Alton Towers

As mentioned in my previous blog post, I am a massive rollercoaster junkie. My husband knew he was onto a winner with a trip there for my 30th birthday.

The day started early with a buffet breakfast at the hotel before heading over to the monorail station to get to the park entrance. The monorail station is less than a 5 minute walk from the hotel so very easily accessible.

We already had our tickets courtesy of The Sun offer (£1.50 bargain) but we had the option to purchase them as part of our hotel package at a reduced cost of £30 per person for 2 days entry.

Hotel guests are entitled to enter the park an hour before normal guests to ride certain rides. We were never challenged and asked if we were hotel guests so anybody who had prebooked tickets could get into the park an hour early. Today’s choice was Nemesis, Air, The Runaway Mine Train and the whole of Cbeebies Land. We know that both Nemesis and Air can build up quite long queues so headed straight over there.

Nemesis is an oldie but goodie. Given it’s 20 years old, it’s still going strong and also still considered one of the best rollercoasters in the world. There was no queue at all and we walked straight on to seats in the back row. I love riding in the back row as you get pulled along rather than driven which I think gives a better thrill.

Alton Towers are currently running the Big 6 competition. The idea is to ride the Big 6 coasters (Nemesis, Air, Rita, Thirteen, The Smiler and Oblivion) once each and scan a barcode on their app to receive free entry to the park on 4th November.

We gave this a go and scanned every time we went on one of those rides. It turns out that by the end of the day, we had travelled quite a distance by coaster! We weren’t even trying that hard as our old people brains can’t take it any more!

We rode Nemesis and Air several times and decided to head on over to The Smiler for park opening time. I love The Smiler! I think I actually cried a little bit when we last visited Alton Towers as I couldn’t go on this and everybody else could! It had been raining pretty hard by this point and we had to wade (literally) our way through the enormous queue line almost straight to the front. We waited 15 minutes and this was the longest queue all day. While on the ride it started to hail. That stings at 60mph!

We followed The Smiler with a go on Oblivion thankfully just as the rain and hail finished. We then headed on over to complete the Big 6 challenge with Rita and Thirteen.

Big 6 challenge under our belt, we decided to try something we’ve never done before – Ice Age 4D. We waited outside in the rain for ages and it was unfortunately really disappointing. I don’t know if it had anything to do with the new 4D film being released the following week but the effects we completely out of sync.

While over in the area we had a quick go on Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I haven’t done this since it opened and it lacked excitement for me as a teenager but, having just read this story to my kids, I have a new love of it. The boat ride takes you through the story and then the glass elevator simulator takes you up and out!

We had a quick burger and chips in the now Alton Towers owned burger restaurant which was really nice. There was a good vegetarian option which the Mr said he was a bit jealous of when he saw it. The chain restaurants have been kicked out the park in the past few years and now Alton Towers have their own versions of them instead.

We hopped on the Skyride back over to the rear of the park again. The Skyride takes you over all the beautiful gardens which nobody (except my mother) has ever had the time to visit.

We rode Nemesis and Air again then started to head back towards the front of the park. We skipped Nemesis Sub-Terra as I pooped my pants the one and only time I’ve ever done it. I have honestly never been so scared!

We popped in for a good old husband and wife battle in Dual then back over to The Smiler for two last goes. The queue was even shorter this time but no less flooded! Not a great time to discover a hole in your shoe!

Our final stop of the day was Sonic Spinball. The queue was so short that they were only loading cars on 1 side meaning we were getting some serious spin!

Exhausted and all coastered out, we headed to the monorail and back to the hotel to collect the car. If staying in the hotel, make sure you keep your hotel card handy when leaving the resort. We were asked to show it to get out the car park and it was buried in our bag in the boot!

We had a great couple of days and I think Alton Towers still ranks as my favourite UK theme park. I loved spending quality time with the Mr as it’s something we very rarely do these days. It’s spending time together like this that reminds me why I married him. He’s a keeper!

Just as an extra, this is my Fitbit report from my day at Alton Towers. I guess I earnt my burger and chips at lunchtime! Neither of us guessed we’d walk anywhere near this distance.

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