Chessington History 1999

1999 brought to Chessington one of its most memorable rides, a UK park first Top Scan Samurai arrived at Chessington. Its fair to say little was known about Samurai, and even the ride type when it arrived at the park, but as more and more people started to ride it, it soon become Chessington’s top ride. The Top Scan (when run correctly) is regarded by many as the best flat ride around. This was the very first ride to ever open at Chessington with a 1.4m height restriction.

The arrival of Samurai did mean the end to one of the parks classic rides in the Magic Carpet, looking back now from modern day the Magic Carpet probably still has a place at Chessington, but this old beast has now been removed.

1999 also saw the end of the Circus and maybe the biggest part of Chessington’s history removed. To be fair it didn’t have the popularity it once had, but was still sad to see it leave the park.

There were also name changes in 1999, Smugglers Galleon becoming Black Buccaneer and Dragon River becoming Dragon Falls, both with new logos. Also Calamity Canyon was re-named Mexicana with Vampire also getting a new logo for the first time since it opened.

A year after opening, Rattlesnake moved from 1.17m height restriction to a 1.39m after an inncident on the ride in opening year.

1998 had seen the closure of the Children’s Zoo, which didn’t re-open for 1999 with Animal Land being renamed again to Animal Adventures.