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Here's a few pics from Saturday evening prior to Spooky Nights Has a silvery "scaley" look between arches Rockwork! Entrance sign soon? Grass/Tarmac has been added by Trident Looks like they're going with the Green look as shown on the preview model (pic credit Parkz) Leviathan with the lighting package looks great at night! No testing tonight but Jaggs Journeys uploaded a vid of it testing the other night:

The next park on my list in Scandinavia was Tusenfryd (Thousand Joys) https://www.parkz.com.au/attraction/tusenfryd Initially I wasn't going to Norway at all, but it turned out a couple of things I wanted to do on a planned day in Gothenburg were closed, so I got a cheap flixbus ticket and got on the bus at 5am for a day in Oslo. The bus had me in Oslo by 9, that was enough time to grab a quick brekkie then backtrack to Tusenfryd. A regular urban bus goes there, only took about half an hour and the bus was quite frequent, so no problems using public transport. The park is stretched out along a hillside with rocks and boulders....very Nordic! In fact the hill is so steep some escalators take you up to the park from the entry gates. So my first ride was Speed Monster. Remember back in the mid 2000s when everyone was getting Intamin hydraulic launch coasters, including us? Tusenfryd got one too. It's the best thing here and I did several laps throughout my visit due to the good throughput. The launch is powerful as you'd expect, straight into the pretzel like Norwegian loop, which has a good flick and twist at the top. The pace continues as you make a big turn through some trees, before a good ejector hill. The finale is good too, with a corkscrew and a couple of good twisted airtime hills that have some good laterals. The next ride was HuriHuri, which opened this year. It's a zamperla spinning coaster and could best be thought of as a slightly more sophisticated version of those SBF spinners. Mild family thrills. Throughput was terrible. The gates at the end of the platform were not automatic so the op had to go close them manually. It reminded me of the op having to attach the plastic chain on sea viper....x4! You can see the queue that built up after I exited. The other big draw of Tusenfryd, a Vekoma wooden coaster that has had both GCI reprofile it and now has Gravity group trains. Looks good on paper, long drops down the hillside, big camelbacks, fast pace. But it's absolute trash. Gave it a go front and back, in the back you can literally see the cars full on bouncing up and down and shuffling like crazy. Bahhhhh Continuing into the park I headed down the hill into the Viking themed zone, which had 3 big rides. No real wait for SuperSplash.....a Mack super splash. It wants to be a water coaster with its camel back, but it's more like a shoot the chutes. You ride in a huge 16 or 20 seater boat. Lift hill, small dip, gradual U turn, and then the main drop and floater hill Mack water coasters are known for, with a splashdown that gently spritzes you. The other water ride is Ragnarok, a Hafema rapids ride (They built the rapids at Universal Singapore, and at Phantasialand) It has a bit of Viking theming but it's all foam and not that well maintained so it's peeling The rapids themselves are great, some good turbulent sections, a whirlpool where you pick up speed as the track goes around a spiral before a curved drop out the middle. There's also a 2nd drop that's damn steep too he 3rd ride in this area is Thor's Hammer, a 4d motion base dark ride by ETF. It had a good vibe walking in because the whole thing is underground. The motion is pretty gentle compared to the Six Flags JL rides, Spiderman, Transformers etc. I couldn't really follow the story, imagine a few screens with Viking guys battling. The media on the screens was top quality, like Hollywood standard, but I guess because the screens are so small (think smaller than JL at MW) you didn't quite get that sense of awe. That and the fact its not in 3D. The intermediate scenes were nice enough too, there was one nice bit with a troll forest. So in conclusion I think to work these motion base rides need to have huge sets to really envelope you. Lunch was down in the Viking area too, they had a stand sponsored by the local dairy company, selling flavoured milk and toasties....Was like being at the royal show/ Ekka! Moving on, they had Western Express, a Roadrunner clone but it was on a metal base frame. Yep yep yep. I wandered up the back of the park and saw the foundations of the Gerstlauer suspended coaster. I was too big to ride the world's smallest coaster, Dvergbanen. Took one look at the upcharge haunted house and couldn't be arsed. They had a couple of other flat rides such as a space shot and another zamperla giant discovery called spinspider, but wasn't in the mood for a nauseating flat. I finally reached the last coaster, Loopen, an older Vekoma loopscrew, so called because it has both a loop and a corkscrew It has a fairly compact layout, but the fan turn was so jarring on your back. A graceless ride I do not remember fondly at all. Spinemelter 3000: ******************** As for the park, before my visit I was told it was Six Flags Norway and it is true in a way, it was a bit run down in places, a lot of bitumen pathways and chain link fences. Have a look at SF Saint Louis in comparison and that's the vibe I got. They are in the midst of giving the park a facelift, with two new themed zones, Route 66 and Expedition Lost Kingdoms. In amongst all that they also have a bit of a Viking Zone, and a Wild West zone, and a bit of fairytale kids zone, but the wierd thing is they dont actually have names for these area, or promote them on the website like they do for the other two areas. https://www.tusenfryd.no/en/oppdag-parken/planlegg-ditt-besok/temaomrader It mostly seems to be new signage on some attractions, and some face lifted buildings, but I Think because all the in between spaces are all bitumen and chainlink the intended vibe of the zone doesn't carry through. Eg in route 66, where are all the American road signs? I finished up mid afternoon with some more rides on Speed Monster before taking the winding path downhill instead of the escalator for some interesting photos. (And the photos of this park can be viewed here https://www.parkz.com.au/search/photos/location/tusenfryd ) And then back on the bus to the Oslo city centre to spend the remainder of my day, eventually getting a coach back to Gothenburg at 11pm, just as the sun was setting)

It’s a triotech dark ride system similar to the ones they have In shopping centres. They have two films - a ninja one and a Wild West themed one. Spent the day in the park on Friday (during the school holidays). The longest wait was 30 minutes. Stayed in the Proximity Apartments nearby (it was a ten minute walk through the Westfield shopping centre). Got tickets for the twilight session as well (4.30-8.30). The place was deserted. Rode Goldrush 5 times in a row. It’s a cute little park with a mix of quirky theming. The arrow looper is smoother than any other one I have ridden. Managed to get a front row ride. Love the way the mine coaster and the log flume interact with each other. The drop tower has a low capacity, but that didn’t really matter. It’s not that tall, but is quite forceful. They have just redone the log flume’s theming. It’s a bizarre mix of pixies, unicorns and pirates. Went to Crystal Mountain the following day.

This is looking super promising! We haven’t seen this amount of theming for a roller coaster from Village, or any of our parks in a long time. Hopefully this is a turning point for our parks, that a full package makes it a better experience. Examples of recent rides would be: Justice League - Great theming, disappointing ride system. DC Rivals - Great ride, disappointing theming. Very excited to see it all completed ✅

Went to the park the other day and noticed what appeared to be some senior staff members looking at/discussing this seating area directly across from the site of the former Marvin attraction. Could this be the area designated for the new ride? If it truly is an SBF Swing Tower as rumoured, would it fit in this location? If so, it seems like a good fit. The ground is already level and all Movie World would theoretically need to do is remove a few shades, plants, trees, lights and In-Ground Speakers and the area should be “good to go” for a new attraction to be built relatively quickly without the need for major ground works. It’ll be interesting to keep an eye on. There still hasn’t been any changes made to the former rocket ride site either.

Back visiting NZ and visited Rainbows End today for the first time since I was a kid and honestly not much has changed but I wanted to give some thoughts anyway. atmosphere and operations: Surprisingly good wait times, they have capped numbers to the park and it was never overly busy in any one area. Ride OPs did not muck about and checked harnesses very hastily, which made operations run well and some of the bigger rides feel a little more ominous. The park was severely lacking in performers and entertainers and the general theming around the park is tidy but pretty uninspiring. Rides: Some family favourites still hold up, like the Log Flume, they have put a lot of energy into this ride to keep it fresh and added animatronics to more sections of the ride making it more unique and enjoyable, its actually one of the better flume rides if you discount how uninspiring the final drop is. Gold Rush is also a fun little mine train ride that has aged well and just as enjoyable as I remember it as a kid. The corkscrew was actually running very well, miles better than Viper was in its final years at SW and for an old arrow Corkscrew it is running much better than expected. Outside of this they have a small drop tower (about 205ft), a Zamperla power surge, and a 360 pendulum disc similar to SX360 at Aussie World. The area I think Rainbows End really shines in is the kids area, which I rate better than all the kids areas at the GC Parks. They had upgraded the old screen ride with a new 4D dark ride which was pretty underwhelming but not bad for little old NZ. And of course Rainbows End has some unique family favourites like Bumper Boats which is a reason in itself to visit the park, with a very healthy run time of about 10 minutes. All in all a great little park and I was happy to see they are still attempting to keep things fresh despite having virtually no competition in NZ. Would really love to see them get one flagship ride to take the park to the next level but its pretty landlocked and good for what it is.

They are upgrading it, but it’ll still be the same ride as when it originally opened. Everything will work again, and we could see upgrades to projectors, lighting and audio.

With Justice League currently closed for renovation, we can hope that the "disappointing ride system" will be improved.

Great theming/surrounding area when it opened, left to degrade and have effects break and now is an embarrassment. Ride is a meh, loading times largely make the ride not worth it in my opinion.

Good catch! It's usually dead quiet there so I guess it makes sense to use the space. I did like using it as a rest zone during the busier days though. Once my party brought food from Dirty Harry's all the way over there when everywhere else was packed, haha. Let's hope they evade Marvin's wrath.

It's a nice little park isn't it? I went for the first time a couple years ago and was pleasantly surprised. It does need a modern coaster of some kind though. A family Vekoma (similar to Gumbuya's) would be a great fit.