Keeping it Rhyl

Rhyl in North Wales has a famous amusement park that is reportedly on its last legs and having never been there I thought I'd go and give the place a visit. After a four-hour trek that took 3 trains I eventually arrived. On walking to the promenade from the station it was obvious that it wasn't all run down. Some of it looked quite nice!

Whilst it was a nice day and people were hitting the beach, overall it wasn't that busy.

First coaster of the day, this little kiddy ride. I'm guessing the spelling is the Welsh interpretation of Nessi. Seems a bit weird to name a Welsh coaster after a Scottish legend.

The skateboard park was open, the viewing tower was not.

The beach had Donkey Rides, I didn't think these existed anymore. Fortunately I didn't see anyone actually paying to ride, they were happy petting the beasts.

Here's Ocean Beach, once a popular destination for people visiting the area but not anymore.

All the rides were open but none of them were running, at least until I handed my tokens over. I think they would have been lucky to have had 10 people in the park. It would have been understandable had everything been closed so I was fortunate that they remained open.

It must have been really hard to remain motivated with no one visiting. I did see a kid have a go on this before returning to the token stand where her mother was working.

The Nessi ride was the most popular ride in this park. Yep, another Nessi. People spend hundres of years searching Scotland for them yet they have two down here.

Having left the empty park I decided to follow the coast for a bit, knowing there was another park to the West.

The sign says not to let your kids play on the rocks but the kid behind had clearly not been made aware and had tripped on them. hahahahaha!!

Rhyl is full of holiday parks and caravan sites for people to stay in. Not really my thing but it seemed popular as there were a lot of families there.
Eventually I found another fair, but not the one I was looking for. I was hoping that this park was permanent, it would be a bit worrying if this amount of dodgems had been damaged for a temporary park.

Open at 11 daily except for weekends where they open at ............................. 11. Weird!

Actually the park was a permanent attraction and not too bad. It was quite empty but still busier than the big park along the seafront.

After a short walk I eventually found the other park, and this was the most popular of all of them, probably on account of there being a massive car boot sale/market across the street.

The coaster, as with all the big ones in the area, was a bit of a headbanger.

I was fortunate enough to get a go on their powered coaster, it broke soon after.

Not sure why I took this, maybe there's a photo in amongst this maritime junk.

Back to Park Empty on the way back to the station. Even the surrounding area has fallen into decline.

Their water splash looked like it would count as a coaster as the vehicle would remain on the track the whole time, usually the water is higher than this.

Empty park, some people would call this a wonderful thing, others wouldn't.

Woohoo, 2 other people here for the rides. At least the park was so empty you would guarantee having the ride to yourself.

Rhyl, like most major cities has the "lets bend your name out of metal" Chinese guy.

I was curious as to who the Rhyl Smack Rats were but having searched in Google it turns out they're a punk band and not the teenage taggers I thought they might have been.

Rhyl's Pavilion has a Peter Kay tribute which I thought was quite funny given that he's not dead.
Lee Lard, haha, at least the guy looks a bit similar.

Unlike this bunch who are supposed to be the rat pack. Frigging awful! At least that will explain why its on a seaside show at a place no-one visits anymore.

On the train on the way back there's this ship that took a wrong turn into this stream and unable to reverse has remained there til this day. Just kidding! I don't know the background to it.

Overall Rhyl was alright but I have no idea what can be done to reverse its fortunes. Perhaps the "going to the seaside" thing is out-dated. A shame.