News, Views, Reviews, Photos

Drayton Manor Theme Park

ByKevin Simon

Aug 29, 2010

We had a day out at Drayton manor theme park on Friday 27th August, so here is a bit about the day and what we thought of it. First thing to mention is how we got the tickets through the tescos clubcard offer, you exchange £7.50 worth of clubcard vouchers (either online or by sending a form by post) for 1 free entry which for adults is normally £28 and children £24, so this works out better than a 2 for 1 entry offer. Once at the gate ticket windows you hand in your tesco free entry vouchers (mine was sent by post) and get your normal entry tickets.

We arrived early at just before 9:30am which is when the gates open, but the rides don’t start for another hour at 10:30am, which gave us time to have a quick look around the park and the zoo, the zoo isn’t that bad since I went a few years ago they now have some meerkats, which again were cute, if you read my article about Birmingham nature centre you will notice that 🙂 In the zoo part they have a dinosaur park called the Dinotrail this looks new and my daughter did enjoy looking at the models and doing the questions about the dinosaurs that are by each one, there is also a little play area there, we didn’t look at that but would be fun for the kids if they get bored of the rides in the theme park.

We then went to Excalibur, which was good you go around the lake in a boat, there is commentary telling you different things, at one point you go into Merlin’s cave with dragons, the last time I went a few years ago the dragons had flames coming out of them and some water was sprayed at the boat, this didn’t happen this time so either not fully working or there was a fault.

The buffalo coaster this one of the smaller roller coaster, but does go in 2 circles over the lake, and does go round twice so is pretty good, we went on this ride twice on the day as was fun for all ages.

We went on stormforce 10, now with this ride you can get very wet, you are in a cart lifeboat that seats 8 people 2 per row, now is doesn’t matter weather you sit at the front or back as you get equally wet as the cart goes backwards at one point, you can purchase the clear plastic rain ponchos at £2 each, but I don’t see the point in these as why go on a ride that involves getting wet if you don’t want to get wet, this ride I have to admit is great fun, we went on this ride 3 times in total on the day, so you can see we really did enjoy it.

Splash canyon which is the water rapids ride that we went on, again was fun and you can get wet, but this time on visiting drayton manor and going on this ride no one in your boat/ring or whatever you want to call it 🙂 didn’t get wet, each boat seats 6. The last time we visited the park I got soaking wet on this one.

There is a new attraction for 2010 which is the happy feet 4D in the cinema, there was signs around the park and on entrance for the day we went saying due to technical difficulties some of the viewing experience wasn’t working, but didn’t say what. After we had sat down they said that they wouldn’t be giving out the 3D glasses as this part wasn’t working. Now I haven’t been to anything 4D, the showing was around 10-20mins of a cut down version of the film happy feet, in certain parts you feel the seats move, you have water splashed at you, and the wind blows in the direction of the action, at one point there are bubbles floating around, this was a part that is underwater. The bass of the music etc was more than in a normal cinema. All of this did immerse you into the action, though I think this would have been better if the 3D part was working. But in our case was still good, just slight disappointment no 3D.

Talking about things not working on the day we went, the cable cars were closed for maintenance, though they were testing them when we got there, the drunken barrels was also closed for maintenance. The little train that goes through the park wasn’t on, this one not be to confused with the train that starts within Thomasland.

Now for lunch we had taken our own food which we had left in the car, you can exit the park and re-enter as long as you get your hand stamped upon exit, so because we had taken our own lunch, I’m not sure of how expensive the food and drink prices are within the park.

The pirate-ship is still there, now this can be a fun ride and does go pretty high, we kind of enjoyed this but we had gone on this after having our lunch, so we didn’t feel brill after it, but that will teach us not to have lunch before going on this kind of ride 🙂

The Ferris wheel is a good ride as you do get the great views of the park you are high up at the top, now I’m not keen on heights, so I didn’t look fully down, but still fun each cabin seats around 8 people.

We went on the black revolver This is like the wirlisers but in the dark, now my daughter loved this, thou I didn’t really enjoy this, but then again I’m not one for these kind of rides, now though I remember this ride from years and years ago at drayon manor, but still a very popular ride people even keep re-queuing to go on it again including my daughter minus me lol.

We went on the golden nugget ride, this is where you are in a mine cart and have to shoot different targets around and get point for each target hit, its not a bad ride and is enjoyable for all ages. There is also the boat trip around the main lake, not really that exciting but fun all the same.

Thomasland is mainly for the kids, but the first thing I have to say about this part is the queas were massive compared to any of the other rides around the park, my daughter went on a few of the rides around Thomas land including the troublesome trucks runaway Roller coaster, the crankys drop tower And the rockin bulstrode, there was also a show on within thomasland, with dancing and singing this was just by the entrance to Thomas land, younger children would really enjoy this.

The day we went as you can see from the above we got to go on most rides and the ques wasn’t that bad for the larger rides. So we did have a great day out and great value with the way we had got the tickets, we thoroughly enjoyed the day and the best thing was the weather wasn’t too bad. We didn’t go on the main larger rides including G-Force, maelstrom, shockwave, apocalypse etc, As we wasn’t really into these kind of rides, but again most people like these, so I have only commented on some of the rides that we did go on. So all in all we did have a very nice and enjoyable day out at the park.

See some of my photos of the day from the link below or the link to my photo albums at the top of the page, and you can see a little video snippit of the day, including the rollercoaster rides, by the link on this page.

[pe2-gallery album=”http://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/base/user/104871678321968501168/albumid/5510535768064405905?alt=rss&hl=en_US&kind=photo” ]

By Kevin Simon

I run this blog & also self employed cleaning out fish ponds, but due to spinal problems not able to do as much, now started a youtube channel showing my converted Peugeot Partner micro camper also as interest in photography so now vlog about the trips and of course Lego figures out in the wild photos.

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