You know what time it is - it’s theme park news time!
Dollywood has confirmed they will be spending half a billion dollars in Pigeon forge
over the next decade. Some of this will be spent on building a new hotel,
HeartSong Lodge and Resort, that is set to open in 2023. The five-story, 302-room rustic retreat
will feature some of the beautiful aspects of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the name
is inspired by Dolly Parton being big-hearted. The new lodge will be opposite DreamMore,
which opened in 2015, which means guests will have easy access to Dollywood and Dollywood's
Splash Country. Dolly Parton said, following the announcement "That's a lot of dough to spend,
but you're going to need it with all the plans and all the dreams that we have going,"
Fårup Sommerland in Denmark is getting a new Vekoma coaster. The planning document for
the new ride reveals it will have a height of 37m, a custom layout and its name will
be 'Woodland'. The addition will be the park’s 8th roller coaster and their fourth by Vekoma.
‘The world of Efteling 2030’ development and zoning plans have been given the green light
to go ahead. The Dutch Council of State ruled that the plan is definitive after seven years
of preparation by the park. Allegedly a circus themed family coaster will be one of the first
rides built, alongside a nostalgic fairground and circus tent, surrounded by smaller attractions.
Due to the effects of Covid, the park won’t be able to start construction right away
as they had hoped - instead they are looking at beginning construction in 2022 depending on the
course of the pandemic over the next year. Fons Jurgens, CEO of Efteling, said “For us, it really
feels like the first giant step towards the future of the World of Efteling that we have in mind.”
A brand new Legoland park is coming to Sichuan Province in China! Merlin Entertainments have
partnered with Global Zhongjun, a development company, to build and operate the new park which
is set to open in 2023. Legoland Sichuan will have two themed hotels and will be the largest Legoland
in the world. It will feature some new things that haven’t been done in other Legoland parks
as John Ussher, Development Executive at Merlin Entertainments, explains “One of the things that
we’re going to do is put Miniland and all of our building activities under one roof. That is partly
for weather protection and model protection. But it is also for the ability to program and bring
more life to Miniland with lighting, sounds, projection mapping, et cetera. That building
will also have a rollercoaster going around it. It will be, effectively, the icon of the park
with a really large figure out at the front of that building.” John also provides a teaser in
terms of the coasters we might see at the park: “We will also definitely put in two or three
brand new attractions. But we can’t talk about that at this point in time.” Many of the details
haven’t been shared yet, but we can’t wait to hear more about this park and watch it be built!
Construction walls have recently gone up around Ramses, a dark ride at Gardaland, revealing the
park’s plan to build a new attraction in 2022. The walls have a jungle like design and read “New
2022, a unique world-class ride for adventurers of all ages”. This isn’t much to go on, but current
rumors state that the new ride will be a family roller coaster built inside the former building
of Ramses. Others speculate that the ride will be themed to Jumanji, the popular jungle-esque
fantasy adventure film series. I think Gardaland will have to work hard to make the Egyptian
facade of Ramses fit the new jungle themed - desert and jungle are just a bit different.
Underlandet has opened in Liseberg, finally! Several years ago Liseberg
announced they would be building a dark ride in the children’s section of the park,
themed to an underground exploration of the rabbits habitat - Liseberg’s mascot
is a rabbit just to explain. The ride was originally meant to open in April of 2020,
however, this was delayed - we all know why. Instead, Underlandet recently opened with Liseberg
in early June. The 150SEK attraction features animatronics and many other exciting effects!
A fire broke out at Universal Studios Hollywood on the 2nd of June. The blaze began in a small
storage area behind the Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem attraction towards the end of the evening.
Fortunately the fire was put out quickly and no one was harmed. The park was relatively unscathed
too, so if you’re a fan of the Minions ride, don’t panic. Are there actual fans of that ride though?
The Avengers campus is officially open! Disney California Adventure debuted their
new Avengers Campus on the 4th June, alongside a new ride, WEB SLINGERS: A Spider-Man Adventure.
The new area also incorporates an already existing attraction, Guardians of the Galaxy - Mission:
Breakout. Though, the initial reaction hasn’t been that great. The ride system used on the
new spiderman ride already exists at the park, in the form of Toy Story Midway Mania! Disney also
somehow forgot to add music to their new ride, to the surprise of many. Since then they have added a
musical score which accompanies conversations with Spiderman through the attraction.
That’s it for another week of theme park news. Until next time I’ll be researching how to travel
to every Legoland park on earth, but by the time I do, I’m sure there’ll be another one...