike Mirabilandia where it was confusing as hell and required filling in a form in Italian) - quick chat with the girl in the kiosk and €10 later I had one of these:-
BUT, they've been rather sneaky - there's an "Adrenalin" one, and a "Family" one - 3 coasters on the first, 2 on the latter. Cath said she'd queue and go on Mammut with me, so we decided on the Adrenalin pass.
3 of the coasters are in one corner of the park, so we made our way over. On the way we passed 2 dark rides we'd have definitely gone for if we had more time:-
I think this a dark boat ride with what looked like nice effects.
This is their new ride for 2009, a refitting of an existing dark ride. More shooty stuff - it looked quite nice, but maybe not quite on a par with Reset at Mirabilandia.
There was also more of this:-
By now I'm REALLY liking this park. It's nice and open, well layed out, has some lovely scenery and great theming, e.g:-
Another restaurant!
We got to the coasters, and my heart fell. I knew Sequoia Adventure was a Screaming Squirrel, but seeing it brought some bile up (might have been the sausage for lunch). I HATE hangtime, and this is a "coaster" consisting of practically nothing else! I mean look, it doesn't even have proper coaster track! :-
I took a deep breath, jumped the queue, got in and braced myself. Up the hill, along the first boring flat bit and then AAAAAARRRGGGHHHHH endless hangtime, more flat and AAAAAAAARRGGGHHHHH more hangtime, what stupid ****ing idiot thought this would be a good idea! I kept bracing and eventually the torment passed. Complete toss.
Admittedly, it fits in very neatly inside Magic Mountain, but that's no excuse.
It made sense to do Magic Mountain next, so I did! And it was actually a nice ride! Good force on the loops, some slightly dodgy transitions but not that bad, nice interplay with the scenery, enjoyed!
I was kind of confused though - some of the trackwork felt Arrow-ish, and I know they've recently replaced Arrow trains with Vekoma ones (which ran fine) - but is the track originally Arrow?
Around the corner was the kiddie coaster, Ortobrucco Tour, quite long for a kiddie. I kept the camera out of sight and just got on with it!
So, 2 more left. Mammut was next:-
The queue had died down a little to 40 mins. It looked quite empty on the way in:-
But soon became this:-
Erk. Hot and sticky. It's a bit of a nightmare to photograph, as it's a jumble of queueline and shade rock and track and station:-
The ride itself was OK - fun around the scenery, surprisingly rough at times, but definitely in the family catgeory (and nothing like as good as Colorado Express at Phantasialand). I was shocked to discover it's only a year old, it looks a little worn - definitely needed more theming!
One more coaster to go, Blue Tornado, the SLC. I was rather dreading this - SLC's are rarely pleasant experiences. I flashed my pass and jumped on near the back.
You know what? It's probably the best one I've ridden! Good speed to the end, not THAT rough (couple of spikes notwithstanding), and some lovely interataction with the scenery, particularly the mist-tunnel and the ground-hugging hedges at the end which really gave an impression of speed:-
With that our day had to end (the park was open for another 6 hours though). We'd been in the park for about 5 hours, hadn't gotten everything done and needed a fastpass, but we'd had a really good time and enjoyed everything we'd ridden.
The merch was a let-down though, it's all kiddie stuff (same as Plopsaland) :?.
I was really impressed with the layout and quality of Gardaland, despite the hordes and heat it felt open and welcoming and enjoyable. It may not have a "killer" ride (like Katun) which would bring me back on it's own, but the park itself was a joy, and on reflection I'd definitely make it one of my favourites. I'll be back someday!
Oh, and Thorpe - this was a MERLIN park that was heaving, in the height of summer, was clean all day, the staff were great (even in a foreign language), had NO breakdowns and ran with the utmost efficiency - suck on that!
