Play-and-Stay Blog

Jim Moore was a man on a mission, a mission to open a chicken theme park. With many acres of land in Rosedale, Georgia, Moore launched his dream (primarily in his head) and took his idea to an American reality show - The Great American Dream Vote. Moore felt let down by the show’s producers as they packaged his work as a chicken amusement park, whereas he felt it was more of a chicken educational centre. Moore eventually lost out to a Basset Hound Rescue Centre, who would have seen that coming!

I would like to see what would have happened if the American public had seen the true promise in such a fantastic idea! CHICKENS EVERYWHERE, what could be better than that! With the current popularity of shows such as the American Inventor and Dragon’s Den in the UK, Moore should make one last attempt to get some financial backing for his crusade!

The concept of Chicken Heaven is a little confusing to say the least. Moore sees it as a series of lit paths into various pens displaying many different chicken breeds. I have been to farms and zoos and in my opinion they are a little smelly and the chickens are possibly the most boring animal to look at! Their range of skills and tricks are limited and would probably not really welcome return visitors, although Moore would ensure repeat viewings with featured breeds and even rides! Now you’re talking Jimbo!

Jim Moore loves chickens and i’m with him now!! Make it happen, we believe!

News that a Hans Christian Andersen theme park could be built in the north of England will be of great interest to so many people throughout the country. Whether you are 3 or 30, male or female, haven’t read a book since school or never read a book at all - Hans Christian Andersen will have made an impact on your life!

As one of the most famous of writers to have influenced fairy tales and childrens’ stories in England along with the Brothers Grimm, Aesop and Roald Dahl, Andersen’s stories have become a part of childhood for millions of children across the globe.

Even those that haven’t realised it have almost definitely read, heard or even watched a version of a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale. How many times will The Emperor’s New Clothes, The Ugly Duckling and The Little Mermaid (yep, that’s one of his too) be retold, rewritten, parodied and adapted?! Whichever way you look at him, Andersen created timeless literature that will continue to delight parents and children for many generations to come!

And so it is to be that a Hans Christian Andersen theme park is to open in England, with the date of opening as yet unspecified although an opening in line with the 2012 Olympics is perhaps likely. There are already successful versions in Andersen’s homeland of Denmark as well as Japan and a proposed park in Shanghai. With the vast success of Disneyland across the world, it feels somewhat justified that a master storyteller like Andersen should get the same sort of recognition, or perhaps more…..

I know which stories I prefer.

LEGOLAND Windsor has recently announced their 2008 calendar of special events and there some real crackers in there. As expected, the superb annual Fireworks show returns in October and November and continues being one of the most spectacular fireworks events in the country. If you haven’t seen it before, put the following dates in your diary - 25, 26 & 31 October and 1, 2 & 8 November.

Check out this youtube video of the fantastic fireworks display that LEGOLAND Windsor put on last year - seriously good stuff!

The Spring and Summer are going to be a wild one at LEGOLAND so get yourself down to the After Dark event on 21-23 March. With the new Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull movie awaiting release in 2008, this Easter at LEGOLAND you can join him for an amazing adventure of your own!

As well as the Indiana Jones spectacular this Spring, LEGOLAND will be putting together a World Record Breaking attempt to build the biggest ever LEGO tower. This event will run from 2-5 May so get involved and get yourself down there.

There is plenty more going on around the park in 2008 so keep your eyes peeled on my blog and the Play and Stay site to keep up-to-date with all the latest news and views. It could be the best year in LEGOLAND Windsor history so make sure you don’t miss out - and if you hear anything that i haven’t mentioned send me a message so i can update this blog. Happy LEGOing!!

There’s a lot of interest and speculation around the new roller coaster coming to Thorpe Park in 2009. Planning permission has been submitted for the Gertstlauer Euro Fighter which will be located in Canada Creek alongside such favourites as Logger’s Leap and Slammer!

You can take a look at the plans for this exciting new ride at the unofficial Thorpe Park Guide where there are extensive plans, designs and images to whet your appetite.

Riders will begin with a drop down before two turns and a zero-gravity roll. The ride will be similar to Speed at Oakwood theme park in Wales, with a vertical climb of about 30 metres before a chilling 97 degree drop into another loop. The ride sounds as if it’s going to be a good new addition to Thorpe Park’s already-impressive selection.

Take a look at the advertisement for Oakwood’s Speed to see what could be in store at Thorpe Park from 2009. Just remember that Thorpe Park’s version should be better going by the quality of their other rides!!

Legoland Windsor will be adding some great family rides with opening of the all new Land of the Vikings. This will feature three new attractions. First up there is a maze called Loki’s Labyrinth. Then there’s the kiddy orientated Longboat Invader. The big announcement is the opening of an all new river rapids ride: Vikings’ River Splash. This river rapids style ride will be a very welcome addition to the park, as it only previously had one with the Pirate Goldwash.

One of biggest moves of the season is Pleasure Beach’s acquisition of The Traumatizer from the now defunct Pleasure Land, which sits just across the Ribble Estuary.

Pleasure Beach are utterly convinced that it will be a totally new experience for all its passengers, having made some interesting changes to the set up. Making the ride Infusion at Blackpool Pleasure Beach.

The roller coaster is now set above water, which sounds pretty hairy, particularly when you take into account the roll-over, double inline twist and a sidewinder. The track is believed to be around two and a half thousand feet long and still quite expensive (at £8 million). This is a really good sign for Blackpool Pleasure Beach, another big investment adding to the already huge collection of roller coasters on offer.

Pleasure Beach is in the news again over the sale of its Spin Doctor ride. The Fabbri Giant Booster ride is rumoured to have been sold for around £1 million and looks to be staying fairly local, being relocated to South Pier, Blackpool. Good news for all the fans, you will still be able to put it to good use, all 120 terrifying foot of it.

Lightwater Valley in Ripon, North Yorkshire, has a new arrival this season, with Hornets Nest. OPening in May, this ride promises to be wild, and was secured from the closure of Pleasure Land, Southport, back in October. This could be great for Lightwater Valley, their Thrill Rides seem to be growing on trees and pleasing all the visitors as they grow! Nothing has been taken from Lightwater Valley in order to include this edition so all is good here.

With the month of March the new UK theme park season is very much underway and soon all theme parks will be open, offering a selection of brilliant rides and great days out.

The following parks are already open:
All Diggerland parks
Paultons
Thorpe Park
Pleasure Beach, Blackpool

The following parks open on the 17th March:
LEGOLAND Windsor
Alton Towers

The following parks open on the 24th March:
Drayton Manor
Chessington World of Adventures
All of the Gullivers Theme Parks
M and D’s

The following parks open on the 31st March:
Camelot
Lightwater Valley

If you’re going to go to a theme park this season then make sure you have a great time!

Having purchased the Tussauds group in 2005 for £800 million, the investment group Dubai International Capital have agreed to sell it to Merlin Entertainments for £1 billion. DIC will retain a 20 per cent stake in the combined company. Merlin itself is owned by the US private equity group Blackstone, the second largest attractions operator in the world after Disney.

Merlin’s Chief Executive Nick Varney said:

“The combination of the Merlin and Tussauds brands, people and operating expertise will create an exciting and world-beating global company. With such iconic brands, the expanded Merlin will not only have strong development potential, but also an amazingly robust and high value portfolio.

“Our ambition is to build on this to become the world leader in location-based, branded family entertainment.”

The Tussauds Group currently consists of Alton Towers, Chessington World of Adventures, Thorpe Park, Heide Park, Warwick Castle, The London Eye and 5 Madame Tussauds Wax Works around the globe. This is added to Merlin’s brands of The Dungeons, the Sea Life Centres and Legoland.

John Lord, an expert in the leisure industry at the University of Wales, saw a number of factors behind the growth in leisure attractions:

“We perhaps go out more as a family than we did in the past and we are more mobile. That means resorts can be developed on out-of-town sites without needing to worry about being close to town or to bus stops and train stations. Increased leisure time and wealth are also playing their part. These attractions are getting ever more expensive … but that doesn’t seem to put people off.”

Interesting… That’s not exactly the more negative view of Southport’s Pleasureland after it closed last year:

“It must be acknowledged that the UK theme park industry as a whole is facing increased competition from publicly-funded and lottery-funded attractions which have significantly distorted the visitor attractions market. This situation has been compounded by our weekend trading now competing with extended Sunday shopping rules and Sunday sporting events.”
(See my blog New Season, Renewed Optimism).

It seems a case of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer after last year’s closure of a number of UK theme parks. The financial power of the bigger groups is now squeezing out smaller competition. This acquisition is likely to push forward more investment in some of the UK’s most popular attractions, but could potentially put even more financial pressure on smaller theme parks and leisure companies.

There was a worrying trend amongst many UK theme parks during 2006 - in two cases financial losses led to owners and investors sadly deciding upon closure as the most viable option.

The last year saw the sudden closure of Southport’s Pleasureland after 94 years of providing fun rides to the public, there was also outrage at the demolishing of its Cyclone, a roller wooden roller coaster that had been in operation since 1937. Meanwhile, in Derbyshire, The American Adventure also was forced into shutting its doors. The problems faced for smaller theme parks are clear from a press release after the closure of Pleasureland:

‘It must be acknowledged that the UK theme park industry as a whole is facing increased competition from publicly-funded and lottery-funded attractions which have significantly distorted the visitor attractions market. This situation has been compounded by our weekend trading now competing with extended Sunday shopping rules and Sunday sporting events.’

The demise of these two family favourites probably had much to do with competition from larger and more diverse local rivals, with two parks that are often regarded within the world’s best; namely Alton Towers. It is also rather unfortunate that the theme park industry in the UK has to compete with something it can do very little about: the weather, which even in the Summer, can be quite unsavoury for a whole day outside!

Whilst two theme parks did close in 2006, it seems unlikely that others in the country will follow suit, and certainly not in the forseeable future! Sure, for the 2007 season there has been hasn’t been the arrival of world beating rides, like when Stealth launched at Thorpe Park just last season, or when Valhalla opened its doors at Pleasure Beach back in 2000 with the acclaim of being the ‘world’s best water ride’, but there certainly is enough to get excited about.

With the Log Flume at Blackpool closing after 39 years of soaking guests, many visitors were sad to see it leave but (to use the old cliché) ‘every cloud has a silver lining’. The closure of Southport Pleasureland has brought its flagship ride ‘The Traumatiser’ across the Ribble Estuary to Pleasure Beach, Blackpool,, where it will occupy the old site of the Log Flume and take the name Infusion This is perhaps the biggest ride move of the year, as Infusion is set to be a truly incredible experience, ‘infusing’ a traditional steel roller coaster ride with water elements. Additionally, guests to LEGOLAND® Windsor will be very excited by the arrival of a thrilling river rapids ride - Vikings’ River Splash, giving you the chance to cool off on a hot summers day in a slightly unusual way!

Brilliant thrill rides at Pleasure Beach, Blackpool, Alton Towers, Thorpe Park, Lightwater Valley, Drayton Manor and M & D’s will all certainly continue to keep the thrill seekers delighted in 2007 and keep the ‘Wow Factor’ very much alive across the UK this year. There’s also the great family fun to be had far and wide from Camelot, down to Chessington and LEGOLAND® Windsor, and then as far south as Paultons in Hampshire. This is not to mention the Gulliver’s and Diggerland parks. For both of these brands there are three separate parks dotted around the country, with rides suitable for absolutely everyone.

It’s great that websites like Play and Stay can offer so much from the theme park industry and help it to stay very much alive and kicking. From the magic of Disneyland® Resort Paris, to the family fun of Paultons or the thrills of Thorpe Park, sites like this help to inform the customer and offer choice. So much information was often unavailable in the days before the worldwide web, but it’s here to stay, and so are the nation’s theme parks!