Day 5 - Saturday 11 February - Busch Gardens

For the first time since I got here I actually slept relatively well.

Up at 7:00, got ready, blogged, and down to breakfast. OMFG I walked into the breakfast room and it smelled like a sugar factory. I had some cream cheese on toast, a muffin, and a banana and decided we'd do a maccas run on the way to the park so I could have a couple of hash browns.

So we did that :) And the hash browns were actually quite nice - fresh and crispy.

Got to the park at 9:45, and went in around 9:50. Like everyone else we headed straight for Iron Gwazi. We got pretty much straight on the first ride in the second back row. We went round again for another go on Iron Gwazi, but it was like a forty minute wait this time.

Iron Gwazi roller coaster in loading station

Wandered back for the gorilla talk. They have a older lowland gorilla silverback and his two sons.

Lowland gorilla

Nyala

Then we went and saw the hippo. It's like the world's biggest cichlid tank which was pretty spectacular. Not only that but the hippo was doing laps of its tank and we got some pretty amazing videos and photos.

African cichlids in the Nile crocodile tank

Nile crocodile

African cichlid in the Nile crocodile tank

Hippopotamus swimming

Next we headed to he Moroccan Palace Theatre to see the Turn It Up! Remix show which was an ice skating show which was quite nice. And nice to sit in air conditioned comfort for three quarters of an hour as well.

Turn It Up! Remix - ice skating show at the Moroccan Palace theatre

We had some lunch next from the Smokehouse. I had the kids ribs (one rib and some waffle fries), which was just about the right amount of food for me.

I was going to have a go on Tigris next but the line said it was about thirty minutes, so went back and did Sheikra with David. It was probably a twenty minute wait, but they weren't being very efficient at loading (leaving empty seats all over the place) and only had one station out of the two open.

We did then go back to Tigris and it was about a thirty minute wait.

Just for fun we headed to Congo River Rapids. Funny thing is we didn't actually get very wet this time. Although some people on the other side of the raft did :)

Let's get.. moist..!

Tiger

Went back to Sheikra. Because Sheikra :) It said it was a forty five minute wait but I think it was closer to twenty. Again they weren't loading efficiently.

SheiKra ready to roll

We walked past Iron Gwazi. They said a fifty minute wait so we left it.

And down to Cheetah Hunt. It was 16:50 by the time we got there and they said a sixty minute wait. They had two stations running and it was actually moving faster than expected. And then. The rain. It started raining heavily and all the rides in the park got shut down. We decided to wait because there was nothing else to do and the radar suggested it would pass soon. After about forty minutes they reopened the ride. All up it was an hour wait from when we got there til when we go on. But forty minutes of that was from the rain. We went round for another go, but they'd dropped down to running only one station instead of two so it was over a half hour wait.

Cheetah Hunt roller coaster in loading station

Cheetah Hunt roller coaster by night

Headed back up to Iron Gwazi. Only had a very short wait. But when we got off they shut the thing down, this time because of high winds. Again, everything else was offline too.

Iron Gwazi roller coaster by night

Busch Gardens in Mardis Gras colours by night

So we walked up to Sheikra just to give us something to do while we waited. They'd just opened it so we went up, got on, and..... couldn't lock the seatbelts. They'd just shut it down again for rain. Doh!!! Waited around for like ten minutes and then they let us on again. Went on in the back row, then stayed on the platform and ran down to the front row for another go. Had to RUN around to squeeze in one more ride before 20:00 and got on for maybe the very last run of the night, again in the front row.

SheiKra roller coaster by night

Such a good day! But our everything hurt haha. We were right up the western end of the park and had to walk the mile or so to the eastern end to get out.

Tigris roller coaster by night

Busch Gardens and Iron Gwazi in Mardis Gras colours by night

Decided to grab some KFC on they way back. The chicken I had was actually quite nice, nice and fresh and crispy, but David didn't like his burger on a brioche bun.

Got back to the motel and did photo and gps stuff. Also Hayley and Victor came over and we chatted for a bit.

David and I were actually a little bit manic so took us a while to finally go to sleep. Like after 23:00 or something silly. Whoops.

Americas 2023

Day 5 - Saturday 11 February - Busch Gardens

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