Richard Bannister

Two hours south of Bangkok lies Pattaya Park, home of one of the tallest roller coasters in the world. Formula One is a compressed air equivalent to the Superman and Tower of Terror rides, and a very impressive structure to look at. However, it has never opened to the public, and at this stage has been rusting for almost fifteen years. Time has not been kind to it, with what's left of the ride car looking positively dangerous now. While I'd love to see this ride open some day, it has to be fairly improbable at this point.

As regular readers of my site will know, I'm willing to be adventurous in my travel plans, but I don't deliberately spend half a day driving just to look at a non-functional ride. My target for the day was Slalom (#1761), a conventional coaster design with a spiral lift hill and several airtime hills. I'm pleased to report that this ride is good fun, if a little on the violent side. One caution for those attempting to repeat this trip; the restraints on the ride are designed for Asians, not westerners, and they are very unforgiving; it is very likely that larger proportioned riders will not fit on board.

Also at the park is a 240 metre observation tower, complete with viewing platforms and a revolving restaurant. The rooftop level has three alternate ways back to ground level for those who don't fancy returning in the lift; a ferris wheel style cabin, a two person bucket, and the option I tried, a zip line. The latter isn't particularly fast as such rides go, but there's something inherently unsettling about stepping off the side of such a high building.

My driver was quite surprised at my request to go to Seacon Square Mall, telling me that it was very much geared at local Thai people rather than foreign visitors. However, he understood right away when I explained what could be found up on the fourth floor. Roller Coaster (#1762) is a large oval-shaped coaster that loops around half of Yoyo Land, fitting in a single drop of around ten feet along its journey. It was originally built with a worthwhile drop that spanned two floors of the mall, but this was removed just before the turn of the millennium, completely neutering the ride. The only thing to be said for riding it is that I only needed a single lap to complete the set of operational coasters in Thailand!