Visiting Blackpool Pleasure Beach
The iconic and award-winning Blackpool Pleasure Beach is an absolutely perfect family day out. The site features some of the world's most exciting theme park rides, as well as other attractions and shows. One of the park's highlights is the UK's first-ever double-launch rollercoaster, named ICON.
This coaster propels its orders forward at speeds of up to 85 kilometres per hour. ICON is a two-and-a-half-minute extraordinary and intense experience full of thrills and spills. The two power thrusts of the engine can only really be compared to the feeling of being driven in a Formula 1 racecar. Blackpool Pleasure Beach is an amusement park with the perfect blend of exciting rides and fun-filled shows, perfect for data out with children.
There is so much to do within Blackpool Pleasure Beach that you will need to split your time between over one hundred and twenty different rides and attractions.If you have younger children who are not quite ready for the white-knuckle experiences of rides such as The Big One or Infusion, then there are plenty of gentler rides available too.
Within Blackpool Pleasure Beach, you will find Nickelodeon Land, with twelve different rides themed around the world's most popular cartoons, such as SpongeBob SquarePants and Rugrats Lost River. There are other family-friendly rides outside of Nickelodeon Land too. We would recommend the Wallace & Gromit's Thrill-O-Matic, the Ghost Train, the Thompson Carousel, and the Tea Cups.
Rides At Blackpool Pleasure Beach
Alice Ride
First opening in 1961, the Alice in Wonderland ride is a Disney-style dark room ride where you travel through the scenes of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, as well as the sequel, Through the Looking-Glass.
Riders are seated inside Cheshire Cat-themed carriages, where you can find models of iconic characters from Lewis Carroll's books. The interior of the ride is dazzling with ultraviolet lights that make the rooms colourful and lifelike. Among the sets, you will find animatronic characters from the books, such as The Mad Hatter and Alice herself.
Infusion
Infusion is the world's first looping coaster that suspends its riders over water for the duration of the ride time. If you are planning to ride Infusion, you should prepare for a thrilling combination of all the elements as you fly through the skies.
Infusion is sure to shock you with its exhilarating experience that will astonish your senses.
Avalanche
Avalanche is themed around the idea of an Alpine bobsled track. The ride was first opened in 1988 and has been impressing visitors ever since.
The exciting part of Avalanche is there is no track for your car to follow. Instead, your carriage has wheels and is simply propelled downwards through gravity alone.
There are plenty of banked turns in the ride, certain to get your blood pumping.
Grand National
The Grand National was specifically designed for thrill-seekers who like their rides with an extra competitive edge. The Grand National is Europe's only twin-track racing coaster!
Two racing tracks with riders in each depart the station at the same time, and then it is a complete race to the finish. You should expect high-speed thrills and huge drops over the ride's three-minute running time.
Steeplechase
Steeplechase is another ride themed around competition. This time riders are placed upon horses as if they are a jockey, and each horse rides along its own separate lane.
Each horse races around their own series of dips and twists before returning to the ride's station after a couple of minutes. We would recommend holding on tightly on this ride, as although it is not the most extreme ride, there is no belt or barrier to keep the rider in place.
Pepsi Max Big One
This is the ride that everyone has heard of. The Big One forever changed the skyline of Blackpool, the ride was erected in 1994 and designed by the talented Ron Toomer.
The Big One stands at phenomenal two-hundred-and-thirty-five feet above The Pleasure Beach. For many years, this ride was the tallest, fastest, and steepest rollercoaster in the world.
There is no feeling like the anticipation of reaching the top of the Big One's lift hull before you go speeding down the track. This is an absolute must-ride.
Ice Blast
Blackpool's Ice Blast is over twenty stories high and takes only two seconds to plummet all the way down. This ride hurls the riders vertically up a two-hundred-and-ten foot tower at eighty miles per hour and then drops the riders for a hair-raising free-fall descent. This ride is truly the ultimate rush.
While you are catching your breath at the top of the ride, take a look at Blackpool's sensational scenery, before you plunge back down at high speeds once again.
The Revolution
Revolution is one of Blackpool Pleasure Beach's most astonishing rides. When the ride first opened in 1979, it was actually the first looping coaster in all of Europe.
The ride is simple but still provides a massive sensation. Riders are propelled forward through a vertical loop where the ride then comes to a halt, after a few seconds, the carriages are propelled backwards, going through the loop again. If you're going to ride the Revolution, be prepared to have everything turned upside down!
Valhalla
Valhalla is housed inside a huge man-made waterfall, and, as you would imagine, is The Pleasure Beach's major water ride attraction. The ride is the most expensive ever made by the park, costing them over fifteen million to design and construct.
Valhalla, as the name suggests, is themed around the mythology of the Viking afterlife. Riders sit within log flumes and will experience the perils of life as a Viking. Be warned though, Valhalla is not a ride you should experience if you do not want to get wet.
ICON
ICON is the UK's first and only double-launch rollercoaster. ICON is packed with breathtaking high-speed accelerations and frantic twists that are guaranteed to get you screaming.
Over the ride's running time, the track interacts with five other rides as well as two tunnels, this makes ICON the ride with the highest number of interactions in the whole world! In Summer 2022, the ride was updated so the rear seats can spin and twist freely during the ride.
Red Arrows SkyForce
The Red Arrows SkyForce is a sky fly ride constructed in 2015. Not only is this the first and only Red Arrows-themed ride across the whole world, but it is also the first ride built by the famous Gerstlauer family in the UK.
Each rider sits within a Red Arrows-themed gondola before they are lifted seventy-two feet into the air. Each gondola has its own wings that can be controlled by the rider, allowing them to perform tricks such as somersaults.
Big Dipper
The Big Dipper is a world-famous rollercoaster and one of Pleasure Beach's main icons. For people who are fans of wooden coasters, this ride is the absolute ultimate.
The Big Dipper has five incredible drops along with massive turns, perfect for anyone who wants to experience the excitement of a classic coaster.
If you can believe it, the Big Dipper is almost one hundred years old, being originally built in 1923 with some reconstruction work in 1934.
Wallace & Gromit's Thrill-O-Matic
In 2013, Blackpool Pleasure Beach was proud to open the world's very first Wallace, and Gromit themed ride, named the Thrill-O-Matic. Riders travel around within dark room sets while Wallace and Gromit's theme music and clips play in the background.
Animatronics are used to bring moments from the Wallace and Gromit films to life. At the end of the ride, the riders are let out into a Wallace and Gromit merchandise shop.