China 01/18 – Fantawild Dreamland Xiamen

Still Day 14

As Oriental Heritage was deserted we managed to ride everything we wanted, including re-rides on Jungle Trailblazer and still had a few hours left of the day.

So we decided to venture next door to the Fantawild Dreamland park.

Before we left though we phoned around to help us plan for tomorrow.

Happy Valley: “All the coasters are running now, nothing’s planned to be closed tomorrow, however wind, rain or cold temperatures may cause closures”.

Knight Valley: “Maintenance”.

Fantawild Dreamland Xiamen

Unlike the Oriental Heritage parks, Fantawild’s Dreamland parks don’t really follow a central theme and are more a collection of everything, normally supported by 2 less than exciting coasters.

While we only came here to tick off the coasters, much to our surprise the park contained yet more amazing dark rides, one of which you’ll probably never see anywhere else.

The Wizard Academy – Much like Legend of Nuwa next door, this dark ride uses the Spiderman/Transformers ride system, unlike Nuwa though, this one’s not amazing and that’s mostly down to the dumb story it tells.

You show up at the Wizard Academy, an evil (maybe) wizard attempts to kill you many times, then at the end he gives you a certificate and you’re now accepted in the Wizard Academy, right.

This would probably be an amazing dark ride at any other park but it pales a bit compared to the other incredible dark rides at the Fantawild parks.

Mount Tanggula – My first ever Golden Horse coaster, it was terrible but extremely funny, I think I like it.

Stress Express – The first time we saw any other park guests today was on the park’s boomerang, each to their own.

Jinshan Temple Showdown – Now this is the ultra special dark ride I’ve been alluding to over the last 2 posts.

I think it might be my favourite dark ride in the World, if it wasn’t debatable if it even counts or not.

This incredible dark ride is made up of 2 parts, both amazing, both mind blowing and both forever etched in my mind.

The first part is a boat ride, past the most authentic dark ride sets I’ve ever seen. We are talking better than Disney, this was next level, I wish I could describe how realistic it looked. Live actors combine with state of the art special effects and multimedia to create a truly beautiful experience.

The second part is witnessed on foot after you leave the boat and in the most basic sense is a show but it’s so much more than that. It’s shocking, gripping, intense and just perfection.

When everything ended I just stood there speechless and I still don’t have the words.

Terror Twister – I never thought China would be home to the least offensive SkyLoop but here we are.

Qin Dynasty Adventure – This ended up being my 2nd favourite dark ride of the day and easily one of the best I’ve ever done. It uses the Indiana Jones dark ride system and while it’s not quite as good as Indiana Jones it’s still amazing and insanely intense.

Sadly we were 1 minute too late to ride the park’s final dark ride but I’ve since heard this was no big loss.

Fantawild Dreamland ended up being a surprise hit, we entered expecting to tick off a few pointless coasters but left after experiencing 2 unforgettable dark rides.

We had no rush to get back to the station for our bullet train to Shenzhen, so we decided to take the bus. It was slightly less terrifying than the taxi but certainly wasn’t pleasant.

The bullet train journey back went well but getting a taxi from Shenzhen station back to the hotel didn’t. There was some weird colour coded system going on that everyone but us seemed to understand.

We worked it out in the end though and I was so happy to crash once we got to the hotel because today had been a long one.

Thanks for reading, click here for the final part of this trip report where we actually make it to Happy Valley Shenzhen.