A decade has past since my original theme park gang was last together, so it was time for a reunion!
A decade has past since my original theme park gang was last together, so it was time for a reunion!
A lot has changed at Alton Towers in the last ten years: We've seen ride openings including Th13teen, Wicker Man and The Smiler, rides that have come and gone such as Nemesis: Sub Terra, and Air transforming into Galactica. It's also been a decade since myself, Paul and Rich have all been at a park at the same time, so it seemed appropriate to get together for a ten year reunion at the "magical" Alton Towers!
Th13teen was opened the year after we last saw each other!
You can get personalised Rita souvenirs if your name is James, which is quite lucky for me
Hex has recently had a couple of tweaks ...
... They have added actors inside the Octagon room, but I think they detract from rather than add to the experience
Rich has been lucky enough not to have visited the park since before The Smiler was opened, but he wanted to ruin his innocence and take a ride
Paul put a brave face on it
Rich got marmalised
Next up, a traditional ride on Oblivion
Harking back to the old days of Theme Park Ducks!
Alton have made some terrible decisions in the last decade, but they've also had the brilliance to add Wicker Man
We took Rich to be burnt as a sacrifice
The Beornen seemed pleased, and the ride was running really well
I'm really not a fan of what they did to Duel last year as part of the "Towers Loving Care" programme
The clean up of the queueline was welcome, but changing the music and covering everything in UV paint is terrible (and not a good "haunted house" type of terrible)
Nemesis has a bit of a queue, but it's always worth the wait
Paul and Rich passing the time
The old girl was looking pretty in the late summer sunshine
Galactica is the major rollercoaster retheme of the last ten years
It's all starting to look a bit rundown though
At least they've removed the VR now ... how long before it goes back to being Air??
Now that's a long queue for donuts! We decided to leave it until later.
Runaway Mine Train had an even longer queue than the donuts stand, so we opted for a go on the rapids instead
Even they had a sizable queue, thanks to the number of fastrack tickets being sold
I miss the old waterfalls
Paul and his Capri-Sun: some things will never change
Another thing that will never change: tea time -- the original theme park gang are back together!
Time for the final ride of the day, on Wicker Man
I'm not sure that's an official Battle Galleons boat
Closing time ... hopefully we won't leave it ten years before another trip!