As I'm currently in Australia studying down on the Gold Coast until the beginning of June, this is an excellent opportunity for me to get to a few parks that not a lot of people really get to.
Last Friday, I finally found some time to hop on the 75 minute bus ride to Warner Bros. Movie World, located right next to Wet n Wild on the Pacific Motorway, so here's some photos...
After what felt like forever on the bus to travel the 30-odd miles, I'm finally at the park.
The ticket prices here are ludricrous. At AUD$80, or around US$84, this makes this park just $6 cheaper than Disney's Magic Kingdom, and around the same price as the Universal Orlando parks. Unlimited entry pass it is then!...
Errrm... Maybe I'll give it a miss? Nah, screw it, lets at least get a bit of money back on this pass... Although I didn't have my pass yet, as the machine wasn't working, which meant the line for the booth to get in was going horribly slowly as the lady had to write down the details of everyone who wanted the pass, which turned out to be the whole line as nobody is stupid enough to pay $80 for a single ticket. I finally got my pass a few hours later from the upgrade booth inside the park. What a palava.
Viewable from the car park, and right next to the entrance, is the new-for-2011 Green Lantern Coaster. I'd skip this for now though and go check out the rest of the park.
Finally in the park!
This park has quite a strange layout, with most of their major rides; Green Lantern, Superman Escape, and the Batman shot tower right at the entrance to the park.
As 2/3 of the rides at the entrance were closed, I decided to venture further into the park. Here is there main street area, imaginatively called Main Street.
The first attraction you get to past the entrance is this awful, awful 4D show of 2008 Journey to the Centre of the Earth. Having never seen the film before, I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but the film is shocking, and with standard 4D stuff happening every now and then, I don't really recommend this to anyone past die-hard JttCotE fans. Apparently, this attraction used to be a lot better according to some locals.
Park map.
At the end of Main Street, the path splits into two. Go to the right, and you end up in the kids section, and to the left you get onto a pretty linear path to the log flume. I decided to head this way first.
Scooby-Doo Spooky Coaster is the first thing you get to, which has a very impressive entrance. The ride was also a walk-on, which was nice. They're pretty strict about taking photos inside the ride, but the ride turns out to be pretty good.
The first half of the ride is a ghost train, with a couple of small drops, before heading onto an elevator lift, which you come off backwards down an excellent drop and hill. After turning back around, the rest of the ride is just a standard wild mouse-in-a-shed-with-disco-lasers.
Inside an arcade, you get to possibly the world slowest dodgems!
Carry on along the path, and you get to Wild West Falls, the park's extremely impressive log flume.
The ride really is excellently themed, and includes a backwards-drop with a coaster/Splash Mountain-esque drop-wthout-water-and-bump.
Now this is what I like to see in a queue!
It looks like everybody was in Lights, Motors, Act...err...Hollywood Stunt Driver instead. What a shame I missed it!
After eating a generic burger-and-chips lunch, I decided to head back to the entrance and ride Green Lantern...
Ride sign.
View of the ride from inside the park.
It turns out that this park has a pretty ridiculous locker-policy, where even though there are drop-boxes in the station, the greeter makes you empty your pockets, even if they're zipped up, and place them in a $1 locker (it might have been $2, but I've forgotten).
After faffing around with finding the nearest ATM and finding a shop that gives change, and putting all my stuff in the locker, a co-ordinator was now at the entrance, and he looked at me like I had just raped his daughter when I said I was going to wear my glasses with my strap, and took the liberty of phoning the control booth to make sure I put them in the drop box at the station. :|
Also, the queue was advertised to be 15 minutes, but it ended up being around 30 minutes even though there was only about 40 people waiting. They were only running 3 trains at this time, but apparently they can only dispatch the trains in 2 (it was a dual-load station), so there was always a train waiting in the brake run forever before the next train came around to get 2 back into the station , and then there was about a minutes wait, and a lot of strength needed, to raise the restraint.
The operations were quite ridiculous, but at least the ride makes up for it. The only other El Loco I've done was Steel Hawg at Indiana Beach, which has horrible horse-collar restraints, but this ride does away with the horse collars, and WHAT A DIFFERENCE IT MAKES! Excellent hangtime down the drops, extremely smooth and really comfortable restraints. This is a winner in my books!
After Green Lantern, I noticed a bit of activity...
Looks like Superman Escape is opening!
After faffing around with lockers again, I waited for around 5 minutes before the lady called out for single riders, and stuck me right on the front!
Zoom...
This ride is seriously fantastic at the front.
It really is an excellent ride, but it's a shame its operations aren't up to it. Even though there was a huge wall blocking the load platform from the station, they would only fill this up once the train had got back into the station and the train checked, which meant longer-than-necessary waits, especially on the 1-train it was running.
As I got on quickly the first time, and many people in the park either had not realised the ride was up, or had not got there yet, I decided to go for a re-ride, so of course the ride had to go 101 when I was just about to get on. After about 15 minutes, I got on again and was put somewhere in the middle; Whilst the ride really wasn't as good this time as it was at the front (and the train was barely crawling over the top hat), it was still a very good ride.
I would have gone on again, but by now the line had built up, and with the single train and the generally slow loading anyway, this would've taken about 40 minutes, so I passed.
The way to the Great Movie Ri...err... the SLC was blocked. Oh what a shame!
Instead I decided to go check out the kids section...
The kids section is pretty decent, and includes a Roller Skater credit!...
You all know what Roller Skaters look like!
After this, I had a re-ride on Scooby Doo and got back on Green Lantern (which now had an extra train on, making the queue non-existant), before deciding to head out the park (the time was now 3pm, and I only got in the park at around 10:15am. However, I noticed the next bus didn't come until park closing at 5, so I decided to head back into the park, only to walk in on the parade just starting up!
A range of Looney Tune characters came out.
Scooby and the gang.
Batman, the Fantastic Four, Joker and a few other characters also went past, before all the characters got off their floats and made their way back down Main Street. At a few points down the street, there were ladies with buckets of ice creams, which the character then gave to the kids! Very cool!
The Looney Tunes then gathered in the middle of the street and started dancing to Party Rock by LMFAO, including Bugs doing a bit of a breakdance and doing the splits!
It was totally unexpected, at it made the whole parade awesome!
You can whip me anytime you want!
After the parade, I had nothing to really do, but still had around 90 minutes to kill, so sat around for a bit watching cartoons down Main Street, re-rode the log flume and re-rode Scooby Doo a couple of times. Th second time I went on it gave me a thumping headache though, and possibly the rudest and most obnoxious group of Indians shouting at me in Hindi because they sat next to me and expected me to get off the bench to allow her husband to sit down (who had nothing wrong with him) didn't help.
After eating an ice cream from...
And sitting around for a bit more, it was finally time to leave and have the bus journey from hell with a head still feeling like a jackhammer.
So, what did I make of the park?
Apart from some dodgy operations on their two major coasters, I thought the park was very good, with excellent theming, two fantastic coasters and an excellent log flume. The park really feels like it's lacking rides though, especially flat rides (the closed space shot was the only non-kiddy flat in the park), and it feels like it needs to have another area added (sure, the SLC was closed, but this was probably a good thing!).
Definitely not worth the extortionate $80 entrance fee (despite how Disney the place was trying to be), but still a very good park and well worth going to if you can find some cheap tickets, or are going to get your money back on the AP.
Hope you have enjoyed, and if I get bored enough again I might do more reports if people want.
Ta.
-Mike-
Last Friday, I finally found some time to hop on the 75 minute bus ride to Warner Bros. Movie World, located right next to Wet n Wild on the Pacific Motorway, so here's some photos...
After what felt like forever on the bus to travel the 30-odd miles, I'm finally at the park.
The ticket prices here are ludricrous. At AUD$80, or around US$84, this makes this park just $6 cheaper than Disney's Magic Kingdom, and around the same price as the Universal Orlando parks. Unlimited entry pass it is then!...
Errrm... Maybe I'll give it a miss? Nah, screw it, lets at least get a bit of money back on this pass... Although I didn't have my pass yet, as the machine wasn't working, which meant the line for the booth to get in was going horribly slowly as the lady had to write down the details of everyone who wanted the pass, which turned out to be the whole line as nobody is stupid enough to pay $80 for a single ticket. I finally got my pass a few hours later from the upgrade booth inside the park. What a palava.
Viewable from the car park, and right next to the entrance, is the new-for-2011 Green Lantern Coaster. I'd skip this for now though and go check out the rest of the park.
Finally in the park!
This park has quite a strange layout, with most of their major rides; Green Lantern, Superman Escape, and the Batman shot tower right at the entrance to the park.
As 2/3 of the rides at the entrance were closed, I decided to venture further into the park. Here is there main street area, imaginatively called Main Street.
The first attraction you get to past the entrance is this awful, awful 4D show of 2008 Journey to the Centre of the Earth. Having never seen the film before, I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but the film is shocking, and with standard 4D stuff happening every now and then, I don't really recommend this to anyone past die-hard JttCotE fans. Apparently, this attraction used to be a lot better according to some locals.
Park map.
At the end of Main Street, the path splits into two. Go to the right, and you end up in the kids section, and to the left you get onto a pretty linear path to the log flume. I decided to head this way first.
Scooby-Doo Spooky Coaster is the first thing you get to, which has a very impressive entrance. The ride was also a walk-on, which was nice. They're pretty strict about taking photos inside the ride, but the ride turns out to be pretty good.
The first half of the ride is a ghost train, with a couple of small drops, before heading onto an elevator lift, which you come off backwards down an excellent drop and hill. After turning back around, the rest of the ride is just a standard wild mouse-in-a-shed-with-disco-lasers.
Inside an arcade, you get to possibly the world slowest dodgems!
Carry on along the path, and you get to Wild West Falls, the park's extremely impressive log flume.
The ride really is excellently themed, and includes a backwards-drop with a coaster/Splash Mountain-esque drop-wthout-water-and-bump.
Now this is what I like to see in a queue!
It looks like everybody was in Lights, Motors, Act...err...Hollywood Stunt Driver instead. What a shame I missed it!
After eating a generic burger-and-chips lunch, I decided to head back to the entrance and ride Green Lantern...
Ride sign.
View of the ride from inside the park.
It turns out that this park has a pretty ridiculous locker-policy, where even though there are drop-boxes in the station, the greeter makes you empty your pockets, even if they're zipped up, and place them in a $1 locker (it might have been $2, but I've forgotten).
After faffing around with finding the nearest ATM and finding a shop that gives change, and putting all my stuff in the locker, a co-ordinator was now at the entrance, and he looked at me like I had just raped his daughter when I said I was going to wear my glasses with my strap, and took the liberty of phoning the control booth to make sure I put them in the drop box at the station. :|
Also, the queue was advertised to be 15 minutes, but it ended up being around 30 minutes even though there was only about 40 people waiting. They were only running 3 trains at this time, but apparently they can only dispatch the trains in 2 (it was a dual-load station), so there was always a train waiting in the brake run forever before the next train came around to get 2 back into the station , and then there was about a minutes wait, and a lot of strength needed, to raise the restraint.
The operations were quite ridiculous, but at least the ride makes up for it. The only other El Loco I've done was Steel Hawg at Indiana Beach, which has horrible horse-collar restraints, but this ride does away with the horse collars, and WHAT A DIFFERENCE IT MAKES! Excellent hangtime down the drops, extremely smooth and really comfortable restraints. This is a winner in my books!
After Green Lantern, I noticed a bit of activity...
Looks like Superman Escape is opening!
After faffing around with lockers again, I waited for around 5 minutes before the lady called out for single riders, and stuck me right on the front!
Zoom...
This ride is seriously fantastic at the front.
It really is an excellent ride, but it's a shame its operations aren't up to it. Even though there was a huge wall blocking the load platform from the station, they would only fill this up once the train had got back into the station and the train checked, which meant longer-than-necessary waits, especially on the 1-train it was running.
As I got on quickly the first time, and many people in the park either had not realised the ride was up, or had not got there yet, I decided to go for a re-ride, so of course the ride had to go 101 when I was just about to get on. After about 15 minutes, I got on again and was put somewhere in the middle; Whilst the ride really wasn't as good this time as it was at the front (and the train was barely crawling over the top hat), it was still a very good ride.
I would have gone on again, but by now the line had built up, and with the single train and the generally slow loading anyway, this would've taken about 40 minutes, so I passed.
The way to the Great Movie Ri...err... the SLC was blocked. Oh what a shame!
Instead I decided to go check out the kids section...
The kids section is pretty decent, and includes a Roller Skater credit!...
You all know what Roller Skaters look like!
After this, I had a re-ride on Scooby Doo and got back on Green Lantern (which now had an extra train on, making the queue non-existant), before deciding to head out the park (the time was now 3pm, and I only got in the park at around 10:15am. However, I noticed the next bus didn't come until park closing at 5, so I decided to head back into the park, only to walk in on the parade just starting up!
A range of Looney Tune characters came out.
Scooby and the gang.
Batman, the Fantastic Four, Joker and a few other characters also went past, before all the characters got off their floats and made their way back down Main Street. At a few points down the street, there were ladies with buckets of ice creams, which the character then gave to the kids! Very cool!
The Looney Tunes then gathered in the middle of the street and started dancing to Party Rock by LMFAO, including Bugs doing a bit of a breakdance and doing the splits!
It was totally unexpected, at it made the whole parade awesome!
You can whip me anytime you want!
After the parade, I had nothing to really do, but still had around 90 minutes to kill, so sat around for a bit watching cartoons down Main Street, re-rode the log flume and re-rode Scooby Doo a couple of times. Th second time I went on it gave me a thumping headache though, and possibly the rudest and most obnoxious group of Indians shouting at me in Hindi because they sat next to me and expected me to get off the bench to allow her husband to sit down (who had nothing wrong with him) didn't help.
After eating an ice cream from...
And sitting around for a bit more, it was finally time to leave and have the bus journey from hell with a head still feeling like a jackhammer.
So, what did I make of the park?
Apart from some dodgy operations on their two major coasters, I thought the park was very good, with excellent theming, two fantastic coasters and an excellent log flume. The park really feels like it's lacking rides though, especially flat rides (the closed space shot was the only non-kiddy flat in the park), and it feels like it needs to have another area added (sure, the SLC was closed, but this was probably a good thing!).
Definitely not worth the extortionate $80 entrance fee (despite how Disney the place was trying to be), but still a very good park and well worth going to if you can find some cheap tickets, or are going to get your money back on the AP.
Hope you have enjoyed, and if I get bored enough again I might do more reports if people want.
Ta.
-Mike-
