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Pleasantly Suprised

RicketyCricket

RicketyCricket

TS Member
Favourite Ride
Taron
There have been many times I've visited a random park to get on the big coasters, but stumbled across something I had no idea existed. Or some rides/attractions I've been aware of but enjoyed them a lot more than expected.

What are your most memorable theme park pleasant surprises?

1. Goats at Cedar Point. No not the GOAT (Steel Vengeance), but the farm area towards the back of the park. This had gone under the radar somehow and we spent a silly amount of time here messing around.

2. The Dragon under the Castle at DLP. First visited here a few months after WDW and was expecting it to be a let down. The whole park was far better than Magic Kingdom and there's a bloody Dragon under the Castle?! Lovely stuff.

Can't think of any more at the moment but you get the idea.
 
Rutschebanen at Tivoli Gardens struck me quite highly. I wasn't expecting any coasters there to be amazing and was more interested in the park itself (and it was beautiful!), Rutschebanen was the last I did and I expected to be a woodie that was just "alright" considering it's age. I was wrong, it was amazing! The airtime was incredible thanks to the minimal restraints (which can also chuck you around quite a bit!) and left a great impact on me. Honestly think the only Danish coaster that could top it is Piraten.
 
Pegasus at Parc Asterix, all my hype was for Oz'iris and Zeus but this little Coaster packed a surprising amount of force and fun and it was really well themed too.
 
Alton Towers in 1993. The year my parents took me and my Sister for the 1st time. I had heard of the park but cause there was no internet. I had no clue what the park was like to I was given a park map.
My favourite ride was the Astrodancer and in its 1st year there was a wheel on the carts so you could twist it more. I went on this ride the most.
The stand out ride for me was the haunted house. The ride itself for the 1st time made me jump with them screaming things that went up and down.
I don’t watch POV’s of rides I hadn’t been on yet so when I got on the Harry Potter forbidden journey ride it shocked me how good it was from the queue line to everything about the ride itself.
 
A couple of coasters that caught my by surprise.

White Lightning. The coaster at Fun Spot, not the drink. It’s nothing special on paper but I found it an incredibly fun layout. The dozen or so back to back re-rides we did says it all really!

Typhoon at Bobbejaanland. When I visited I think we all rode this bracing for the Gerstache but it never came. Probably rode better than any other Gerst with OTSRs that I’ve ridden to this point.

Super Wirbel at Holiday Park. Much like the above really; went in expecting a world of pain but was met with a very smooth and pleasant ride.
 
Funcone said:
The log flume at Tripsdrill. I don't want to say too much in case I spoil it for people who haven't ridden it. But it wasn't what I was expecting.
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I was surprised, but I don't think pleasant was the word :tearsofjoy:
 
RicketyCricket said:
Another one - Dinosaur at Animal Kingdom. Had no idea what it was going in but turned out to be one of our favourites at WDW.
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That's a good call. Disney fans are often quite negative about Dinosaur, because they see it as an inferior version of Indiana Jones at Disneyland. I've heard quite a few people saying it should get re-themed to Indiana Jones. Personally I think it's a decent ride in its own right, and I like the fact that they've got something unique. Everything from the comic pre-show to the onboard audio works well, although like most pre-shows it gets a little annoying once you've done the ride a lot.
 
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I adore Dinosaur, but I kind of knew what I was getting with it.

But on the subject of WDW I’d have to say Ariel’s Undersea Adventure is probably one of my biggest non-coaster surprises to date. I went in not knowing what it was going to be, and probably expected something basic like Pinocchio or Snow White at DLP. However, it’s an absolute delight and really caught me off guard. There’s so much movement, animation and life to it. It’s just a generally fun ride.
 
Reutschebanen at Tivoli Gardens, was a real highlight.
Cyclone at Coney Island, thought it would be terrible but was excellent.

Justice League Battle For Metropolis (at Six Flags Great Adventure). Yes it's cloned at numerous parks but it was a great and unexpectedly fun. Thank god for the rain storm that shut all the coasters for a period.

Goats/animals/frontier trail at Cedar Point. Just a lovely area of the park.
 
De Waarbeek in Holland was probably my top surprising park. Initially just a +1 cred but ended up riding all the old fashioned rides they had there.

Plus the ancient coaster was just silly in a fun way.
 
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