Germany Trip September 2023

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During September 2023 we undertook a week long trip to Germany visiting three parks and trying to squeeze in a few beers along the way.

Inspiration for the trip was based around a similar one taken by @pluk way back in 2016.

09/09/2023

Travel day. We flew into Karlsruhe / Baden Baden (FKB) Airport via Ryanair from Stanstead and collected our hire care from the Budget desk before taking the short drive 40 minute to our hotel, the Holiday Inn Express in Karlsruhe.

After checking in early and dropping off the bags we took the short walk into centre taking in the Karlsruhe Palace and Schlossgarten, before deciding it was too warm to be walking around and headed for a beer at Badisch Brauhaus, where it also happened to be happy hour.

On the evening we went for Wirtshaus Wolfbräu for food and more beer.

 

[pluk]

Hooe you had the best time.
Very interested for this, been a good few years since my trip! I'm sure plenty will have changed...

Love the thought of my ramblings years ago playing a part in inspiring someone doing something now, with my own trip being inspired and informed by others on forums I'd read before I went. A great part of the enthusiast thing.

 

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10/09/2023

Leaving Karlsruhe, we took the 45-minute drive to Holiday Park. If my research was to be correct, this Sunday was to be the last day of the school holidays in the area, so we were expecting the park to be busy. On arrival we joined the queue of cars to get in and soon found out that it was also the German Red Cross Family Day at the park.

Even though this bolstered attendance at the park for the day, luckily it was still manageable. There’s only one real reason to visit this park, Expedition GeForce and it lived up to the hype it gets. The queue never really went over 30 minutes, but the dispatch procedure is so slow. Even when they added a second train, it didn’t really improve. The adjustable seatbelts are a faff, and these needing to be checked by the two ride-ops before lowering the restraints takes double the time necessary. The trains would really benefit from seatbelts that just pullover and lock.

Aside from GeForce we took a few rides on Sky Scream and some of the flat rides which didn’t have massive queues. The drop tower was only operating on one side and had the longest queue all day, so didn’t bother with that.





After leaving the park we took the short 15-minute drive to our hotel, the ibis Styles in Speyer. With it being a Sunday, we were conscious of early closing times, so ate in the centre of town at Zum Goldenen Hirsch, before catching a quick beer at Hausbrauerei im Domhof just as last orders were being called.

 

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11/09/2023

Leaving Speyer we made the hour long drive to Tripsdrill. As we were staying the night in a “Schäferwagen” Shepherds Hut next to the Wildlife Park, we needed to park there, check-in and receive our tickets before walking over to the theme park. The park had already opened by the time we arrived, although some of the larger rides didn’t open until 10am. It was apparent though that it was busier than we thought it was going to be. It transpired talking to a local that although most kids had returned to school, those of an age transitioning between primary and secondary school had also got this day off and many families were taking this as an opportunity for one last theme park trip.

With the park being so spread out the queues were still fairly manageable. We headed first for the two new coasters and was really impressed by Hals-über-Kopf.

Over the other side of the park Karacho was an enjoyable punchy ride, with only a slight jolt into the final inversion being a negative.

The woodie Mammut however was a disappointment. For starters you can’t hear it. It’s a very quiet woodie. As for the ride experience, it wasn’t particularly rough, but sort of juddered all the way round the nondescript circuit.

During the day we took in rides on the dodgy drop tower and log flume, and also got our free glasses from the wine cellar. Although we didn’t partake in any wine tasting.

As mentioned, that evening we stayed in a Schäferwagen at the Natur-Resort. After checking in we spent the last hour in the Wildlife Park, where the deer see you as walking deerfood vending machines before having a beer from the catering hut.

With light fading we walked back down to the Natur-Resort to grab some food and another beer at the onsite street-food truck, which closed shortly after serving us.

 

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12/09/2023

With breakfast included in our stay we took a walk up to the restaurant situated in the Wildlife Park before finishing off visiting the parts of the Wildlife Park we’d not got to see the afternoon before.

After checking out we set off on the three-hour drive to Todtnau to ride the Hasenhorn Rodelbahn Mountain Coaster.

On arrival whilst parking the car we spotted a large coach party of school kids heading towards the base of the hill. We quickly got in front of them, purchased tickets and took the ski-lift up to the top. Unfortunately, with the school party closely following behind we didn’t get much time to admire the view from the summit. Fortunately though, on entering the mountain coaster station we were the only people there.

The mountain coaster was bonkers! I tried not to brake for the entirety but have to admit I did slightly touch the brakes a couple of times. This was only because at the speed I was hitting the corners at I thought the cart would 1. leave the tracks, or 2. I would exit the cart.

What also didn’t help though was I had my backpack on my front and shortly after setting off I became aware that the top had come off a bottle of water inside. This resulted in hitting the brakes at the end of the track looking and feeling like I’d had an unfortunate accident.

After a slice of obligatory Black Forest Gateaux at the Gutmann Bäckerei in Todtnau we made a quick stop at the nearby waterfall before heading towards Rust. We passed by the entrance to Steinwasen Park whilst we hair-pined round the roads, but unfortunately it was too late in the day to visit.

For our first night in Rust we stayed at the Moxy Hotel and was suitably impressed. A fairly new hotel located close to the Europa Park hotels, it’s somewhere I’d look at staying at again.

We took a short walk over to Rulantica and Krønasår for a quick look around, before jumping back on the shuttle bus to return to Rust.

That evening we ate at the Outside Ristorante Pizzeria in Rust, which we weren’t impressed with at all. The food was average and service to get our bill was painfully slow. I’d recommend any other Pizzeria in Rust rather than this one.

When we finally paid our bill we took a walk around the park hotels before stopping for a beer at the Commedia Dell'arte Cafebar outside Colosseo where our waitress looked thoroughly fed up. We had planned to stay for a second beer, but she brought our bill over partway through our drinks. So, we saw it as a sign to leave.

 

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13/09/2023

After checking out at the Moxy we left the car parked at the hotel for the day and headed for the nearby Edeka Supermarket to pick up something for breakfast from their bakery counter before walking around to the Europa Park entrance.

The park was reasonably busy, but without many school kids. The crowd was made up of mostly likeminded people who thought to visit once the kids had gone back to school. We heard more French accents than German.

We didn’t have to queue more than 30 minutes for anything, and also watched the GalaXia ice show and Darkness illusion show.

For the next two nights we stayed at the Pension Marianna, which we’d stayed at previously and offers clean, cheap accommodation. As our room had a kitchen, we made use of it and cooked our own food that night before having a couple of beers at Pizzeria Après Park.

 

[IDB]

14/09/2023

Our second day at Europa Park followed much of the same pattern as the previous, albeit it was a “free” day courtesy of our Blackpool Pleasure Beach passes.

The Funny Library show in the Globe Theatre was entertaining, and although not in English it was funny to hear the word Scheiße muttered a few times by the magician when things went wrong.

I think over the two days we pretty much rode and saw everything we wished to see.

On the evening we ate at the Silver Lake Saloon. The food was good, but it felt a bit rushed. We’d been seated, ordered food, and eaten all within about 30 minutes. Ironically after our slow service at the Pizzeria two days previously I was now complaining it was too fast!

We were then going to take the monorail over to the hotels from the park entrance but was deterred by the sign saying you needed to show your room key to the driver. Not sure if we could have got away with it?

 

[IDB]

15/09/2023

As our flight back to Stanstead wasn’t until the afternoon we headed towards Baden-Baden and the Merkur Funicular Railway, Europe’s steepest with a maximum incline of 54%.

On return to base we then took a walk around the “Wildgehege” wildlife walk, where we managed to both get lost and not see any wildlife.

After dropping the car back off at Budget we found out our flight back to Stanstead was delayed by an hour or so.

Overall, a very enjoyable trip helped by good weather throughout the week. Not sure if I will rush back to visit Holiday Park, but would definitely return to Tripsdrill, stay over again and explore more of the Black Forest. A return to Europe Park is always on the cards, especially once Voltron opens.