In the morning we left Karlstad and continued west into Norway for Tusenfryd, which was the only Norwegian park on the trip. Located up a mountain south of Oslo it's a pretty decent, if steep park. Last time we were here I'd joked about it being the only park with an escalator to get you from the car park to the park itself.
In the last two year's they'd only gone and put a loop around said people mover. This is the Norwegian Loop (I prefer "Lazy Pretzel") element of their new ride Speed Monster.
It seemed only right to go to that first!
It uses the same launch technology as Top Thrill Dragster, Rita and Stealth.
But unlike those has a really decent layout as well, making good use of the mountainside terrain.
It was one of only two launched coasters on the trip and I don't know why but people seem to really like those. Perhaps people find lift hills boring...
As well as Speed Monster they have a corkscrew coaster.
I didn't ride it on this occasion.
In the background is Thundercoaster, which was apparently great when it first opened but had become very rough by the time I'd got to ride it a couple of years later. Work had been done to improve things since then so it would be interesting to see how it rode. The band were pretty good, but they didn't have to dress up so smart for us!
This was the biggest slushy stand I'd ever seen with more flavours than you could fit in the bottle. Whilst in Russia I came up with the rather stupid idea of having a brain freeze race with Keith, and this seemed like a perfect opportunity to have it. But he bottled it! It would have to wait til another day, but in preparation I tried a slushy and it wasn't that good to be honest. I got no brain freeze at all.
I was surprised to see people wearing life jackets on the boat ride. A sign of silly UK Health and Safety rules coming over to the mainland perhaps?
This monster is Teeny Weeny Coaster, officially the world's smallest coaster, which the ride operator hadn't realised until I told him. I'd suggested for a laugh that we should have an ERS on this at the end of the day, so imagine my surprise when that's what happened, although to be honest most people preferred to ride Speed Monser & Thunder Coaster, which was open for us too!
Last time we were here we broke this ride.
Teeny Weeny rocks!!!!
At the top of the park is the Dragon powered coaster.
and the Rollover ride. They need to have a massage stand too, the climb was pretty tiring.
At the bottom of the park is Supersplash, which was an amazing ERS last time we were here, where we all dressed up in swimming gear, took inflatables on the ride, and had a great big waterfight. Unfortunately the weather wasn't so great on this occasion.
People still seemed to enjoy the ride however.
This is a really cool and unique dark ride themed around Viking mythology. You sit in the longship and as it rocks you encounter dragons and Norse Gods. An enjoyable ride especially as it provided shelter from the rain. It was on this ride that myself and Keith tried getting high on the smoke they were pumping into the boat.
Thundercoaster to be honest was much improved than last time, as long as you didn't sit above the wheels. Do that and you'd get juddering vibrations sent through your body.
It was a good sign that people lasted through the ERS; the last time we were here most people quit and I think only half a dozen of us (the most masochistic probably) remained on the train for the full hour.
This is the second drop, which is actually the best drop on the ride as it takes you down the side of the mountain.
In the evening the park had given us Thundercoaster, Teeny Weeny and Speed Monster for an hour; very generous indeed.
There was a great atmosphere during the Speed Monster ERS, with people really hamming it up during the launch, so here's a selection.
What is Gordon doing in row 2?
Maggie and Kat re-enacting Thelma and Louise.
The Amborns! I'm not going to say a word!
The Englanders (thats their surname, not nationality)
Bob seemed to visibly show the forces more than most.
It all gets too much for Michael.
Special mention to Darren for riding this. He has autism and whilst he can ride more coasters than anyone for some reason couldn't bring himself to ride these rocket coasters. We'd almost got him on Top Thrill Dragster on the US trip to no avail. He had signed that he was going to ride this one and he did! Good work!
Debbie and Martin
Nice pose.
Dirk was responsible for getting us to do Mexican waves during the launch but he's behaving himself here.
Mattius again with Erik, Peace brother!
Joel looks like he wants off!
Jazz hands!
This phot didn't take place during the ERS. Some of us got to walk amongst the ride once it had closed.
People were also enjoying themselves on Thundercoaster. There is still more work to be done to get this back to its former glory but I don't think people came back slating the ride as much as on the last trip, a good sign.Speed Monster has turned Tusenfryd from an "OK" park to a "Must Do" park now, and if you're ever in Oslo I would recommend a brief trip here.
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