Today, Rob took a walk to see a museum, Heather and Ken were off on their own to do some exploring, and I headed over to the other amusement park here: Parque de Atracciones de Madrid. Unlike Parque Warner two days ago, I didn’t need to sell a kidney to afford a cab ride out to the park - I could take the metro right to it. I knew where the metro station was, just a block from the hotel and I knew which stop to get off at and I knew vaguely how the metro ticket system works, having googled it already. The first stop was the Metro station, where I would have to get a transit card from a specially marked ticket machine. Easy enough, once I figured out how to get the screen to tell me things in English.

Once I got the card, I loaded it with enough money to get to my stop and headed down into the underground to find my train.

It was only about a 12 minute ride to Batán, the stop I needed. By this time, the underground had become above ground and the sunshine was a nice change of pace from the tunnels.

I didn’t know how far I’d have to walk from the stop to the park, but as the train pulled into the station, I could see the entrance to the park literally right next to the station. I was there about an hour before the park opened, so there were only a few people around. No worries. This is how I like to do a park: get there before it opens, be one of the first ones in, then hit up a bunch of rides while the throngs of people lined up at the gate are still waiting to buy a ticket.

It didn’t take long for more people to show up - by the time the park was getting ready to open the gates, there were several hundred people lined up waiting for the gates to open.

Once inside, I scanned the horizon for coaster track. None of was visible right away, as (unlike Parque Warner) the park was lush and green with lots of trees and hills and shade.

Also unlike Parque Warner, the park was mostly free of licensed characters. The exception was the kiddie land area, which was Nickelodeon Land - home of SpongeBob SquarePants, Paw Patrol, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and all of that. It was right at the front of the park, just inside the entrance (you can see a bit of it in the photo above, at the left side). This is the best thing and I wish that other parks would take notice. Most families with very small children will likely only go to the kiddie land area. Why make them trek deep into the park to get to the area where they want to go? It also means that all of the little kids and the giant strollers are going to stay right up front and not clog up all the walkways in the rest of the park. Bravo!

I passed by Nickelodeon Land and the licensed properties fell away and what was left was decorations, architecture, and theming that was created by the park itself. I like this much, much better than corporate tie-in theming. Have a look at the castle-like entrance to the mine train coaster, for example. How nice is this?

The mine train (and most everything else at the park) was unknown to me. I had no idea who made it, what to expect, or what it would do. It’s pretty tall for a mine train coaster, which are usually set in and around tunnels and mine shafts and such. It’s called TNT Tren de la Mina (TNT Mine Train).

I looked it up after I left - it’s a Gerstlauer brand mine train. It was fun enough, but probably not fun enough to come back to later. Lots and lots of folks were still outside the gates waiting to get in, so I made sure to hit as many rides as I could before the crowds built up.

Right next to that was the edge of Nickelodeon Land and their Paw Patrol coaster.

I know what you’re thinking: “why would I even bother with such a small coaster?”

Two reasons: [1] I’m a credit whore. I’ll ride any coaster, no matter how small, to “get the credit” (add it to the list of coasters I’ve been on). Sometimes, the term is shortened to “creho” and it’s a thing.

[2] Occasionally, you get really fun experiences on these little rides, which you’d never know about unless you threw your dignity under the bus long enough to get on the kiddie coaster. These things are designed for much smaller people, and when your centre of gravity is radically different, the forces and such on the ride can lead to giggle-inducing fun.

This was one of those. While the kiddos got a nice, gentle little ride, the adults got tossed around like rag dolls. The kids were all “wheeee” and the adults were all “OMG OMG”. It was funny.

Next to this was another kiddie coaster with hanging cars shaped like airplanes.

This one actually WAS tame, but I’d never seen one of these before, so yay. It’s called Padrino Voladores (Flying Godparents) and there are only three of these in existence. The other two are in India and Japan. It wasn’t much, but it was cute and rare and there was no queue for it. On to the next thing.

Vertigo is a standard “wild mouse” coaster.

And next to Vertigo is Abismo. It’s a Maurer brand Sky Loop model - I’ve been on two of them previously: one in Arkansas and another in Finland - but this one isn’t just the loop, it’s got a whole section of track after the loop. I didn’t even know this was a thing. It’s called Abismo (Abyss).

I looked it up later, and this is the only one in the world. It’s bizarre, just like the standard Sky Loops.

You begin with a slow, vertical climb, but then it keeps climbing up and around until you’re upside-down about 15 storeys in the air.

It’s bizarre, hanging there upside-down, looking at this Twizzler-track hanging out in midair… then you slide off the lift chain and make your way into the twisted, suspended track, flipping right-side-up, then upside-down again.

Now, the other two Sky Loops I’ve been on - one in Finland and one in Arkansas - dive back down to the loading station after this and that’s the whole ride. But this one is unique in that after it dives out of the Sky Loop, there’s a whole coaster layout after that. A rising, twisting turnaround followed by a camelback hill with some wicked airtime…

…then an overbooked turn and back to the station. You rocket back up the vertical lift, getting almost 2/3 of the way to the top before the catch chain slowly lowers the train back down to unload. It’s difficult to explain, so here’s a video I took:

Right next door to that is Tarántula a standard Maurer brand SC3000 model spinning coaster. Fun enough, but these aren’t the most comfortable rides, since the cars freely spin as they traverse the track and sometimes you’re facing in a direction that runs contrary to the turns or other forces you’ll encounter.

It was fun enough, but the small cars mean that the queue moves very slowly. Once and done.

Last up was Tornado, an Intamin brand inverted coaster. Inverted coasters are nothing new (there were two of them at Parque Warner just two days ago) but the fact that it’s an Intamin brand inverted coaster makes it very rare. In fact, there are only two in the world. I’ve ridden the other one and I liked it a lot, even though we rode in a torrential downpour that day.

So I was pretty excited about riding this one with sunshine and blue skies overhead. I was even more excited to see that there was almost no queue!

This one has the added bonus of being in a corner of the park basically by itself, nestled in the trees. It feels like it’s been there since the beginning, a part of the natural landscape,

The ride itself is quite good - smooth and well engineered without the head-battering present in some other manufacturers’ versions of this ride.

After a couple of rides on Tornado, I made my way back to the entrance, having gotten all the rides in that I wanted to do in less than three hours. It really does pay to get there early and be one of the first through the gate. The crowds were beginning to pick up by the time I left.

Of the two parks in Madrid - Parque Warner and Parque de Atracciones - Parque Warner has the better rides by a huge margin. However, if you’re looking at the experience of the park as a whole, I’ve gotta say that I had a better time at Parque de Atracciones. I like not having corporate theming tie-ins plastered on every ride, I like the more relaxed atmosphere, and I love that there are trees and shade and beautiful landscaping.

Not only that, but Parque de Atracciones is considerably cheaper and a lot easier to get to. Bonus: seniors (65+) get in free! I may have to pay them another visit when I’m older.

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