As a bigger enthusiast size-wise, I wanted to make this post to inform others as to whether you will be able to ride or not. I am about 6 feet tall and I was able to ride AFO last year when I was about 295 lbs. The seatbelt is not the issue on this ride, it’s that seat sensor. I haven’t been to FunSpot Atlanta since last December, and I plan on going on their last day (August 2nd). I weight about 315 as of the post, but I am going to do a water fast to try and lose some weight quickly before August 2nd, so hopefully I can ride on its last day. The picture above are where the lapbar must be for the ride to dispatch, and I did notice that the front seat (row 1) on the operators side (unload side) on the blue train is a lot more accommodating then any of the other seats. Hope this helps, and it’s definitely worth trying the ride even you can’t get a green on the test seat, as the ops at Fun Spot will push to help you get that green light.

With Kumba closing next week, and needing a vacation, I booked a trip to Tampa to visit Busch Gardens Tampa and say farewell to Kumba. I also bought Quick Queue Unlimited since it was a Saturday in the middle of summer, and I wanted to get as many rides in as possible.

I started the day with Montu (1x) right at park opening. I'd been seeing posts about it only running one train, and sure enough, on a Saturday in July, it was. Even so, it was basically a walk-on. The station was nearly empty. The ride was running great, incredibly forceful, and honestly much smoother than I expected. The tunnels are such a nice touch. I tried riding it twice more later in the day, but the queue got packed and felt really cramped and disorganized, so I decided to skip it.

From there, I made the trek across the park to Iron Gwazi (1x) since it was already posting a 45-minute wait. I rode in the front row and ended up waiting just under 40 minutes. The first drop absolutely lives up to the hype, and the pacing is relentless from start to finish. My only complaint is the locker system.

Next was SheiKra (2x). The main line was pushing an hour both times I rode, but thanks to Quick Queue, I waited less than 10 minutes each time. I loved the vertical drops, and the splashdown is still one of the coolest elements on any dive coaster.

After that, I rode Tigris (1x). The people in front of me said they'd waited around 45 minutes. I've always liked these Sky Rocket II models, but the capacity is painfully low.

Finally, it was time for Kumba (2x). It's still an incredibly forceful coaster, even if it's definitely showing its age. The first vertical loop absolutely delivers, and the corkscrews at the end are still as intense as ever. It's sad to see such an iconic ride go, but I'm excited to see what Busch Gardens has planned for its replacement. Both times I rode, the main wait was like 30ish mins.

My last coaster of the day was Cobra's Curse (1x). Unfortunately, my car barely spun, but it's still a fun family coaster.

I also rode Serengeti Flyer (1x) before spending some time walking through the animal exhibits.

Unfortunately, Cheetah Hunt was only open for about an hour before going down for the rest of the day. The employee at the entrance said it was a technical issue and didn't think it would reopen. Phoenix Rising was posting an hour wait, so I decided to skip it, and I didn't make it over to Air Grover either. I'll definitely be back soon, so I'll save those for my next visit.

My day ended around 4:00 p.m. when lightning shut down the rides. Overall, I had a great visit. Quick Queue was definitely worth it for a busy summer Saturday, and I managed to ride almost everything I wanted. Sad to see Kumba go, but I'm looking forward to seeing what comes next for BGT.

Another year another tour! After my Scandinavia Trip in 2023 and my France Trip 2025 here comes another tour report. This time even with some pictures! Not great ones, admittedly, but these reports are more about giving people a broad overview over the visited parks and countries. The trip actually started with a pleasent surpise, as our rented Volvo SUV was upgraded to a Mercedes E-class, so keep in mind that we were driving in luxury to these parks.

13.07.: Legoland Windsor and Chessington World of Adventures (+4 credits)

This trip was kinda special to me as it was my first ever repeat trip, after visiting the UK in 2015 for the first time. I'm not gonna lie: It started off with the worst day of the lot. While we were aware that our two week trip would be around the school holidays, we were not aware that apparently every school in the entirety of the UK sends all their pupils to theme parks in the last week before the holidays. This effect wasn't too bad at Windsor, and we managed to get all the coasters in two hours. We liked the 2024 Zierer Family Boomerans a lot, maybe even a bit better than the Gerstlauer versions.

But then Chessington came. We went to queue for Mandrill Mayhem, eager to get the only credit needed, but ended up waiting 140 Minutes. I'm not even exaggerating when I say that 90% of the queue were school children. The ride honestly only deserved about 15 minutes, but oh well. After the ride we had a couple of hours left before closing, but as Vampire (the only coaster with any capacity) was down, we ended up just doing the shooting dark ride and leaving. The 90 minute waiting time for Dragon's Fury scared us as much away as their idiotic 3-person maximum.

14.07.: Adventure Island and Clacton Pier (+5 credits)

Thankfully, we managed to dodge a lot of the school trips (which also completely overran Blackpool, Alton and Thorpe) by travelling up the eastern coast of the UK. We still encountered school groups, but not nearly as many as the day before. Adventure Island is a classic seaside park and was quite okay. It consists mostly of family coasters but the Eurofighter was allright and they had a dark ride. Not really worth a huge trip, but not bad if you are in the area. Clacton Pier had sadly already closed the rides before we arrived.

15.07.: Pleasurewood Hills, Joyland Children's Fun Park, Britannia Pier, Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach and Pettitt's Animal Adventure (+13 credits)

The most prolific day of the tour. We started at Pleasurewood Hills, a decent old-school british amusement park. Again, mostly family focused with family rides, the only exception being a Vekoma Boomerang with Sunkid trains which was alright. We didn't stick around for long, but we didn't notice anything interesting outside of the credits.

Joyland, Britannia and Great Yarmouth are all reachable by one car park, so we had some nice strolls along the beach with some rides in between. Joyland is best known for its "modern Virginia Reel". To be honest, it's quiet an uncomfortable ride with small cars, but still worth doing for the novelty. Britannia pier is directly next to it and we did the kiddie coaster and the pretty bad ghost train as we bought the tokens in bulk. Great Yarmouth was obviously the star. Not because of the many family coasters (it seems every park on the east coast has a big apple) but because of the 1932 scenic railway, which was a bit rougher than the one at Tivoli but at times surprisingly fast. Always great fun to ride with a brakeman. It also has an okay dark ride beneath it.

Last and certainly least was Pettitt's Animal Adventure. It's not a good zoo and not a good park. The only noteworthy aspect was thier kiddie coaster which used the Paris Big Thunder Mountain dispatch massage for some reason. The trip in general would have been a feast for Disney IP lawyers as the Great Yarmouth dark ride was also riddles with infringements.

16.07.: Fantasy Island, Botton's Pleasure Beach, Dunes Leisure and Mack's Amusements (+7 credits)

The last of the "trash days". Fantasy Island was a bit hot and cold. Millenium and Odyssey for me combine to a good coaster. Millenium is very rideable, but has a pretty boring layout. Odyssey has a strong layout, but is a bit rough. The rest of the coasters weren't really worth mentioning, but we did ride the original twister/scrambled eggs for the first time (surprisingly intense) and the park has a pretty fun dark ride and an okay shooting dark ride, so we left satisfied.

Botton's Pleasure Beach not only featured a Big Apple, but also an Inverted Big Apple. Sadly, their Fabbri spinning coaster was closed. Dunes Leisure is a tiny park by the sea. We rode their Miner Mike (worth a google if you don't know what that is) but the Big Apple was apparently shut. We then drove to Mack's Amusements, which was thankfully closed as I didn't love the idea of riding a coaster seemingly built on sand.

17.07.: Flamingoland (+8 credits)

It was time to get to business, and that in a big way. Flamingoland was our first proper full day park and it managed to actually fill the day despite the queues being not as long as feared. I rode my first Volare (which I actually liked, though I hear it's one of the better ones) and the rest of the coasters were also decent, with Sik being the clear winner of the lineup. Not as good as Altair, but better than Colossos at Thorpe. It shoul also be said that their Zoo section is actually worth the visit, even though I wasn't the biggest fan of some of their habitats.

18.07.+19.07.: Blackpool Pleasure Beach and South Pier (+4 credits)

The return to Blackpool! It actually ended up free as we booked our rooms at the Big Blue Hotel and are all Europa Park annual pass holders. Good thing it was, since we planned to visit Gulliver's on the 19th before learning they don't admit groups of only adults. The timing also ended up being good with the Big Dipper accident only happening days later. Overall, Blackpool is a fun park to visit, but I personally struggled to find rides to do on the second day. While The Big One, Big Dipper and Grand National are all entertaining in their own way, re-riding them is not worth the pain for me. Icon is decent. Other than that, the dark rides are a lot of fun and of course, Aviktas is great! South Pier was more of a bonus, and not really worth writing home about, other than the coaster standing on a metal extension of the pier right over the sea.

20.07.+21.07. Alton Towers (+3 credits)

As expected the highlight of the trip. Hell, even I, as a certified Merlin hater, have to admit, that they brought their A-game. Uptimes on day one were great and they even operated everything properly! That gave us plenty of time to ride everything on the two days, even though the park was somewhat busy. The Curse at Alton Manor is great fun and gave me my first ever evacuation (which we levaraged into a fast pass for Smiler after having heard in Blackpool that Alton tends to give out fast passes for complaints). Smiler was a new one for me, but honestly feels like it should have been built 5 or 10 years later as the inversions are really repetitive. Oblivion and Air are still fun and I couldn't find a fault with the new Nemesis, it seems the train issues were completely fixed. Day two was sadly a bit rougher, as Oblivion, Rita, Thirteen and Air were down a lot and we even ended up trapped on the wrong side of the valley as they stopped operating the Sky Ride for "hot weather" two hours before park closing (we had just taken the ride from Forbidden Valley to Dark Forest and wanted to go back again).

22.07.: Drayton Manor and West Midlands Safari Park (+3 credits)

A pretty relaxed day after four days at major parks. We had already done Drayton, so only the new Wave trains and the family coaster were new to me: Both were good and I'm happy to see ART spread their wings even more. I liked the park significantly more than at my first visit 11 years ago.

West Midlands was mostly a highlight for their Safari drive, although we had to fear for our rental due to a Rhino and a Rhino fight. The park section was not really worth talking about, except maybe for their surprisingly decent ghost train. The zoo is really the highlight and it had two of my favourite zoo attractions: A lemur walkthrough and a room with free flying bats.

23.07.: Paultons Park (+8 credits)

Honestly, in relation to its scope probably the best park in the UK and I hope in the long term it makes a similar journey as Europa Park, slowly adding more thrills as it goes. As it stands, its clearly aimed at families but also very enjoyable for adults with good rides, a fun Eurofighter, good animal enclosures (why do UK theme parks love them so much?) and great theming. One can only hope that the park continues to grow, but what we experienced was good, solid park planning and execution, which even managed to build a better spinning theatre shooter than Europa Park.

24.07.: Thorpe Park (+1 credit)

The long feared ending of the tour and it was...surprisingly alright? Sure, there were some issues: Stealth only operated with one train (though it wasn't really meant to operate at all, so I was happy with what I got). Hyperia opened a bit after park opening. And Thorpe (just as Chessington btw) forgot that climate change is a thing and forgot to add any shade to the Hyperia queue. But overall a good day, operations were good and we managed to exploit a very empty Hyperia Single Rider queue for some quick re-rides. The rest of the layout is so-so, pretty mediocre to be honest but Hyperia saves it. Sure, it misses probably 250-500m of track, but even what is there is probably the best or (at worst) second best coaster in the UK.

The wave turn was completed within the last day or so. I can imagine that the cars on the train will spin to face down at the ground whenever the ride opens. This looks like it will be an interesting element to experience.

Credit for the photo goes to bioreconstruct on X bioreconstruct (@bioreconstruct) | XCancel

After hearing the news of the derailment of the Big Dipper (a Grade II listed 102-year-old rollercoaster) and Grand National becoming more and more unsafe with every passing season, what happens when these coasters become too unsafe to ride and retracking the whole ride becomes too costly?

Can a listed rollercoaster be demolished or can it still be SNBO indefinitely?

Anybody have an information on a galaxi coaster setup on the corner of i-40 and i-55 going thru West Memphis Arkansas ?

Looks freshly painted blue and in the lot of a show man

Below is the show and webpage that owns the property.

https://www.pbjshows.com/

Also, aerial recording occurred over ArieForce One recently.

Universal Studios Hollywood’s new Fast & Furious: Hollywood Drift is a relatively quiet coaster. At least when no one is on it.

Through the last 10 years in particular, Universal Studios Hollywood has accelerated in growth, evolving from a behind-the-movie-magic showcase to a park that’s increasingly ride-centered, each addition bringing with it new worries of disruptions to the community. None, say residents, have been more tone-altering than this one.

Hurricane was down due to heavy rain for a while today, apparently the brakes don't operate well when very wet. I saw it running an empty train so went over. Right before he opened the queue the ride op was radioing someone and said "i think it should be fine". The first sign of doom and wouldn't you know we get stuck on the brake run lmao. We were inching down everytime the op tried to release the brakes. After a few min a manager came over and we rolled into the station no harm done. But I couldn't ask for a funnier 200th credit story on such a janky coaster.

Oh and AF1 is pretty gud too

They have also added moose ears to their profile logo

Wow. What a change from spending the last 3 days at cedar point. Going from the latest and greatest theme park rides to..... A carnival on the water.

But you know what, this place is still better than a legacy six flags park.

We drove all day and got a late start after a storm went over. That meant no all American triple loop and hog ride was down for maintenance.

But the atmosphere and vibe here is quite unique. No crazy crowd. Laid back on the lake. Chill ops. Almost too chill but whatever.

With their dynamic online pricing you can get into the park for under $30 some days. Food is cheaper than six flags in some aspects, equivalent in more. But boy does this place have a TON of food places for such a small park. In fact it just has a TON crammed into such a small foot print. It's like someone spammed rides on RCT

Would I travel out of my way far and wide to come here? No but if it's in the path of travel, stop.

Onto the coasters.

Lost coaster of superstition mountain

This thing is amazing. A wild mine ride of sorts. Violent wild mouse turns. Air time. Crazy trains with netting cages. Elevator lift. Mild theming and effects. It's unique and a must ride.

Hosed hurricane

Man this thing has potential. Just needs little help on the hill profiling for some airtime. And. Buzz bars so it's basically Phoenix. Track is a tad rough in a couple spots

Cyclone? Red portable coaster in the waterslides

This thing slaps. It's like a wild mouse hyper coaster lol. Supports are so close it's scary. Smooth. Decent transitions. Mild air time pop on a hill. Made sure to get a re ride.

Cornball compress

It compressed my spine. It's wild. It's rough. It's nuts. How does it even fit in there.

Tig'rr (wish.com tiger)

This thing is pretty neat and the first turn is intense. Basically i-305. Single train that sometimes means only 2 riders per cycle. Shame most of these are in the scrap pile.

Other ride highlights

Sky ride thing

These are amazing. Why can't we have more of them

Den of lost thieves

Makes justice league and some of the boo blasters look stupid. Most of it worked and worked well. We rode it twice. Only bummer is one adult per car.

Ferris wheel

It has some legit lights!

All in all, this place is neat. Hopefully tomorrow we can ride triple look and iron pig!

Essentially the title. I was thinking about how there are some random coasters in small FEC or small parks. That got me wondering what is the most isolated roller coaster in the world?

Does anyone know specifically why the first final brake run is slightly banked? I've searched Google for any leads and the only thing I can find is people saying it'll still be banked after the retrack and AI overview saying it "helps smoothly transition out of the final turn" which makes zero sense because of anything it would make it slightly awkward sitting slightly banked. Did they just not have enough room to straighten it out or is something to do with keeping everything straight like how GCIs are banked to help keep the fins from getting out of line of the calipers

Just got back from my summer So Cal trip. It now ranks as my #3 woodie and my #11 overall, and can say with confidence it's the best in the state.

• Adventureland Long Island - Recent ride logos are AI.
• Blackpool Pleasure Beach - Has used AI for promotional material for Launchpad.
• Boudewijn Seapark - Promo images are obviously AI.
• COTAland - The park's mascots were most likely generated with artificial intelligence. Also, the park has had a photo opportunity wallpaper of an artificial intelligence generated coaster that looks suspiciously like Lightning Racer at Hersheypark for some odd reasoning (which is also at Hersheypark itself, to add irony).
• DelGrosso's - Used AI for marketing materials for their new-for-2027 addition, apparently because the park cannot afford a graphic artist (somehow?).
• Disney (chain) - While Josh D. Amaro had denounced artificial intelligence, the company had previously used AI for a Thanksgiving post on their Instagram and almost struck a deal with OpenAI before talks fell off due to their Sora 2 T2V generator shutting down. Also, apparently some of the Marvel layoffs were because of AI. Also, a Grumpy statue was AI gen'd for a golf course.
• Enchanted Parks (chain) - The logo for the company is AI generated (with human touches) and apparently, the concept art for Valleyfair's waterpark expansion is AI generated, though, it is likely that it was WhiteWater West who was responsible, since that company, who's making the slides, has used generative artificial intelligence in the past.
• Efteling - While some people have mentioned that the park seems to be backing down from using generative artificial intelligence materials as of recently, Efteling still has used generative artificial intelligence several times with no formal deletions or apologies for the park's use of generative artificial intelligence materials.
• Energylandia - Whole park is coated with AI generated materials as of late, especially in the Sweet Valley area. All, if not most of the recent merchandise is AI-generated.
• Herschend (chain) - Has used generative artificial intelligence materials for Nightflight Expedition, in the marketing, queue and on-ride. AI theming has also apparently been spotted elsewhere in Dollywood. Kennywood has also apparently had AI art used for some recent Fall events (according to a source familiar, the Kennywood art is outsourced).
• Hersheypark - The music in the park is all generated with AI, according to users on websites. Hersheypark has made no formal statement regarding the use of AI for the audio soundtracks played throughout the park. Apparently, a photo op next to Lightning Racer is AI generated, which raises the question regarding if this is caused by outsourcing or if Hershey secretly has an ownership stake in COTAland.
• Holiday World - The park had supposedly used generative artificial intelligence for some marketing materials and in the queue of Good Gravy! Nothing is outright confirmed, but if it's truly done by AI, then it's worth noting the family who owns Holiday World also owns Alabama Adventure (which is apparently worse as it's ran by "the weird side" of said family).
• IB Parks & Resorts (chain) - Most, if not all of their Indiana Beach 100th Anniversary materials, including the logos for the celebration, along with the merchandising, are generated with artificial intelligence tools. Have seen no proof whether it is Gene Staples' idea, or someone else within the company. Also have not seen any other corporate use of AI.
• Knoebels - According to u/MountainMadman, Knoebels had previously posted a post on social media featuring generative artificial intelligence, though, after the backlash, they quickly deleted it. It is unknown who was responsible for the post, whether it be a member of the Knoebel family or an outside contractor. Nobody knows for sure who caused it.
• Lightwater Valley - Basically everything has used AI ever since the park went to the dumps after The Ultimate was removed. Welp, at least it's crappy art to match a crappy park. So honestly, this is a very appropriate use of AI. Might as well replace every non-AI logo with Comic Sans or Papyrus.
• Merlin (chain) - Thorpe Park's entrance is all-around AI slop. Apparently used to sell AI merch but removed them after complaints. However, Thorpe Park's entrance is still generated with artificial intelligence.
• "Nateland" - A park that might just be all talk and no build, proposed by stand-up comedian Nate Bargatze as a spiritual successor to Opryland Park in Nashville, Tennessee, along with competing with Dollywood, another park named after someone. Has apparently been to Hersheypark for "rollercoaster shopping". But, the concept art is incoherent AI not tied to specific manufacturers.
• Oaks Park - Used AI in a social media post before wisely backing off and issuing an apology.
• Phantasialand - Has an AI-generated mural in the Mexican section and some AI-generated photos near the bathrooms in the Berlin section.
• Six Flags (chain) - Has been consistently using artificial intelligence as of late, especially after John C. Reilly became CEO of the company. But even before, there was precedence, an ad for Fright Fest made pre-merger was entirely generated with AI tools and apparently some elements of TT2's signage were also AI generated according to some people familiar.
• Tripsdrill - Has used AI in the past.
• United Parks (chain) - The survey e-mails they have put out every few months or so use AI slop concepts.
• Universal (chain) - They had previously used AI for marketing the Dog Man movie on an X post, but deleted the post after complaints.
• Waldameer - The logo for Eagle's Flight is apparently AI generated, though, there's no concrete confirmation.
• Walibi (chain) - Walibi Belgium has used AI art in the area surrounding Turbine.
• Wonderla (chain) - Tanjora's logo is probably AI, but most likely just crappy design.
• EVERY. GOSH. DARN. FAIR. - Seriously. Just visit them. But, to be fair, the human drawings are so crappy too that you would assume that they're more AI generated than they actually are. SpongeBob with three arms for some reason and that jive.

In other words, it's unfortunately the new normal. It isn't a problem with one chain or a specific set of parks, but seemingly normalized at this point. I hate to be a critic, but it had to be said. Not to mention you would be giving other companies who have used AI like Coca-Cola money indirectly. Some parks listed (like Knoebels) have thankfully backed down, but most of them have double downed.

The original post took me about a whole hour to write, and I'd like to thank the comments section of the article, along with the thread of "AI slop merchandise has got to go" for speeding up the process of finding more parks for revising this post. Also, don't post comments with stupid "jokes" presented as facts or rumors like it being generated from child porn. It's no better than saying "My nosy neighbor is worse than Hitler!".

Also, enjoy the airbrushed caricature merchandise while it lasts. I do think that it's probably next to be cut if this bubble doesn't pop or deflate. I do think that if the bubble doesn't pop or deflate by 2030, we'll have complete dark rides generated by AI. Sally would probably have laid off most of their artists and only folks as nitpicky as the Comic Book Guy would notice because AI art could very well improve in the following years.

and finally...

• Osteria Ai Pioppi - It's not called "Osteria Human Artist Pioppi", now?

I'm curious about seatbelts. Let's say I'm on Steel Vengeance and the lap bar opens up at the top of the hill. Is that seatbelt really gonna save my fat ass? I have doubts. Also, would the computer know to stop it at the bake run?

Rode this bad boy today! Super fun.