A Day Out: Drayton Manor Theme Park

"You two are going to hate me."
Krissy turned to give Wayne and me a big, evil grin. We were sitting on a ride at Drayton Manor theme park - a ride she promised us was just a log flume. We had just been down one flume – one down, two to go.
My stomach threatened to fall out.
"Why?"
"We're going to go backwards."
"WHAT?"

Wayne and I are first class, self declared Wimps when it comes to terrifying rides. If she had mentioned anything about going backwards down this flume, I would have said no to going on it. Which is why, I imagine, she didn’t mention it until a few moments before it was going to happen.
Imprints from my fingers will, I believe, never leave the bar onto which I was holding on for dear life as we plunged backwards, down a slope of unknown steepness, and immediately got drenched by the splash of water.
Freezing cold, very wet water.

Why did I go to a theme park if I wasn't expecting to go on anything? Same reason as I went to Alton Towers when I left Sixth Form - to go somewhere new, to hang around with my friends, and to laugh at other people going on stupidly terrifying rides. Yeah okay, it would be a bit (very) expensive to go to a theme park purely for that, but hey, I have been good and barely spent anything this year, so oh well.
Besides, my bursary was due to go in that day.
Miss Krissy and Kelly, however, would not stand for this and dragged me on as many rides as possible. The only ride I refused to go on was a spinny roundy thing with Speedy Gonzales on it. Rides that spin around in circles have a weird effect on me – I get really, really ill. I’ve never been able to go on Teacups, waltzers, or even roundabouts without getting very sick, so I didn’t want to go on it.
Kelly said I did the right thing by not going on, so I am very pleased I said no to that one! Saying that, somehow they did manage to get me to go on Black Revolver (waltzers) and some barrel things that were basically the same as the Teacups. They weren’t even too bad – okay, so I was a bit dizzy afterwards, but I was nowhere as ill as I usually get after going on that type of thing.

I enjoyed most of the rides I went on, actually. A special mention goes to The Buffalo Coaster, the first coaster that I have ever been on! That one was Wayne's fault, not Krissy or Kelly's. They were in the queue already and they were going to let me off. It was Wayne who grabbed me and dragged me into the queue.
Mean git.
Okay, so it was a rollercoaster for kids.
Apart from a couple of sharp bends and dips, it was pretty simple - no loop the loops, no big slopes, nothing drastic. It was, however, the biggest ride I had ever been on, and so I was bricking it while waiting in the queue to be allowed on. As it happens, I needn't have worried. It was absolutely fine - I even found myself enjoying it! We enjoyed it so much that we ended up going on it twice! I got thrown around a lot, especially on the second go, and was screaming more in pain than enjoyment or terror as I earned bruise after bruise after bruise. But hey, they’ll go soon.
I’m glad he did drag me on there. Even if I was shitting myself in the minutes before the ride set off.

Splash Canyon was the only other ride we went on twice. The first time I went on it, I was with the full group, the second time I was just with Wayne. I loved it as much the second time as I did the first, although I sustained more injuries in it. There was a very scary/funny moment when we got caught between two currents and were in danger of getting stuck on the course, but (with some help from a boat behind us) we managed to break free. The injuries came towards the end of the ride.
There’s a camera poised to get photos. We wanted one, but if we had been in our original seats, we would have got a shot of the backs of our heads. So, when we saw the camera, we dived for seats that would mean we would get an okay picture.
The flash went off.
And suddenly the rapids meant the boat jerked off to the side. I was caught unaware, and flew off the seat, landing hard on the steps that lead into the boat. And then it jerked again: I earned another bruise when my arm smashed into the side of the boat.
At least the photo was good!

While not particularly thrilling and despite me being completely crap at it, the Golden Nugget Shoot Out was lots of fun. We were in a little cart; Kelly and Krissy in the front, Wayne and me in the back. Have you been to Cadbury’s World before? If you have, you know there’s a ride through a trippy land of dancing coca beans.
This ride was kind of like that, but it was far less terrifying.
In the front of the seats were guns, and you had to use the guns to shoot targets that were all over the place. Hitting the target meant that the item the target was placed on would move.
Wayne, having played lots of games before, came first. Kelly came second, Krissy came third…I came last. Yay, go me!

One of the less brilliant rides of the day was Excalibur. Can it even be described as a ride, when it was neither interesting or exciting? I don’t know. I do know it was pretty damn awful, but Krissy had warned us about that before. Her reasoning for going on it anyway? “You’re at Drayton Manor, you have to go on as many rides as you can!”
Fair enough, Krissy.
The best thing about the ride was some of the quotes that came out of it.

*sees ducks*
Wayne: Look! Real wildlife!
Us: …
*boat turns a bit and we see a bloke by the trees*
Wayne: A real, authentic fat man!
Us: *sporfle*

The most exciting part of the ride wasn’t part of the ride. Nor was it particularly exciting. It was scary, but not in the normal themepark type way.
There was a duck in front of the boat, and we were *this close* (imagine a very small measurement) to running him over.
When you say that about a ride, you know things are bad.

Very similar to Excalibur was the very underwhelming Pirate Bay. Based on Pirates of the Caribbean, the main difference (apart from it being based on a battle and not the story of the Round Table) was the complete lack of ducks.
And a lot more pirates in suspicious positions that you don’t really want to think too much about.

The absolute shittiest ride of the day, though, was the Haunted House. The sign out the front promised much:

THE SCARIEST PLACE UNDER ONE ROOF.

As is usually the case with such things, this was a wild over estimate – I have been on scarier donkey rides at Skeggy beach. (Admittedly they aren’t UNDER ONE ROOF, but still.)
After a several minute wait, you go into a small room and watch a cliché filled film about some bad actors pretending to be paranormal investigators. They disappeared, and have never been seen again. Therefore this scientist dude wants more people to go in and check it out. The attendant turns the telly off, and opens a door, leading you through. Lights flicker on and off.
It could be scary if you are the biggest wimp in the entire universe.
Suddenly all lights go out. There’s screams from up front. I look around, no idea what the hell’s meant to be scary. My gaze goes upwards, and I’m looking at the ceiling. A very poor skeleton flies above us, so quickly that most people don’t have a clue what they’re supposed to be looking at.
The lights flicker back on again. We’re lead through a door at the end of the hall.
We emerge into a large room with three paintings on the wall. ‘Behind’ one of them is a puppet skeleton with a thick German accent that makes it difficult to understand what the hell he’s going on about. I think he said something about never being able to escape his house unless we find the Inner Sanctum. The atmosphere might even have been slightly scary, if it wasn’t for the bored looking attendant at the side of the room playing on his phone!
Anyway, straight after the puppet’s finished talking (with much Evil Laughter™ from him and laughter from me) we’re broken into two groups. One group goes through a door on the left, one goes through one on the right.
Both doors lead straight into the Inner Sanctum.
Possibly the simplest escape from a haunted house, ever.
We sit down, are told to hold on tight…and the walls spin around. Okay, so it makes you a bit disorientated. But, more than being scary, it was absolutely bloody hilarious how bad it was!

The only part of the day I completely hated was the zoo. I was reading the signs as I went around, and the number of animals whose natural habitats were in deep forests and yet had only one small tree in their cage was depressing. Plus, I hate zoos anyway. I spent half the time walking around fighting the urge to break down in tears for the poor creatures.
But I won’t talk about that in this post. It’s too depressing and cry-worthy to talk about in a post that should be happy. For the most part, it was an absolutely amazing day with three of my best friends, and was well worth the 19 quid I paid to get in. I would go again any time, and am already thinking about arranging a trip there with my brother sometime!