 It's once again time for IAAPA and this year we've once again got Renée and Chris in Orlando covering all of the coverage for us. We'll try and update this as often as possible but be sure you are following us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat (park_journey) all day for updates. Coverage by Renée Girard and Chris Con We are here! IAAPA day 1.  We are at the SeaWorld press event for the new attractions reveal.   SeaWorld Orlando’s Infinity Falls features a 40 foot drop and close encounters with animals native to the rainforest.  
Ride vehicle reveal for Oscar’s Wacky Taxi at Sesame Place by The Gravity Group opening spring 2018. 
 Oscar’s Wacky Taxi, coming soon to Sesame Place!  Time Traveler coaster by Mack opening in Silver Doller City in spring 2018. 
Closer look at Time Traveler by Mack, coming soon to Silver Dollar City.   Checking out what’s new at Busch Gardens Williamsburg next year, the action VR ride Battle for Eire.  Battle for Eire features a motion based theater simulator with 360 VR headset. Opening spring 2018 at Busch Gardens Williamsburg.  Set in the Ireland area of Busch Gardens Williamsburg, Battle for Eire introduces several new characters. 
Addie is one of the main characters to be featured in Battle for Eire.  We’re ready to see what’s new from the folks at Dynamic Attractions.   Dynamic Attractions new dark ride system is the all-terrain dark ride.    Dynamic Attractions’ Dragon Rider system allows guests to feel as though you’re flying through the air on a Dragon.
 Awesome work from Dynamic Attractions. Check out the models for the all-terrain dark ride and dragon rider.  Waiting for the big reveal at Skyline Attractions for their ride at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom  Harley Quinn’s Crazy Coaster by Skyline is the first and only coaster of its kind in the world. 
Harley Quinn Crazy Coaster looks great! Coming to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom next year.
Love Beaver Tails! Please bring them to more theme parks in the US.
 RMC design for Twisted Cyclone, opening next year at Six Flags Over Georgia.  That’s all for day one of IAAPA. Stay tuned for more tomorrow!  Related Updates:
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 Today is the last day of IAAPA which is the Amusement Industry's yearly trade show in Orlando. To say that they cram a LOT of stuff into 4 days would be an extreme understatement. We had two days of Live Coverage (IAAPA Day One and IAAPA Day Two) which included a LOT of great announcements. What we're going to do today is concentrate on some of the announcements that we thought were awesome and give out some "awards". Enjoy!! HOLY CRAP, IS THIS ENTIRE EVENT IN VR AWARD!?!? To say that 2016 was the year of VR at IAAPA would be putting it mildly. It was EVERYWHERE and in lots of different forms. While we think VR certainly has it's place we are traditionalists when it comes to Roller Coasters and thrill rides, so we kind of like them to be left alone. That being said, some of the VR that we saw at IAAPA this week especially in the interactive video game type simulators was really cool. Biggest news that totally blew up our Twitter (in a good way) Award The awesome people at Sally Corp have done it again and unveiled their concept for a Five Nights at Freddy's Dark Ride. While not a whole lot of details are readily available right now and no park has announced it, with all of the excitement around this one we're sure it's only a matter of time. Remember, IAAPA has a lot of concepts from companies that make rides, and there are deals going on throughout the entire convention with parks buying what the companies are selling. Hopefully we'll hear something about this one going to a park soon. Most awesome coaster concept This is an easy one, and it's this model from MACK Rides. First off, MACK rides are already awesome, but this concept appears to be perfect for some smaller parks looking to make a big impact. We can already think of 10-12 parks that this type of ride would be PERFECT for and would essentially put them on the map for the coaster community. Again, no park has announced that they are building this, but there are rumors flying around already. Stay Tuned!! Most amazing resurrection of technology the Mouse never uses anymore Award There was some disagreement on the awesomeness of this concept among the members of Team Park Journey. Some of us thought it was just a rehash of technology used in Carousel of Progress. Others thought, well, if Disney isn't gonna use it then why shouldn't somebody else. Overall, we think the motion theater from Dynamic Attractions is one of the winners of this years show, the possibilities are endless from large and small parks and things in between like aquariums, observatory's and more. We can't wait to see this put into action. Tech we are SURE is gonna end up in a plethora of Haunts in 2017 Award We became familiar with Technifex last week through their press release, we found it very intriguing and made sure to put them on our list for IAAPA. And we sure weren't disappointed. In addition, the people there are amazing and it looks like sometime in the VERY near future we'll be heading to their shop in Valencia to get a closer look at what they do. So stay tuned for that!! The "Stepping it up in a BIG way" Award This was another easy one, and it goes to Triotech. They started off working exclusively with a couple of Cedar Fair parks with, frankly, some mixed results. We were VERY impressed with the Ninjago Ride at Legoland this year though. They definitely addressed some of the issues such as capacity and graphics. This year they announced so many new concepts it was hard to keep track. But we loved their demo's of the The Flyer (coming to San Francisco next year) and Werewolves. But later on Day One they announced a new Walking Dead walk-through attraction coming to Las Vegas next year but also a Ghostbusters 5D attraction coming next year to Heide Park in Germany. They are working with the production companies for these two attractions so they are definitely making a name for themselves and stepping it up. What we want the new Wild Rivers in Irvine to look like Award We've never made any illusions about our extreme love for WhiteWater West. Great slides, great people and check out these models. They are simply amazing. So we totally volunteer as tribute for the new waterpark they are supposedly building in Irvine because we want to ride all of this. We can't wait to ride whatever you're building now, so will you just announce it already Award RMC has taken the coaster world by storm. Sure, they had a couple of hiccups this year, but every time we ride Twisted Colossus it just keeps getting better and better. So of course we had to spend some time checking out RMC, and their amazing track designs. Oddly enough, nothing really announced for 2017 ... yet. But we're sure that's gonna change and change quick. Best looking trains Award This isn't just going to one park, but really to an entire chain of parks, who is working with three different manufacturers to make their trains (how awesome is that). SeaWorld Parks totally stole the show with their trains for InvadR at Busch Gardens Williamsburg, Wave Breaker at SeaWorld San Antonio and Ocean Explorer at SeaWorld San Diego. These are easily among our three most anticipated rides for 2017 and we can't wait to check them out. Most Badass IAAPA Coverage Team Award We'd be remiss if we didn't mention our own Renée. Without whom, well, we wouldn't have had any coverage this year. One of these years we'll totally work it out to get other members of Team Park Journey out there but we can't argue with the results. So thanks once again for the amazing coverage, and thanks to all of you who enjoyed it. We are still getting a LOT more info from exhibitors so we'll be posting those up in the next week or two on our Industry News page. #IAAPAOut Be sure to take our poll below. Some of the choices here were featured in our Day One and Day Two IAAPA Coverage. Related Updates:  Welcome to our coverage of Day Two of IAAPA 2016. If you missed our Day One Coverage Click Here!! Today we're exploring more of the show floor as well as some pretty exciting announcements from Dynamic Attractions, WhiteWater West and more!! Coverage by Renée Girard Cyborbots by Galaxy Multi Rides offers people a chance to sit and control their robot.
On this inflatable Adrenalator, you run up a 27 degree treadmill and slide back down. Super fun!
Interactive curling? Who knew! From the people at Xtra Ice.
 Pro Slides have some amazing slides for water parks all over the world!   A bit more info on the new Zipper open view seats from Chance Rides.  You can go for a spin on the VR car on the Zamperla Windstarz.   Technifex offers some amazing technology and effects, such as the FauxFire on display here.
Talon Simulations has immersive VR experiences. The race car simulator is shown here but others offered includes coasters and jets  Nine D offers some more unique looking ways to experience VR.
 Some awesome props and photo ops made by Little Spider Creations.  Another interesting VR type ride from Exo.   Want some wheels? Millennium Ride Wheels has got you covered!  We love what Rocky Mountain Construction does! Here's some of what they have on display.
Celebrating the 25th anniversary of SimEx Iwerks.  Splash & Bubbles the TV series follows the undersea adventures of Splash and Bubbles and is launching Nov 20 on PBS Kids, 7 days a week.
Herschend Entertainment is developing Splash & Bubbles 4D for several locations, one of the first being the Newport Aquarium.  SimEx Iwerks has a number of different attractions, including Rudolph 4D  Ah, a Park Journey favorite, the tram!  More Legolands popping up in the future. Here's the proposed site for LegoLand New York.  Always love a good GCI coaster. Check out these trains from Busch Gardens Williamsburg 
A look at some of the models on display from the fine folks at Gerstlauer.
  You can find all sorts of random animatronics on the floor at IAAPA. I think this is a furry raptor?  Inflatable rock climbing on SkyClimb is harder than it looks! But a fun challenge from Inflatable Depot.  Awaiting the media event from Dynamic Attractions. Really looking forward to what they have in store! Dynamic Attractions won best booth @IAAPAHQ this year, and the Orlando company has doubled in size since last year.
Dynamic Attractions developed and contributed to 11 attractions over the past year.  Dynamic Attractions introduced their new motion theater, that rotates and moves to reveal various scenes.     Unveiling the model of the motion theater.  Congratulations to the Dynamic Attractions team for another incredible year!
We rode the Cloud Coaster at IAAPA last year. Looks like they have more to see this year as well.   This ride 360 by SBF Visa Group seems to be quite popular but that's a big no thank you for me!
On the other hand, Wave Rider looks more like something I could handle.
Some more info on Five Nights at Freddy's the Ride by @SallyCorp . Hopefully coming to a park one day soon!  Another thing I wish I could add to my home.  Venturing outdoors to the land of inflatables.
 Ok this was a lot of fun! Super tall and steep inflatable slide that sends you airborne.  Fun little drop tower from Moser's Rides. 
Trying out the VR preview of @SkylineAttrax Skywarp. Really fun ride! Looking forward to riding the real thing one day.  Attending the #IAAPA2016 Legends panel, with a discussion of Shanghai Disneyland.   We played zombie tag a few weeks ago, and it's cool to see that it's here too! Would love to see this used in more locations.  Halloween might be over but I wouldn't mind if it was all year round!  Finishing up our day trying out a few arcade games.
Every game you could imagine is pretty much at IAAPA2016 . I especially liked Ghostbusters!
 We are at the media event for @WhiteWaterWest
 Geoff from @WhiteWaterWest discusses the success and plans for the future of their business.
We won't be able to make it to IAAPA2016 for the rest of the week so this concludes our coverage. Thanks for following along!  Even though we won't physically be at IAAPA2016 the rest of the week, we continue to get lots of great info that we'll be sharing. We'll also have our full IAAPA 2016 wrap-up on Friday which includes our thoughts on some of this weeks announcements. Stay Tuned!! Related Updates: |
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