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Ongoing Photo TR: Rastus goes to Korea and Japan


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After wanting to go to Japan for many years, I finally got sent to Asia for work. I'm in Korea for about 6 weeks doing a safety review. Then I'm off to Japan for a week of vacation. I am planning on hitting many parks while I'm here, the first being Everland on Saturday hopefully.

 

Since this is a work trip, I flew business class on Korean Air. Wow, that was nice. The culture is very old school with the flight attendants all women, and all dolled up in uncomfortable attire. They bowed a lot, and even went around at the end of the flight and bowed to everyone. They had Korean and Western meals, I always chose the beef, which is was decent. They had a bowl of ramen you could get as a snack. I should have tried it, but didn't. Free hooch too, but I didn't drink much.

 

The entertainment system was nice, with about 30 movies on demand, music, TV, and games. I watched Vantage Point and 21. I tried to sleep but the timing was weird, and they served dinner at essentially midnight right when I was getting tired. I did get about 2 hours sleep after dinner on the near lay flat seats. We did go through Russian airspce, so I've been to Russia, which is cool.

 

After landing and checking into the shitty hotel my boss got for us, I walked around a bit and tried to sleep in a stinky room in what the Korean's call air conditioning, which is the equivalent of putting a bowl of ice cubes in the room. After complaining, we got to move to a Japanese style new hotel with good AC.

 

I've wondered around some, and hit a mall so far. I've been too tired to go to Lotte World, but that is coming soon. I'm hitting Everland Saturday hopefully for a full day. They advertise their water park a lot, which seems to even have a Master Blaster. OF course, the park also looks to be packed with Asian babes.

 

The subway was something else too. When you think it's full, that is just the beginning, as it then gets packed. Then more folks get on to the point where you are totally immobile in the collective.

 

I hope the lines at Everland aren't that bad.

 

RO

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There are convenience stores everywhere too. Probably 2 every block. All small, with tons of coffee drinks and these nasty "meat" items.

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At night, these street restaurants pop up everywhere serving fried something and other things I choose not to eat. They are literally every few hundred feet.

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This cat thing is very popular here in Korea. Hopefully this theater will show Batman in English.

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These apartment complexes are everywhere. They don't look great, but still cost serious bucks apparently.

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Food was pretty good, including this beef brouchette.

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The lay almost flat seats were nice, but needed more padding. You did get some free slippers, which seems to be a big deal in Korea.

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The entry desk for the lounge.

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Wow this looks like its gonna be a really interesting TR. What's with the vaccum packed hot dogs? Weird!

 

Korea is not somewhere I would really choose to go as a holiday destination so it'll be nice to see what its like as a holiday as well as a coaster trip!!

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Thanks for the comments. This is going over well, so I have more random pics to come. Park plans have changed. It's raining like mad today, I have a sinus issue, probably from the first crappy hotel's mold, and we have to work today. So, no Everland today. It's probably rain tomorrow too, so I am hoping to feel well enough to do Lotte World, at least the inside stuff. I'll probably subway over and taxi back, since my GPS says it's only 9.9 miles from the hotel.

 

I'm sick of sandwiches, which are very popular here. The streets basically go: Coffee shop, sandwich shop, convenience store, Korean food, repeat. A lot of stuff is below the street and above. I've attached some sign pics. The signs with balls on them are for snooker halls, with maybe one table with pockets.

 

TV is OK. CNN International propaganda, of course, but I do get channels that show US shows with subtitles. And they are uncensored. So, I was watching Rock of Love uncensored. Strange show choice for Korea.

 

I did find a good restaurant that served decent steak. Probably Ponderosa quality at Morton's price. But, it was served almost as soon as I ordered on a hot rock that cooked it, so you chose how much it was cooked. They had a salad bar with a lot of stuff, including green tea yogurt! They also had a baked potato, which really made me happy.

 

Plus, I found a store that sells Guinness in cans. Hooray!

 

RO

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The steak was neat. It came on a mega hot stone with this "safety fence". You had a little bowl of seasonings you could add to taste.

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There was a putt putt course on the roof. It was pretty simple and vacant.

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The mall I went to had a few huge department stores. Each floor was dedicated and seeemed to have many different stores within it. Like this electronics floor. Each counter had about the same stuff, and seemed to have one salesman per customer.

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The subway transfer halls have people selling stuff in the center the whole length of the hall. And these halls are quite warm. I didn't look much, but it seemed you could get some knockoff stuff.

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these downstairs areas are a bit scary. You definitely get looks for being there as an American.

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These signs list what is below and above the street. I'm not sure if the ball colors mean anything, but many are different.

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They set up seating areas at lots of these street places. Some are busy, some empty.

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Lotte World!!!!!

 

Part one

 

Sit down and relax, this is going to be long.

 

This morning, the forecast was rain, all day. I had already decided to skip Everland this weekend, so I thought, hey at least I can ride the indoor rides at Lotte World, so I got up to find Starbucks closed. NO!!! Luckily, the 7-11s sell about 325 different coffee beverages, so I got a Starbucks there, and headed over to the crappy Lexington hotel where I knew there would be cabs. Well, there were tons of busses, plus a lot of traffic probably coming to the huge Christian church across the street. I found a cab dropping off someone, and jumped in. A coworker had written down directions for me to give the driver, but the cabs do offer free translation services if you need it. He put it in his GPS and went off. I also tracked him on my GPS to make sure we were going the right way. His even beeped when he was speeding. It sure didn't beep when he was weaving around everywhere.

 

We get there and I see a big Lotty sign. I get excited and tell him that's where I want to go. He's confused, but finally figures it out "animal". He asks me what kind it is and I say "Raccoon". Right on cue he says, "ahhh, Laccoon". I pay the very reasonable $16 and get out at the hotel. I ask a bellman how to get to the park. He points me to the "New York City Subway". I was a bit confused, so I ended up going back to teh front desk and they tell me to walk around the hotel, and I get to the empty South entrance. I later learn all the main entrances are from subway and underground mall.

 

I buy my ticket and am first in the gate. I head straight to Sinbad, hoping to get a Magic Pass, I couldn't get it to work, and the girl said the ride would open in 10 minutes. So, I bail and try to find Pharoah's Fury. It's up on the 4th floor. I find the escalators and get there easy enough. I again try the Magic Pass for a future reride, and still no luck. I never did get one, the bar code on my ticket was not as long as on everyone else's ticket (story of my life). Luckily, the park was dead this morning.

 

I enter the looong queue that is loaded with museum stuff and then you get into a burial chamber, enter an Iron Maiden, and finally get to the load station. Lotte engineers spent a LOT of time at Disneyland designing this. It's a complete ripoff of Indy, with many things looking EXACTLY the same. The ride motion was great, the effects were very good, although not Disney level. The room that I guess usually has fire did not, and was dark instead until the bill ball comes out and you take a big dive. The treasure room was pretty neat, as was the spider room. I decide for a quick reride since it was still walkon.

 

I decided to hit the French Revolution coaster next, which had about a 10 minute wait. No lockers were needed, as they have bins for your stuff and keep track of them if there are multiple trains going. This coaster was decent and really reminded me of the one at Circus Circus as far as going into rooms and some basic theming. It had some rough transitions, but was unique enough.

 

I decided to go back to Sinbad next, since it seemed to be a major ride. I got my son another Mario DS stylus goshapan, still not Boo, and got on the ride. This ride was excellent! A good story, even with no English, with good scenes, some drops, and obviously some more Disney stealing.

 

Then I headed back to the other side, taking a quick journey into the bug exhibit that had massive beetles, and then into Desparados. This was an unusual ride. You go into a theater with about 25 horses facing a screen. You get on one and hold on and shoot your gun at the screen that has animated sceens in it. It's hosted by this weird stick figure cowboy. There are lots of screts to shoot for. I got a TNT keg during the learning stage and quickly jumped to first place. They showed the top three after that sceen, and it was a bit surreal when I was the only non Korean there and I was kicking ass, and looked silly when I raised my hands in triumph. There was a scene as you went through the desert, and one in a soloon, and a few others. It was very cool, and made it look like maybe Disney is copying Lotte with Toy Story a bit. I was again shown as the winner at the end.

 

I then found the rapids ride. This is, as far as I know, the only totally inside rapids ride in the world. It's themed to the jungle, and was again damn good. An average length with some cool rooms, great dark setting, and nothing to get you soaked. I had the boat to myself.

 

I then went around the arcade area some looking at the weird games. They had a variation on the cork guns, a strange one called "Catch the Mouse" where you had to throw balls at mice moving around in a scene, and a pool game where you had to get balls to stop in divits. They all seemed quite hard. I found some squished penny machines that just squished copper disks, so the result was a nice, very shiny medallian.

 

I really felt a bit strange at this park. Kids would keep coming up to me and going "hello" and waving their hands frantically as they seem to do to Americans. Some seemed VERY interested in where I was from, and wanted to use their English skills.

 

I then headed up to the ballon ride. THis was very unique and cool. YOu get in and float up to the top of the mall for a slow tour. There was even a rope to pull that looked and sounded like turning a burner on in the balloon. I got some great pics, and saw that the log ride was pretty basic, so I never did ride it since I couldn't get a pass and it's line was fairly long.

 

I did see one of the nastiest items ever that you'll see in a pic.

 

It seemed to be fairly light outside, so I headed to Magic Island, the outside section, that I'll cover after some photos.

 

RO

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More awesomeness to come.

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Odd catch the mouse game. It seemed qiute hard. You really had to nail the mouse with the ball to get points.

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Jump rope game. Wow, how exciting.

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The big ball from the balloon ride. Under it is a skating rink and mall.

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Funky coaster shot

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Balloon ride. This ride would never work in the US. I was amazed at how clean the tunnel you went through was. Although many queues were covered in graffiti.

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Ape.

Yeah, the captions are getting lame

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The mushroom room

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The crystal room in the Jungle Adventure

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More Indy ripoffs! You Cheat!

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The river raft ride entrance

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Big ass creepy cartoon bugs

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Big ass beetles

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The Conquistador that the pirate ship is named after

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The monkey band

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These skeletons sounded like very sterotypical arabs. It was pretty funny.

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THe Sinbad ride was pretty misty to take pics. They even filmed a queue movie that the animatrons were based on.

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HERE IT IS!!!! Peanut Buttered Roast Squid. And, um, NO I didn't try it.

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What No fire? Or have I entered a worm hole to Anaheim.

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The very creepy spider room. Good thing I left my wife in the car with my son. She would have flipped here.

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The treasure room

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The first section that you go outside for and can see the rest of Lotte World Adventure.

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No choice of doors on this Indy

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Through the Iron Maiden to the station

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The Pharoah's Fury queue was great

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If you're going back and haven't tried them yet, go for the fried cheese balls that come on top of a soda at one of the stands! Excellent!

 

Also we had good luck at both the Chinese and Mexican style restaurants at the park!

 

Good to see Sinbad back open, it was VERY down last year. Hopefully we can get on it this time!

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Lotte World part 2

 

So, the rain had stopped, and I headed to the outside portion, which is really pretty small. Obviously, the star of this area is Atlantis Adventure. It looms to the right of the castle, another Disney rip-off.

 

I try and get my ticket fixed, in preparation of getting a magic pass, but that still doesn’t work, and no one could help me. Luckily, the magic pass machines were covered anyway. They were also holding the line outside the main queue, making it look longer than it was, thereby keeping it a bit shorter. In line, the girl in front of me is talking like crazy, asking me where I’m from, etc. She was proud of her English skills. She asks me how old I was. I say 39. Her soul crushing response? “Wow, that’s really old, I’m only 13”. When I said I was young at heart, she still said I was old. She talked to me the whole line. Sometimes I didn’t know what she was saying. She said the ride was scary. I said I like scary and gave the thumbs up. Hopefully that wasn’t some sexual gesture like using the “come here” finger is.

 

I stuff my GPS and camera in a cargo pocket on my pants, and leave my vid camera in the bin in the station. I’d never do that in the US. They hassle me about my glasses, but let me go.

 

OK, I knew nothing about this ride really, except seeing some pics of the outside. This ride is f&*#ing awesome!!! I think this is the best launch and start on ANY coaster. It scared the bejeebies out of me. Insane air, insane head and arm choppers, and great theming. The whole ride is awesome, great hills and curves, although the water doesn’t add much. I’m amazed there was no on-ride pics. This is definitely a top tier coaster. A bit short on the number of thrills, but the ones it has are flipping awesome. And I can’t believe all the stuff they got in that building.

 

I then got in line for Ghost House. After seeing the clouds getting worse, I left that line for another Atlantis ride. I didn’t want to get rained out with only one ride. The wait was about 20 minutes.

 

After that I got what was thankfully a normal corn dog and then got in line again for Ghost House. I had read this was a special effects show as you sit at a table with things going on around you. Well, that’s not it now. You go up to a theater to watch a 3-D movie. It was a bit odd, since it was animated from a cats perspective and used a cats eye lense, so that made it weird, plus it was a bit dark, and my second row seat was a bit too close. It was very cool though. Everyone once in a while, you’d see your reflection to remind you you’re a cat. You enter a haunted house, go into a toy room full of total demented toys, including a hilarious bit where a doll is caught on fire by a dragon and tries to put the fire out but only get it’s melted face stretching off on their hand. There were some cool effects, and a ghost dog chasing you. Some spiders showed up, a snake, some skeletons, and a surprise ending when you see your reflection one last time. Very well done, and no dialog. After that, you go through a vertigo tunnel and a few other haunted rooms and that’s it.

 

Next up was the Fantasy Dream only-in-asia dark ride. You basically went through candyland and other really f-ed up scenes on a train. Lots of animatrons, and very well done..

 

Comet Express was down for inspection which really sucked. Although it sounds like this may not really be a coaster anyway. I went though another Disney ripoff, which was a Snow White walkthrough in a castle setting.

 

I decided I needed one more Atlantis ride, and got off right before the rains really picked up, so that was good.

 

I went back inside to see a stage show going that had all sorts of ripoffs. A Goofy ripoff, Droopy Dog, and some others. The inside section crowd had REALLY increased. I walked around taking in the weirdness and bought a few trinkets. The plush of Lotty and Lorry were way too expensive, and didn’t look that great.

 

I checked out the mall for a while and saw Lotte Mart which was basically a Korean Wal-mart. It was packed to the gills. I’d love to have bought a few things, but didn’t want to carry it around. I saw a Sizzler on the bottom floor. Not the greatest place, but as good as I could find. The steak looked a bit odd, but tasted decent with the pepper sauce. I almost ordered a plate that had a steak, lobster tail, and some ribs. Then I noticed it was meant for two people. I could have eaten it all, but felt I didn’t need to perpetuate the fat American standard.

 

I was going to ride some more, but after 5 they have a late entry price, the crowds got even bigger. I never did get on the log ride, but had a really great day at Lotte World. They do a great job at theming, do hold their own with Disney on what I’m sure is a much lower budget. I’d love to see what Pharoah cost in comparison ot Indy. Yeah, it looks cheaper, but it’s a hell of a ride still.

 

I decide to ride the subway back, and get out of the station in what can only be described as the most water that can physically be falling from the sky at any one time. There is a tunnel somewhere for part of the journey, but I don’t know where to get into it. It didn’t really matter, After 10 seconds you were totally soaked.

 

Well, no fun for a few days now. I’m REALLY hoping for a sunny weekend next weekend and a good visit to Everland.

 

 

RO

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The star of the Island, Atlantis Adventure. These statues said lots of ominous sounding gibberish.

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The weenie of Magic Island, a Disney ripoff castle.

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Random subway shot

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After my less than satisfying Sizzler meal, I was wanting more. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I see the grail shaped beacon. And they were hot!!!

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I find these signs strange. As if to say "if you can read this, you don't want to eat here"

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I exited through the main entrance. Here's the whole Lotte World gang.

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Lotty in person.

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Who said I'd see rides with this weird cat thing?

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Fried squid balls. WTF is the deal with squid?

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More weirdness

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I'm goofy candy cane dude, and I'm going to eat you.

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Since this is a fake island, you enter here to go down a long escalator to get on the creepy candy ride.

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This is why you don't wear shirts of another language. It says "I'm a tosser for design united"

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This line wouldn't have been as bad if they would have been filling the theater.

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at about this point, you're going: Oh My God, this ride kicks ass.

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Grafitti is everywhere in the lines, including stuff you wouldn't find in a real Disney park.

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Great pics and report! I absolutely loved Lotte World. And it's good to see someone else agrees that the AquaTrax kicks amazing amounts of ass.

 

Still never figured out why more parks, other than Maverick, haven't installed one!

 

--Robb

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Finally hit Everland today. I'll get pics up tomorrow hopefully, but I'm exhausted tonight.

 

T-Express was down at opening, so I hit Eagle's Fortress first. Man, the location of this thing is unbelievable. Even on a parking lot, it's the best suspended ever. But on a mountain side, it's phenomenal. Definitely top 10, maybe top 5 steel. I always loved BBW, but it's neutered now, and was never this good.

 

T-Express finally started sending trains about 11, just when I got some food. I wolfed it down and headed over to find about a 10 minute wait. I took my favorite first seat, last car. This is my first Intamin plug-n-play, so I have no comparisons. But, the first drop is simply insane. It looks a hell of a lot steeper than the advertised 77 degrees, even from the side. The second hill looks comical, almost like a tophat it's so extreme. You then dive down to a fast s-curve to the midcourse. The second half is failry repetitive bunny, turnaround, bunny, bunny, turnaround, etc. IMHO, this half could be improved. THe hills give too extreme of ejector air, like I've heard other PnPs do. But, you certainly don't get stapled. And the turnarounds are too high, and don't go fast enough. It DEFINITELY got better as the day progressed. My third and final ride in late afternoon was simply insane in the front seat. The section up to the midcourse is probably the best wood coaster track anywhere. Since I'm more of a floater airtime fan, the second half is a bit much, but still great, and smooth. Is it my favorite woodie? I don't know, it's damn close, and it's definitley the best first half. If you like extreme air, I can't see how this wouldn't shoot up to number one immediately.

 

Everland is awesome, but makes BGW look flat. My dogs are barkin.

 

A high point of the day, just as much as the two coasters was the fact that I got to hold a baby tiger, probably about 4-6 weeks old, and he let out a little meow-growl as I was getting my picture taken.

 

Lots of pics to come.

 

RO

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^Too strong of ejector air? Sounds *exactly* like my kind of ride. El Toro's second and third hills look like something out of a cartoon, like you describe on T-Express. Thanks for posting this! I've been wanting to read a review from a non-local.

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I'll post some quick pics of just T-Express. I tried to get some good overview pics, since getting closeups is tough, since it looms over the back portion of the park.

 

You ejector lovers will be in heaven. The second half of the ride is like being on a bucking bronco with short respites on the turnarounds. And they do NOT staple you.

 

RO

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Early morning pic from the big chair lift. There was a guy working on the first drop.

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The sun actually came out. You can see the train roaring towards to the midcourse. I'll do some photoshopping later. These are 7 megapixel pics, so, I'll get some much better closeups with some work.

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Most of the ride. Note how much lower the second hill is from the first. The second drop dives right, does a quick S-turn, and then jumps up to the midcourse, all in view here.

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That's one steep drop

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The drops from a distance

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The bucking bronco section

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Since we’ve been working 6 days a week, I was really hoping for good weather on Sunday. As it approached, the forecast kept improving to where it was saying simply overcast. Excellent!

 

I got up quite early, and did a similar plan from last weekend. A coworker wrote down in Korean so I could taxi from Yeoido to the Gangnam subway station, exit 6. That is where there was to be a bus to Everland. My taxi driver was a lot more aggressive than last Sunday. We took a different route, which concerned me a bit when we crossed the river. But that was so he could get to a freeway and haul ass. We were doing 120-130 in an 80 km/hr zone. His GPS was not alarming him either, I guess it had just given up.

 

Once we got back across the river, we were hauling through the city streets, where I’d assume the limit was 40 or 50, and we were doing 100. We got there quite fast, and the fare was only 10,000 Won, as opposed to 16,000 last weekend for destinations quite close to one another. I thanked him, and got out. Luckily, the bus sign was right there and showed I needed to walk a few blocks to the 5002 bus stop. It was further than I thought, and I got a bit nervous, but finally saw it and ran to it, only to find out it wasn’t leaving for 5 minutes or so, but I sure didn’t want to miss one. It was a bargain of 1800 Won to go the 35 minute drive to Everland. The bus almost filled up, and we were off.

 

We drove by tons of the apartment buildings that litter Seoul. They basically make up cities in a very small footprint of about a square mile. It started sprinkling. You only see glimpses of the park as you circle around the resort before entering. The entrance plaza for Everland and Caribbean Bay water park are at a plateau near the top of a hill. I walked from the bus stop to find a very nice entry plaza and thankfully very short ticket lines. I got my very cheap ticket for 33,000 Won and got in a short line and finished my second cold Starbucsk drink I brought. I saw nothing but Koreans, and luckily they were for the most part heading off to the right to the water park, which is heavily advertised on TV here, and looks to be pretty impressive.

 

As 9 am approached, the ticket takers came out and did a halfhearted dance and they opened up. They took your ticket, but also gave you a wristband if you had a ride ticket. You can enter Everland for the grounds only. The entry plaza is themed to Arabia, and looked a bit tacky, but still very nice and clean. The map was not to scale very well, but T-Express is as far from the entrance as it can be. So, I came up to a chair lift and hopped on. The lift was sloooooooow. But, I could see that the park is quite well landscaped. The back section of the park is a good 200 feet below the front section, if not more. T-Express then is on another hill that goes up in the back of the park that has some sled hills on it for the winter. It is probably 50 feet above the ground level.

I walked through some animal areas with pretty small cages, and got to the Alpine Village to find a girl in front of the ride giving me an arms crossed X, meaning it was closed. It was to open at 10:30. OK, well, now what. Eagle’s Fortress was next on my agenda, and of course it was waaaaaay back up at the top of the park, so I got on another, larger chairlift to get most of the way back up.

 

I got to the station to find a line barely out the station, and they only let folks in for one train, so it was 2 trains, with only one running. I got in line for the front seat, and the guy behind me offered to take my pic in the seat, which was very nice. I first thought he asked if I was going to take pics while riding. I’ve always loved suspendeds. I was heartbroken when I simply stood in front of the Bat in the 80s. I was shocked to see an article on the bulletin board in the computer room of my high school in 85 about Big Bad Wolf. I was shocked to learn another one was successfully built, and I begged my parents to hit BGW on our trip to NYC for the Statue of Liberty celebration in 1986. I vividly remember riding it with dad, and being ecstatic about finally being on a suspended. BBW has been neutered over the years, but is still great. Top Gun and Vortex are very good, and I always enjoyed riding them. Eagle’s Fortress is on a whole other level.

 

First up, it’s a perfect terrain coaster. It stays about 10 feet off the ground the whole time. You go up to the top, do a turn around, and dive through the trees. Over the years, the ride has carved out a nice tunnel in the trees. You get back to about the station, and make a large loop to the right, and back over and by the station. You then go off on a zig zag out and back similar to Top Gun, but a heck of a lot faster. The last few turns were very violent from the speed. If it gets a lot faster during the day, it could get painful. This ride is awesome. Without a doubt the best suspended ever, and definitely one of the funnest coasters anywhere. It’s like the bottom of BBW’s second drop for the whole ride.

 

Is it the third best steel coaster on the planet? I don’t know. You could ride it all day long, and it’d never get old. My fave is MilF, with Dragster right behind. The Supermans are good too, but SFNE’s is too brutal on the thighs for marathoning. I’m surprised at its ranking last year. I’m a major league suspended lover, and it’s somewhere 3-5 on my list. I’m amazed that folks wanting aggressive coasters would rank it that high. Suspended coasters, by design, can’t offer much in lateral or negative g’s. Since I’m “very old” in the word’s of the one Korean girl at Lotte World, I really like that EF doesn’t bash you around. I’ve always loved coasters for speed, and flying through the trees, hanging under a near invisible track is kick ass.

 

I took a quick reride in the back for an even wilder ride, but front is where it’s at overall. I’d love to have ridden it later in the day, but I was exhausted, and the line was about 30 minutes.

 

I decided to head back down to check on T-Express. I could see a worker on the first drop, so I knew it was still not open. I saw the Mystery Mansion right under the chairlift, so headed on in. This is a shooting dark ride with a strange car with four seats facing outward, and the car doesn’t spin. You got a laser sight flash for each shot for aiming. Most of the targets worked, and many triggered animation. A pretty good ride, really, and scarier than Sally ones. They had a score billboard at the exit. I quickly rerode and filmed the ride.

 

Next, I saw they had a 4D film in the Space World building named Zootopia. OK, sorta weird. I think Zootopia is a cartoon that is even in the US, but I’m not positive. It stars a bunch of uber-cute little animals and the villains are big evil wolves. The preshow room was filled with banners and pictures, but the preload room just has TV screens showing the cute animals getting some magic items to use against the wolves.

 

The show room is stark, with I believe 4 motion bases, but I don’t recall the seats moving really, but maybe they did just a bit, each with 3 long rows of chairs, somewhat similar to Jimmy Neutron. You wear standard polarized glasses, and the screen is pretty large. There are only 2 4-D effects, water of course, and very overused fans. It’s like a damn tornado in there. There seemed to be some smell misters firing, but I didn’t smell anything. The film was pretty good, for being in gibberish, and was good animation. Good fun for the kiddies. I was amazed you weren’t dumped out into a store full of Zootopia stuffed animals.

 

I went back to T-Express, with a new estimate of noon for an opening, and clouds rolling in. I was having sinking hopes of riding. I decided to go check out the log flume, which was about a third of the way up the damn hill. The queue was full and advertised 30 minutes, so I bailed and went back down to get some food. Couldn’t find much variety. Every place had burgers, fried chicken, and popcorn chicken, which I got. I waited for it to be fresh made and saw an empty train fly down the tracks of T-Express. I damn near left without my food, but it showed up soon. It was dark meat popcorn chicken, but still OK, but a bit fatty. I wolfed it down while I saw another train go by.

 

I ran towards the station to see a train full of people going up the lift. They were already holding the line outside the queue house. I got a locker real quick for 1000 Won with unlimited time (now that’s a bargain), and got in line. It ended up being about 10-15 minutes for the wait. I got my favorite first row of the last car, and we were off for my first Intamin Plug-n-play coaster.

 

You get to the top, make a 180 and dive down the impossibly steep first drop. And let me tell you, that drop is awesome in the back. Serious pull over, and big air. The second hill is damn near a top hot with more insane air. Then you make a curving right drop down to a fast S-turn and curve up to the very early midcourse. This first section is flat out awesome, but quick. I can’t compare it to El Toro though.

 

After that, the ride is a bunny hop, 180, 2 bunnies, 180, 3 bunnies, 180, and then the final run of bunnies. A bit repetitive, and each hill felt the same, and the turns were slow. This ride would be killer if they used the fact that this section was way over the ground and threw in another big drop and high speed turn on the ground. The air on these hills was quite extreme, but not painful. And thankfully they don’t staple you.

 

It’s a damn good ride, but could be so much better. A park with the masterpiece terrain coaster adding a coaster basically on stilts is a bit of a head scratcher. It’s damn good, and smooth as silk, but I’m not sure it’s my #1. Of course, my #1 Shivering Timbers probably wouldn’t be if I ever rode it again. I just love the newer GCIs with a great mix of smooth curves, great bunny hops, and loads of fun. And of course, I’m NOT a Voyage worshipper. I do think T-Express is better than Voyage, for what it’s worth.

 

The section up to the midcourse is brilliant, the rest could have been so much better.

 

I did go for another ride, again in the back seat. It had already sped up considerably, and the turns were faster, but still tame. After that I was hungry and a bit woozy. I got a Steff hotdog which are everywhere here. It was damn good. I then headed over to the animal section. I saw the raft ride, so got in line.

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first two drops

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Good overview of the ride.

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more T-Express

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First drop, damn it's steep.

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Gardens area

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Cast of Zootopia 4-D movie

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Station and some ending stunts

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Mystery Mansion shoot-em-up ride

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Eagle's Fortress station. You can't see much of the ride anywhere.

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The main entry plaza in the park.

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T-Express from the chair lift

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Entry plaza. You could not see much of the park at all.

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If you're on a bus at Gangnam station, and see this to the right, congratulations, you're going to Everland!

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You kind of have to go on ET and Balder to really get a full kick out of T Express I think. If you look at a Balder pov to me it does not look that amazing but from what I have hear the ejector air makes up for it. I live in wooden roller coaster hell aka California and have never been on a TPR trip so my number 1 is Ghostrider ( I know, it is pretty sad) so hopefully SFMM's GCI will change my mind when it opens next year. I am assuming that you are like me and prefer a twister to an out and back. THat is why I never really liked Colosus.

 

Anyway sorry to get off topic. You have some great photos. I also agree with you that according to your photos it is kind of funny that T Express pretty much dwarfs the rest of the park. One day I really hope to get a plug n play credit. Have fun for the rest of your trip and keep posting.

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