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West Midlands Safari Park: General Discussion

This park was mentioned on the radio on Wednesday. The presenter was talking about the Cobra coaster, which was a traditional boomerang, which got removed in the early 90s.

Having had a little look on RCDB, it looks like it would have been a really impressive coaster for the U.K. in the late 80s. Does anyone have any idea why the park decided to remove it after only 5 years of operation? American Adventure’s boomerang continued to be their flagship ride for many, many years after West Midland Safari Park removed theirs.
 
I could be wrong but I am sure I read they were struggling financially, they traded the coaster in to vekoma, in exchange for money and the roller skater junior coaster. Plus this better fitted the parks family target market.

I remember visiting when Cobra was there, I was too young/small to ride it though.
 
That explanation would actually make perfect sense. Especially given that the roller skater opened the following year.

I’d say that it was a pretty wise move to get rid of it. Rides wise I think that WMSP has a lot of potential. A junior GCI like White Lightning would fit perfectly here.
 
I always see that the Safari Park invest more into the Safari and non-ride areas more than they do on there amusement park. The amusement park side of things by the look of things hasn’t had any new attractions since Kong but they have invested money on adding theming on there current attractions. I hope the looping group offer a annual pass option that you can go to all 3 of there uk parks or at least a discount of 20% on the online prices.
 
I’m guessing the first set of lodge accommodation has been a success then. As effectively it’s the overnight guests funding these refurbished areas.
 
Themeparksandy1981 said:
Going off topic a bit but it is to do with West Midlands Safari Park and Pleasure Wood Hills with the amount of investment that the looping group has put into Drayton Manor over the past 2 years and ths plans for the next 3 years the fans of both parks want to know why they not investing in new attractions at these’s parks with the Pleasure Wood only really getting re-themed attractions and 2nd hand attractions in its 11 years it’s owned the park and at the Safari park they just only invested in the Safari side of the park and built the new lodges. I don’t think the amusement park had any new attractions since Kong was installed by the former owners with just some rides getting a re-theme.
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Switching to the other thread to stay on topic.
I don’t see WMSP adding much to the amusement area in the future, they’ve added many animal attractions recently and I think for the walking areas they are focusing more on animals than rides.
Most other safari parks don’t have rides like that, just the driven safari and walk-round animal exhibits.
 
Whenever I go to WMSP I never go on any of the rides. The animal attractions/walk-through attractions/safari work nicely as a day out if you pace yourself. The amusement park is nice for families but I would happily see it go in favour of more animal exhibits.
 
Yesterday was the 1st time I been to the Safari Park since the fireworks event in Nov 2017. We used our free Drayton Manor annual pass ticket so only had to buy my wives ticket.
We all loved the Safari section and cause that’s the 1st time I had driven round there since the early 2000’s Can’t comment on if the looping group has invested much on that but it’s shocking the state of the rest of the walk round animal areas.
The Aquarium, Creepy crawlies, Discovery room and Twilight Cave all need the outside of the building repainted with some of the indoor bits needing repairing and painted.
Penguin Cove looked ok but a piece of glass had shedded with just a fence stopping people touching it.
Didn’t see the Sea lion show but even that needs some TLC.
Lorikeet landing and the red Pandas were new since my last trip but not sure if the former owners added them before the looping group took over.
Reptile house also needs some TLC with many of the enclosures covered over.
The Animals encounter was a excellent talk about the small animals.
The African village was excellent when we went round it 5 years ago but even that looking in a sad state in places.
Now the worst to last Land of the Dinosaurs when we went round this in 2017 it was excellent with everything moving I was really looking forward to showing my son this area but the dinosaurs been outside hasn’t had no TLC by the looping group with only 4 or 5 moving with many of there skins worn away and lots of holes in them.
Even the Ice age section not sure if this was added in 2018/19 but that also was in a bad shape with hardly anything moving and the animals in a bad shape.
The kids playground was still looking good and my kids loved that and the funfair looked clean with the looping group looking like there themed up some of the ride areas with just the ghost train in need for some TLC.
You can tell the looping group see the Safari as there main draw with big queues all day to around 4pm to drive round it was a 2 hr drive round experience and the lodges look a great investment we hope to go again in November for there Bonfire/fireworks event and we go round the Safari again next year when we activate our new passes in November.
 
Had a brilliant day at WMSP yesterday, it was our first visit since 2017.

I can see why they’re introducing time slots for the safari, it gets very busy. We arrived for opening at 9.30 and seemed to beat the worst of it, but people were constantly being told by staff in 4x4s to move along to ease congestion, particularly near the beginning of the safari which is understandable as people had barely entered it and were stopping to feed animals which was causing delays getting people in. I also witnessed cars being told to move on near the giraffe section when we were in the on foot viewing area later in the day, so yeah it definitely seems like they need to do something to manage it and improve guest experience rather than having to have staff rushing people along. Hopefully it turns out to be a success.

Most of the animals were visible in some capacity, the best view was of the lions, most of whom were sat basking on the large rock in their enclosure, which gave some great views of them. Unfortunately the giraffes, which are one of my kids favourite animals weren’t out on the safari when we went round but we got to see them from the viewing area later on so not all bad. Cheetah’s weren’t available either but that was well sign posted before entering the safari.

On to the park itself. The dinosaur walk is in a bit of a sorry state. Barely any of the animatronics move anymore and some had holes, pretty sure I noticed a wasps nest taking up residence in one of the holes. Poor dino. Some of the info boards had some props missing. The area needs some tlc. Seeing the real fossils is super cool, but again some of the display cabinets need a bit of a refresh.

Saw the sea lion show and thoroughly enjoyed it. The lorikeet house is great too, they go nuts for those little pots of nectar (£1.50 a pop).

The theme park section hasn’t really changed much since our last visit but was clean and well presented in most areas. We got to this section at around 2pm and queues weren’t too bad.

Venom is pretty decent as far as drop towers go. Black Fly isn’t what it once was, doesn’t seem to get much height anymore but the spinning is forceful. I had 2 rides in a row and felt a bit sick afterwards.

Rhino coaster is rough but I suppose that fits the theme and I kind of expected it with it being an old school Vekoma. I enjoyed the ride and found the helix’s to be nice and forceful. However that brake at the end is unreasonably harsh, I somehow, despite being a short arse, smashed both my knees off the carriage when it stopped, really hurt. The ride op warns you about it before sending the train and tells you to brace which I did, obviously not enough!

Monkey Mayhem is fun enough, nice pop of airtime near the end of the layout. It seemed like they were only sending one train round at a time, which made for a bit of a long wait. Didn’t ride the mini apple. A new, more modern coaster in the park wouldn’t go amiss but I get that the theme park isn’t the main focus for WMSP and what they do have is perfectly adequate for the target audience even if they are aging a bit now.

Both water rides are good fun for what they are, got pretty wet on both the rapids and the flume. Did a few of the flats including the pirate ship, chair swing and the disc o. Operations ok but not amazing, given the mostly short queues it didn’t matter too much. My partner and youngest child did the ghost train and said it was rubbish, kind of expected that.

There are plenty of food outlets and gift shops dotted around. Only a couple of food/drink outlets were closed but all the main ones were open, we brought our own food so didn’t sample what was on offer. Gift shop prices weren’t too bad, I got a 50th year branded fridge magnet for £2.99 which I thought was very reasonable. There were more expensive magnets but I wanted a 50th year one with a lion on it.

All staff we came across were friendly and enthusiastic.

Didn’t mean to go on for this long but overall an enjoyable day was had. Won’t be leaving it so long between visits next time. We are considering getting platinum passes for Drayton Manor/WMSP in the future, which includes entry to both parks.
 
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BigShadowtinytree said:
We are considering getting platinum passes for Drayton Manor/WMSP in the future, which includes entry to both parks.
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They are great value when they both include everything. If I lived half way between both I would get 1. I think the prices at both Drayton and the Safari park really have improved and you can see that with how many guests visit and buy from the sweet and toy shops.
 
I don’t dislike it myself! It’s quite a fun font, and the giraffe head silhouette adds a nice little touch, in my view!

Based on the comment from @KolonelKlink above, however, I’m going to guess that as with Thorpe’s logo change, which I also didn’t dislike, I’m profoundly in the minority for not hating it…
 
Slight change in the name as well from Midland to Midlands with the s.

But to but honest though I’m not sure that I ever noticed that it was just Midland before, I think I’ve always said Midlands in it’s name.
 
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