St George’s Day Alton Towers Event

On Sunday 22nd April 2007 5000 Scouts from all over Derbyshire gathered at Alton Towers for a celebration of 100 years of Scouting in Derbyshire. The event started off with a ceremony before everyone went off to enjoy the thrills and spills of Alton Towers.

Representing Genus Network were Andy and myself. I’m told that Derrick was also there (probably hiding from us). Anyway after what was a very disappointing opening ceremony we joined up with our good friends from Lynx Network for the day, and we started what would be a fun day. The rides that we went on were:

  1. Spinball Wizard
    What I quite like about this ride is that you can’t really tell went the drops are coming due to you spinning all the time.
  2. Teacups
    Here we thought that we would start the fun of fast spinning before the ride had even started, at which point we were given a “telling off” from the ride staff.
  3. Rapids
    The first of the wet rides, and yes we did get wet.
  4. Duel
    Duel is where the ghost train meets laser quest. The aim being to shoot as many monsters as you can, whilst trying to enjoy the ghost train ride. My score of over 40000 points was the highest from our group (no need to gloat)
  5. Nemesis
    One of my all-time favorite rides and the ride on this day didn’t disappoint.
  6. Air
    Another one of my favorite rides, Air makes you think that you are flying at a high speed. Some people reckon that Air is well overrated, they might have a point but I like it. Oh, and at least it didn’t break down on this occasion when compared to other times that I’ve been to Alton Towers and queued for Air.
  7. Blade
    After some lunch it was off to our next ride, Blade. Blade is basically a pirate ship, just what you need to go on after eating.
  8. Corkscrew
    One of Alton Tower’s oldest rides, still a good ride. We thought that we would go on the Corkscrew as a warm up for Rita Queen of Speed. As out ride on the Corkscrew started someone behind us made a somewhat “frightening” reaction using words that I won’t mention here. I dread to think what this person would have said on Rita. Speaking of which…
  9. Rita Queen of Speed
    The park’s newest rollercoaster, and boy it is fast. Form a standing start it all of the sudden thunders like a rocket. Suppose it is one way to get a shock (or a fright).
  10. Oblivion
    The vertical-drop rollercoaster, not one for the scared. Quote from this ride went along the lines of:
    “why do I put myself through this” – I didn’t say that by the way.
  11. Submission
    A bit like “Blade” only this one spins and rotates the full 360 degrees.
  12. Enterprise
    Alton Tower’s tilting big wheel.
  13. Hex
    Inside an ancient building, after a little film you sit down and starting rotating. Funny thing is that you don’t feel as though you are upside down. Described as a weird ride.
  14. The Flume
    It was nearing the end of the day and we decided that we needed to go out in style, so the flume it was, and guess what, we got wet again.
  15. Spinball Wizard (again)
    We thought we would finish where we started, so Spinball Wizard it was.

Definitely a fantastic day all round. Oh, and yes we did find the car in the end.

Adam Thompson