I visited Australia with my father as part of a 3-week British & Irish Lions rugby tour, which included visiting the Gold Coast and Sydney and I managed to visit all the parks in those locations. I don’t usually write trip reports but, given the remote location of these parks, I thought a summary of each might be useful to others. Not posting photos given the new forum rules. For information, we were on the Gold Coast during the tail end of the New South Wales winter school holidays, so those parks were relatively busy. I was also mostly riding solo as my father is acrophobic. First up:
Tickets
Individual entry to Sea World or Warner Bros. Movie World was around £60, but they offered a 5-day combo ticket for £80, which includes unlimited entry to both parks plus Wet’n’Wild (closed for winter during our visit). It’s cheaper to buy online and the ticketing system appears to be the same as used by Merlin.
Park Overview
Sea World is a Thorpe Park sized well-kept park with a mix of rides, animal exhibits and live shows. While there’s no dedicated green space, the wide paths, water and tree-lined areas make for a pleasant atmosphere. The shows included classic animal presentations, feeding demos and a water stunt show near the entrance. While the animals seemed well cared for, some enclosures felt too small for comfort, particularly for the penguin house and polar bears.
Almost all the rides are clustered on the eastern side of the park, just beyond the stunt show lake. The Huss Top Spin, Vortex, was closed for maintenance. I skipped the family flats, the battle boats and the Zamperla kiddie coaster, SpongeBob’s Boating School Blast, due to queues, jet lag, incoming afternoon rain and wanting to spend more time with my father. We only stayed for half a day - if you have younger children it’s a full day park. There are no SRQs currently at this park.
Sea World’s standout coaster is Leviathan, a 2022 Gravity Group wooden coaster that dominates the park’s skyline. Headed there upon park opening and managed to get on the second train of the day after a 15 minute wait.
Queue/Operations: You enter through a large themed arch with giant statue however then the main queue is a cattle pen within the ride structure. You’re then batched onto floor dots, then move into themed tunnels straight into the stunning station, which is complete with video screens and lighting effects. Unfortunately, operations across all Gold Coast parks are extremely slow due to strict policies banning all loose items (even in zipped pockets or securely fastened e.g. glasses straps). Virtually all trains have two restraints, one of which the ride ops must close by themselves (in this case the main restraint), followed by re-checking all restraints. You are only allowed through to board when the station is fully empty. Expect around 5 minute dispatch intervals on most major rides.
Ride Experience: Compact but surprisingly long, the layout features strong laterals, fun unexpected airtime moments, and quirky transitions with no filler elements. Felt like a combination of the best aspects of Wodan and Troy. It uses Timberliner trains however, which I find always ride too rough on larger coasters and are headache-inducing. This ride was no exception to this, a shame given it’s only 3 years old.
Backwards Ride: For an additional £7.50, you can ride the back row, which faces backwards. This also skips the main queue which was nearly an hour by this point. This was the superior experience - the drop felt more intense and the layout became even more dynamic and forceful in reverse. Also more comfortable than riding forwards for me. Highly recommend this!
The 2013 Mack water coaster was surprisingly good! I wasn’t expecting much, but the mix of outdoor coaster section and indoor splashdown/dark ride worked really well. Vehicles are themed to lifeboats. It was a walk on, with the queue mainly being an indoor cattle pen with theming and you do get wet on it!
Outdoor Ride Experience: The outdoor track is a clone of Skatteøen at Djurs Sommerland (which I have not ridden), and it rode smoothly with a combination of turns and a nice drop with an airtime hill before the splashdown.
Indoor Ride Experience: I didn’t realise the splashdown was indoors (very wet) followed by a cool dark ride section - turns out this ride reuses the old Bermuda Triangle show building. I was wondering why I was reminded of Area 51 at Movie Park Germany throughout this section, turns out Area 51 was a clone of Bermuda Triangle.
This 2008 Intamin motorbike launch coaster (themed to jet skis) was a sleeper hit for me. This was the only rollercoaster my father went on for the entire trip as it barely gets above ground level. After a 20 minute wait in an outdoor (uncovered) cattle pen queue, we luckily got the front row.
Ride Experience: Two punchy tyre launches, fast-paced layout and whippy tight turns just above ground level. Great fun. The straddle seating and punching through the air made it feel far faster than the listed 43mph top speed.
To be continued with Dreamworld…
Sea World Gold Coast
Located just north of Surfers Paradise, Sea World was an easy single-bus ride from Broadbeach (where we were staying) through Surfers Paradise. Public transport in Queensland is fantastic - fares are currently just 25p one way regardless of journey length, payable via contactless card.Tickets
Individual entry to Sea World or Warner Bros. Movie World was around £60, but they offered a 5-day combo ticket for £80, which includes unlimited entry to both parks plus Wet’n’Wild (closed for winter during our visit). It’s cheaper to buy online and the ticketing system appears to be the same as used by Merlin.
Park Overview
Sea World is a Thorpe Park sized well-kept park with a mix of rides, animal exhibits and live shows. While there’s no dedicated green space, the wide paths, water and tree-lined areas make for a pleasant atmosphere. The shows included classic animal presentations, feeding demos and a water stunt show near the entrance. While the animals seemed well cared for, some enclosures felt too small for comfort, particularly for the penguin house and polar bears.
Almost all the rides are clustered on the eastern side of the park, just beyond the stunt show lake. The Huss Top Spin, Vortex, was closed for maintenance. I skipped the family flats, the battle boats and the Zamperla kiddie coaster, SpongeBob’s Boating School Blast, due to queues, jet lag, incoming afternoon rain and wanting to spend more time with my father. We only stayed for half a day - if you have younger children it’s a full day park. There are no SRQs currently at this park.
Leviathan
Rides: 1x Forwards (Row 4), 1x Backwards (Back Row)Sea World’s standout coaster is Leviathan, a 2022 Gravity Group wooden coaster that dominates the park’s skyline. Headed there upon park opening and managed to get on the second train of the day after a 15 minute wait.
Queue/Operations: You enter through a large themed arch with giant statue however then the main queue is a cattle pen within the ride structure. You’re then batched onto floor dots, then move into themed tunnels straight into the stunning station, which is complete with video screens and lighting effects. Unfortunately, operations across all Gold Coast parks are extremely slow due to strict policies banning all loose items (even in zipped pockets or securely fastened e.g. glasses straps). Virtually all trains have two restraints, one of which the ride ops must close by themselves (in this case the main restraint), followed by re-checking all restraints. You are only allowed through to board when the station is fully empty. Expect around 5 minute dispatch intervals on most major rides.
Ride Experience: Compact but surprisingly long, the layout features strong laterals, fun unexpected airtime moments, and quirky transitions with no filler elements. Felt like a combination of the best aspects of Wodan and Troy. It uses Timberliner trains however, which I find always ride too rough on larger coasters and are headache-inducing. This ride was no exception to this, a shame given it’s only 3 years old.
Backwards Ride: For an additional £7.50, you can ride the back row, which faces backwards. This also skips the main queue which was nearly an hour by this point. This was the superior experience - the drop felt more intense and the layout became even more dynamic and forceful in reverse. Also more comfortable than riding forwards for me. Highly recommend this!
Storm Coaster
Rides: 1x (Front Row)The 2013 Mack water coaster was surprisingly good! I wasn’t expecting much, but the mix of outdoor coaster section and indoor splashdown/dark ride worked really well. Vehicles are themed to lifeboats. It was a walk on, with the queue mainly being an indoor cattle pen with theming and you do get wet on it!
Outdoor Ride Experience: The outdoor track is a clone of Skatteøen at Djurs Sommerland (which I have not ridden), and it rode smoothly with a combination of turns and a nice drop with an airtime hill before the splashdown.
Indoor Ride Experience: I didn’t realise the splashdown was indoors (very wet) followed by a cool dark ride section - turns out this ride reuses the old Bermuda Triangle show building. I was wondering why I was reminded of Area 51 at Movie Park Germany throughout this section, turns out Area 51 was a clone of Bermuda Triangle.
Jet Rescue
Rides: 1x (Front Row)This 2008 Intamin motorbike launch coaster (themed to jet skis) was a sleeper hit for me. This was the only rollercoaster my father went on for the entire trip as it barely gets above ground level. After a 20 minute wait in an outdoor (uncovered) cattle pen queue, we luckily got the front row.
Ride Experience: Two punchy tyre launches, fast-paced layout and whippy tight turns just above ground level. Great fun. The straddle seating and punching through the air made it feel far faster than the listed 43mph top speed.
To be continued with Dreamworld…
Last edited: