In order ...
- The station looks fabulous - photos below. The soundtrack was playing intermittently and is still switched off when there is a breakdown.
- The skull waterfall was off, but the infrastructure for it appears to still be there - perhaps it shall return.
- Huginn and Muninn have been replaced by a static scene with a viking that reminded me a bit of He-Man - quite a decorative scene
There is some audio here, you go past so quickly I have no idea what it says. It appears as if there are some speakers above the trough as you approach (next to the exit from the maintenance dock) - but they don't seem to be working (or aren't intended to).
- The real fire torches have been replaced by vapour / steam
- The dogs remain as they were, but have been relit - no sound today
- Fenrir(?) remains above lift one, and has been relit
There is also a large V above your head - I am not a fan of this whole V thing, a family run park in a decrepit seaside resort built one of the most bonkers dark rides of all time, with a great brand and name recognition - why on Earth would you dilute it by using a single letter ? Worse still, when they use #V on Twitter - the amount of crap that gives you from K-Pop to far right madness is astounding. Moronic.
- ... then it all starts going wrong, the boat stops on lift 1 for 10 mins - the announcements regarding what is going on are barely audible
We stopped here again ... but only for a minute or so, no work lights ...
- The effects on the lift (they look a bit like eyes) switch off
These seem to be on a timer and one presumes are meant to stay on for as long as it should take for your boat to pass them, so when you stop they're on for a little while and they go off.
- ... we eventually start moving again
- It appears the twin-trommel is still in place, but naturally, is not moving
I couldn't say for certain if it was still there or not, perhaps just covered up - it would have been a hassle to remove
- Odin appears to have been removed / there is no audio - there is nothing in that space
Again, just black space here - I wonder if something was supposed to be lit up but we missed it because we stopped on the lift.
- Coming off lift 1 there is no bouncing, nor are there lights in the cave at the top
- The dragon heads that were to your right have gone and been replaced by lots of lanterns in a mirrored box
I would love to know what the design decision was for this - you have a reasonably large space there but they have stuck a small scale effect into it and tried to make it look bigger, with mirrors. Baffling. It's always been a bit of a dead spot on the ride, but simply bizarre now.
- The river of fire remains largely unchanged - but now each 1m of it or so lights up as you approach it - very cool
This was switched off, no steam in the air at all
- The waterfalls are gone - they have been replaced by a solid wall with thin shafts of light shining through - fine, but a downgrade
Just blackness today ...
- Turn 1 (which I suspect is a relocated Turn 2) spins you round anti-clockwise to go down the mini-drop forwards
Before we got to the turntable, the work lights came on and a boat was on the turntable. The boat is brought out of the water to a level perhaps 1 - 2ft above where it would naturally sit in the water, on to the turntable - which operates above the water line. Having seen it with the work lights on, I think it is the original Turn 2, relocated.
- You then approach a bizarre large figure that was lit very badly - but it looked odd, no idea what it was. Reminded me of the Mumbo Jumbo logo.
This appears to be a skull that spits water at you, but it's comically bad.
- The ice room wasn't cold - there are a lot of ornate 'things' in there now - a weak snow machine, but the canons are presumably gone. Thankfully the perspex polar bear, or whatever it was has been banished.
The stuff that they have added to that room is nuts - so bad. There are some big figures but as many have said, they are completely ill-fitting for the ride - or at least what the ride used to be, perhaps they're going for a much camper vibe now. Anyway, no snow machine. No nothing.
- Drop 2 - there is a new effect with some lights / water dropping from the ceiling
- The vortex infrastructure was there, but switched off / broken - but it did light up
The vortex lives ! It was in darkness as you came down the drop and lit up as you approached, an effect only ruined by the work lights being on - presumably due to the breakdown. It's been nicely cleaned and was working well - clearing the trough.
- The waterfall and shooter before the 180-degree turn to lift 2 remain the same
- Lift 2 had some new sound-effects, but were very quiet
- The skull chandelier now lights up when you get to it, rather than being on constantly
- There were some new bits on the 'bad corner' - again very ornate
I noticed today that the original Valhalla sign / crest is still there - but the 'cooking scene' to the right has gone.
- The hammers were there, but didn't work
The hammers are back and provided a soaking
- The flaming arrows were there, one worked
These were a no show today.
- The rolling log was there, didn't work
The rolling log is back and is unchanged, moving slightly clumsily - but it was there and functional
- There is a new scene with bells above your head that chime as you pass under
No bell noise today, but I did notice one of the ravens (Huginn and Muninn) had been relocated to this stretch and was flapping away - pretty cool. That might have been there the other day but maybe wasn't lit.
- The Tesla coil corner, which was 'upgraded' in the last refurbishment to have the exploding chests has been completely redone, I assume stuff was supposed to happen there but nothing did - it almost looked like tracks with stuff on that was supposed to move side to side on said tracks, but nothing happened ... could be really cool I am sure, but it wasn't today.
The new stuff lit up today, but nothing moved - it looks like a mechanical headache just waiting to happen.
- No flaming trough / ring of fire - I would be delighted and hugely surprised if that came back
- No fire explosions on the run out - didn't appear to be lit
I forgot to mention on the previous post, but there is some improved stuff on the bend after the drop 3 run out before the sunken longboat. It's lots of smoke / coloured lights. Back in the day, there used to be something similar, but not quite as effective - that used the high pressure water misters, as per the River Caves - but this uses whatever they're using outside, more akin to a massive Vape, minus the teenager clutching it.
- No long boat explosion - but the mechanism appeared to still be there
- One final fire blast on the right hand side
Nothing here today, nothing. No real fire across the whole ride.
- ... and out into the daylight with a huge feeling of WTF
Wetness
The corners are just as bad as they have ever been - the boats didn't have as much standing water as they have done previously. In the run out from drop 3 I was hit by a wall of water from the right, I can only think a boat had come down drop 2 at the same time or there's something new that the water from your boat 'ricochets' off. It felt like it did in 2000 where the boats could drop together - maybe they can again.
It was slightly less wet today, but I did manage to adopt my patented riding position as I had a row to myself whereby I wear a waterproof coat, 'step in' to a bin bag poncho when riding and cover my shoes and jeans with it and then put my feet to the side, off the floor.
Audio
There felt very little compelling about the soundtrack and the sound inside around the ride was worse than ever.
This is the worst aspect of the ride - the silence is deafening - bar the ride system creaking and the sound of water, it's so quiet. Of all the complexities that ride has, an amplifier and speakers is not one of them. They have obviously spent a fortune on that funeral march, you might as well let people hear it - or just bring back the old one - such a bizarre decision. It's as if the composer hadn't been on the ride, or perhaps was given a brief by someone who didn't yet know what the ride was going to be.
In addition
- They opened it at 3 but were still allowing people to enter the queue 10 mins before park close (with at least an hour's queue) - which is not particularly typical Pleasure Beach behaviour, so good on them.
- It feels like the ride has a bit of an identity crisis at the moment - like it doesn't know what it wants to be. All the strange additions don't sit nicely alongside the broad brush craziness of the old - but there is enough of the old to make the new feel out of place.
- One thing that I think is an oversight is a pivot toward static scenes - it just doesn't feel like it suits the ride. I was hopeful that there would be more use of water in the ride ... hear me out. The most effective / obvious example of this (the waterfalls after the river of fire, before the turntable were a good demonstration of how you can use 'show water' to great effect, fairly cheaply and simply without soaking riders ... (I know it's recently been changed) ... but something like the water curtain on Vliegende Hollander would have been a slam dunk. So simple, so effective.
