Yesterday, quite a few of us went to Plopsaland De Panne for the day.
Once we had all gathered by the giant door entrance, Ian asked "so, what's de panne?" and I'm still laughing about that now.
First, we received a proper behind-the-scenes tour of the park from the management. This was the official back stage pass we were given:
I love that it's nothing but a laminated picture of a dog!
We watched a presentation on studio 100 / the Plopsa brand. They showed us lots of clips of Maya The Bee etc, but I spent the whole thing mildly irritated because they weren't maximizing the viewing window on the videos they were showing us.
It was like watching all your fave Youtube shows like this:
We had some Q+A, where we got to find out a little bit about the great new attractions the park will be building in the future. (Subject to Panne-ing permission of course)
Then we got a tour of the office. I don't know about you, but when it's the weekend and I'm on holiday; there's nothing I like better than looking around someone else's office.
But seriously, I actually really enjoyed looking at all the stages of their concept design. Especially seeing the drawings for older rides done crudely in pencil, in direct contrast with their newer concept art made in Photoshop.
We also saw the staff lunch room, the costume/ locker area, the man hoovering the carpet in the lobby.
Next, they showed us the events hall, which had these lovely handmade chandeliers and walls that looked like stars. It had recently been used as the venue for the Belgian TV Awards, which Jordan called 'The Flemmies' haha.
The tour trundled on to the new Plopsaqua waterpark, which the managers were obviously very proud of. If there's one thing I learned from this lengthy goon tour experience, it's that PLOPSALAND HAVE A NEW WATERPARK.
To be fair, it looks pretty fab. There's a water slide that plays 'Waterloo' by Abba as you go down it, which is all any water park needs really.
By now it was midday and Rachel, NHS Jordan and jjnumbersandletters were starting to suffer from cred anxiety. So eventually we made our way to Anubis. Ian quipped that it's not A-new-bis anymore, it's An-old-bis. I'm still laughing about that now.
I have to sit down and have a serious think about it soon, but I'm pretty sure Anubis is still in my top 10. I love the sudden kick of the launch; straight into the floaty airtime of the top hat. The lack of height makes the change of forces flow faster into each other.
Sure, the coaster panne-ders out after the MCBR. But the first half is fantastic.
Then Rachel got her 200th cred, on the splash boat thingy that's barely a cred. I noted that the lift section of the ride features the same wall lining as the Plopsaland Events Hall. Just think of all the people I can impress with that knowledge! Here's hoping it comes up in next weeks pub quiz...
We went over to washing machine cred next. I was disappointed that it didn't 'spin.' This coaster had the longest queue, but it passed quickly as we joked about excel-erator coaster-count spreadsheets and hand-dryer creds.
New blue coaster followed. It was new. It was blue. I would rate it 'Mild-Moderate' on the scale of vibrating bottomness.
Grabbed some lunch then rode the mediocred Dragon. It's one of those Mack powered mine trains that doesn't do anything. I'll be glad when it's (dra)gone.
It does, however, sit right next to the fab log flume. Where both the Vadge Boat and the Fat Boat got spited by '3 adults per boat' policy. We made up for this with our Whitesnake Boat though heheh...
I watched everyone else ride the Bat Flyer thing, which I found to traumatising to re-ride.
Then we rode the dark ride, where the characters look somewhat familiar... Let's play spot the difference:
One last ride on Anubis, before I got the most important cred of the day: a new mug cred!
Mug Report:
I noticed that my mug count is a bit Merlin-heavy, so I've decided to branch out this year and some for some rarity points.
Annoyingly, Plopsaland didn't have much tat that alluded to one specific cred. So I had to settle for a park-wide mug. But like a Moser Drop Tower on a seaside resort, I saw charm in my chosen mugs crappiness.
It's white, with rainbow circles that look as though they are straight outta Clipart. Then some glittery bubble writing that simply reads 'Plopsa'. Not even 'Plopsaland'!
With it's complete lack of anything theme-park related in the design, this is the kind of mug that'll keep guests guessing: 'What is Plopsa? And why do they make such hideous mugs?'
So I gave it a test-run today. The glitter didn't wash straight off on the pre-rinse. I had a decaf tea with milk and no sugar. It stayed warm for 13 minutes - that's comparatively less warmth-time than a thick Merlin mug.
Here's my On Mug Photo: (Or 'Mug Shot' if you will...)
...and this is what happens when you write a trip report on 3 hours of sleep. I think I'm going to go to bed now. Sorry for wasting your time! Go to Plopsaland, it's great. They have a waterpark.
Once we had all gathered by the giant door entrance, Ian asked "so, what's de panne?" and I'm still laughing about that now.
First, we received a proper behind-the-scenes tour of the park from the management. This was the official back stage pass we were given:
I love that it's nothing but a laminated picture of a dog!
We watched a presentation on studio 100 / the Plopsa brand. They showed us lots of clips of Maya The Bee etc, but I spent the whole thing mildly irritated because they weren't maximizing the viewing window on the videos they were showing us.
It was like watching all your fave Youtube shows like this:
We had some Q+A, where we got to find out a little bit about the great new attractions the park will be building in the future. (Subject to Panne-ing permission of course)
Then we got a tour of the office. I don't know about you, but when it's the weekend and I'm on holiday; there's nothing I like better than looking around someone else's office.
But seriously, I actually really enjoyed looking at all the stages of their concept design. Especially seeing the drawings for older rides done crudely in pencil, in direct contrast with their newer concept art made in Photoshop.
We also saw the staff lunch room, the costume/ locker area, the man hoovering the carpet in the lobby.
Next, they showed us the events hall, which had these lovely handmade chandeliers and walls that looked like stars. It had recently been used as the venue for the Belgian TV Awards, which Jordan called 'The Flemmies' haha.
The tour trundled on to the new Plopsaqua waterpark, which the managers were obviously very proud of. If there's one thing I learned from this lengthy goon tour experience, it's that PLOPSALAND HAVE A NEW WATERPARK.
To be fair, it looks pretty fab. There's a water slide that plays 'Waterloo' by Abba as you go down it, which is all any water park needs really.
By now it was midday and Rachel, NHS Jordan and jjnumbersandletters were starting to suffer from cred anxiety. So eventually we made our way to Anubis. Ian quipped that it's not A-new-bis anymore, it's An-old-bis. I'm still laughing about that now.
I have to sit down and have a serious think about it soon, but I'm pretty sure Anubis is still in my top 10. I love the sudden kick of the launch; straight into the floaty airtime of the top hat. The lack of height makes the change of forces flow faster into each other.
Sure, the coaster panne-ders out after the MCBR. But the first half is fantastic.
Then Rachel got her 200th cred, on the splash boat thingy that's barely a cred. I noted that the lift section of the ride features the same wall lining as the Plopsaland Events Hall. Just think of all the people I can impress with that knowledge! Here's hoping it comes up in next weeks pub quiz...
We went over to washing machine cred next. I was disappointed that it didn't 'spin.' This coaster had the longest queue, but it passed quickly as we joked about excel-erator coaster-count spreadsheets and hand-dryer creds.
New blue coaster followed. It was new. It was blue. I would rate it 'Mild-Moderate' on the scale of vibrating bottomness.
Grabbed some lunch then rode the mediocred Dragon. It's one of those Mack powered mine trains that doesn't do anything. I'll be glad when it's (dra)gone.
It does, however, sit right next to the fab log flume. Where both the Vadge Boat and the Fat Boat got spited by '3 adults per boat' policy. We made up for this with our Whitesnake Boat though heheh...
I watched everyone else ride the Bat Flyer thing, which I found to traumatising to re-ride.
Then we rode the dark ride, where the characters look somewhat familiar... Let's play spot the difference:
One last ride on Anubis, before I got the most important cred of the day: a new mug cred!
Mug Report:
I noticed that my mug count is a bit Merlin-heavy, so I've decided to branch out this year and some for some rarity points.
Annoyingly, Plopsaland didn't have much tat that alluded to one specific cred. So I had to settle for a park-wide mug. But like a Moser Drop Tower on a seaside resort, I saw charm in my chosen mugs crappiness.
It's white, with rainbow circles that look as though they are straight outta Clipart. Then some glittery bubble writing that simply reads 'Plopsa'. Not even 'Plopsaland'!
With it's complete lack of anything theme-park related in the design, this is the kind of mug that'll keep guests guessing: 'What is Plopsa? And why do they make such hideous mugs?'
So I gave it a test-run today. The glitter didn't wash straight off on the pre-rinse. I had a decaf tea with milk and no sugar. It stayed warm for 13 minutes - that's comparatively less warmth-time than a thick Merlin mug.
Here's my On Mug Photo: (Or 'Mug Shot' if you will...)
...and this is what happens when you write a trip report on 3 hours of sleep. I think I'm going to go to bed now. Sorry for wasting your time! Go to Plopsaland, it's great. They have a waterpark.
