Lou's Year In Review: 2007

^ YAY, I'm not alone! I also stole somebody's dinner roll at Isla Magica, along with maybe a croquetta or two, and I definitely had somebody's caramel dessert pot thingy.

How could I forget Templo del Fuego!! This is why I need to take more pictures of rides, I keep forgetting things!

And thanks for the awesome info on yet another language I will get to watch Desperado in! Yay!!

I think at this point most of us would be disappointed with Desperado in English. It's much better in random other languages! (Korean being my favorite so far!)

I also stole a few peoples bread from Isla Magica! And someone ate my pasta! So obviously it wasn't inedible!

What park was Desperado at in Korea??? I don't think I remember that! Unless the one I rode WAS in Korea, and I'm imagining that there was one in Japan when in actual fact there was not... I went to too many places this year, I'm so confused!!

^It was at Lotte World! I don't remember one in Japan so it's possible you're confused.

Now you've said it, I do remember it! It was down at the bottom of the indoor bit on the lower floor, right?? I'm still getting weird memories though, perhaps there was one in Japan too? Meh. I still don't know who makes that thing, I was gonna try and look it up and see if there are any more in other languages that I need to try and head towards.

^Check out:

http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desperados_(attraction)

http://www.alterface.com/en/amusement_parks/desperados/presentation/

Looks like we'll get some more languages on the Euro Trip!

EDIT!!!

OMG! There's a flash game of Desperados available!!! http://www.alterface.com/contents/menu2/20/desperados_game.php?l=en

I found the food at Isla good also, course I also buy school cafeteria food every day of the school year.

^^

OMG!!!!!!!! COOL

At least with the flash game I wont shoot the numbers...

Spain looks like it was alot of fun, Its times like these, when everyone brings back memories of all the fun trips that went on over the summer, that make me think "I have GOT to do another one of these..."

 

Wow, I wonder how hammered Chris was in those last few photos,

I was very very drunk. The beer was really cheap and it was realy good. there is another pic of Lou and I at that bar where I think im trying to tickel her..Im not entirely sure what was going on. I will see if I have it.

^ You mean these ones?? As you can see, there were several in sequence!! Photos courtesy of Hector Guerrero!!

(Excuse the sidewaysness, I'm too lazy to figure out an easy way of rotating them, I've been up 22 hours straight)

Pretty sure this was a different night though, our clothes are different!

Yeah Baby! [/austin powers]

I must ahve been in bed for this as I remember none of it.

I cannot believe how Red Chris is. Both of your faces are great in every pic.

^^^I have lost a lot of respect for you two!

^ You had respect for us?! What the hell is wrong with you?!

^^Aww.

And YES those are them, I love these pics! And you were right, we were wearing different clothes.

LOVING this report! More, please!!!

Chris, what the hell do you mean by "tickling"?

^Look at the pics and you will understand. But it did end with a Lou credit, lol

The last two resembled more of a lap dance than tickling.

Great pictures Hector.

On day.... two or maybe three... at Port Aventura, we hopped on a bus and headed over to Tibidabo for the afternoon. This park has one of the most incredible settings of any place I've ever been to, it's near the top of Mount Tibidabo, with a beautiful view over Barcelona and for miles upon miles around in every direction. The park is built on five or six different levels, each of them featuring rides built actually into the side of the mountain. The falling star for example was built with its back to the mountainside, trees in front of it, then as you rise up you see over the trees and there's no ground there, just a massive drop off the side and an incredible view!

I didn't take any pictures this day apart from this one, which I'll include because a tiny part of it has a story involved with it:

So, in the middle of the two men in my hotel room (LOL at the false implications) is an awesome Chinese hat.... Some of you may know the story that after booking onto the Spain trip, I found out that it would clash with my graduation, which originally SHOULD have been July the 12th, which might have scuppered my plans to do Mini-Europe but would've meant I was fine for Spain. Anyway, it got changed to the 4th. Bugger. So I spent a good few months soul-searching and trying to decide whether I needed to go to my graduation or would rather go to Spain. I chose Spain, pissing off many of my friends and family, but not myself. However, that day when I woke up, I was still a little depressed, knowing that many of my friends were in their gowns walking, and I wasn't with them. So the TPR crew organising a mini-graduation ceremony for me on the way to Tibidabo was simply perfect.

Larry got me the hat (pictured there on the bed, sadly it didn't make it home from Germany ), and I was given a "diploma" (a placemat ) and made to walk up and down the bus to people singing the graduation march (which I didn't know, because I'm British, but never mind). An awesome memory, and just what I needed, so thank you SO much to anybody who had a hand in that. And thanks to whoever it was who decided that making me wear a black plastic bin bag would depress me.

Anyway, onto Tibidabo chit-chat:

Montaña Rusa is the main coaster draw there, built (as with everything else) out on the edge, terrifyingly awesome views. I rode this first with Melanie and our onride photo was great, but they wouldn't let us take a picture of it and it's rare that either of us buys them so I don't have it to share. But the ride was fun. I have to wonder whether it would have been as fun if you weren't so frightened about flying off the side of the hill, but whatever, there was some decent airtime and the cornering wasn't too brutal.

The park also had a SPEEDY powered coaster, the Tibidabo Express. This thing was really good fun, but if you only have a small build, do NOT ride it alone!!! I wasn't strong enough to hold myself in place and I had the world's worst bruise on my left side from slamming into the side of the car. I think this was also one of the coasters which slapped me in the face with a branch. Very good fun though.

Also at the park, a Fabbri skydiver which I DIDN'T GET TO RIDE... The Bucket Ride of Death which provided the best views EVER but was a little too rickety and rusty for many peoples' tastes. A funny moment of the day was a bunch of us posing for a picture up there and the second we all let go of the sides, the thing JOLTS wildly. The park elevators were entertaining, with actors who were frightened of Hot Fuzz Rich.

The park's other selections were fairly decent, as well as the Skydiver they had a falling star, a top spin ("MY STAMPIDA BRUISE, MY STAMPIDA BRUISE!!!), some kind of haunted walkthrough (which I didn't do because I'm a wimp), a new 4D movie (which we didn't do because we were done with 4D movies.... either that or because it didn't open until the following week ), the awesome plane ride which shows you the 360 view whilst hanging you over the edge of a whatever-foot-drop, and which was operated by the very handsome Oriol, much to our delight (Hi Oriol!), a nice waveswinger, and a "meh" pirate ship.

Oh, and not to forget, the suspended monorail, which becomes a dark ride and gave me the biggest fright of the trip... But I won't spoil it.

Overall, the park was a lot of fun, and apart from the food situation I had no complaints! I had been planning to leave early to go into Barcelona with a group who was going, but in the end I was having enough fun to just stick around! Thanks again to anybody involved in my graduation. Really appreciated the support and the celebration.

Benidorm to follow in a new post!

Lou, you'll always be first in my class.

That is all.

After a final morning at Port Aventura, including ERT on Baco which due to technical difficulties ended up being more like ECT (Chat time, not that I'm complaining, I was endlessly entertained by the Panthers as always), we travelled alllllll the way down the Meditteranean coast to Benidorm. As a town, Benidorm is kinda like Spain's version of Blackpool, but thanks to Elissa's travel savviness, we wound up staying an absolutely stunning resort, seriously the nicest place I have ever stayed. This hotel was beautiful, and as of this coming year, will be not only a hotel but also a golf resort, meaning it will now be far too pricey for me to ever stay there again though. It was lovely to have just one night there though, and I think it totally refreshed us!!

Upon arrival in Benidorm, we dumped our bags, explored our rooms (they were big enough to explore!) for half an hour, then hopped back on the bus to go to Festilandia, a mini kiddie park with the best coaster of the trip, Draky. We also had a few hours to explore the town and the beach before either making a bus meet, or getting a taxi back to the hotel. We decided to skip Draky in favour of having more time to ourselves, then going back on the later bus.

Did I get to California two months early?!?!

Boys on the beach.

Jon, myself and Hector sinking. I love to sink. It's fun until you fall over and get an eye full of sand.

Kyle is essentially insane and decides that the Med isn't cold and he's gonna go and jump around in it. I seriously thought he'd lost the plot, but now that I've put my toes in his Pacific I can see why he's immune.

You can't see Miles's face, but something about his body language just SCREAMS disbelief at what Kyle is doing.

This was me DETERMINED to get a picture of Jon both smiling properly and wearing his glasses. Success!!

And damn happy about it I was too!

Kyle just didn't seem to get what all the fuss was about! Freak!!!!!

At this point, Jon had my camera, so I had three copies of the picture before, three copies of this one, and three copies of the next two. I do think Ron looks like a catalogue model here!!

The Retarded Yellow Hat Crew have arrived, and are equally shocked by Kyle being back in the water!

(Also, is that me behind Melanie, taking pictures?!?! This shot came off my camera... Was I using Kyle's or something??!!)

Jon apparently thought Kyle was ready for his close-up.... Three times!!!

Yeah, he's in a towel, and???

Back at the hotel, I had a couple of drinks in the bar with the Brit lads, watched the others frolic in the pool for a bit, and then headed back to the room to sit on the balcony and read for an hour. I'm sad that my old camera and my photography skills suck too much to really capture this, but the Benidorm skyline was beautiful from this angle.

Couple of shots of our awesome rooms:

Oh, and I cut open my foot.

The next day, we headed off to Terra Mitica, which you could actually see from out hotel! Once again, no pictures, which I apologise for. If it helps at all, on future trips I intend to take pictures every day, because this summer I really really failed.

We had all been really hyped up for the Intamin Ball Coaster, but sadly they couldn't run it the day we were there. However, Robb and the park had kept in touch during our time in Spain, so we had at least been warned in advance, and they were nice enough to give us ERT on Synkope, their giant Frisbee, instead.

Synkope was actually pretty fun! From a lot of reports, maybe even moreso than the Ball Coaster! We also had ERT on Magnus Colossus (more in a minute) and I believe Tizona... Or perhaps they just walked us over to Tizona before opening. I forget, which is what happens when you get too much ERT on a trip.

Anyway, inbetween all of these little sessions, the park very kindly walked us over to a restaurant where they had drinks and plenty of soda for us, and pastries and other breakfast goodies. On a day where I had grabbed the world's quickest breakfast in the hotel but definitely needed more, and when the heat was particularly brutal, it was just what we needed, so much thanks and kudos to the park for that one!

Tizona was blah, just another SLC, didn't wish for it to be burned to the ground, but didn't ride it again either... Except actually I think I did, I think I rode this one at least twice if not three times, and I can't remember who to blame for convincing me, but I do know I had pink-ear.

Magnus Colossus.... This one kinda did live up (or down) to expectations. The first of two RCCA woodies in two days.... This has to be near the bottom of my list. It didn't cause a huge amount of pain, it was just damn uncomfortable, kinda itchy, and really crap. The restraints vibrated against my stomach so much that they actually unscrewed my navel piercings, and no I'm not kidding. It's just a really ODD ride. I guess "vibrated" wasn't really the right word, it's more that it shunts back and forwards, so you don't even feel like you're moving some of the time. It's really quite amazing.

We rode a bunch of stuff at this park, but the only thing that really stands out in my mind is the Labyrinth of the Minotaur, a Sally shooting dark ride. I should state right off the bat that I can't stand shooting dark rides, unless their theming is really good, in which case generally I'll just sit and not shoot because I find that having to concentrate on targets makes me miss out on the rest of the ride. This one I loved. The animatronics and scenery is really REALLY good, and guns actually work as they should, and it has the awesome multi-ending thing where depending on how well your car performed, you can end up in any one of three or four final scenes. I believe in the worst eventuality you don't even GET a final scene. Our car thought we had done terribly, but then we went through a door and faced the Minotaur, which apparently means you did really really well! That ride was a lot of fun. And a lot of the other rides are well themed too, the rapids etc. Really REALLY lovely park.

Next up, the final day in Spain *sob* with ACTUAL PICTURES!!!!

^Lou - I still think you would have looked fine in a black plastic garbage (rubbish) bag for a gown "walking the bus".

I'm sure if I had thought of it sooner I could have collected enough Euro from others on the trip to buy an appropriate gown from the Chinese store at Port Aventura, but then you would have just left the beautiful gown in Germany, also.

Awwww, that post made me so sad!! I didn't "leave" the hat in Germany!! I lost it!! And I lost my Troy wood and my Zamperla hat!! *sob* And I really did appreciate the gesture so much, I was devastated when I realised I'd lost it, ask Jow!

At least it was a TPR trip, therefore about a dozen people took pictures of me wearing the hat. So I've been able to get photographs even if I don't have the real thing. LOL at the thought of me wearing some kind of Chinese gown all day in the middle of July in Spain.