China 01/24 – Shengming Universal City + Chongqing Sunac Land
The train that night took us to Chongqing, a city I last visited in 2018. It rained a lot back then, but Happy Valley was a success at least.
This place wasn’t however, so let’s give it another go
Day 7 – Shengming Universal City
Nothing exciting going on, just some creds under a flyover, but at least things were open.
Sadly that included this. You wouldn’t know it to look at it, but it’s their newest attraction. As far as I can tell it’s my first coaster from Wuhan Fute Amusement Rides. They built Millennium Force didn’t you know?
There’s some sort of deal you can get near one of the entrances for multiple rides of #1 Sky Roller Coaster, but it looked complicated and I couldn’t tell what was available. Alternatively you could pay for all the major stuff in situ. Arrival at the ticket window for this one led to a fun encounter as no one was around to operate the thing. The staff member who took the cash made a call and soon someone rocked up on a motorbike to perform the deed.
Headed up the stairs with trepidation where I was promptly presented with a musty old neck pillow to wear in between myself and the restraint. This does not bode well.
Headed up the lift hill with trepidation while running through an internal monologue to the effect of what a stupid hobby, why do i do this, i don’t care any more.
It was fine.
No ridiculous forces in the undersized loops, no general brain rattle, the neck pillow did a servicable job of keeping any bruises at bay. I’ve had much worse.
This may be the greatest attraction of all time.
The one here I was most interested in was this Jinma spinner with the inversion. There’s a bunch around, but never managed to catch one (including the failed attempt at the dinosaur park just a few days prior).
Closed. For maintenance. So much so that they’ve translated the dedicated sign for ‘Closed for maintenance’ into French and Korean as well.
Is it a dark ride? We may never know.
Only other cred in this part of the establishment was #2 Crazy Skaters, another spinner, non-inverting. It happened.
A piece of information popped into my head from RCDB at this point. There’s more here, but it’s the other side of the road. Sure enough, headed under the big flyover and past a circus into another area with amusements.
Tank ride?
Happy Town Parent-Child Park
Things got a little more complicated as this all led around the perimeter of another, gated, park. As the name would suggest it’s very much a ‘children’s park’, but the remaining coasters appeared to live inside and we had a long conversation with the staff about the situation.
They were fine with it, there was a deal on, we paid admission and popped in. You get a little ticket that’s good for a single go on the three ‘major attractions’ and everything else is unlimited.
Only ‘major attraction’ of interest was #3 Brave Jurassic. A fine beast of a rollercoaster if ever I’ve seen one, with a single vicious lateral kick to it.
RCDB had another junior type thing listed, but it’s gone. Instead there’s now a spitey one of these. From what we gathered of the conversation earlier, adults of a certain size can legitimately ride this one. Problem was it was broken. This man with a spanner was tinkering and scratching his head and it remained off limits for the foreseeable.
Damn.
Well, though it could have been a momentous occasion, wasn’t gonna wait around for it. Places to be.
Chongqing Sunac Land
Sunac are growing on me again. Can’t recall the exact beef I had with them before, beyond being disappointed with the coaster lineups they’ve been going for since, say, massive custom GCI and Intamin. Never got that wild again.
That and not running both sides of this
Even the odd creative splurge became wasted potential.
Anyway, Jinan and Wuxi were pretty great as of late. They run a reasonably tight ship for China, haven’t spited a whole bunch, have definitely taken my words to heart about putting dark rides IN the main park and provided a more well rounded experience. There’s a decent vibe to them.
The Chongqing park is relatively small. Things began on the #4 Osprey Mine Train – a fairly hefty and either custom, or at least new to me, Jinma mine train. RCDB says it’s a double lift clone. RCDB is wrong.
It’s got a good face, is enhanced by the rock work and there’s some decent forces thrown in there. A solid centrepiece.
All these creds had been leading up to a milestone of some description. It could have ended up pretty bad on this trip, but as ever I only work to within the bounds of the already established plan and landed #5 Legendary Twin Dragon for a sweet #1600. The modern Intamin Impulse coaster.
It ain’t great though. New Intamin invert lap bars are a nice touch, as is yet another dragon themed train, but as I find with many of these types of experiences it’s just a glorified flat ride.
Slight embuggarance in that they couldn’t be bothered to open the restraints for the back half of the train. It only ran once every 15 minutes and never had more than a handful of guests on it at any one time. Towards the front at least you get no sense of scale from the visuals provided on ride. You wouldn’t know you were travelling 200+ ft up.
The build up in each stage of launch was the most fun, as it often is with any multi-launch experience. More. More! I asked for it, but it never delivered much in the way of anything for me. At least the days of the Twist and Twist version punching people in the head are behind us.
Elsewhere they had a flying theatre, Chongqing in the Air. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Sunac ones are good. There’s always a custom pre-show and narrative reason for the exploration – this one being some futuristic pods in the city of Chongqing taking you on a journey around local scenery, past and present.
And that’s the other nice thing about them. It isn’t just ‘here’s some things you could go see yourself now, if you can put up with the hassle of tourism’. You get dinosaurs, ancient armies, other timelines sprinkled within the sights you could go see yourself now, to give it a unique edge.
Saw a few variations on whatever these things are on this trip and remain confused. Some sort of sheltered, square, water slide. Shoulda been an alpine coaster.
Not much else going on at the park really, back at the top end it’s set into a hillside with escalators, good views and the ferris wheel.
Did the wheel, cos why not.
I guess they’re expanding. Construction, get excited.
Satisfied, called it a day. Back on another train to the final city of the journey.
Saw one of these on the way out. Drive-thru car batter changer. This is the future.