Alton Towers behind the scenes tour

Hey guys,

just to let you know that in a weeks time i will be one of 20 people selected to go on Alton tower's first ever officail behind-the-sences-tour.

Expect lots of photos from me including

How hex works (as if you don't know)
Air catwalk
Rita and Nemesis control rooms
and much much more

plus i get to have lunch at the end in the board room wich is an archive for past, present and maybe even future projects Taiko WTF?

However i won't be able to get the photos up until monday when i get back to my house Taiko Straight Face

see you in a week

Posted: Fri Mar 03, 2006 10:33 pm Post subject:

Looking forward to, um, some of what you bring back to share...

But - don't give away tooooooo much, hmm'k?

Nudgenudge winkwink. SaynomoreSaynomore?

Wink

( A future TPR UK Tour Group-er, in June <g>)

Posted: Sat Mar 04, 2006 4:46 am Post subject:

Hex is a suprisingly fun ride - but less fun if you know anything about it in advance! Taiko Happy

Sadly I had already heard what it was all about before I went on it.

Have fun on your tour!

Posted: Sun Mar 12, 2006 10:19 am Post subject:

Well the 11th has been and gone, can we see some pics now?

Posted: Sun Mar 12, 2006 10:26 am Post subject:

Posted: Mon Mar 13, 2006 11:55 pm Post subject:

Okay guys sorry i didn't get them up yesterday but i was ill Taiko Cry Red

But anyway....

ALTON TOWERS BEHIND THE SCENES TOUR

I left Plymouth for Alton Towers on Friday 10th at 6:40 in the morning (i'm a student and so i wanted the cheapest tickets Taiko Tounge Red

). My route was Plymouth -> Derby, Derby -> Stoke and then bus from Stoke to Alton, all in all taking about 7 1/2 hours with all the waiting around, etc.

I was staying at the Chained Oak B&B which is (for all you Alton Towers know it alls) is just down the hill from the trade entrance. It is also home to the legendary chained oak that Hex is based on.

Anyway i had a breif kip and then went into Alton to get drunk and have some food. There are loads of pubs in Alton becuase they used to brew their own beer, and all of the pubs have tunnels leading to the old brewery so that they could evade the tax! By the time i had finished i headed back to the room and got in after about an hour becuase i got lost (no paths or street lights) and went to bed.

We had to meet at the Celebrations cabin, which is outside the main entrance, no later then 9:45am. So after a nice breakfast i headed out and arrived about 9:30 with mostly everyone there. The guys who organised it around arrived about 10am and we registered and signed our life away.....i mean the health & safety form. We then had to wait for the head engineer Terry, who would be taking us around.

Eventually we left around 10:15am and headed around the back of the main entrance to the Sky ride station. We got to see all the gondolas in the maintenance shed being prepped for the opening this weekend. Terry talked about how they work and how they are actually quite safe despite there look. He knows so much about everything it's unbelieveable! We then headed into the station where he showed us how they move them on/off the cable into the maintenace shed.

We then came back out and into the warehouse next to the sky ride. Inside were lots of things either being fixed or broken. Namely pumps for the water rides, 5 spinball trains getting new wheels to test out different speeds and some older things (one of which you will see below).

We walked through the warehouse, opening up to a huge courtyard on the otherside where (in a skip) we found Oblivion and Nemesis' old chains. They had stretched and had to have a link removed until finally after 8 years they are replaced. There was some other things in the courtyard like old food carts, spinball car chasis' and some scrap hehe.

We then headed out of the courtyard back into the park, entering via a road/path next to the entrance to Katanga canyon. This part of the park was closed to guests that day (as was most of it) but still they had music playing. It was the single most eerie thing i have witnessed at a park and led to some good photos (although my camera is pretty crap Taiko Sad

We walked all the way to Gloomy wood to walk around Dual. We entered via the gate next to the house (usually where the queue cuts across) and into a huge side door which brings you pretty much into the station. From here we got a look in the control cabin (complete with bats hehe) and then carried on up a stairwell next to it, up over the station and into the maintenance area. There were quite a few cars in here that were being worked on (although no-one was in there) and you might be interested to know that there is a methane alarm as well. This is becuase Dual (or back then teh Haunted House) is built on a swamp! and so they need to have a methane alarm incase of an outburst, but luckily they have never had a problem, but the staff toilets on the other hand Taiko WTF?

From here we went along a hidden corridor (much like Disney's) into a big room which houses the spinning tunnel. Terry then told us how it all worked and then let us loose to wlak around the entire track. So off we went and i'm not one to get too scared but at one point i was on my own in a room and taking close-ups of some zombies.........needless to say i was bricking it lol. This was probably the best part, however my camera was being a bitch about being in the dark so i only got very few decent photos. We then all ended up in the station again and Terry talked breifly about the cars, noting that there is slime on hte books on the back of the cars to stop people cracking their heads open (pic later).

We then walked out the same way and off to Forbidden Valley, also completely deserted but no music this time. We headed straight down to AIR and had a good snoop about the station (with the trains in). We had a look in the control booth, wlaked along the brake run and Terry was there to answer any questions. We then went into the tunnel and walked up the lift hill, and i was at the front! This was probably the second best part of the trip becuase the views were just breathtaking. We then headed back down and over to Nemesis were we had a look at the computer room underneath the station, where we got to see all the electrics and some spare OTSR's.

Back out we came and headed across the valley to Ug Land, which was the first area of the trip that was open to the public. We went into RITA's hydraulics bunker to look at the drum, which is a lot bigger then i imagined, having only looked at pictures. Terry pointed out that they started with having the hose's fixed to the wall but they were ripped off becuase of the kickback, so now they use rope! He also mentioned that the return hose burst and managed to leak 1000 (litres or gallons i can't remeber) all over the place in 2.5 seconds.

We then left the bunker and went onto the station platform, having a look around the trains and the control booth. I did enjoy this bit becuase i haven't seen RITA before and so i got some good photos. We then left Ugland and passed Charlie and the Choclate factory. Unfortunatly we couldn't go inside but we managed to get a good look at the facade. We then went to the old coaster corner behind Cred St where the Beast and Alton Mouse used to be. However it is now just a huge storage/scrapland.

We walked through, spotting some interesting things such as one of the now defunct. swans, heading to the Flag tower. The flag tower is the highest building at the Towers and is now used by Phone compaines for broadcasting. We walked up the huge spiral staircase (no i didn't count) and got some cracking views at the top.

After having walked back down and getting out of breath, we walked back towards the Towers and to Hex. The shed for Hex is smaller then i imagined and we all squeezed into the control cabin where we watched the operator make six people happy lol (it was a busy day). He turned the lights on in the shed so we could watch the cylinder spinning. It's weird becuase in the ride, when the room is spinning, it feels like it spins forever, but in actual fact it can only spin 1 1/2 revolutions each way otherwise all the cables will snap!

We then left the operator to his own devices and headed out towards X sector. We were going to go into Oblivion's maintenance shed but we were running out of time so instead we went for lunch in the board room. This is the very last building on the right hand side of Towers Street if you are looking from the entrance. Inside we had a hot buffet and the lady in charge of Archives (Julie i think) had arranged loads of things around the room such as historical papers, concpet work, construction pics, royalty, etc. While we ate we listend to the music for Charlie and the Chocolate factory. Some of us then managed to sneak on a few rides on Spinball before they closed at 2:30.

I then headed back for a bit more grub and then went on my way, thanking everyone for a great day at around 3pm.

I'll get some pics up later today but right now i've got to go to a lecture!

thanks for reading, pics later today.

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 12:48 am Post subject:

Wow,
Great report. Sounds like you had fun
cant wait to see the pics.

thanks again.

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 11:01 am Post subject:

Heres the first batch of photos (not going in order of the tour) --> Rita: Queen of Speed

Just to note before i post anymore pics. All the pics seen in this topic will mainly consist of my own collection, however thanks to all the guys who attended from www.towersalmanac.com who have shared their photos, i have included some of the better ones so you can get better idea of what happened.

Link at the end for everyone elses photos

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 11:09 am Post subject:

Batch 2: concepts and plans.

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 11:21 am Post subject:

Batch 3: Flag tower views

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