Mistake of My Life: Eurostar

Julie, Jackie and I went on a weeknight expedition to Eurostar, a small carnival at the Fort. We've been getting mixed reviews and comments from our peers but hey it's something new so we were excited in trying it out.



Right now I'd say that the Eurostar rides made a wimp out of me, considering that I consider myself a somewhat theme-park-ride veteran!

----------------

What I Liked Most: BOOSTER

BOOSTER is a revolving disc platform tilted at a 10-degree angle. Riders sit on suspended chairs configured like an octopus: 4 arms radiate outward from a central axis and revolve about it. Moreover, the chairs themselves rotate at an angle perpendicular to the backrest.

Think of the arrangement that the center of the disc platform is the sun, the axis for the chairs as a planet, and the chairs are like moons engaged in planetary motion --- except that the moons can't make up their minds whether to spin this way or that while going around the planet.

The ride starts out calmly --- probably the designer's idea of providing 'false security' to the riders --- when all of a sudden the revolving disc will be provided sudden boosts in speed. The tilted disc provides the momentum gain for the arms and the seats. Eventually, you'll end up oriented upside-down, sideways-up, right-side-up and everything-in-between as the ride gets faster-and-faster.

Strobe lights provided a desirable visual disorientation (kinda makes you feel like having 'E' -- not that I've tried it before) to add to the thrill factor.

I got off the ride laughing uncontrollably... i was probably hysterical hahaha. The other riders were in a zombie-like daze though... too bad for them.

I woke up today with slight bruises on my shoulders/upper back.

-------------------

What I Liked Least: FLIPPER

You know that 'rotating saucer/teacup' kiddie ride in most fairs? Sounds peanuts, right?

FLIPPER is just like the rotating teacup but instead of going round-and-round on a level platform, the disc-platform tilts at almost near-vertical! Holy-mother-of-sh*t! I lost track of how fast the disc was going because I was too busy checking if my stomach is still where it should be.

So that's the way how shaker fries feel.

This ride is definitely NOT my cup of tea.

-------------------------

Ride-which-garnered-the-most-expletives-from-me: RANGER

"Anchors Away" of Enchanted Kingdom is a walk in the park compared to this smaller cousin of his.

This ride looks like a rock-back-and-forth attraction, but upon stepping onboard the 'ship' I definitely had my doubts.

Instead of leg restraints, this ride has padded chest restraints (a padded bar pushes your chest and back towards the backrest. And it's caged -- there are overhead steel bars.

First sway: fine... 90 degrees. I can live with that.
Second rock: about 140 degrees... Tolerable.
Next sway: holy f*cking sh*t... almost upside-down, but not quite.
Next sway: p*tang **a... (we were completely upside-down, and I was holding on to the overhead steel bars already)

I thought that was the end of the ride... but the 'fun' was just starting.

Next sway: AAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGHHHHH!!! There was no next sway. The ride just looped and looped continuously.
And then it stopped at the top (again, we were upside-down).

Slowly, the ride began to tilt in the other direction... ohnooo... AAAAAAAGGGGHHH!!!! hooooolllyyy fuuuuuu*****KKKK!

We looped in the other direction. And looped. And looped. I lost track after three loops because I was concentrating very hard not to throw up!

Somewhere along the way I distinctly remember saying "ayoko na!!!" ... boy, that was a first from me.

This ride really made me feel *sick*. Burp... urk..

----------------------------

EASIEST-yet-MOST-THRILLING RIDE: JOKER

That is, if you're not afraid of heights. Well, I'm not. Julie chickened out on this one.

40+ feet, going around in circles at 100 km/hour centripetal speed right-side-up and upside-down! At some point, you get almost the same feeling as when you're bungee-jumping!

Hoo boy!



We called it quits after these rides (what?! we've only been at Eurostar for less than an hour!). I recommended that we find ourselves some tea and hot soup to alleviate our almost-vomit-able situations (hey, that really works! Julie and Jackie gave it a thumbs-up after!) so we headed off to Good Earth Tea Room nearby.