We had a somewhat leisurely morning and didn’t head to breakfast till 8.30am. Enjoyed bread and cheese as always. Then we collected the car and headed to Europe’s second most popular theme park (after Disneyland Paris) – Europa Park.
It was an absolutely freezing cold day and started at about 6 deg, with a top of 9 deg. We don’t get many days this cold in Australia. Kevin had been wanting a cold day and today he got it.
The park was a lot busier than expected. We thought the cold and drizzly weather would have kept locals aways. And maybe it was quiet for the park. We saw quite a few groups of hens and bucks parties. It must be the thing here to dress up as a group (usually as an animal).
We picked up an English map but it was rather hard to navigate with so we ended up just following the crowds. We knew the park was really big and wanting to concentrate on the big coasters so we missed a lot of the smaller attractions.
Kevin went on the Ghost Castle. I don’t like being scared so sat this one out. However, it turns out it was just a copy of the Haunted Mansion at Disney. Actually, quite a lot of the park is a copy of Disney, even down to the mouse mascot.
Our next ride ended up being a water coaster called Poseidon. I really didn’t want to do this as it was so cold and I didn’t want to get wet. But we went on and it was pretty fun. Part coaster, part flume ride. And yes, I did get wet – my arm was saturated.
The park is all set out in the themed lands. The above ride was in Greece.
Kevin wanted a snack and we saw someone eating gyros, we thought we could share as walked to the next ride. Unfortunately we ended up with this!!!! Not quite the snack we wanted at 10.30am. I just had some of the chips to try and warm me up.
Our next ride was a game ride where you had to shoot stuff (much like Buzz Lightyear). Kevin won!
Then came on of my favourite rides of the day – Euro-Mir (in Russia). I thought this was a really cool ride, but Kevin got a bit motion sick. We took quite a lot of video today so you’ll be able to see the ride better once we get home (and I get all the video footage edited).
Time for the some coffee and tea to warm up (though Kevin threw his coffee in the bin again).
In France he spotted the crepe place so we got another sugar crepe to share. It was “almost” as delicious as the one we ate in the real France.
We then headed into Holland to the Pirates of the Caribbean, oops I mean Pirates of Batavia.
Such a Disney copy, but as you can see definitely not the quality of DIsney.
And instead of the dog with the keys, they have a monkey.
We rode Blue Fire in Iceland – which was pretty awesome.
and Wodan (a huge timber coaster built last year) which I loved too. Kevin doesn’t enjoy coasters like he used to and said he’d be happy not to ride them again. I still love them.
It really was a shame it was so cold today. I’m sure we would have enjoyed the park (and rides) that much more if we hadn’t been freezing.
There was a great interactive area called Grimm’s Enchanted Forest – which I’m sure the girls would have enjoyed (plenty of adults were playing there). There was also a great looking Children’s World play area. Definitely something for all ages at this park. And we didn’t even do any of the shows (being that they were in German).
We took a photo of the horse for Christy.
Around 2pm we finally found ourselves back in France and found a lovely looking place to have lunch. Best of all, it was nice and warm in there.
Kevin ordered a kids schnitzel and chips but said it wasn’t that good.
I had a stuffed capsicum and veggies. It might not have looked the prettiest but boy did it taste good.
Time to get rugged up and head back out in the cold. Thought this sign was appropriate for someone who’s too old to ride coasters! Oh, fahrt in German means exit but I don’t know what this sign really means.
We’d had enough of being cold and had done all but two of the big coasters, so decided we had had enough. But not before doing a loop around the park on the monorail.
Kevin certainly did NOT look like a local.
So it was goodbye to Europa Park. We did have a good day but I’m sure it would have been much better with warmer weather. I don’t think we’d return on our own but probably would if we had the kids with us.
We stopped to fill up the petrol tank (and get a cup of tea), then it was back to Freiburg.
We returned the car at the train station and picked up some imitation Subway for dinner.
I got quite excited when I spotted an Accessorize shop in the station. Unfortunately it was pretty small and hard to move around it.
It was a pretty short walk back to the hotel, but I found a Fossil store along the way and stopped to buy a new travel wallet (this was a planned purchase as I was using one that Christy had been set to donate).
They even gave me a lovely tin box as a gift but I don’t really have room to take it with me.
We were back in our room by 5pm. I had a shower and it was nice to have time to enjoy a bit of pamper time with a face mask. I then made a start of on packing and had my dinner in bed (it was a bit too cold siting out) while watching True Blood.
Tomorrow : We take the high speed ICE train to Berlin.