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Thorpe Park or Chessington World of Adventures; which London area Merlin park do you prefer?

Thorpe Park or Chessington World of Adventures?

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Matt N

Matt N

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Mako (SeaWorld Orlando)
Hi guys. Merlin Entertainments, the owner of the 4 biggest theme parks in the UK, has two Resort Theme Parks in the London area; Thorpe Park and Chessington World of Adventures. In spite of these parks’ identical owner and close proximity to one another, they are very different theme parks; Thorpe Park is aimed at thrillseekers, and has one of the UK’s biggest selections of thrill coasters and thrilling flat rides, while Chessington is aimed at younger families and has a zoo and various family-orientated rides. With that in mind, I’d be keen to know; which of these two theme parks do you prefer?

Now I know you probably all think I’ve lost my marbles a bit here. I can imagine you all thinking “Come on, Matt; we’re all adults, and Chessington is a kid’s park. Obviously Thorpe Park and its thrill coasters and flat rides will win here!”. However, I made a poll because things I’ve read and heard would suggest that it isn’t quite that clear cut. It feels like most people absolutely despise Thorpe Park with every fibre of their being; no one ever has a good word to say about it. Chessington, on the other hand, seems to get fairly good reviews, and a lot of people heap praise upon it whenever they visit and cite good memories they’ve had there. So I was interested to know whether Thorpe Park’s thrill rides are enough to get it past some of its perceived inadequacies, and whether Chessington’s perceived advantages are enough to get it past its less thrilling ride selection, in your eyes.

Personally, I would (perhaps controversially) vote for Thorpe Park here, and by a comfortable margin. I do have a soft spot for it, and I don’t think it deserves much of the criticism it gets. The coaster selection is really decent, with some excellent headliners, they have a really decent selection of support rides, including two brilliant flat rides in Detonator and Rush (and I’m not the biggest flat ride fan, so that’s saying something!), the theming is stunning in areas, the landscaping is surprisingly nice in areas as well, and I overall get a really nice vibe from Thorpe Park! I do like it a lot, and while I rate Alton Towers higher as a park, it is up there with AT as a park I try and visit at least once annually.

With Chessington, on the other hand… while I admittedly haven’t been since 2014, so I probably need a revisit with fresh eyes at this point, I’m not entirely sold on the hype it often receives. I don’t remember any of Chessington’s attractions really standing out to me even within the sphere of family attractions, and while it was nicely themed in places, I don’t remember the theming being anything spectacular. It wasn’t a bad park by any stretch, but even at only 11 years old (my last visit was just before my 11th birthday, so technically 10 years old), I remember me and my family had the overriding feeling that we were just a bit too old for it. Of the UK Merlin parks, I’d (surprisingly) even say I preferred Legoland on my recent visit there, although I would perhaps say I felt similar at that park. As I say, though, I do probably need a revisit to Chessington; I’ll see if I can get back there when the new coaster opens.

But which of these London area Merlin parks would you rate higher?
 
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Thorpe Park has an advantage in that it goes after the thrill market. It also has newer hardware. Most of the big rides at Chessie are over 20 years old, even if some of them have been re-themed (to varying degrees of success). Thorpe Park gets a lot of criticism for their queues, mainly because they’re exacerbated a lot on busy days by Fast Track, priority passes and various other ‘queue jumping’ mechanisms.

A lot of the rides at Chessington have the same problems, as well as low underlying throughputs caused by a combination of poor maintenance, dated systems and safety procedures the ride wasn’t designed for. For all of its problems, Thorpe Park has a lot of well engineered reasonably modern rides. Chessington once did, with several Mack rides etc, but they’re showing their age. It isn’t necessarily a foregone conclusion. Lots of other parks have old rides including Disney, but they’ve modernised their rides more and looked after them better. I’d say that typically the big rides at Thorpe Park have double the throughput of the big rides at Chessington. Or close, at any rate.

Chessington peaked early with the original developments and Transylvania. Terror Tomb, Rameses, Rattlesnake and Beanoland all improved the park. Soon after Beanoland they butchered Vampire and Tomb Blaster. Since then, there have been a few highs with Land of the Dragons, Hocus Pocus Hall and Wild Asia, but generally the park has been in decline, whether it’s the Imperial Leather Bubble Works or replacing Samurai with Peeking Heights. It’s been one step forwards and two steps back. I first visited Chessington in 2000. It’s hard to compare because I was much younger, but it was objectively a better, more magical park.

It's harder to say when the golden period was for Thorpe Park. You can argue that at the very least the park has stagnated since The Swarm, but it had a much longer period of growth. Whilst Thorpe Park has lost their non ride stuff (shows, the farm, the boat trips, the models) a lot of investment has gone into the ride hardware. Chessington does still have the animals including the Sealife Centre and the Sealion Show. Which is better might partly come down to how much emphasis you put on rides vs the other stuff. The other argument is that although individual rides have gone down hill and look tired, the original design is still fairly evident, and it was a good one. John Wardley did create something very impressive, even if it hasn't been looked after. The basic concept of different areas themed to different countries/regions works. Thorpe Park has become a messy hodge podge of IPs. Chessington is more coherent, but individual attractions lack quality.

A few years ago I’d have said that Chessington would have been an easier park to sort out. I’m not so sure now.
 
For me it’s easily Thorpe Park, and then probably a tie after that between Legoland Windsor and Chessington. It might well be different though once CWOA open the Project Amazon coaster in that it would pull it clear of LLW for me as the second placed park but at the moment CWOA isn’t really that appealing for a visit.

The poor throughput of some of the rides combined with what seems to be a bit of problem with ride availability means that it’s not a park I’d be that inclined to visit compared to some others. My kids however are interested in going to Chessington but I think I’d rather just wait until they hit the magic 1.4m mark and take them to Thorpe.
 
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Chessington suits my children more due to them being shortarses so there’s more for them to do there. Thorpe suits my partner and I more due to the coasters. Although I did enjoy my visit to chessington a few weeks back, I don’t think it’s somewhere I would go without the kids.

That said, I wouldn’t mind bringing the kids to Thorpe on a nice day when the beach area is open, I’d imagine they’d spend at least an hour or two playing in there which would give us a chance to take turns going off alone to do a few coasters each, there’s also the new playground which they’d probably spend another 30-60mins in, and from what I saw on Saturday there are a handful of attractions that would be suitable for them/us as a family, so we could probably make a day of it, there just wouldn’t be many coaster rides for them which are their favourite. I’m not sure I’d consider taking them without merlin passes though, if we didn’t have them then we’d probably stick to chessington out of the two when it comes to family trips, until they get taller anyway.

Personally I prefer Thorpe, it has more there that appeals to me, with better throughputs in theory if operations weren’t so hit and miss. Both parks have loads of room for improvement though.
 
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Enter Valhalla said:
What about Legoland Windsor?
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I didn’t include LLW as if’s a slightly different kettle of fish to Chessington and Thorpe what with the Lego IP and all; Chessington and Thorpe Park are both Resort Theme Parks, and I often hear them compared without Legoland ever being bought into the conversation.

If I did consider LLW, though, it would slot in a fair bit below Thorpe Park, but slightly above Chessington.
 
Despite living up the road I tend to avoid both of them.

I do slightly prefer Chessington though. The rides at Thorpe don't do much for me so it's pretty irrelevant in that respect. Chessington at least has a decent zoo and I like Dragons Fury and Vampire.
 
I 1st went to Chessington in 1998 with the sun free tickets as I always wanted to go after seeing this ad in the mid 90’s

I never heard of Thorpe park to I saw this ad

I use to love Chessington and felt it had the best dark rides and flats. I not been since 2008 as with the attractions they were adding it wasn’t worth the 4 and a half hr round trip.
I always loved Thorpe park and I not been since 2011 but that’s been cause I’m waiting to my daughter’s 1.4m tall.
 
Themeparksandy1981 said:
I 1st went to Chessington in 1998 with the sun free tickets as I always wanted to go after seeing this ad in the mid 90’s

I never heard of Thorpe park to I saw this ad

I use to love Chessington and felt it had the best dark rides and flats. I not been since 2008 as with the attractions they were adding it wasn’t worth the 4 and a half hr round trip.
I always loved Thorpe park and I not been since 2011 but that’s been cause I’m waiting to my daughter’s 1.4m tall.
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Dont go to Chessington nowadays, you'll be very disappointed on what they've done to the park...
 
Trooper Looper said:
Dont go to Chessington nowadays, you'll be very disappointed on what they've done to the park...
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The topic was about which 1 we prefer and I gave a honest answer. I think not going for 14 years to both Chessington proves it ain’t worth going to and I think Paulton’s park is such a better park but that’s not in the poll.
The problem with all 3 London parks and all the midway attractions in the central of London they got no one to rival.
 
Undecided.
Despite the fact that I am not its target demographic, I enjoy the more relaxed atmosphere at Chessington and I feel like I enjoy a day at Chessington more than a day at Thorpe. However, Thorpe by far have the better collection of rides.
 
This is such a hard one for me, I sit on the fence. It’s common knowledge to us adrenaline junkies that both parks are very different and targeted at difference audiences.

I am a southerner and both parks have always been less than an hour from me, Chessington is especially closer. Infact, from where I live now it is less than 4 miles as the crow flies. 🤣 I went there when I was little and remember the mascots…one was a panda with a bamboo hat…? I have some old photos somewhere. And I remember the Skyride when I was young. Then, in 2000, I went with a college group for the first time in many years, and I barely remembered most of the park. In 2003, I got some free vouchers from BP and went on a hot summers day, we returned in early 2004 and got our first Annual Pass, kickstarting regular visits. Towards the end of the season I hit Thorpe Park for the first time since just after the fire in 2000, and throughout 2005 slowly overcame my fear of going upside down on rides, and I slowly got into more thrilling rides. By late summer of 2005 I was encouraged to try Alton Towers for the first time due to it having a mix of what Thorpe and Chessington had.

I’m so pleased I never once rode Rameses or Ripsaw - it was just wasn’t for me.

So despite me sitting on the fence, I guess the pendulum swings more towards Chessington.
 
Thorpe for me, as I like the big rides. However I do like Chessington, Vampire is a great family coaster, dragons fury is good fun when the queue isn’t too long and I adore the Gorillas. We tend to go to Chessington with the kids whereas Thorpe is usually an adults only trip until they get older/taller.
 
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