Hi All
Following on from another members post after they visited Lightwater Valley, I thought i'd post my report from 2 visits, one in November 2021 and another September 2022.
I visited as I wanted to see the state of The Ultimate rollercoaster, as well as other closed attractions there, one of which has been closed for over 15 years.
As the park have now started the process of dismantling the last bit of their park, I might as well post this report showing what was left on my visits. This park means a lot to me, I grew up visiting this park a few times a year, and have many cherished memories of it. I have a keyring somewhere of me riding the Ultimate as a kid.
I hoped that one day i'd have kids and I could bring them to enjoy the same park I once did. Sadly they've backed themselves into a corner and removed pretty much every ride that had any level of thrill to it, aiming the park at young children only.
The Ultimate was the main reason for my visit, a custom built rollercoaster, and one of a kind. It was planned and built essentially in-house. Robert Staveley transformed the site into a thriving theme park, and orchestrated the creation of this ambitious rollercoaster, the longest in the world when it was built. Firstly manufactured by a defunct company called "Big Country Motioneering", then also was famously worked on by British Rail. You can see some of that influence in the way the ride is constructed. Most rollercoasters are either wooden or steel. Usually they have pile-driven foundations, upon which concrete pads are poured, and upon that steel or wood structures are sat.
The Ultimate has steel track bolted to wooden supports. Most of the layout is just steel track bolted to wooden railway sleepers, which just sit in the ground. This isn't an ideal way to build a ride as it's not good for the track to be able to move about so much. The ride was opened by famous boxer Frank Bruno in 1991, and was modified over the years, including removing the "over the shoulder restraints" which were replaced with lapbars.
There was some excitement in me which I kept to myself, as I didn't want to get my hopes up. Between my 2 visits, a generator had been hired and was next to the rides original generator location. And one of the two trains had been pulled out of the station. This got me excited for a potential re-opening of the ride.
The ride was known for being brutally rough from the start, mostly due to the layout being so badly designed, it doesn't account for the forces properly - meaning the train would slam into corners and bang through wierd kinks in the track. It was still hugely popular especially for the first 15 years of its life.
COVID finished this ride off, with the ride closing due to the outbreak and then the park decided to restructure the park, leaving the Ultimate sat there as an icon of a time now gone, the 90s heyday of the park now long gone.
Additionally, there's "Raptor Attack" which opened as "The Rat Ride". This gave you a feeling of going underground in tunnels, into an underground lair. The tunnels you entered via are actually buried underground, and the huge opening the ride sits in is essentially inside a quarry, 3 of the sides of it are bare rock, there's a wall at 1 end and a roof on top. This was an "off the shelf" ride installed in this space, which left the park a few years ago.
"The Toad Hole" is another unique and iconic ride of Lightwater Valley. It opened as "Devils Cascade" and was essentially a ride where you got in at the top of a hill, into a big skip with seats inside. The skip was mounted on rails, and when the ride began, you'd roll down the hill, up a small hill and down into the lake below. The skip would then float a bit, and then be towed back to a platform where you'd exit. This ride closed in 2005 and has been left to get overgrown ever since in the middle of the park. Visiting this ride again after so long gave me goosebumps. I remember visiting the park as a teen and knowing that this ride sat there abandoned. Barely any images of it exist online. And it was magical seeing it again, surprisingly well preserved.
Sadly the park had stagnated for a long while, with a lack of proper investment, leaving the 1991 coaster to be the parks icon until it closed. The park was bought by "Brighton Pier Group PLC" in recent years which seem to be just winding the park down to a potential land sale or something, which is quite depressing. This one of a kind coaster could have lived on, but instead will be cut up for scrap.
Here's the pics and videos.
Hopefully the park doesnt go down the pan and end up like American Adventure... or Camelot.... or Pleasure Island the various other UK parks that ended up dying completely.
Following on from another members post after they visited Lightwater Valley, I thought i'd post my report from 2 visits, one in November 2021 and another September 2022.
I visited as I wanted to see the state of The Ultimate rollercoaster, as well as other closed attractions there, one of which has been closed for over 15 years.
As the park have now started the process of dismantling the last bit of their park, I might as well post this report showing what was left on my visits. This park means a lot to me, I grew up visiting this park a few times a year, and have many cherished memories of it. I have a keyring somewhere of me riding the Ultimate as a kid.
I hoped that one day i'd have kids and I could bring them to enjoy the same park I once did. Sadly they've backed themselves into a corner and removed pretty much every ride that had any level of thrill to it, aiming the park at young children only.
The Ultimate was the main reason for my visit, a custom built rollercoaster, and one of a kind. It was planned and built essentially in-house. Robert Staveley transformed the site into a thriving theme park, and orchestrated the creation of this ambitious rollercoaster, the longest in the world when it was built. Firstly manufactured by a defunct company called "Big Country Motioneering", then also was famously worked on by British Rail. You can see some of that influence in the way the ride is constructed. Most rollercoasters are either wooden or steel. Usually they have pile-driven foundations, upon which concrete pads are poured, and upon that steel or wood structures are sat.
The Ultimate has steel track bolted to wooden supports. Most of the layout is just steel track bolted to wooden railway sleepers, which just sit in the ground. This isn't an ideal way to build a ride as it's not good for the track to be able to move about so much. The ride was opened by famous boxer Frank Bruno in 1991, and was modified over the years, including removing the "over the shoulder restraints" which were replaced with lapbars.
There was some excitement in me which I kept to myself, as I didn't want to get my hopes up. Between my 2 visits, a generator had been hired and was next to the rides original generator location. And one of the two trains had been pulled out of the station. This got me excited for a potential re-opening of the ride.
The ride was known for being brutally rough from the start, mostly due to the layout being so badly designed, it doesn't account for the forces properly - meaning the train would slam into corners and bang through wierd kinks in the track. It was still hugely popular especially for the first 15 years of its life.
COVID finished this ride off, with the ride closing due to the outbreak and then the park decided to restructure the park, leaving the Ultimate sat there as an icon of a time now gone, the 90s heyday of the park now long gone.
Additionally, there's "Raptor Attack" which opened as "The Rat Ride". This gave you a feeling of going underground in tunnels, into an underground lair. The tunnels you entered via are actually buried underground, and the huge opening the ride sits in is essentially inside a quarry, 3 of the sides of it are bare rock, there's a wall at 1 end and a roof on top. This was an "off the shelf" ride installed in this space, which left the park a few years ago.
"The Toad Hole" is another unique and iconic ride of Lightwater Valley. It opened as "Devils Cascade" and was essentially a ride where you got in at the top of a hill, into a big skip with seats inside. The skip was mounted on rails, and when the ride began, you'd roll down the hill, up a small hill and down into the lake below. The skip would then float a bit, and then be towed back to a platform where you'd exit. This ride closed in 2005 and has been left to get overgrown ever since in the middle of the park. Visiting this ride again after so long gave me goosebumps. I remember visiting the park as a teen and knowing that this ride sat there abandoned. Barely any images of it exist online. And it was magical seeing it again, surprisingly well preserved.
Sadly the park had stagnated for a long while, with a lack of proper investment, leaving the 1991 coaster to be the parks icon until it closed. The park was bought by "Brighton Pier Group PLC" in recent years which seem to be just winding the park down to a potential land sale or something, which is quite depressing. This one of a kind coaster could have lived on, but instead will be cut up for scrap.
Here's the pics and videos.
Hopefully the park doesnt go down the pan and end up like American Adventure... or Camelot.... or Pleasure Island the various other UK parks that ended up dying completely.
