I had my first visit to Chessington yesterday and viewing it through the eyes of a complete noob to the place had some mixed thoughts on the place.
Overall I thought there's some decent theming to be found in some areas but other parts look like they could do with a bit of TLC but I guess that could be said of any UK theme park, but all in all it's not a bad place to spend a day.
If it wasn't for my MAP and the required creds I probably would have stayed away and missed the opportunity to visit a new park.
As for the rides:
Vampire : not a bad ride at all, different from other suspended coasters I've ridden by the swinging action of the cars which made parts of the ride more forceful than I was expecting from a family coaster. The interaction with the trees and ground added interest as well.
I loved the loading station, dark and gloomy with the best theme music I've come across on a ride, it might even end up as my ring tone.
Scorpion Express : Boring, boring, boring. Unnecessarily slow out of and into the station and not much else to say about the rest of the ride either. I know it's only a mine train at a family park and I didn't ride it before the revamp, but I was completely unimpressed .
Rattlesnake : Surprisingly good, nice theming and with it being built in a pit it actually makes a believable mine area. The ride was rough enough to be interesting with a few little airtime hills thrown in and very short queues yesterday led to a quick re-ride.
Dragon's Fury : The surprise hit of the day for me. I've ridden Spinball quite a few times and it leaves me feeling completely underwhelmed every time so I was expecting this to be pretty much the same. But I ended up really enjoying it, there's no point in me describing it, you've all ridden it lots of times I'm sure but I was really surprised just how much better a ride it felt than Spinball and I've no idea why that is.
Bubbleworks turned out exactly as I was expecting it to be, most of it makes no sense, even less than I imagine it did with the sponsorship plastered over everything. I'd have like to have taken a ride on it in its original form, only the room with the fountains and the small drop provided any interest to me sadly.
Zufari : it's hard to disguise the fact that this is just a very short ride in the back of a lorry past some disinterested random animals. A shame really, maybe I expected too much but I'm sure it could be so much better with a bit of imagination/larger budget.
So all in all, not a bad day out, I came away liking Chessington and would probably visit again, but probably not more than once a year.
