"If you carry your childhood with you, you never become older"~ Tom Stoppard
Crossing the border between French and Germany... no post, no passport check.... just a bridge... I open the car window, and start taking pictures of the Autobahn. I feel amazed that I could cross boarder like this... I wish one day Asia would be like this....
After a while with the "are we there yet?" question Mr. T stop on a junction and said we are going to Europa Park. I was ecstatic... I love theme park, and Europa Park is the biggest in Germany!
Its just like the Brussels Mini Euro Park, but instead of miniatures of interesting things of each Euro country, this theme park had divided into several theme based on the 13 countries in Europe like Italy, French, Russia, Switzerland, Spain, etc.
He did talk about this before when we chat, if I went to Europe especially Germany I HAVE to visit this theme park. I checked the Europa park website and I found it’s just my thing!!
The thing is this park not opens all time.. So you have to check the website about the opening date and also the time. It’s divided into two season summer and winter. While in summer this year this park open start at April until mid June and then it closed and reopen again for winter season start from end of November until early January 2012.
After remembering the parking number, we go to the ticketing.. It’s a very great day since it’s not so cold (for me) and sky is blue!!
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| Front of the Europa Park |
The parking is really huge we got number 94. And not far from there, there's a line for the highest and biggest roller coaster "Blue Fire Mega Coaster" (yapp.. see the word "mega" means huge!!). I told Mr. T I want to ride that... but he say I am insane...well maybe I am... I am Indonesian hehe we love crazy ride!!
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| Fountain on front of the Park Entrance |
The entrance is huge, and there is a fountain in front of it. I never had been to Universal Studios.. But somehow it does remind me of pictures about Universal Studios..
You could buy your ticket online too at the Europa Park website. The entrance ticket is 36 Euro for adults and we have to pay 4 Euro for parking. They gave discount/special rate for birthday kids and also elderly age 60+ also for groups above 20 people. Ohhh and also hahah for thus still in school or nursery they gave only 20 euro ticket. And of course ticket on winter time is cheaper (if you could bare the cold!), it’s only 29 euro for adults.
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| Top of the Entrance to Europa Park |
From here we got two tickets and a coin for the parking. From the entrance I know I cannot get the whole park only by one day!! It’s so huge!! We got two maps... I mistaken took one with Japanese language hahah....
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| I want this! |
Things I notice is somewhere on the map it said this park is guaranteed by Safety Standard Authority (TUV) so.. Oh well.. Even the rides seemed very crazy I believe it’s safe! (By all means this is Europe people). There are signs everywhere on the entrance of every rides about the age and height limit example sign say 11,140 means it’s for age 11 above with height 140cms above (in Europe they use metric).
Oh.. At the entrance there's lockers for rent, so you could keep your belongings there (not for free though heheh).
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| Part of the Park |
First of all we went to the Italy for breakfast with coffee and éclairs.. ohh oh.. yums! And we watch for the wild ducks there... anyway I don’t believe its wild... but Mr. T assure me it was wild... because no such as wild duck in Indonesia.. hehe wild means it live in jungle.. not in a theme park where someone feed them! (Different terms of "wild"). Wild in my terms where they rarely see human and think human as their food..hahaha..barbaric eh?!
Ohhh roses there are.. GORGEOUS!!! I LOOOOOVVEE IT! I love the well taken care garden there, roses and so much flowers... it’s very nice morning. The park also very clean! even the toilets (this is matters for me!) And then.. Mr. T say, let’s get start.. So we went to our first ride...
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| Flowers are amazing there! |
Our first ride is..Something that goes up :) yupp we like high places hehehe.... we went to France part of park first and we queue on "Euro Tower"this is not thrilling ride.. But if you afraid of heights, then it will be a problem! Also the place pretty small so.. Those who cannot feel easy in small confined space should not ride this.
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| The glass seated tower |
These tower glass parts where we sit down go up 75 meter high and turn 360 degrees for all park view and surrounding town... it’s very nice to see it from this height.
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| view from Europe Tower-note the blue fire coaster |
After spotting places we want to visit we get off the Euro Tower to find BANANA TREE on the park... Mr. T eventually never sees a real banana tree and says "are you kidding me?" LoL it’s amazed me how they put banana tree in Germany that had winter.. It won’t survive the chill! I do hope they really put it somewhere warm when winter come!
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| Banana tree under the tower |
We went to Switzerland part; see one of traditional farm house which reminds me of my grandparent house in Jambi. They had these two floors of wooden house and they put live stocks aka animals under the house... it’s pretty surprising it’s...looks a like model hahah...of course in different way.. But the same concept! But of course no live animal’s just puppets with recorded voices.
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| One part of the traditional wooden house |
After that we ride something crazy called "Matterhorn-Blitz" it’s pretty crazy with loops and curves. To get to the ride we had to queue and get inside the house..Which had puppets on, showing the live inside the house...errhhh I don’t like puppets....?
The thrill started when they pull you up to the end of the roof that looks like a barn, and then the door slowly open and ...voila.. The curvy track revealed....I swear it’s just too fast! I was screaming like mad!
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| Thrilling first ride! |
It said the top speed of this ride is at 3G's means you literally flying with it!
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| the Swiss Bob Run |
Oh well.. That’s just a start... we went to the other part of the park again..Still pretty close to the Switzerland there is another ride called "Swiss Bob Run" it looks like an ice slide ride thing where your partner seat on your back and their legs on your side and you had to lay down on them-literary.. It’s pretty cute for couple. Mr. T somehow asks me to sit on front hahaha! It was thrilling but it’s just a short turn..too bad! But still the curve goes wild, the ups and down also thrilling.. Just pretty short time though. We seat on the very first car, so it’s pretty much thrilling too!
But after a while on crazy ride, and I forgotten my lunch, I feel a bit sick, but ...erhh I left my medications for acid indigestion on my backpack, and the rides are pretty much stressing out my body causing me nausea and tummy ache. But I thought.. Oh well.. It should be ok (not telling Mr. T about it)
Next ride is at the Greek... this time we want the wet side of the park.. hmmm... It’s next to the Swiss Bob Run. When we see it we know.. Ahh this is our next ride!
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| Poseidon-looks really challenging! |
Its "Poseidon" this ride mixes the roller coaster and the water fun. The building itself is pretty unique, with ship wreck on one side, and a huge Poseidon statue on the other side of the building. The queue is pretty long. I guess this ride pretty famous!
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| We ride this yippie!! |
After a long queue we finally get to the ship with the other two guys-that scream louder than me! hehehe.. But it’s just fun!
After the ride and we went out, and on the exit there's a booth for pictures and the amazing thing is we could also mail the pictures to our email. There also a dryer incase if we were too wet. It’s just so cool! So we don't need to get a spare shirt to ride this thing.
We went to the Russian part. It was pretty cool. Mr. T said we should try the MIR Station ride. But I feel bit sick, said we will do it later. We went to a puppet show there "Sleigh Ride Snowflake", it’s a story about a girl with two bear in snow world with king winter I think.
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| Russian carving at Europa Park |
After the ride on the puppet house we went to a workshop and see some Russian craft where the carpenter making some carving and glass work also collection of wooden nesting dolls. It was beautiful. I like the Russian wooden nesting doll or in Russian language called Matryoshka.
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| Matryoshka at Russian part of Europa Park |
After seeing the Russian workshop, we heard the announcement about the mid day parade. Mr. T said I should taste the Russian food called "Piroschki" but then he said it’s not enough for lunch, so we went for something else.
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| i want to try that.. but had pork on it? |
That's when we hear loud music and the parade was started.
I got too sick when we walk that I told Mr. T that I need a hot cup of tea ASAP as I could feel the acid on my mouth and I really get sick. Mr. T thought it was because the ride. Well it’s not. So we went to nearest cafe near the Spain area. But tea wasn't enough.
Mr. T suggests we had lunch at the Food Loop Restaurant at England part of the park. I had no idea what was it. I just said "quick" that’s all. I should bring my meds with me all time or nor to delay my lunch.. That was a big mistake. We were almost lost a bit until we found our way about 10 minutes later we arrive.
With 215 seats this place is pack that we had to queue for a while to get a seat on the restaurant. I was thinking this is short of very famous restaurant too.. But then I see why they so eager waiting in long queue to be eat on this restaurant.
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| Food Loop-the food roller coaster! |
It’s the unique way serving food. On the entrance they will give you card for each person who wants to eat there. They don't really have waitress like in common restaurant. In every each table you had a hi-tech touch screen panel so you could order your food from there. And when you want to order/finish selecting the food and drink you want, you just need to swipe your card next to the screen.
Your food won’t be delivered by waitress; the food will come from the long roller coaster like reeling from the kitchen straight to your table! This is where the fun at! Seeing the food on the rails!! This is the one and only in the world they said! Very sophisticated!
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| My pasta arriving, yay! |
The food not bad. I got pasta and hot tea for my tummy. Warm food made me feel better, in general I can't be hungry that’s all reason why I brought snacks hehe..
After eating we went walking around the park. But Mr. T said enough about the ride, as he insist that made me sick. But I know he want to try the MIR (so.. sorry). We pass through Holland and Spain... when we heard the sound of Flamenco dance music.
Mr. T said he would like to watch it, just too bad we were there when it’s already half time playing. The dancers are very good. I like how they dance sensually... the guys.. humm.. Not so bad. But then when the show over, we walk around and see what other show we could see.
At the "Piraten in Batavia" there is a horse stall where I could see the real horse, oh my..They are so big! Then we found out that there will be a show pretty soon. So we would like to watch it!
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| Knight in Shining armor! |
We found some places to take pictures, including a place where you could take pictures with knight’s suite. Hehehe I ask Mr. T to take one.
Show was started pretty soon. It’s about a king who had a kick ass daughter. But anyway it’s about prince and it shining armor to safe the kingdom from evil. All the horse riders are cute (wink).
After the show it’s raining pretty hard. We had another flamenco show, this time from beginning! And Mr. T seemed enjoy the dance very much (stare at him) maybe he like the sexy dancer hehehe. Kidding!
On our way back to parking we went to the part of the park where they put all of this my childhood bed time story, start from Sleeping Beauty castle, fairy tale gallery to the witch bread house of Hansel and Gretel! It’s called the "Enchanted Forrest"
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| Poor trapped baby owl-Howgard missing an owl?? |
Oh we found a baby owl trapped on a window too.. But the park keeper will rescue the poor baby owl! It was too scared, that we afraid it will break it wings when it try to fly behind the window bars.
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Hansel and Gretel Cookie house |
At the entrance we found the sign on the pavement that show directions to several cities in Europe. I took the pictures on the rose’s road, it was amazing I like the smells too....
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| one of the direction to Den Haag |
When we thought that we had such amazing day, at the parking Mr. T just realize that he lost the parking coin! he had to get another one from the ticketing... ohh pooh!
But over all, i will say, i had unforgettable screaming day at Europa Park!
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