I have already commented several times that I genuinely like the social aspect of these trips more than the actual rides. A big part of that is just hanging out, usually in drinking establishments, and usually until the whee hours if the morning. After returning from Mirabilandia on Tuesday night, we ended up getting together in the hotel bar; and when I say "we", I actually mean that more than half the trip was there. It really was a fun time, and I got to finally try some Grappa (I mean, when in Rome
).
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Neither Derek or I had tried Grappa, and we were both anxious to do so before leaving Italy. We'd both heard the horror stories about how it tastes and how strong it is, so we were eager to see if it could actually live up to it's reputation. Well no, it didn't. At least as far as I was concerned ... Maybe I simply have no taste, but I thought it tasted like a mix of tequila and sake and honestly enjoyed it. I also didn't find it particularly strong, certainly not 50% alcohol; I had already enjoyed a Lemoncello (spelling??), and even went on to have several glasses of beer. Derek didn't agree with me though, and really didn't like it ...
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- Later that evening Dave showed off some of his mad juggling skillz.
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But enough shameless alcohol consumption (until Germany at least), and let's go to Movieland Studios!
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This is an odd odd park .. Like very odd. They are currently building a new coaster, and it was supposed to be open for us, but I guess there were delays in construction. No big deal though, because I honestly did not think about roller coasters at all today. Movieland Studios is nuts, totally out of control; and I know I say that a lot, but I was genuinely terrified on two of their rides - it was totally great! As the name suggests, the rides in this park are all themed around movies, and film making etc. A question remains as to whether these are official licenses, but really who cares?? We had so much fun here, I could have easily filled a whole other day - and we didn't even venture into the watermark, which I hear is similarly insane.
It was a hot day, like seriously hot, so right from the start we made heavy use of the misters. Thankfully a lot of the rides also include water .. Ranging from a light mist, to almost drowning. Lou, Renee and Divv are cooling off.
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The park started weirding us out almost immediately with this strange "parade". The stage is built using construction scaffolding on top of a really dodgy looking pickup truck. It was like the Pide Piper, with a trail of kids running behind, screaming out in Italian. It was a bit surreal, but just such a thing will seem perfectly normal by the end of the day.
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The park typically opens up in sections, and one of our perks for the day was being let into one section about half an hour early. One ride in this section was a simulator themed to ... the "Police Academy" movies. The pre-show movie had such amazing production values that it could have been shot by high-school kids for YouTube. It was just unbelievable (in a good way). But the ride itself...! We were all in these little motion cabinets, watching a projected video. It's odd because the story of the ride is such that we were new cadets being trained, but for some reason this training begins in the middle of a car-chase. Production values of this movie were slightly better than the pre-show, and there was even a 4D element (we were sprayed with water). However the truly bizarre thing is that halfway through the movie suddenly stops, and we see some of the characters showing different clips, playing music, and other hi-jinks. You can't believe what it's like to be in a motion simulator that is dancing to the "chicken dance". Then after a few minutes we're back to "training". It was all quite odd, very fun, and just the tip of the iceberg. Next up we hit the log flume, which is in the "stone age" section of the park. Now there wasn't a single mention of the Flintstones, but it was very obviously inspired by it. It was a great flume ride, and despite the small drops we got significantly wet. (Remember, it was *hot*!)
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One of my all-time favorite rides is the Tower Of Terror (a Disney masterpiece):
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Well fortunately for me, Movieland Studios has their own version! This is actually nothing like the Disney version ... Well it is a free-fall ride. Ok so like the Disney version, this is a free-fall ride ... And I guess the logo is very similar too. Ok so like the Disney version, this has the same logo, and is also a free-fall ride ... But this is themed to Twilight Zone and uses the theme tune. Ok so this is nothing like Disney version except that it is also themed to the Twilight Zone, uses the same theme music, has the same logo and is also a free-fall ride
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In all seriousness, this version is special in that it's a first generation free-fall ride - and these are getting harder and harder to find. I had never ridden one, but have heard some horror stories that they can be really painful. I like to give rides at least a chance, and since these are becoming so rare (they used to be everywhere), I took the risk and tried it out. It was awesome! Really a great drop, and not even slightly painful (others said that it was running really really well, so I'm fortunate for that). Very different from the second generation drop towers (typically known as "Giant Drop" rides). Really glad I got to ride it..
Like any good park themed around movies and Hollywood, there is of course the "Studio Tour" attraction. At other parks this is typically a calm tram ride through movie sets, and back-stage areas. Informative? Absolutely! Fun? I guess. Terrifying to the point of needing a stiff drink? No. Well not unless you're at Movieland Studios! Passengers are driven through the backlot on these giant trucks - I guess that should have been my first clue. Second clue should have been all the signs warning about getting wet - although you can get wet from Jaws at Universal Studios in LA, so what's the big deal right?
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Now before meeting up with TPR I spent some time in Rome, and took part in an insanity taxi ride where the driver was racing through the streets while thumbing through the street directory. Picture that same guy driving a giant truck full of park guests .. Except over collapsing bridges, through flaming lakes, and exploding rooms. There were two truly white-knuckle sections ... The first was when going down a steep, narrow, twisting road, the driver put the pedal to the floor and we must have hit 50MPH- with tree branches hitting the truck (and people on the sides ducking for cover). The second moment was climbing up a similarly steep hill, out of a significantly deep pool of water and fire. Half way up the driver just throws the truck into neutral and we roll backwards (completely out of control) back into the water. Madness, I tell you! All of us needed a rest after that, so we grabbed some lunch. While the previous two parks had amazing food, Movieland Studios absolutely did not. No more really needs to be said, other that it made me just a shade homesick for my local parks.
Moving on to another insanity "never in America" ride, we come to U571. This is another simulator, but calling it that really doesn't do it justice. The rules claimed (again) that we'd get wet, and kids under 14 were not even allowed to ride. A group of about 40 we are led into the first room, which is a grated walkway around some water, and the submarine on the far side. As we wait there, some planes and helicopters approach and start shooting/bombing us. Not real planes of course (just sound effects), but each "bomb" caused a large geyser of water, and the "bullets" from the machine guns caused long lines of small geysers to fire. In the middle of all this we are commanded to start running (along the wet and slippery grated walkways), while the sound and water insanity is literally exploding all around us. The pathway leads to a metal (wet!) ladder into the submarine, and we all take our seats. This was a very well done set; it was extremely cramped in there, and felt a lot like what you'd imagine a sub to be like (complete with red alert lights, etc), it was cool. The seats didn't have backs, they didn't even have proper bases, we were just sitting on a large pipe that ran the length of the room.
We sat through a short schpiel in Italian, which was fortunately translated for us: "prepare for your shower". Lovely! Actually I was expecting that we'd get pretty wet, but what I wasn't expecting was that the whole sub was itself a motion cabinet. You can feel it raise up, and start tilting heavily to one side ... Now please remember that we're just sitting on some piping, with no setback, no restraints, and no windows. Then the water started, which was basically like being inside a dish washer. So the whole room is tilting heavily side to side (length-wise), and rolling slightly side-side, you're hanging on to stop from sliding off the "seat", there's water spraying everywhere, and lots of noise, and then they kill the lights so that it's pitch black too. The whole thing lasted several minutes, and I admit it was borderline traumatic!
Lou, Larry and I actually ended up not getting terribly wet, but Divv and Renee were soaked.
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Finally we ended the day at this utterly madhouse of a park with a relaxing ride on the "Back To The Backstage" monorail. Yes, this is a scenic monorail themed to "Back To The Future". We enjoyed clips from the movies while in line, and a great view of the cool looking new coaster (still under construction):
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Renee and Divv on the monorail. It was Divv's birthday today (yay!), but unfortunately he's heading back to to the UK tonight (boo).
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All in all this was a fabulous park, and I'm so sad that it's not closer. You'd never see anything even remotely like this in the US, and it's yet other reason why I love the Theme Park Review trips so much.
As I type this we are driving through Switzerland on our way to Germany .. Europa park, Olympia Looping and other amazing attractions. So to recap: I woke up this morning in Italy, had the poo-poo scared out of me at Movieland Studios, and am now posting a report from a bus driving through Switzerland on the way to Germany. And this was just the third day of the trip!
Up next: Europa Park!
