Alton Towers – Opening Day of the Season – March 2025

So, we’ve done something this year I never thought we’d ever do – ‘cause it ain’t cheap! – but given how often we want to visit Alton Towers, Chessington World of Adventures, Legoland Windsor and Thorpe Park, we thought we’d treat ourselves to a Merlin Annual Pass! Are they worth the money? Well, I’ll get to that in about 12 months when I’ve crunched the numbers and see how much we would have spent, but my initial thoughts are yes.

But what better way to ‘test drive’ our new found power than with a trip to Alton Towers for, not just opening day of the season, but night one of Alton After Dark and the grand opening of Toxicator – their new ride for 2025.

This was our first visit to The Towers since last May, so we were excited to get on some coasters. We had our usual packed lunch at the ready and a super early start for a drive from gloomy Wrexham to get there. We wanted to be there before 9am to make sure we had time to get in and head down to Forbidden Valley to witness the official public opening of Toxicator, the new Huss Rides Suspended Top Spin. If you remember Ripsaw, it’s basically a newer, greener, swankier version of that!

I’ve covered our thoughts about Toxicator in a separate post (read it here: Toxicator), but as an overview, we got there, headed down and joined the massive queue and waited for the big green spinny thing to do its big green spinning thing. It looks awesome and was lots of fun to ride.

Opening day plus a new ride day plus day one of the after dark event meant Alton Towers was a who’s who of the Theme Park vlogging community. We saw Theme Park Worldwide, Coaster Dad, Theme Park Insanity, Adventure Planet and several others. From watching all these guys on YouTube every week to seeing them all in one place was quite fun.

After the initial joy of the opening of Toxicator was over and we’d had our ride, everything seemed to take a turn for the worse. Rides seemed to be dropping like crazy. Nemesis Reborn was delayed, Sub-Terra was down, Galactica was up and down like a yo-yo all day, Wicker Man, The Smiler, Thirteen, Oblivion – all the main coasters had long periods of down time which really did effect the quality and enjoyment of the day. Whenever we checked the app, it seemed half the coasters were closed, so you can imagine what that did to the queue times for the other half. 60-80 minute queues all day!

Yes, it was opening day, so you expect a busy park with big queues, but uber busy with 50% ride capacity was just plain chaotic at times. Thankfully, we now have passes, so we tried to not let it ruin the day as we knew we’d be back again soon, but for the people who had spent their money to come specifically for the day who might only afford one park day and chose this one, this must have been a massive disappointment.

We’d seen pictures of the queues at guest services of people complaining and heard many reviewers calling it the ‘worst opening day at Towers ever’. And whilst it didn’t give us the best first impression of an opening day of the season, we still had some positive experiences too.

Elliott finally hit the 1.2m height requirement and was chuffed with his wristband. This opened up a few new ‘big boy’ coasters he could get his credits for. Goodbye Octonauts, hello Wicker Man. We thought we’d start him on that as, while fast, it doesn’t have the bigger drop like Thirteen does. And luckily, Wicker Man was just reopening from a breakdown as we got close, so in the queue we headed, lucky to catch it at around 30 minutes. The queue I looked refreshed this season, with some updated theming, and Big Bob always looks great.

Elliott was a little nervous for his first go, but, as usual, the initial worry leads to hands in the air and screaming ‘I love it!’ all the way around. No sooner had we hit the station that he requested to go on Thirteen next, so over to the Dark Forest we headed.

Rita was down and Thirteen was showing a 70-minute wait, but we got in the queue anyway. A few breakdowns and a pause to add another train later made 70 mins into 2 hours plus change. Definitely not worth that wait for Thirteen, as much fun as it is. But it was his first time on, so we stuck it out with minimal queue fusses. It was Jo’s first time on Thirteen too, so new creds all around.

As well as these, Jo and Elliott had managed to catch a ride on Elliott’s favourite Runaway Mine Train (choo choo), visit Sharkbait Reef and catch the Bluey show over at CBeebies. Who doesn’t love Bluey? Well, the meet and greet queue for Bluey was massive after the show, so Elliott didn’t love Bluey that much, but he did find and get pictures with Alton Bear, Peter Rabbit and Shaun from Theme Park Worldwide! He should probably have a photo op area in the park, he’s there more than most of the characters.

Whist they were enjoying their day, me and Evan headed down to X-Sector. Smiler was on an hour plus queue all day – or down with technical issues, but we did catch Oblivion just after reopening with a short queue, so managed to jump on Evan’s favourite ride with minimal fuss.

The sun was going down and Elliott wanted to get on the parks final 1.2m height coaster so he could claim his 3rd new credit, so we headed for Spinball Whizzer at around 5:15pm. I’ve only done Spinball Whizzer a few times previously and it always has a slow moving queue. This time was worse than usual. It said 40 minutes, but it was about 2 hours. In hindsight, we should have cut our losses and left the queue, but the kids were determined to ride it, so we stuck it out.

It’s an okay ride. Definitely not a 2 hour wait good ride, just okay. Unfortunately, it really cut into our After Dark time. Spinball Whizzer looked good illuminated in blue and the lights along Towers Street also looked fantastic. Think this was the first time I’d ever seen Alton Towers at night.

Alton After Dark is the park’s extended hours/evening event where you get to see the park illuminated. It only happens for 3 weekends in March. Lots of lights around the Towers themselves, around the trees and paths, on the rides. It looks great.

We wandered past all of the multicoloured trees that line the paths on the way to Mutiny Bay, which looks brilliant and so different to how you’d normally see it. Jo and Elliott headed for an 80-minute queue for a night ride on Wicker Man. The lighting and fire around Big Bob make it look world class at night. Me and Evan decided there was only one ride we needed to get on for a night ride, so ran to Forbidden Valley for Nemesis Reborn. The lighting across the paths in Katanga Canyon and around Runaway Mine Train looked great, Gloomy Wood looked much spookier and The Curse at Alton Manor really shows itself with the purple lights illuminating the silhouette of Emily Alton in the top window. Is that always there? I’ve never noticed it.

Forbidden Valley looked stunning. Red lights flashing as soon as you enter, the helicopter and Nemesis egg glowing. Brilliant. It was illuminated from front to back and you could see where they’d focussed all their efforts for after dark. Not that it doesn’t look great by day, but by night its something else. The red glow of Nemesis Reborn against the amazing green lighting from Toxicator, and the blue glow from Galactica in the background. It’s such a shame that you don’t get to see Alton Towers at night more often.

Nemesis Reborn was a 40-minute queue and well worth the wait for a night ride. We loved it. A classic coaster, and I’m not a frequent enough rider to notice the rattle that many say it has, but this ride felt pretty smooth!

With just minutes to spare, we didn’t want to rejoin Nemesis 40 min queue as we had to get home, and Toxicator had a massive queue. Nemesis Sub-Terra was a walk on, so we jumped on for our first ride since it reopened, which was also Evan’s first ever go. They should rename it Nemesis Sub-Par. It’s a pretty poor experience. Glad they reopened it to add some much-needed attractions to the area, but it isn’t great. Its more of a show than a ride. Lots of walking, a quick video, a small but uneventful mini drop tower experience to see some Nemesis eggs, then more walking.

It was after 8pm so we just stood and watched Toxicator spinning in all its glory while we waited for the others to finish their much enjoyed night ride on Wicker Man.

We always bring a packed lunch with us to the parks to save money. The kids don’t like stopping for food as it cuts into ride times and when you’re only there once per year, ride time is at a premium, so sausage rolls and crisps in the queue gets us through the day. But today was a much longer day than normal and a tad chilly and we all wanted some hot foot at one point. Mixed reviews from us on the quality though. I needed a coffee, and Evan spotted a kids Sausage and Chips meal from Eastern Express in Mutiny Bay for £7.50 with a drink, which was a decent price and a decent portion (2 small sausages and half a tray of nice, hot chips). No passholder discount here though. Jo and Elliott grabbed a tray of chips from the same stall a little earlier and they were cold, soggy and disgusting.

You’re paying theme park prices so don’t be shocked if you have to fork out £6 for a magnet or £30 for a t-shirt. Prices at Towers were expensive, but not overly. Well not in comparison to Universal or Disney. We only picked up some Toxicator souvenirs (magnet, pen) and Evan wanted a Wicker Man hat which was £12. Passholder discount of 20% really makes a difference, bringing that £12 down to £9.60, and the extra off the other items. It makes the overpriced items a little more reasonable.

We were glad we made the trip to Alton Towers for Toxicator’s opening day. We watch the new ride opening videos whenever they appear, so it was nice to be a part of one, though very underwhelming in comparison to Hyperia or Nemesis Reborn’s openings.

It was a good day, all things considered, but the poor operations and ride availability really put a dampener on our first ever day one, and the general park experience. Not really how you want to start your season.

Alton After Dark was great, though we didn’t experience nearly enough of it due to the slow ops on Spinball. It is a shame its only on for 3 weekends, but we’re passholders now, so we’ll definitely be back.

…and we were. We headed back the following Sunday for a few more night rides. Availability was much better, and we got soooo much more done. It was like a completely different park. And there’s only one weekend left for After Dark, so we might have to sneak another trip in!