I Visited This Amazing Dutch Park And YOU Should Too! – Toverland VLOG
Here I am again. I’m back at Toverland today, or in English “Magic Land” or whatever. Something like that. It’s my fifth visit to this magical Dutch theme park here and my third one since July 2023…I know, it would have been smarter to take a season pass, but I mean,
Do I look smart? Exactly. Anyway, I’m back, but I’m not here alone. I’m here with someone else – he’s standing right there, I believe – and we’re about to enjoy our favorite rides here again and you are coming with us. The 2024 theme park season in Europe is coming
Closer and this amazing Dutch theme park in the Netherlands has opened its doors already for what they call ‘pre-season’ and what better way to enjoy the start of the season in what I believe is the Netherlands best upcoming theme park? Let’s enjoy some great rides at Toverland!
All right, so let’s start our day here in this amazing park. For the ones that don’t know Toverland: it’s a Dutch theme park that opened in 2001 as a small kids focused indoor amusement park. It was just one hall – it’s somewhere there at the back – with some rides in there,
With some very minimal theming and that was basically it. Now, today that hall and most of those rides are still there, but it has received a lot more theming and it’s also not the entrance to the park anymore as this area here, which we’re walking in now, is the new entrance
Area of this park since 2018, as Toverland has been stepping away actually from an indoor park and has evolved a lot more over the years to become a true outdoor theme park. And, really, the park has taken huge steps to accomplish that by adding amazing rides over the years and
Stepping up their game when it comes to theming and creating immersive areas. I mean, just look at this entrance area: does look amazing, right? Now, the entrance area here is called Port Laguna and it kind of reminds me of Port of Entry, the entrance area of Islands of Adventure in Orlando,
Especially with the lighthouse tower and the summery feeling here, the palm trees and such, but it’s more like the budget friendly version of Port of Entry, but anyway. Still looks great in my opinion. Huge improvement compared to the former entrance they used to have and a lot better
And original than most other theme parks in this region actually. And by the way: if you like this video as much as I like this entrance area, this is also the perfect moment for you to give this
Video a thumbs up. I mean, just a small reminder. Anyway, we’re off to the first ride of the day. All right, welcome to Avalon the newest themed area here at Toverland and in my opinion the most beautiful themed area here in the Netherlands. I mean, prove me wrong in the comments,
I’m open for discussion, but you’ll have to come with some really good arguments to change my mind, cuz I think this area is amazing. With the limited budget Toverland has, they they made a magnificent looking area here based on the stories of King Arthur
And Merlin and with addition of four new rides here last year this area became even more beautiful and interesting to me. But let’s have a look at what we can find here. All right, and here we are at my second favorite ride at Toverland, next to the wooden coaster
Troy. This is Fēnix, the only B&M wing coaster I did so far, but really a great one in my opinion. And it’s an unpopular opinion maybe and I’m sure a lot of Efteling fans will not agree with me, but this coaster personally is the best B&M coaster in the Netherlands. It’s so much
Better than Baron 1898 in the Efteling. Let me know in the comments if you agree or not, but this one here is phenomenal in my opinion. It has a nice themed station. Except for the sides maybe. That’s a bit of a shame. But the rest is just really well themed and the whole
Coaster is also really beautifully embedded in the Avalon area as you can see here. Just look how it stretches all over the area, winding around and over some of the other rides there. It’s really well done. But the ride itself is also a lot of fun actually. Pretty intense at some moments,
Especially at that helix right there after that inversion. The only downside: it should have been a little bit longer. But anyway, I love this coaster, so let’s ride it. All right, so Fēnix here behind me is still an amazing ride. it’s just such a smooth coaster,
Really great layout. I really, really love this coaster actually. We’re here at the back of Avalon here and we also have three other rides actually, all new since last season. They are not really that interesting for adults, but anyway,
On our right here we have Garden Tour, which is a fun small kids ride in which you make a tour through Merlin’s Magical Garden. Fun thing is that parents can actually keep an eye on their kids
From aside here, as you have a pathway running all around the ride here. So that’s very thoughtful of the park actually. Another new ride for kids here since last year is this one here: Jumping Juna, which is a small carousel ride, similar to for example those frog carousels in many parks,
Like for example the Plopsa parks in Belgium, etc. And another fun fact: the construction here, covering the ride here, is actually designed to resemble Merlin’s hat. So that’s a funny detail. But the biggest ride of the whole Avalon area here is this tower here: Dragonwatch. Now it’s
Closed today unfortunately but this one, it looks high but it’s not thrilling at all actually. It’s basically the same as the Toy Soldiers Parachute Drop Tower at Walt Disney Studios in Paris, but with a different theme obviously. But the ride is not that scary and it goes up and down
In a very controlled way, so not really like a drop tower or anything like that. And it provides you some nice views on Avalon and the surrounding areas of the park here, but yeah, it’s more a relaxing ride than a fun ride. So if you want to have a good moment to rest:
This is the place to be. If it’s open of course, because today it’s not. Next up here is Pixarus here, the newest addition to the park. Or better said: one of the newest, as Toverland opened an astounding four new rides last year. Now, Pixarus is a Gerstlauer Sky Fly
Ride in which you have control over your own seat, and you can actually make several rolls or not. You can make it as thrilling as you want. I really suck at this. I only did two Sky Fly’s so far,
I believe, but I just don’t get how people are able to make more than a few rolls on this. It’s really hard. Or is that just me? For those who did Sky Fly rides like this one before, here
In Toverland or in another park: let me know how many rolls you’re able to make. I’m very curious if this is really that hard, or if I’m the only one who’s really terrible at riding these rides. All right, so, Pixarus. I was able to make 9 rolls this time. It was the most
Rolls I ever did on this ride, so I’m kind of proud of myself, but it’s still very difficult and very hard to make some rolls on this one. Apparently there are Sky Fly’s in the world where you don’t have to…yeah…be this strong as on this one,
But it’s still a hard one. But I was able to make 9 rolls so happy me! All right, and from that ride we’re going to this ride here, which is Merlin’s Quest. Another relaxing ride here in the Avalon area. Now, this boat ride is actually kind of a hidden gem in my
Opinion, as to many it will look like just another slow boat ride taking you through Avalon here, but in the middle of the ride this boat ride here has actually a nice surprise up its sleeves, thanks to the addition of a really magical indoor darkride section. Now, together with the lighting
And music in there, this adventure is truly a magical one in my opinion. Very relaxing, but also something that kind of leaves you in awe afterwards. And I got to say: the music in this whole Avalon area – but mostly the soundtrack you hear inside of
The darkride section of this ride here – it’s so magical. I really love the soundtrack that IMAscore created for Toverland here, but anyway, let’s enjoy this one again. And here we are at the Troy area of the park. They’re actually in the process of
Kind of upgrading it a bit, so there’s a lot of scaffolding here unfortunately. I believe this was the first truly themed outdoor area here in Toverland, back in 2007. There was only like a small area here with only the wooden coaster here, which you can see in front of us,
But since 2010 more rides have been added, such as the horse ride which we will see later, called Paarden van Ithaka and Scorpios, a nicely themed swinging boat ride with onboard music even. Pretty cool. And this year, as you can see – like I said – they are working on upgrading the whole
Theming of the area here, as a lot of things needed some love again. So I’m not able to show you the end result of course, but I’m sure it will look amazing again once it’s finished. But anyway, let’s explore some stuff here. All right, as said Scorpios here is a smaller swinging
Boat ride reaching a height of 15 meters. It was constructed by Metallbau Emmeln, a German company, together with the other ride here in this area, which is Paarden Van Ithaka, a horse ride there. Not sure how to explain the ride system of that ride, but as you…yeah…you can see what it is
Actually. It’s just a small horse ride thing where you’re seated on a horse. I don’t see a horse at this moment. Ah, there is a horse. But anyway, both rides opened here with the expansion of this
Troy area in 2010 and they fit perfectly within this area here. But let’s try them out again. All right, so Scorpios here behind me is a really, really fun little swinging boat ride. It’s a pretty fun one, because there is a lot of airtime at the top. It goes pretty fast,
It’s not a high one, but it’s just a very fun one. Really enjoyed this one. And here in this Troy area we also of course have Troy, which is a wooden coaster from GCI and opened here
In 2007 as part of this Troy area here. It’s a pretty long one and has some great twists and turns and the first drop is also really cool and the rest of the rides is just pure GCI fun cuz yes I’m a huge fan of GCI wooden coasters. I really love them. Honestly,
Troy here at this moment is my second favorite wooden coaster in the world actually, after El Toro at Six Flags Great Adventure. But of course this is all highly subjective of course, so feel free to share your favorite wooden coaster in the comments. Unfortunately Troy
Is closed here, as you can see, so really such a shame, because I really, really, really love this wooden coaster. But anyway, I’ve done this ride several times already, it’s a really great one. All right, and now we’re going to explore the original Toverland actually, where it all began,
As this hall here we’re entering right now is what used to be Toverland when it opened back in 2001. There was actually nothing else here, except for this hall. Everything started here in this big hall and as you can see, compared to the other areas we explored yet,
This might be the least interesting one, but that’s because the park here opened back in 2001 as a very kids focused indoor hall, and it was more an amusement park actually back then, instead of a theme park as most of the theming you see here was only added later to this hall. Many,
Many years later actually. Still looks a bit cheap in my opinion maybe, but it used to look even worser. But anyway, what rides can we actually find here? What we have here for example is the oldest coaster of the park: Toos Express, a custom designed Vekoma junior coaster. Not very heavily
Themed, as you can see. Or actually just not themed at all, but anyway, it’s a short but fun coaster. Not too bad, not too thrilling either, just a fun family coaster, so let’s ride it. All right, so Toos Express here behind me: fun family coaster. It’s not a really smooth one,
But it’s quite an old one of course. It’s already 23 years old I think, but it’s a really fun one. It’s just not very smooth. All right, let’s get to the second part of what used to be the original park actually, as
Originally Toverland opened up as an indoor park, like I said, for kids, but that is the reason these two big indoor halls can be found here. But the second hall which we’re entering here is not actually the original Toverland, as this one was actually the expansion of the first hall we did,
Which can be found right there, where we just were, but this area here is Wunder Wald (or Wonder Woods as in English). Now, this area is kind of based on some Austrian mountain village theme here
And there. It’s a bit unclear to me, but anyway, the theming inside here is not top notch, could be more immersive, especially since you’re in a hall, in which you can…in which you can really
Do a lot in terms of lighting and such. I mean, look at parks like the Plopsa indoor parks or Warner Bros World in Abu Dhabi for example. Those parks know what to do in indoor environments,
But anyway, it may look a bit bare here, inside of these halls, but there is a few fun rides, like for example this one here: Maximus Blitz Bahn. It’s a powered bobsled kind of ride, constructed by Wiegand. It’s a really fun thing actually. Now, unfortunately the capacity is absolutely awful. As
You can see the ride…the waiting time is 35 minutes. The ride received a complete overhaul actually a few years ago, when they rethemed this area of the park a bit. Now, the track has been completely replaced with a new track, they installed some wooden coverings above the
Track actually, making the ride more waterproof, but they also rethemed the whole queue actually. As you can see here, they made a nice house in which you walk around. A nice Austrian house in which you can also find some inventions of the owner of the house. I believe this guy is called
Maximus and this ride is now called Maximus Blitz Bahn. But anyway, let’s race through the woods. All right, so Maximus Blitz Bahn here: a really fun bobsled kind of ride. I’m always surprised how fast this one goes. It’s a pretty fast one, but it’s really fun. It’s very unique
Also, the capacity is really extremely bad, but anyway, it’s a really unique, fun coaster. And next to Maximus Blitz Bahn here, you can also find Villa Fiasko. There’s not much to tell you about this, except for the fact that it’s a fun house, so why not try it out.
Now, and for the water lovers out there: this park also has a log flume ride here. Formerly known as Backstroke, this ride here received a makeover together with the rest of the area here back in 2015 and was renamed to Expedition Zork later in 2018 actually. And in 2022 the outdoor section of
This ride was completely rethemed, so lots of work has been done since this ride opened back in 2004. But it’s still the same log flume ride from Mack Rides since its opening. And it’s a funny one for sure, with a nice backwards section and such. Now, this park has actually two water rides:
The log flume, but also Djengu River, which is a rapid river water ride. So, water ride lovers out there: a question for you: are you a bigger fan of log flumes like this one or are you a
Bigger fan of rapid river rides? It’s not an easy one, I know, but let me know in the comments and in the meantime I’m going to have some fun in this log flume and hopefully not get too wet.
All right, so Expedition Zork here behind me: fun log flume water ride. I was in the front, but I was barely wet actually. It’s just a fun log flume ride, nothing too special. All right, and here we are in the next themed area in the park here, which is De Magische
Vallei or in English The Magical Valley. Now, this area here is new since 2012 or 2013, I believe, and houses a few more of my favorite rides in this park here. Now, according to the storyline of this themed area, this is a magical area in which little fantasy creatures live,
Called Dwervels, so throughout the area you will find a few places where you can find these cute little creatures. Very nicely done. Also the fact they worked a lot with natural resources here to create the right atmosphere in this area is also really nice to see. It looks pretty amazing
Actually walking around here, especially in the area with Djengu River there. But of course I’m not here to look at nature or animatronics or little creatures. No, I’m here to do some rides. And here we have another really great roller coaster: Dwervelwind is a spinning coaster from
Mack Rides from 2012 and there are only two coasters with this exact layout actually, the other one being Le Twist at Le Pal in France. But although these two are the same, Dwervelwind is in my opinion like the more superior one actually as this one here has something Le Pal does not have:
It has a beautiful station, as you can see here, and it has an amazing soundtrack playing on board during the ride. Now, Dwervelwind is a really fun spinning coaster. I love the layout here, it always has quite a fair amount of spinning and although it’s a little bit short maybe,
It’s pretty…yeah… it’s just a really good one in my opinion. I even dare to say that this one is one of my favorite spinning coaster. It’s not on the number 1 spot of course, or my top 3, but for sure in the top 10. But Ride to Happiness in Plopsaland,
And Tarantula in Parque de Atracciones in Madrid or Now You See Me: High Roller at Motiongate are a little bit better according to me. But in my opinion both Maurer and Mack have amazing spinning coasters. It’s difficult to say which manufacturer I’m loving the most when it comes
To spinning coasters to be honest. Now, according to you: what manufacturer has the best spinning coasters? I would love to know your opinion on that. In the meantime I’m going to ride this one. All right, so Dwervelwind here behind me: a really fun spinning coaster. Like I said:
The onboard audio is really, really nice, the music, but it’s just a very fun spinning coaster. We didn’t spin that much, because the weight was balanced quite good or not good actually, doesn’t matter. It’s just a fun spinning coaster. and I think it’s going to…right
There. Ah, here it…ah there it is. I really love this one. Great coaster! And here we have Djengu River, a rapid river water ride from 2013, constructed by Hafema, the same as the rapid river ride in Bobbejaanland or Le Raft at Parc Bagatelle in France for
Example. Now, Djengu River, it’s closed, as you can see. Normally, when it’s open, it’s not the wettest or most spectacular rapid river ride, but it’s not that bad actually. But don’t expect anything to thrilling here. It’s rather a calm rapid river ride. But it’s a fun one.
All right, and the next roller coaster here is one you cannot skip if you’re visiting Toverland. It may not be the most thrilling ride, may not be the longest ride or not be the most beautifully themed ride, but it’s for sure a special one actually, as the ride here was
The very first motorbike coaster in the world, way before Disney opened the Tron coasters in Shanghai or Orlando or before Zamperla came up with their own motorbike coasters. Now, this ride here was Vekoma’s prototype of the motorbike coaster. Booster Bike here was built in 2004. It’s clearly
A family coaster, as you can see. It’s not a very interesting layout, not very thrilling, but back in 2004 this was such an innovative concept with the motorbike train designs. But although there are a lot more motorbike coasters in the world, mostly from Zamperla, it’s a bit strange actually
There’s only six motorbike coasters from Vekoma actually, since this one opened 20 years ago. Not sure why that is, as Vekoma did a really great job here, but same for example for the Tron coasters from Disney. But let’s stop rambling about motorbike coasters. I’m going to ride this one.
Okay, so Booster Bike here behind me: very fun motorbike coaster. It’s not a very smooth one, not a very long one, but it’s it’s a fun first motorbike coaster. All right, so that was our day here at Toverland. It’s starting to rain, so that’s the perfect
Moment to go home. We did all the rides we wanted to do. It was a fun day. We did some fun rides here, but I already knew what to expect here of course. Unfortunately Troy was closed, Djengu River was closed and then some… two other smaller rides, but that doesn’t really
Matter. It’s a shame that Troy is closed, as you can see there, but anyway, great park still. If you ever visit the Netherlands and you don’t want to visit the Efteling: this place is a really great alternative. It’s a really fun park with some great rides,
Great theming here and there. Not everything is very nicely themed, but still it’s a very nice little park here in the Netherlands that really deserves a visit from a lot more people. And with that I am going to end this video and I’ll see you in the next one. See yah!
Join me as I explore Toverland again for the third time since July 2023. I visited this Dutch theme park again on the pre-season opening day of 2024 and will be taking you through this amazing park, showing you all the fun rides they have to offer; such as the incredible B&M Wing Coaster Fēnix, the Vekoma motorbike coaster Booster Bike, the magnificent Mack Rides spinning coaster Dwervelwind, as well as great rides such as the Gerstlauer Sky Fly ride Pixarus, Maximus Blitz Bahn or the log flume water ride Expedition Zork. Unfortunately the really good GCI wooden coaster Troy was closed, but this park has more to offer to make sure you are having an amazing day here!
CHAPTERS:
00:00 – Intro
00:52 – Entering the park
04:14 – Avalon
05:16 – Fenix
09:23 – Dragonwatch, Garden Tour, Jumping Juna
12:52 – Flaming Feather & more Avalon
14:23 – Pixarus
17:31 – Merlin’s Quest
21:16 – Troy area
22:11 – Scorpios & Paarden Van Ithaka
24:09 – Troy
26:36 – Land Van Toos (the original park)
27:26 – Toos Express
30:23 – More Land Van Toos
31:16 – Wunderwald
32:14 – Maximus Blitz Bahn
35:26 – Villa Fiasko
37:19 – Expedition Zork
41:02 – More Wunderwald
41:37 – Magische Vallei
43:13 – Dwervelwind
47:40 – Djengu River
49:01 – Booster Bike
53:03 – More Magische Vallei & Port Laguna
53:40 – Overall opinion
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Presenter: Thibault Deprez
Camera: Thibault Deprez
Produced and edited by: Thibault Deprez
Gear used in the video:
iPhone 15 Pro Max
Insta360 X3
DJI Mic
©️ Theme Parks To Do.
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