Another China Trip - Part 3: Nanchang Oriental Heritage & Sunac

[Gavin]

In my recent UAE report – if you haven’t read it, we have beef – I mentioned that I moved my entire Qatar and Saudi trip over to the Easter holidays. Obviously, that never happened, but I waited until Qatar Airways officially cancelled the flight about a week or two before it was scheduled, figuring that even though I had a refundable booking, the refund would be quicker and easier if it were the airline that canceled the flight. Anyway, that left me with an Easter-holiday-sized hole to fill. The boyfriend wanted to spend a few days in Shanghai, so I just did some China stuff for around week and then met him there.

None of the cities I was hitting up were new to me, so this was very much a park-focused trip. Since I was using trains, I just stayed near the high-speed train stations, which in most cases aren’t in particularly exciting areas but were massively convenient for what I was doing. First up was a train from Hong Kong to Changsha, taking around 3 hours, and then the next morning taking a short train ride out to Ningxiang.

Oriental Heritage Ningxiang

It had been raining when I arrived in Changsha, and was still raining the next morning - this will be a continuous complaint throughout this report – which is less than ideal for most Chinese parks, especially those operated by Fantawild. I was there shortly after opening and headed across to the main coaster, Celestial Gauntlet, one of four Vekoma hyper space warp models, all at Fantawild parks, knowing that it wasn’t going to be open.

Time for some indoor stuff and hope the weather clears up then. Let’s Fly is the name of most (all?) of Fantawild’s flying theatres, and some of them are excellent. This one had their fairly standard film – random computer-generated flying over Chinese landmarks – but being newer meant that the ride system itself was decent.

Magic Gallery was, I think, a new one for me. It was quite heavily screen-based, but integrated well with sets and at least there were different types/sizes of screens. It was all quite lovely. I rode another one in another park a few days later and took a video, so I might shove that in later.

I’ll just chuck in some other pictures. I skipped the Chinese opera ride (the one with the dice-looking boxes on it), but did River of Tales, a boat ride. The Lady Mengjing show was closed – a sign out front said it only ran in summer. Three or four parks I’ve been to have had this show, but only one was running. I remember it being very good though. It was a no thanks the water rides.

These pagodas at the Oriental Heritage parks house launch/drop towers. They’re the ones with the “Lanuch Tower” signage, starting with a mediocre launch, bouncing a bit, then heading to the top for a drop (actually very decent on this one) and some more bouncing before coming to a slow stop. Some of them are knackered; this one was actually ok.

There were two shows that were running, but only had one show per day and both on at the same time, which is obviously completely stupid and ridiculously poorly planned, especially given how quiet the park was. At other parks, they tend to stagger the show times to allow people to move from one to the other. The one I watched (the one with the “mountain temple” looking facade - can’t remember the name) was fine. I ended up seeing the other show at another park later anyway.

Another closed coaster. By this point, the rain had stopped and the ride op out front said it would open when the track had had chance to dry out. I took this to be bulls**t.

However, moving around the park = finally an open coaster:

By this point, I’d downloaded Fantawild’s app – there were QR codes at all the rides, most prominently on the “closed for weather” boards – and it turns out it’s excellent. It’s in Chinese, but there are pictures next to each ride, and there’s very up-to-date open/closed statuses. The map is also very good and offers GPS walking instructions. Anyway, the suspended coaster actually did open. It’s a Fantawild staple, but is the very decent Orkanen /Dragonflyer layout.

Celestial Gauntlet also opened, so that was obviously great and changed my overall mood significantly. It’s a very decent ride – I think it’s basically Formula at Energylandia but with a lift hill – but weaker than most of the other similar Chinese Vekomas. It’s a solid coaster though.

I watched (got stuck in front of) a parade – I don’t think I’ve seen one at an Oriental Heritage park before – did rerides on Celestial Gauntlet and rode Legend of Nuwa, a 4D dark ride that I’ve done at way too many other parks at this point. Along with the pagoda drop tower, I think it’s pretty much guaranteed that you’ll find it at any Oriental Heritage park. It’s very good, but I’d forgotten how long it was. Thinking about it, most Fantawild dark rides are very long, usually hitting around the 10-minute mark.

So yeah, it ended up being a decent day. A rainy day at a Fantawild park is never going to be as disastrous as at many others – especially if you haven’t been to one - thanks to all the dark rides, but since there was very little I hadn’t already done at other parks, it still would’ve been a very disappointing visit if the rain hadn’t stopped in the early afternoon.

I picked up some +1s on the way back to the train station, also changing my ticket back to Changsha in the meantime since I’d given myself loads of time and would have had a couple of hours still to kill.

More Nanchang in the next bit.

 

[davidm]

Drop towers inside Chinese pagodas - why I have I never seen this before? - fantastic!
I'd call it terrible cultural appropriation if it were in anywhere other than China.

 

[Gavin]

The weather was s**t again the next morning, just grey, drizzly and generally miserable. In terms of major parks in Changsha itself, I’d decided against a revisit to Colourful World (still known as Window of the World when I was there last). Technically, there were two new coasters, but one of those is an S&S launch thing - all of which were closed down in China a few years ago, but are all still standing – so I’ll look into a revisit if/when that reopens.

Joy Ocean Park – as RCDB refers to it, but labeled as Xiangjiang Ocean Kingdom on maps and ticketing apps etc. – opened around 3 years ago and is operated by Haichang. They’ve got a handful of RCDB-listed parks, but also operate a lot of aquariums around the country. This was the first park of theirs that I’d done.

Just remembering that I called into Yanghu Wetland (kind of) on the way and I haven’t uploaded any pictures. If anyone’s particularly arsed, I can add some later. I’d been before, but since then they’ve replaced their powered dragon and jungle mouse with a powered dragon and jungle mouse. The whole rides area has been totally refreshed though, and now includes a glass water slide thing (popping up everywhere now) and feels a bit more like a proper, cohesive rides area than the plonked coasters before. I seem to remember the whole park feeling quite isolated last time, definitely on the outside edge of the city, but the area around it has been developed quite a lot and it now has its own metro station, which I’m pretty sure didn’t exist last time. Anyway, the on-off drizzle and lack of guests wasn’t an issue in getting the +2. This was a Sunday though; I wouldn't have fancied my chances at that time in the morning, with crap weather, on a weekday.

Back to Ocean Kingdom then. They’ve either tired, or are trying, to make the whole area some kind of resort, including a monorail system which had stations labeled on local maps, but wasn't operating., no idea if it ever has. The rain had picked up quite a bit, and, unsurprisingly, the two coasters were closed. The forecast had it clearing up later though, so I was hoping for a similar situation to the previous day. Being more of an aquarium, at least most stuff was indoors, with this first building being a bit of a hodgepodge of different animals.

The major coaster here is a standard Beijing Shibaolai SLC. I hadn’t done one of these for ages. LIke I said though: closed.

A couple more aquarium buildings, but I can’t really remember which stuff goes with which building, not that it really matters. I’m fairly sure that the main tank either held or was supposed to hold whale sharks, based on it having little else of note in it that couldn’t have been housed in a much smaller tank and there being a whale shark information board along with the species that were actually in there.

The other coaster was a very old-school Beijing Shibaolai mine train. Considering the park was only a few years old, I was surprised that they went for such old coaster models. Just quickly looking into it, there are only 6 of these listed on RCDB, with one already removed and one SBNO. Maybe because I’d done a handful of them, I thought they were more common. Well, who gives a f**k? Closed.

I would’ve happily skipped the show, but since the rain hadn’t quite stopped, the coasters still weren’t open. As with my suspicions about the whale sharks, I think this was another case of having something else planned which never happened. It’s called Amazing Whale Show and there’s an orca on the front of it, but it just had a handful of dolphins and wasn’t any good at all.

By this point the coasters were being tested and opened, so as with the day before, the visit went from “meh, I’m here regardless so trying to make the most of it” to a sense of relief that I wouldn’t have to come back. I’ve never had much of a problem with SBL’s SLCs, and this one was fine as well. I rode it in the front since I’m not an idiot, but still. I’ll take these over the earlier Jinma “Kumali” versions at any rate.

There was an Arctic/Antarctic building with penguins, a polar bear (neither of which I seem to have uploaded pictures of) arctic foxes/wolves and a couple of beluga whales. The buildings behind the water chute belonged to another park, a Huayi Brothers movie studio affair. There are no coasters listed, but I have no idea if there are any other rides in there or if it’s just one big photo opportunity. Maybe something to check out if/when I’m back in Changsha if/when the S&S ever reopens.

This place was ok, but was already feeling a bit rundown even though it was only a few years old. It seems that there's stuff that was planned to be there and never materialised, and they went for a cheap option with a package of off-the-shelf SBL rides. I should've taken some pictures to prove my point, but a lot of Chinese parks paint their floors in bright colours, which I'm sure look great for the first year or so, but then the paint starts to fade, show dirt easily and chip, and any cracks which form in the walkways become incredibly obvious, all making the place look really tatty, which was very evident here. Fantawild are smarter about this now, and use more neutral/natural "stone" colours alongside patterned flooring that hides any cracks.

I was heading to the next city, Nanchang, that evening, having already checked out of the hotel and just left luggage there that morning, but hadn’t booked a train since there were really regular. Doing ok for time, I did another quick cred grab, which turned out to not be so quick thanks to Lelin Amusement Park being part of a much bigger botanical garden that required having to piss about with QR codes and passport registrations just to get into the place, which was free anyway. Utterly pointless yet increasingly ubiquitous Chinese QR code faff.

And then it was on to Nanchang, another revisit, arriving to more rain and getting drenched during the 5-minute walk between the train station and the hotel. F**king over the weather at this point.

 

[Gavin]

In avoidance of marking student essays, I’ll continue with this report. The more time between the trip and the writing, the hazier it’s becoming. F**k, there’s still a lot of it to go.

Oriental Heritage Yingtan

The next morning in Nanchang was gloomy with rain clearly on the way. Trains and park tickets had been booked though, so it was a 5-minute walk to the station and a 40-miute train ride to Yingtan, followed by a very short taxi ride to another Oriental Heritage park.

With rain very clearly on the way, it was a quick rush to grab the coasters before they inevitably closed. Grand Showman was a clone of the Vekoma I’d just done at the last Oriental Heritage park, so I got the first train of the day after testing (solo ride) and decided against rerides in favour of grabbing the other creds first. Had I not already ridden the same thing multiple times a few days prior, I probably would’ve forgone the +1s for some rerides. As it was, I managed to grab the big apple thing (next to the major coaster) and junior boomerang (not particularly close) before it started raining.

There was another Let’s Fly, which I skipped and another pagoda drop tower, which I rode. I can’t remember whether I did the Boonie Bear’s Theatre here or at a later park. The lack of photos here suggests the later park, but I wasn’t taking many photos here anyway, partly due to the weather and partly to just generally not feeling it at all on that day. I had the entire 3D cinema to myself.

The water ride was a dubious cred, but at least was open in the rain. There's a little coastery section before the drop, which I stupidly haven’t shown in the single picture I bothered to upload. There was a show which was either closed that day, or I missed because of timing – can’t remember now. I rode Legend of Nuwa, but haven’t uploaded any photos; they all look the same, or almost the same.

From the other dark rides, I took a couple of videos. I think the ride entrance with the deer goes with the first video. I’m pretty sure I’ve done the same ride elsewhere, Forest Drifting, but can’t be arsed to figure out where. The angular building housed Magic Gallery and goes with the second video. I thought it was going to be similar to a ride at the previous OH park, but it was something I don’t think I’ve done before. It’s a very screen heavy trackless (I think?) dark ride, but it looked gorgeous and had some impressive moments including a long simulator-style ending. The video quality isn’t great (my video - the screen quality on the ride was excellent). I don’t make enough of them to warrant proper filming equipment.

Forest Drifting, Oriental Heritage Yingtan, China

A boat ride at one of Fantawild's Oriental Heritage parks.

youtu.be

Magic Gallery, Oriental Heritage, Yingtan, China

A trackless, mostly screen-based dark ride, ending with an extensive simulator section.

youtu.be

Have a couple more pictures of the major coaster here, which never reopened since it didn’t stop raining for any longer than about 15 minutes at a time. This had been a really nice park, with decent dark rides, and I’d luckily got the creds done early enough, but the incessantly s**ty weather was really grinding me down by that point. I’d spent days being constantly soggy and was at the point where I was actually hating this trip.

I had a train booked for much later in the day, but there was no point hanging around, so I changed it for the next train back to Nanchang and got a Didi back to the station. The plan had been a revisit to Nanchang Sunac Land the next day (It was still Wanda when I’d last been), but since the weather had cleared up a decent amount, the park was open until quite late, and the train station/hotel were very close, I decided to knock it off early.

Nanchang Sunac Land

I’d first been here within a few weeks of it first opening, when Wanda had opened a bunch of parks which were later sold to Sunac, and really enjoyed it. At the time, potentially maybe still, it had what I thought to be the best one-two punch of coasters in China with Coaster Through the Clouds - an Intamin hyper and China’s tallest coaster – and Python in Bamboo Forest, GCIs biggest (arguably best) coaster. It was also a lovely park, and busy, but now it’s a very different story.

The entrance is next to a large shopping mall (a consistent “Wanda” feature) and still looks kind of impressive if you haven’t seen what it looked like before. Under Wanda, it was a pay-one-price park, but as with many other Sunac properties, it’s now free entry and pay-per-ride / ride package. From outside, I saw the Intamin running, so that was a good sign.

I needed one cred here, a Beijing Shibaolai SLC, but I wasn’t interested in reriding anything else other than the Intamin and GCI. The woodie was closed though and looked to have been that way for some time. I was half disappointed, but also half relieved. It had been one of my all-time favourite woodies, and, knowing how crappily some of them have been maintained in China (looking pointedly at Fantawild), I was worried I’d have that ruined.

I got a completely solo back-row ride on Coaster Through the Clouds. It’s s decent coaster, but far from my favourite hyper. It has its moments, but generally doesn’t do that much with its height and speed. It’s still really smooth though, so perhaps ride maintenance isn’t as bad as the overall state of the park might suggest. I ended up hanging around for about 15 minutes just to get a few pictures of the thing before doing a couple of rerides.

I’ll chuck a few more pictures in. Admittedly, the crappy weather and lack of people will make it look even worse, but the place really felt run down. It was a weekday though, with that crappy weather, and open until quite late in the evening, so maybe it’s more popular then and I’d caught it at an especially bad time.

So that just left the SLC, which I’d convinced myself would be closed, but turned out to be open. Again, there was nobody there. I got front row, but they waited to get more riders to dispatch it, so I ended up sitting there for a while. I was expecting the worst, but I really liked it. It’s far from smooth, and I was riding in the front to mitigate any roughness even further, but I’ve done a lot of much, much rougher SLCS, including Vekoma. The layout was excellent, with a ridiculously steep first drop, and it was stupidly fast. Beijing Shibaolai haven’t cloned this layout anywhere else, and I don’t know why not. It’s far better than their standard model and fits in a much smaller footprint. It does seem to run way faster than it was possibly designed to, so perhaps that's something to do with it - no idea really. Again, I waited around for an eternity to get a few pictures.

I was glad I revisited since I could knock off the missing coaster and get a few rerides in on a major Intamin, but the park itself is now a total dump. Again, trying to be fair, I’d caught it at the worst possible time. Maybe I should have gone back in the evening; it would’ve no doubt looked better at night and perhaps it attracts an after-school/work crowd since it’s free entry and very well located, being very close to the high-speed train station. I’m curious about Python in Bamboo Forest though; hopefully there is maintenance going on and it’s not been closed for good.