Do you have any theme park guilty pleasures?

[CoasterMOG]

Personally, my absolute guilty pleasure is doing the ‘around the world’ drinking challenge at Epcot. One of those tidbits of info that I limit telling to certain people when they hear of me going to Epcot.

As for a ride, it’s the Scrambler flat ride. Never went on one till I was an adult and I have to hit them up every time if they’re at a park; they always make me giggle like a small child

 

[Tonkso]

I have a soft spot for a good old pirate ship!

Nothing wrong with that, Pirate Ships can be airtime machines if you know how to ride them. We've been known to chain ride magic carpet rides for this reason.

 

[TMCoasters]

My guilty pleasure is definitely when a park has secluded nature-centric areas. The quaint bridges, trails, and spiral stairways, at the back corner of Liseberg behind the Ferris Wheel are honestly part of what make it such an untouchable park for me.

Other good examples from my experience are the forested trails near Mega Lite at Happy Valley Shanghai, and the back section of Lake Compounce by the rapids

 

[Hixee]

@TMCoasters ' post triggered a thought in my mind. One for me is Ferris Wheels. I love the perspective it gives you over the park, and often times is a great picture snapping opportunity.

I don't tend to have to ride them, but if it has a short queue (which they often do) and the day isn't too hectic trying to get stuff done, they're a great little breather.

 

[JoshC.]

I always love the idea of a ferris / observation wheel at a park. They are great breathers and give good views.

But they always feel like such a chore to ride. Awkward loading procedures. Long ride times. Don't always give as good views as you expect. It's always a bit of a Russian roulette.

I think I lost my love for them after doing Liseberg's wheel, which had an extremely long ride time, and a huge rain storm came out of nowhere just as we were getting on, meaning we saw nothing.


Whilst I'm here, and after the conversation in the Towers flat ride thread, I should add another guilty pleasure: Zierer Family Freefall Towers. You know, like Tikal at Phantasialand. Great family rides which are much more fun than they look imo. Always try to ride one whenever I see one.
(And Tikal is the best drop tower experience at Phantasialand.)

 

[Chris Brown]

Not so much a guilty pleasure but I'm obsessed with any sections of parks being indoors, not bothered about an individual ride being in its own building but when a collection of rides or a whole park is inside it really gets me going. Take Toverland shed, Plopsaland De panne shed and Nickelodeon Universe at MOA as examples, the more themeing the better of course. In addition to that, indoor water rides. Jesus I dunno what it is about water rides being indoors but they do weird things for me, Nickelodeon Universe log flume is the pinnacle but honorable mentions to Toverland Log flume. One of the best would have been the old splash boat inside Adventuredome but its since been spited.

Nickelodeon Flume.

Toverland Flume

Adventuredome Flume.

Buffalo Bills log Flume through the casino.





Seriously tho if you know any others hit me up.

 

[davidm]

^ indoor rapids (not even small ones) at Lotte World.

And not just indoors, but on one of the upper floors of the building.

Bonkers.

 

[Chris Brown]

^ indoor rapids (not even small ones) at Lotte World.

And not just indoors, but on one of the upper floors of the building.

Bonkers.

Life has peaked.

 

[JoshC.]

Bobbejaanland has a splash battle indoors and, if memory serves me correctly, it's also the building that serves as the entrance to Revolution's queue, and has a small snack stand as well?


Theming aint bad either

 

[Gavin]

Life has peaked.

They also have an indoor log flume and the Sinbad boat ride (Pirates of the Carribbean style).

Sent from my Redmi Note 7 using Tapatalk

 

[Gavin]

Not so much a guilty pleasure but I'm obsessed with any sections of parks being indoors, not bothered about an individual ride being in its own building but when a collection of rides or a whole park is inside it really gets me going. Take Toverland shed, Plopsaland De panne shed and Nickelodeon Universe at MOA as examples, the more themeing the better of course. In addition to that, indoor water rides. Jesus I dunno what it is about water rides being indoors but they do weird things for me, Nickelodeon Universe log flume is the pinnacle but honorable mentions to Toverland Log flume. One of the best would have been the old splash boat inside Adventuredome but its since been spited.

Nickelodeon Flume.

Toverland Flume

Adventuredome Flume.

Buffalo Bills log Flume through the casino.



View attachment 11381

Seriously tho if you know any others hit me up.

Double post. Sorry about it.

How about Wanda Nanning? It's a shopping mall park.

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[nadroJ]

Not so much a guilty pleasure but I'm obsessed with any sections of parks being indoors, not bothered about an individual ride being in its own building but when a collection of rides or a whole park is inside it really gets me going. Take Toverland shed, Plopsaland De panne shed and Nickelodeon Universe at MOA as examples, the more themeing the better of course. In addition to that, indoor water rides. Jesus I dunno what it is about water rides being indoors but they do weird things for me, Nickelodeon Universe log flume is the pinnacle but honorable mentions to Toverland Log flume. One of the best would have been the old splash boat inside Adventuredome but its since been spited.

Nickelodeon Flume.

Toverland Flume

Adventuredome Flume.

Buffalo Bills log Flume through the casino.



View attachment 11381

Seriously tho if you know any others hit me up.

This entire post is extremely relatable. Indoor water-rides give me serotonin.

 

[Chris Brown]

Double post. Sorry about it.

How about Wanda Nanning? It's a shopping mall park.

Sent from my Redmi Note 7 using Tapatalk

Those rapids pictures...

 

[Pokemaniac]

I'm no expert, but ...


... screw it, my PhD thesis on this exact topic is due in a week. At this point, I probably am an expert. How the heck are they handling that moisture load in such large open spaces? High ceilings mean high convection, and high moisture plus high convection equals condensation, which generally brings lots of moisture problems in the roof. I guess it could work if the building isn't insulated or if it's in a warm climate (something something, sun heating the roof, driving moisture transport towards the internal side), but MoA is in Minnesota, a place famous for its cold winters. I guess they could crank up the ventilation system and connect some beastly dehumidifiers to the exhaust fans, or build the whole mall like a swimming arena, but that's quite expensive and malls are notorious for being built at a low quality. If I were to guess, if you cut open the roof of that building, the insulation inside would be dripping wet.

 

[Hixee]

At this point, I probably am an expert. How the heck are they handling that moisture load in such large open spaces? High ceilings mean high convection, and high moisture plus high convection equals condensation, which generally brings lots of moisture problems in the roof. I guess it could work if the building isn't insulated or if it's in a warm climate (something something, sun heating the roof, driving moisture transport towards the internal side), but MoA is in Minnesota, a place famous for its cold winters. I guess they could crank up the ventilation system and connect some beastly dehumidifiers to the exhaust fans, or build the whole mall like a swimming arena, but that's quite expensive and malls are notorious for being built at a low quality. If I were to guess, if you cut open the roof of that building, the insulation inside would be dripping wet.

Also my day job.

Lots and lots of ventilation. Probably, if I was guessing having never done something quite like this but also having solved problems like this in other places, multi-level ventilation with a massive stratification effect throughout. Most HVAC problems can be solved by chucking tons of air at it.

 

[Pokemaniac]

Most HVAC problems can be solved by chucking tons of air at it.

That's true. The building physics get quite wonky when you add a layer of energy efficiency requirements, though. Suddenly, you can't chuck air at it, there has to be insulation everywhere (thermal gradients, yay!), and then your roof is too thick to dry out effectively, so you need everything to be airtight, and by that point your roof is effectively a balloon that must not be popped. Except there is no pop, there's no easy way to tell whether it's working as intended or if it's bungled beyond all repair, until the damage has become so extensive that somebody notices. That moment usually overlaps nicely with the "bungled beyond all repair" side of things. The accepted solution appears to be "Eh, we plan to tear it down one day anyway, so until then we'll just put out some buckets to catch the worst of the dripping". The mall in my hometown has installed rain gutters indoors in an attempt to at least get rainwater out of the shops. That solution is to a building engineer what making a white flag out of your underpants is to a five-star general: humiliating defeat.

Famously, Disaster Transport at Cedar Point was the indoor coaster that had to close during rainstorms because its roof was so leaky. I sometimes wonder how the heck they managed to build a roof that bad.

 

[Hixee]

The building physics get quite wonky when you add a layer of energy efficiency requirements, though. Suddenly, you can't chuck air at it, there has to be insulation everywhere (thermal gradients, yay!), and then your roof is too thick to dry out effectively, so you need everything to be airtight, and by that point your roof is effectively a balloon that must not be popped.

It's worth remembering that we solve the problem "the other way round" all the time in countries where it is exceedingly hot and wet for a good chunk of the year. A well designed and detailed vapour barrier, coupled with a practical approach to air distribution means you can get away with an awful lot. Throw in heat exchangers and you start to get towards reasonably good "kW/m2" figures.

Maybe "the engineering of ride buildings" is something we could write...

 

[Howie]

Fudge.

Not just any fudge, theme park fudge. I'm not talking about the mass produced, cubed, crumbly fudge you get in supermarkets, no no no - proper fresh cream fudge, freshly made, soft, gooey, creamy fudge served in big slabs. Y'know... fudgey fudge.
Almost guaranteed to be on sale at every theme park in the US, but sadly not quite so common on this side of the pond. But still, when I see it, I buy it. Cookies and cream flavour fudge is the one to beat.

Fudge.

 

[rob666]

Used to be a lovely fudge stall on BPB, next to the Goldmine, where the Wallace and Gromit shop is now.
Spent half my pocket money in there as a kid, dark chocolate and raisin fudge.

 

[Tonkso]

And good chocolate. The chocolate shop in Rookburgh is exceptional, and reasonably priced too. I highly recommend it for people's next visit to Phanta.