Alton Towers Park, A Day Out Review

Alton Towers, Staffordshire, UK. A theme park full of white knuckle and family rides and attractions. The perfect place to spend if you’re looking for a family day out or a thrill seeking day. The park has so many different rides to offer. If you’re a family they have the CBeebies land which is aimed at families with younger children. But also have rides that families can go on out of that too like Congo Rapids and The Runaway Mine train. To the white knuckle rides like Nemesis and The Smiler for those people who want a full on thrill ride.

On Saturday 6th of July, I went to Alton Towers embarking on one motive; that motive being to ride the new attraction known as “The Wicker Man”. No exceptions.

Alton Towers is 1 hour and 30 minutes drive from where I live, so it’s easily accessible to get too. I mainly drive down the country lanes which I much prefer to drive through. On arrival to the park you await to be to told where to park. There are available spaces to go express parking which you can book in advance for £15. Which for me is a little steep for being able to park near the entrance of the park. For me I think having to pay to park at the park is a little bit rubbish. But the normal parking is £6 for the whole day. You can then either walk the 15 minute walk to the entrance or hop onto one of the many monorail services which takes you to the entrance to the park.

Welcome To Alton Towers

I don’t think I’ve ever gone to Alton Towers and paid full price. There are promotions that you can get getting money off tickets. Which include free tickets or in this case 2 for 1 tickets. It takes the price from £56 to only £28, so if you’re going with someone you know you can just split the ticket price. Which then equates to it being a lot cheaper. Once you purchase your tickets, the park is now yours. Boasting 910 acres of park space you need to make sure you’re wearing comfortable footwear as you’ll be walking back and forth to different parts of the park. They do have cable carts to take you to each section of the park, if you find walking a little hard throughout the day.

Every time I’ve been to Alton Towers I think it has rained. I don’t think I’ve ever been when it hasn’t rained. The day before the sun was glorious and the day we went it rained most of the day. You need to prepare yourself for the unpredictable British weather. The last time we went to Alton Towers it rained and none of us had jackets, waterproof coats or an umbrella. This time we were not chancing the unpredictability of the weather. I’m glad I took my raincoat as it decided to rain for most of the day. It brightened up towards the end of the day so the raincoat came off.

Scream If You Wanna Go Faster Baby, Alton Towers Style……

No matter what ride you go on at Alton Towers you will experience some kind of waiting time in regards of a queue. With may years experience going to the park whenever you arrive, you always go to the ride you want to ride first. The queue times are at their lowest before the afternoon. We found that downloading the Alton Towers app was perfect as it told you the queue times of each ride. Whether it was open or closed, and how long it would take to get to that ride. It even gives you directions to the ride for the quickest way to the ride. This helped us out massively as it made us prioritise rides depending on their ride times and how far away they were.

The main rides of Alton Towers are as follows, Galactica, Rita, Thirteen, The Smiler, Nemesis, The Wicker Man, Oblivion. So I would always prioritise these rides depending on how much you want to ride them. We managed to ride Galactica, Rita, The Wicker Man and the rest of my group rode Oblivion as I couldn’t bring myself to ride this ride. We also went on to Dual which is a haunted house zombie shoot out. You’re in a ghost train styled cart and go around shooting zombies and ghosts that fly at you. Another awesome ride to go on is the Congo River Rapids, A water ride that you drift along the Katanga Canyon and no doubt get a drenching. As we were already wet from the rain we didn’t really care that we got a soaking.

Ride Anxiety

For me, going on rides fill me with anxiety, people always say why do you bother going to theme parks then. I really do enjoy going to theme parks as it takes me well out of my comfort zone. I push myself to go on rides as much as possible to not let anxiety beat me. After I’ve come off the ride I want to ride it all over again.

This was the case on any ride I went on on my latest trip. I experienced Galactica (Formerly known as Air) on the front carriage for the first time. I was so scared to start with. The state of panic when we sat down and when the harnesses came down was through the roof. But during the ride it actually felt like I was flying through the treetops of the park. It was an amazing experience and one I’m glad I pushed myself to do.

  Pit stop

After a while you start to need some food. After all the adrenaline of the rides you start to work up an appetite. There are so many different restaurants and eateries in the park. On the app it clearly showcases where each of them are. Which makes it so much easier as then you’re not wondering around the park wondering what you want to eat.

We stopped at one of the eating outlets in Mutiny Bay as we had just come off the Wicker Man where had to wait over an hour to get on. I enjoyed a a nice hot dog which was reasonable priced for £4.95 as it was massive. My brother was a little bit harder to please being a Vegan, however they did have a vegan curry which he really enjoyed. He just asked whether they had any Vegan food which they showed him the menu and pointed out how many Vegan options they had.

Conclusion

In conclusion, despite the rain and getting absolutely soaking wet, I had an amazing day. I went to ride the Wicker Man and I came off knowing that it was now my favourite ride by far. I conquered my fears of going on the front of Galactica. Conquered my fear of Rita the super high speed ride the launches you at speeds of 60 mph around a track. I love Alton Towers and I love the amount of rides that we managed to get on despite queue times being 30 minutes to 1 hour. I’m hoping to go back closer to Halloween for Scarefest where they have additional attractions where its themed around Halloween. Also the park time extended to stay open till 9 o’clock at night so you have a all mighty day of scares and thrills. I would recommend Alton Towers to so many people.

Check out over at Alton Towers website for all of the information and ticket prices: www.altontowers.com