Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Phantasialand Posted)

[TheCoasterCruiser]

With both big and small players in the German attraction industry lined up, I embarked on my biggest coaster trip to date.

Day 1

After an early departure from Denmark at about 4AM on July 30, we drove about 6 hours south to our first park, Ski- und Rodelarena Wasserkuppe. This was more of a credit hunt than anything else, but they did have my first Alpine Coaster, which was great fun!

Closing in on our first park in the somewhat interesting weather.

Welcome to Ski- und Rodelarena Wasserkuppe, a small place some 800 m above sea level with virtually no information whatsoever for credit whores who just wants to grab and go.

But seriously.
The place was dead, only populated by the constructers of this building who knew nothing as to how and when the rides would open.

Eventually I overcome my introvertness and asked a mechanic working on the Alpine Coaster and soon we were off into the fog, not knowing what to expect and with the classic mindset of NOT braking.

Here's a video of my first ride.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aV0cAsHttU8[/youtube]

This establishment was also home to Hexenbesen. Perhaps one of the lesser known contraptions of the coaster world.

We totally filmed it.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZehRAfIBmD8[/youtube]

When we were "done" so to speak, at Wasserkuppe, we were off to the next park of the day, Freizeit-Land Geizelwind.

Home to 4 very different roller coasters and overall a fun little place.

They had an impressive selection of flat rides.

And this Zierer Spinning Coaster!?
Unfortunately I didn't shoot any more photos of this ride, but it was basically your standard Zierer Tivoli, but with spinning cars.
It worked surprisingly well and I'm honestly shocked as to why they haven't sold anymore of these, considering how many Tivoli coasters is out there.

I did film an onride to give you an idea.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSdumT8wxEw&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]

They had this water ride with what might very well be, the cleanest water of any flume anywhere!

As well as this rather smooth Boomerang.

Here's an onride I shot.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVdlAGLIzmc[/youtube]

These are always fun.

And another unique Zierer Coaster.
Former a traveling ride, this is basically a Flitzer in an overheated tent.

View from a drop tower.

And as any other smaller German amusement park, they off course had animals.

At noon we headed to our next stop of the day, Schweinfurter Volksfest.
We didn't bother riding Cobra as we fortunately already had the credit.

It wasn't the biggest Traveling Fair, but not the smallest either.

And now to what pretty much made us come here. A new version of my favorite flat ride, a Pegasus from Technical Park.

It was absolutely sick and blew us both away! - Great experience, if a tiny bit painful.

Here's what you're dealing with.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEr-ghUeU78[/youtube]

Next up, Rainbow Magicland!

 

[TilenB]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014

^ Is Pegasus the same type of ride from the manufacturer as the one in Tivoli Friheden? These rides are sickening, I went really close to throwing up on the one in Aarhus.

 

[TheCoasterCruiser]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014

Yes it is. The one at this fair was a smaller model, a Pegasus 16 if you will.

 

[GuyWithAStick]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Cobra looks painful as heck. Especially that too small "inversion".

Sent from my VS840 4G using Tapatalk

 

[caffeine_demon]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

looks like day one was totally awesome!!

The world needs more wiegand rides!

 

[TheCoasterCruiser]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Cobra looks painful as heck. Especially that too small "inversion".

Sent from my VS840 4G using Tapatalk

Actually it's the way too small helix you should look out for! :wink:

Day 2

Okay, so after a good nights sleep and some breakfast, we were on our way to Tripsdrill.
It's a bit unfair to say that it was the trips first "exciting" park, but I think you know what I mean.

We arrived just in time for opening in front of this modest entrance.

I instantly loved Tripsdrill and this photo helps explain why.

I love "main streets" with character!

They had one of those drop towers were they never run the other side...

This is basically a... Okay I got nothing.

First coaster of the day is a Zierer family one!

Here's some track for you.

Next coaster of the day was something entirely else... Karacho is a fun and quick Gerstlauer Launch Coaster. Sadly, I didn't find anything special about it other than that.
It does have some of the best trains in the industry and I guess it does the job for Tripsdrill.

It also had the best test seat ever.

I filmed one of my rides.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qcGtrn0WqU&list=UULe7a9-uaV6ozJR9mZq0GAg[/youtube]

They also had a woodie!

Which overall was good.
If only it would run a little faster though, the layout has such a great potential!

Our mounted POV.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ahd2qHS-GXw[/youtube]

This castle mingles with a awesome Gerstlauer Bobsled as well as a reversing log flume!

Great theming! Great ride!

We got to film this beauty as well.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_aSJnHaOew[/youtube]

Log Flume finale.

They also had this good looking raft ride.

Let's have some more Karacho.

Post MCBR is the best part in my opinion.

At this point we felt like we were pretty much satisfied with our time at Tripsdrill, so we decided to visit a small park nearby that is also home to some quality rides... But before we do that, some words on Tripsdrill.
- I really liked this park, the atmosphere was great and the ride line-up is very solid, apart from a little confusing park layout, the overall experience was good. The staff here is also particularly nice and granted us permission to mount our camera to the ride.
Oh and a shout out to the guy operating Karacho who recognized our enthusiasm and gave us a bunch of stickers!

Now onto the next park. If I remember correctly, the clock was about 2PM at this time.

Welcome to Schwaben Park!

The park was absolutely dead so we had this beautiful Zierer coaster for ourselves. The ride op was cool and we chatted a bit with him as well. The coaster had a rather thrilling layout with some great moments, the trains had some nasty rattling though.

Why off course I filmed it!
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=972eWVyk3EA&list=UULe7a9-uaV6ozJR9mZq0GAg[/youtube]

They had this tiny flume.

And this little drop tower.

And this little chimpanzee... Wait wtf?!
So apparently they had animals here as well, which totally came as a shock to us ignorant coaster enthusiasts.
And now we're at apes. - The new Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is one great movie!

They had a Schwarzkopf here as well.

An ugly colored Wild Cat to be precise...
Ran good though, as expected. (Cliché Schwarzkopf fanboyism)

Shot a slightly **** onride of it.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMguZm7yc9c&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]

They had a kiddie credit as well.

Complete with a jerky layout.

Random "Freizeitpark" rides.

These are good fun!

They had another wildcat here.

They just don't make them like this anymore.

It might actually be taking a **** here.

One last ride on "Force One" before leaving Schwaben Park.

Sex.

We then drove back to the city of Backnang, which our hotel sits in, to find something to eat.
It sounds like a city in Thailand but it is intact a town in Southern Germany.

And a quite good one at that.

We eventually had this mediocre dish before going back to the hotel.

So Schwaben Park was overall a fine little place... But I'm baffled as to why so many smaller german parks is able to keep these animals, I mean they clearly aren't well... It shouldn't be legal.
I'm not gonna be the guy who always whines about animals well being, but when I see something like this, it just makes me sad.

 

[Darren B]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Really enjoying the reports so far. Germany is such a wonderful country; Can't wait to go back, TWICE, later this year.

I completely agree with you on Tripsdrill, it's a beautiful park with some really good rides. I haven't been since they added Karacho but it's no doubt made the park even better. Did you ride the log flume of the rapids? Or had you already done them on a previous trip?

Schwaben on the other hand doesn't look like a particularly brilliant park. Animals aside, it doesn't look like it has the beauty of a traditional German park. How long does it realistically take you to mop up everything there? Can you cred run it in less than an hour?

 

[TilenB]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Tripsdrill is awesome, I'll try to write a trip report from our trip in June in the following days (I didn't have as much time as I would wish for in the past month...)

 

[furie]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Yea, I'll add to the Tripsdrill love. Gorgeous park, really nice place to chill and while the rides aren't exciting; it was just a great park to spend the day at.

Karacho does add that extra level of "excitement" into the line up though that lifts it a little from just a chill park to becoming a little more. It's another park on my list to take the family to.

 

[TheCoasterCruiser]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Really enjoying the reports so far. Germany is such a wonderful country; Can't wait to go back, TWICE, later this year.

I completely agree with you on Tripsdrill, it's a beautiful park with some really good rides. I haven't been since they added Karacho but it's no doubt made the park even better. Did you ride the log flume of the rapids? Or had you already done them on a previous trip?

Schwaben on the other hand doesn't look like a particularly brilliant park. Animals aside, it doesn't look like it has the beauty of a traditional German park. How long does it realistically take you to mop up everything there? Can you cred run it in less than an hour?

Thank you! - This was my first time there and we did ride both the rapids and the log flume (both got us pretty wet)
Regarding Schwaben, I would say it's doable in about an hour yes. - Looking at some info from my photos and videos I can see that we were there from about 3.10PM to 5.30PM though.

 

[Serena]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

They had another wildcat here.

They just don't make them like this anymore.

Hahaha! And a duelling Wildcat nonetheless! Brilliant report, Tripsdrill looks v. lovely

 

[TheCoasterCruiser]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Day 3

Another good nights sleep and we were finally on our way to the much talked about Europa Park.
While my traveling companion already had been there several times, this was my very first time and what a place!

We pulled up to Hotel Colosseo, where we were gonna stay for one night, got our tickets and entered the park...

After checking in to our hotel, we went straight through the entrance in the "Spain" area of the park.

First coaster was the powered mine train, nothing our of the ordinary, just enjoyable.

The landscaping is already growing on me. Got it? Got it?

A quick look inside the new Arthur area.

We'll get back to you later!

And you. - I mean there were so many roller coasters to ride we found ourselves walking back and forth because we couldn't decide where to start.

I absolutely LOVE this, it's so real and exactly what I want in a theme park.

More scenery.

Now to Silver Star.
Impressing engineering in terms of how long they can sustain the floater airtime on this one!
Other than that, I didn't find it particularly special.

It was my very first B&M Hyper Coaster.

Next up was Eurosat, a slightly rough indoor coaster with some speedy turns.

And more lovely "Europa" theming.

We then rode Matterhorn Blitz.
Best themed Mack Mouse, but that's it.

Except for the pointless start, I actually found Schweizer Bobbahn better than the one in Heide Park.

There is so many areas to discover in this park.

I think we were very lucky with crowds, waiting times didn't exceed 30min.

Time for some water coaster.

But first, this stuff.

A beautiful family coaster.

Disclaimer: You will need a beautiful family to ride.

One of my favorite views <3

Then Poseidon.
Which was fun, if a bit forgettable.

Silver Star is the most beautiful "parking" coaster of the lot.

Euro Mir was rather fun and quick actually.
And that soundtrack!

One of quite many Dark Rides in the park. I found they were all more or less hidden away and had no queue at all.

The "Scandinavia" area of the park.

Feels like home.

They have more stuff that makes you wet.

This one does a good job.

And then time for some lunch in the shade.

Atlantica SuperSplash entrance.

We watched the "Arena" show in the "Spain" area.

It was wonderful.

They didn't play "negra y azul" which totally ruined my day.

Now onto some GCI.

It flirts with Atlantica.

Even the spiders eats great at Europa Park.

It's made out of wood.

It's fun, aggressive and has a great first drop.

It's well themed.

But it's not better than Thunderbird.

I really liked blue fire. It just had everything. Perfect ride.
My new number one!

New for this year was Arthur.

Suspended Spinning Powered Coaster.
And it was really cool! - This and Blue Fire are the stars for me.

Back to the hotel now.

Our room.

We had dinner, walked around the place a bit and ended the day with a "Wodan" drink in bar on the top floor. Great stuff!

So what do I think of Europa Park?
Well, when you're on a roller coaster trip, you pretty much focus on riding coasters, so at first when I stumbled upon this park, I didn't know how to process THE most well done, most complete high quality theme park experience I've ever had the pleasure of witnessing! - It was slowly coming to me at this time, but wow, this place was like a whole other country!
It's so well done, and it's really not about the coasters, it's about the complete experience every single ride contribute to create and it works so well!

 

[TilenB]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

When has Arthur actually opened? I remember going through some webpages at the end of June, but it had still appeared to be under construction.

And I've never actually realized how close Wodan comes to Atlantica. It really looks impressive (at least on the photos that you've posted). I guess I'll have to go back to Europa soon. Possibly next year or in two years' time.

Great PTR so far!

 

[TheCoasterCruiser]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

^ On RCDB it actually just says that it's been operating since July, so considering that we where there from 3rd-4th, we've been pretty lucky!

 

[CookieCoasters]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Great report and great pictures truly showing off the beauty of Europa Park. And blue fire is equally beautiful :--D

 

[TheCoasterCruiser]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Great report and great pictures truly showing off the beauty of Europa Park. And blue fire is equally beautiful :--D

Thank you!

Day 4

Since we rode pretty much everything on our first day at Europa Park, we decided to drive even further south to ride Europe's longest Alpine Coaster on this morning.

Eventually we would find ourselves at Steinwasen Park as well before going back to Europa Park to enjoy the rest of this very hot day.

As we drove further south, beautiful landscape began to reveal itself.

We are at Hasenhorn for a ride on this unique attraction! Longest Alpine Coaster in Europe I think.

In order to get to the station on the top, we took a chairlift.

View from the top. This is summer in Europe <3

Refreshment before going down.

And the trips first selfie!

This is the cars you ride in. You control the brakes.

It was not only fun, but absolutely beautiful! - Very glad we did this!

On our way back to Europa Park, our weakness as credit whores showed.

And we somehow ended up in front of the entrance of Steinwasen Park.

A smaller park situated on this beautiful german mountainside.

Quite a nice little place.

They had a brand new Alpine Coaster!

Nothing compared to the one at Hasenhorn, but still fun.

They also had this ABC Rafting ride.

And this Wiegand Powered Bobsled.

And this credit! - Quite cool indoor Mack coaster.

More chairlift action.

Would bring us to this awesome sommerrodelbahn! - I really liked these! hey
Not completely safe either!

Here's a video of my first ride.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iazer85xnFc&list=UULe7a9-uaV6ozJR9mZq0GAg[/youtube]

They also had a fabulous black forest train.

Time to leave now. Fun little place!

Freaking stunning view!

And we're back at Europa Park!

To get some more rides on Wodan!

We discovered the excellence of Single Rider lines.

Now onto Blue Fire.

Absolutely brilliant.

Euro Mir was still entertaining.

Soundtrack still playing in my head...

See this is pretty cool. It's a little court where you and your friends can by water balloons and have a battle. - In the middle of the park!

We rode this shooting dark ride, which actually worked quite well.

Poseidon says splash!

France area of the park.

Very cool little ride.

And that's it for this update. Awesome day under the European summer sun.

 

[BBH]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Great report with some fantastic pictures. Europa looks like one of the best parks in the world (obviously you seem to think so); it really does have a bit of everything for everybody.

 

[PeskyTrimBrake]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Excellent report so far! B&M hypers are great, right? Love how Steinwasen Park looks.

 

[TheCoasterCruiser]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Many Firsts)

Great report with some fantastic pictures. Europa looks like one of the best parks in the world (obviously you seem to think so); it really does have a bit of everything for everybody.

I appreciate that!

Excellent report so far! B&M hypers are great, right? Love how Steinwasen Park looks.

Actually Silver Star didn't really do it for me, but I guess there still is a good amount of B&M Hypers out there to turn my opinion around :wink:

Day 5

Next park on the trip was Holiday Park.
This park is home to Expedition GeForce, a roller coaster several times voted the best in the world, so needless to say I was pretty excited about this one.

Entrance time!

They've done a pretty decent job with theming in this park.
This is the recently revamped entrance area of the park.

Let's go this way!

Another day with minimal crowds.

Intamin porn.

53 m tall mega coaster.

Okay so Expedetion GeForce is a great ride. The first drop is one of the best and I can see why people love this ride so much, but at this point my # 1 spot had already been taken by Blue Fire...

Not overly impressed.

Considering it's size, it's very well hidden away in the tree tops.

+1

Suddenly, something else craved our attention.

New for this year, Sky Scream is a Premier Rides Launcher.

It's lovely themed.

A little less intense than I've had hoped for, but overall a fun coaster.

Okay it's really fun!

Back seat is the best.

Holiday park has a great location within the woods.

Recently re-themed log flume.

Loading on EGF was ridiculously slow!
Don't know if it has something to do with the accidents, but first they checked the seat belts and then they started all over checking the lap bars...

Checking out the new kiddie area.

Which was nicely done.

Refreshment on another hot day!

A car from Super Wirbel was displayed in the park.

This was one of the wetter rafting rides.

The park had some nicely decorated areas.

Okay I lost concentration.

We watched their "Talking Dead" water ski show.

With Zombies on water skis!

And this awesome thing.
Actually the show was great.

Some more rides on Sky Scream and Expedition GeForce and we decided to leave.

Looks like they used the old foundations for Super Wirbel at the entrance plaza for Sky Scream.

On the way to our hotel, we randomly stopped in the city of Koblenz for some food.

"Food"

Koblenz turned out to be quite a cool place!

With a cableway over the Rhine.

Suddenly we felt all cultural.

And ended up checking out stuff like this.

Neat place actually.

I totally approve.

This was also the day on which Germany won over France in the quarterfinal I think? - So at the time we were heading back to the hotel, cars with screaming germans where the thing.

Last hotel of the trip was a classy one!
With really nice staff!

So romantic!

Complete with an oversized bathroom.

That's it for day 5!
Holiday Park was overall a nice place to spend a half day, at least when it's so dead. But as you might have noticed, I'm not blown away.
Next up is Phantasialand.

 

[CookieCoasters]

Re: Germany Coaster Tour 2014 (Holiday Park & Culture Posted

Actually Silver Star didn't really do it for me, but I guess there still is a good amount of B&M Hypers out there to turn my opinion around

Sadly, sometimes Silver Star's airtime is killed by the trims. After my last visit two years ago, it was running brilliantly with great airtime, but the visit before that it was very underwhelming.

Shambhala should turn you opinion round if/when you ride it :wink:

Loading on EGF was ridiculously slow!
Don't know if it has something to do with the accidents, but first they checked the seat belts and then they started all over checking the lap bars...

Urghh :roll: . I really hoped they might have stopped doing that. It's bad enough they only run one train. If EGF was at Europa Park, it would probably never have a queue.

Anyway great report! I don't know if it is just your fab pictures, but Holiday Parks a lot nicer than I remember. Shame you didn't love EGF, hope that doesn't mean it's not running on top form this year. Glad you liked Sky Screamer, even if it wasn't very intense (neither's blue fire though :? ).