We're off to the Movie (World)!

Day 4 (Wed, 5 June 2013)

Our second theme park escapade, this time to Movie World!

The kids got their momentum going by riding on the kids' coaster, the Road Runner. In 2006, this was Lesley-Anne's first experience in a roller coaster and she found it scary.  Seven years later, the kids found this disappointingly boring. I guess you can say they've grown up.

A new ride from 2006 was the Justice League 3D ride. You wear 3D glasses on this ride and use the laser guns to shoot as many starro spores (targets) as possible. If you've been to Disneyland, it's somewhat similar to the Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters ride but less sophisticated.  Nobody can beat Disney when it comes to animatronics.

It's quite fun though and a good one for individuals who hate fast rides or have motion sickness issues. The ride confirmed my suspicion - I am a dud shot.  I probably couldn't get a hit even if the target was wearing a giant bulls-eye right across its chest.  Among the four of us, Andre topped the score chart with more than 82,000 points.

When we emerged from the ride, we saw a posse of the Justice League team posing for photos.  The kids ran in to get a shot for old time's sake:

Here's the 2006 version: (notice the superheroes have gotten themselves costume updates since then?)

A water ride - Wild West Falls.

Another ride re-visited - the Scooby Doo Spooky Coaster. This is an indoor roller coaster in the dark.  The track is not actually as scary as some others but it seems scarier because you can't see where the drops are.  In 2006, I persuaded Lesley-Anne to take this ride with me and she emerged almost in tears (even though you can't tell from the picture below).  She has blamed me for her fear of coasters since then.

Not afraid anymore!  Well, not too much. This time, she went on the ride voluntarily and had a new companion. Mummy has grown more chicken over the years. My roller coaster riding days are behind me.

We found ourselves a spot at the Hollywood Stunt Driver Show. It's highly entertaining, much better than the old Police Academy show they used to have.

We also caught the Ice Age 4D show but this one turned out to be a total rip-off.  Quite unlike other 4D shows like the old Shrek one which are from your point of view, to give you the effect that you're going on a ride in the show, this is merely a 4D version of a portion of the Ice Age movie.  It's pretty lame.

In the whole park, my kids' favourite ride was the Green Lantern roller coaster.  Touted as "the steepest inverted drop in the southern hemisphere", it has various sharp turns and corkscrews.  It looked pretty terrifying to me but my kids claim it's not as scary as it looks.  They went on this ride multiple times.

Here's a video we took of the ride. The kids are seated in the front row, far side.

Before we arrived in Gold Coast, Andre had planned to go on the Arkham Asylum roller coaster but unfortunately, it was down for annual maintenance when we were in Movie World.  This is a renamed coaster. It used to be called Lethal Weapon (pic taken in 2006).

Quite surprisingly, it was Lesley-Anne who then suggested to Andre that they go on Superman Escape. Now, this is a roller coaster of epic proportions. You're propelled out at 100km per hour and at one point, there is a 90 degree drop.

I'm not sure why Lesley-Anne suddenly became so brave during this trip. I think she always had the grit in her but just needed to bring it out of hiding.  She treats roller coasters now like a personal challenge, which I guess is one way of channeling one's inner courage!

Here's a video of the ride.  You couldn't pay me to go on this.

After Superman Escape, Lesley-Anne said she feels like can face anything!

The last ride the kids tried was the Batwing Spaceshot. You're shot 60m upwards and then dropped back down.

Here's a video clip. Luckily, Lesley-Anne went on this when she was all fired up after Superman Escape because she said she left her heart up the tower of the Batwing.  Never again!

A last look at the park before we departed.  Green Lantern's insignia could be seen for miles.  Pretty cool.

Go-karting - the need for speed

Day 3 (Tues, 4 June 2013)

June is winter in Australia but in the Gold Coast, the winter is very mild.  While we were there, the days were sunny and about 20-22 degrees celsius, lovely for walking outdoors.  Sunrise is about 6.30am and sunset about 5.30pm. By 6pm, it's pitch dark so many restaurants start serving dinner from 4.30pm. We found it quite unusual that even when we decided to have an early dinner at 5pm, there would already be diners halfway through their meals!

Spectacular sunrise from our apartment.

Today, we decided we go go-karting! Well, this was actually just for Andre's sake as the rest of us weren't really interested.  One of Andre's passions in life is driving, fueled by his addiction to the Top Gear series.  So off we went to Kingston Park Raceway which is about an hour's drive from Gold Coast.

Side note: Most of the tourist attractions are towards the north so staying at Main Beach (the top end of the beach) meant we saved quite a bit of time on driving. Even though Gold Coast Highway is named a highway, it has many traffic lights and that can slow you down considerably.

We chose Kingston Park Raceway even though there are other go-kart operators closer to where we stayed because it has a really nice outdoor track.  There are two tracks: Le Mans (for adults) and Monte Carlo (kids track) but the day we were there, they were only operating the Le Mans track for both kids and adults.  Maybe they do this on weekdays to save on manpower as there are fewer visitors.

There are four categories of race karts based on age and height. Do check out tourist brochures and their website for discount coupons. There's a one-time A$5.50 charge for registration and helmet rental.

Watching the safety video and waiting to suit up.

Getting into the assigned go-kart.

And off he went!

The track was really fantastic but the dampener was the waiting time.  Each session lasts 6 mins but because the different categories of racers can't be on the track at the same time for safety reasons, they have to rotate among the different groups of racers.  Since they were only operating the Le Mans track that day, it meant we had to wait for about 20 mins between sessions. Really boring for non-participants.

So even though we had initially planned on letting Andre go 6 times, we figured that would mean having to be there all day which wasn't our idea of fun. In the end, we let him go for two sessions.

Here's my observation: go-karting, like race driving, really is a boy thing. There was one other girl  and another boy racing with Andre in his sessions.  I've no idea how but even before she had left the pit, the girl managed to lose track of the boy in the pole position and drove straight into the wrong lane, causing the marshalls to yell and chase after her.  After she got on the right path, she drove like going on a scenic tour while the 2 boys tore around the track like speed demons.

 

There's also nothing like a race track to bring out the competitive spirit in boys.  The other boy Bailey already had a trial run session before Andre so he was confidently navigating the track at top speed as Andre tried to find his groove during his first session.  In his second session, knowing that this was to be his last, Andre went all out.  Bailey was in the pole position and tried to block Andre from overtaking on the straight stretches by staying in the middle of the track, so we thought Andre was going to come in second again.  Then at a curve, Andre took a chance and successfully overtook Bailey from the inside.  Bailey, clearly as competitive as Andre, tried to catch up but ended up crashing a little while later, putting him out of the race.

Speed racing and boys. Innate? I'm inclined to believe so!

Here's a short clip of Andre's second race. 

After all that excitement, we headed out to Pacific Fair Shopping Centre for lunch and a spot of shopping.  To me, this is the best shopping mall in Gold Coast. Lots of sales while we were there.

Lunch was at a little Japanese cafe Hanaichi. Good sized rice bowls at decent prices (A$11 or thereabouts).  The chef is supposed to be award winning.

Mandatory cup of coffee. I'm not crazy about Australian coffee in general.  It tends to be very weak and the only saving grace is that their milk is fantastic.  The only good coffee I had throughout the entire trip was at Star Coffee at Harbour Town mall that brewed Lavazza brand coffee.  However, coffee in Australia is more reasonably priced than in Singapore. You can usually get a regular cup for under A$4. 

Back at Xanadu in the afternoon, Kenneth and Andre decided to try out the tennis court.  You can hire their rackets and tennis balls for A$5, for as long as you want.

This has been Andre's day. He enjoyed it thoroughly.

Revisting a childhood Dream (World)

Day 2 (Mon, 3 June 2013)

Gold Coast holds fond memories for us. Kenneth and I visited it for the first time before the kids were born, and we revisited it in 2006, when Lesley-Anne was only 9 and Andre 5.  We had a great trip each time and remember it as a fun and vibrant city, partly because of the many theme parks.

In fact, one of main reasons we decided to go back to Gold Coast once again was so that our kids could live out their theme park fantasies before they got too old.  Just looking at our 2006 photos made me nostalgic - the kids were so cute then! It was also fun to compare the "then" and "now" photos, which I'll be doing a fair bit in this post.

If you have been reading my travel blog, you'll know that we're quite a theme park family. We normally arrive just before the park opens and leave only when it closes.  My kids, especially Andre, go crazy and will go on their favourite rides over and over.  Just as well they get their money's worth as I've grown increasingly chicken as I age.  I used to brave corkscrews without hesitation but these days, just the thought of it makes me feel queasy.  Kenneth, with his hereditary motion sickness, has always preferred his feet on terra firma.  At theme parks, he is the default bag handler and camera man.

Gold Coast has a myriad of theme parks but we decided to visit just two this time as they have the best rides, in our opinion. The first one we went to was Dream World.  When the gates opened, we made a beeline for the ride Escape From Madagascar.  This ride has a funny story to it.  In 2006, it was called Runaway Reptar and I'd made Lesley-Anne go on it with me.  She was rather timid back then and she was terrified by it. Andre had wanted to go on it badly but he missed the height requirement (110cm) by just a couple of cm.

When we first found out we were coming back to Gold Coast, Andre immediately googled Dream World and was disappointed that Runaway Reptar no longer existed. It was only later that we discovered they had merely renamed it as Escape From Madagascar. Clever way of making rides current, without having to demolish and re-build! 

The ride is one of those where your feet dangle and since it's a family ride, it is exciting without being terrifying.  Great fun. It's mild enough for Lesley-Anne to realise just how much of a chicken she was back then, to have been scared out of her wits by it!

We went on another nostalgic ride - the River Rapids. This was our favourite ride in 2006 - we lost count of the number of times we went on it.

The signboard hasn't changed in 7 years!

In this ride, you may get totally soaked or emerge completely dry, depending on where you sit and how the boat turns.  It's really the luck of the draw and it was absolutely hilarious because Andre wanted to get wet but Lesley-Anne didn't.  On 4 consecutive rides, no matter where she sat, Lesley-Anne got completely drenched and Andre remained dry.  It was almost as if the waterfall was gunning directly for her!

In the end, it didn't matter because we went on this so much that we eventually all got wet. 

Throughout the park, the kids posed in various places for old times' sake.  Like these:

One tip about theme parks in Gold Coast - the food there tends to be pricey and very limited. For example, at Dream World, a nondescript burger and fries platter costs A$14.95.  Fortunately, I found out about this in advance and following online tips, we packed our own lunch.  We'd bought two buckets of roast chicken legs at the supermarket the day before, heated them up in the morning and brought them along.  When we feasted on them at Dream World, we saw many envious looks.  A$12 fed the whole family.  My advice: pack a lunch.

Dream World has a wildlife section which features Australian animals. Feeding the roos - always a popular activity.  2013:

2006:

A couple of lovely animal shots by Lesley-Anne:

In 2006, one of Lesley-Anne's greatest disappointments was that she was too small to be allowed to hold a koala.  Obviously this time, we weren't about to let the opportunity pass by again, so the kids went for it.  Some states in Australia don't allow koalas to be carried by strangers as it can be stressful for the animal.  But according to its handler, this koala is so relaxed it doesn't mind being carried for pictures.  You can probably tell from the way it's not even bothering to cling on to Andre. It looks like it's just draped on like a rag doll.

More rides in the afternoon.  Shockwave is touted as a family ride but personally, I think this is a mis-classification.  The track is similar to the Viking, only lower, except that you sit around a circular contraption that keeps spinning and never seems to end.  Andre went on it and staggered out, saying it was scarier than it looks as you feel like you're going to be flung off.  I'll bet. I saw several unsuspecting aunties and ah peks clinging on for dear life during the ride. I'm sure they were praying for it to stop.

We went on many other rides throughout the day but the one that stood out most for us was Mick Doohan's Motocoaster.  This is a roller coaster ride unlike any other.  You're strapped in on one of the motorbikes and speed along a track to simulate riding on a very fast bike.  There are many sharp turns but no drops, so it's good fun for people like me who hate heart-stopping drops.

Here's a video Lesley-Anne shot of the ride.  Andre is in the second row of bikes.

I went on it 3 times and Lesley-Anne about 5. Andre loved it so much he spent the last hour at Dream World just taking and re-taking this ride. There was hardly any waiting time so I think he managed about 13 times in all.

Unanimously, we agreed this was hands down, the best ride in Dream World.