2004
Coaster Trips: 2004: Legoland Windsor (#2), Barry Island Pleasure Park, Coney Beach
Saturday September 25th
The best laid plans
Towards the end of 2004 it was announced that Coney Beach in Wales would be closing soon to make way for a supermarket. George and I decided that it would be worth paying a visit before that should happen, and planned a day trip accordingly. The original plan was that I should fly into Bristol early in the morning and out of East Midlands in the evening. However, the opening hours of the parks were totally unsuited to this otherwise cunning plan, resulting in a rapid rethink.
The net result of this was my arrival into London Luton at the comparitively civilized hour of 9:30am. One major benefit of this change was that I could take the first bus of the morning to Dublin Airport instead of a Taxi, thereby saving a not insignificant sum of money. The change also meant that I had flown into four out of five London airports (Luton, Gatwick, Heathrow, and Stansted) in a period of just twelve months. At some point I'll need to find an excuse to fly into London City Airport.
My flight was on a Ryanair plane painted into a positively hideous red and white livery advertising Kilkenny Irish Lager. I appreciate that painting advertising on aircraft helps keep the overall ticket price down, but in all honesty it would be nice if those designing such advertising considered the effect of gaudy colours upon the eyes of those compelled to look at them. The trip itself was uneventful, other than a slight delay which led to us landing about a quarter of an hour late. George was waiting in the car park and we departed for Legoland Windsor.
Legoland Windsor
Traffic was, to say the least, heavy. It took nearly ninety minutes to cover the distance from Luton Airport to the park, almost twice the time AutoRoute had predicted. While the plan for the day allowed a certain amount of slack it was still frustrating to be behind so early in the day.
At any rate, we finally made it into the park, and headed down to the Jungle Coaster (#370), a Mack wild mouse. This was our reason for visiting today, having paid a visit earlier in the season to find it down for the day. It seems silly to make a fourth visit to a Legoland park in one year, and this isn't something I'm overly proud of, but what can I say? I wanted the credit.
There was a surprisingly long queue given the type of ride, but in due course we made it to the station. The cars have been fitted with seatbelts which everyone must wear, the first time I've seen a Mack mouse with this rule. I can imagine that some might have problems with this, as there was not a lot of room in the belt even for me and I am not a large person. Other than that though, the coaster was running well, and the brakes (other than the final one) were notably less agressive than others of the genre.
Given our time constraints we elected not to ride anything else, instead making our departure just after noon for the two and a half hour drive to Coney Beach in Porthcawl, Wales.
Coney Beach
Coney Beach is not a park I would normally have thought twice about. It presented a dreary and depressing appearance that had, I assume, seen better days. The weather certainly wasn't helping the first impression but even diregarding that the park was dirty with peeling paint very much in evidence. Several buildings that were once home to major rides were now lying idle and derelict. Pieces of broken wood supports could still be seen attached to the roof of one, the last evidence of a shoot-the-chutes ride that was demolished in 1994 after a fatal accident. All the remaining rides on our visit were portable models that could easily be relocated; chief among these, and visible in the photo, was a KMG Afterburner.
We made our way directly to the larger of the two roller coasters, the Megablitz (#371). The ride itself was quite sore, mainly due to the over the shoulder restraint and the particularly inconvenient location of a set of keys in my coat pocket. Once I realised the problem I made a vain attempt to relocate the offending items, but my harness was too tight to do anything about it. Chalk that one up to experience.
As we were disembarking, Tom showed up. I had mentioned to him last weekend that we were planning to be here, and as he lives in Cardiff he said he'd try to join us. He watched politely as George and I took a circuit on the junior coaster, Nessi (#372). This was my third encounter with this particular junior coaster, and the second time in as many months.
Following this, Tom took us on a tour of the park, taking time to point out where some of the better rides had once been located. Coney Beach had once been home to an impressive collection of rides on the sea front, but declining attendance, and probably a certain amount of mismanagement had brought that day to a close. Tom knew quite a bit about the park history, including information on the shoot-the-chutes accident that I had not been able to find out myself; "decapitating people is not good!".
With thhe scenery complete we all braved another go on Megablitz. After my previous experience I was quite careful with my pockets, and the lack of a key digging into my chest made for a much more pleasant experience. The trains were still tracking awkwardly in a few places, but this is par for the course for a Pinfari coaster.
Tom and I played a quick game of DDR Euromix 2 before leaving the park. We had been there for just under an hour and yet we had seen all that there was to see. The next stop was Barry Island, about twenty miles away.
Barry Island
First impressions of Barry Island suggested that the park was not all that different from the one we had just left. The location is similar; a small park in a small town in Wales. The major difference, though, is that Barry Island is clearly not on borrowed time (yet!). It has an impressive collection of spin rides among its other attractions.
The first ride we sampled was the Haunted Mine dark ride. Though I am quite interested in dark rides, this particular one didn't look like anything particularly special from the outside at least. However, Tom informed us that it was the first ride ever designed by John Wardley, and as such it would be interesting for that reason. While lacking the excitement of his later designs, it was an interesting piece of nostalgia, even if the ride power system wasn't working entirely correctly.
The real reason we were here, though, was for Viper (#373), a Pinfari built coaster, and a clone of The Storm. Unlike The Storm, this one wasn't built on the roof of a building, but other than that the rides were identical.
The End
After bidding goodbye to Tom just after 5:00pm, George and I began the drive back to East Midlands Airport.
After fifty four different parks in one year, one hundred and fifty three new coasters, three new countries, and seven new airports, the coaster season for me is now over. I don't honestly know how I became so addicted to amusement parks, but through the hobby I made lots of good friends and had some real fun. I hope to do quite a number of the trips planned by the European Coaster Club next year, time (and money!) permitting.