COASTER SHEET Anubis: the Ride Opening: 5 april 2009 Constructor: Gerstlauer Designer: Ing.-Büro Stengel GmbH Launching System: LSM Acceleration: ..-56 miles/h in 2 sec Max. Speed: 56 miles/h (90 km/h) Length: 600 m Highest Point: 34 m Inversions: 3 Elements: - Cow Hitch (Dive Loop + Immelmann) - Barrell Roll Capacity: 700 persons per hour

At 56 miles per hour in 2 seconds, wordt Anubis: The Ride became one of the fastest launch costers in the Benelux, sharing a first place with the Dutch Xpress at Walibi World. For Plopsaland De Panne, it is the first roller coaster ride to go over heels.

The House of Anubis

De name “Anubis: The Ride” refers to a popular TV show for teen agers, called "The House of Anubis", broadcasted on Nickelodeon in Belgium and Holland.

The station is housed in an exact copy of the Anubis House, which was rebuilt at 70% of its actual size. While queuing in the House, you can admire several rooms as they were used in the series.

The House of Anubis cast and Studio 100 owners Gert Verhulst and Hans Bourlon were given the honor to officially open the attraction. The star of the sieries,  Nienke, was the one to cut the ribbon and to enjoy the first official ride with Gert Verhulst. Other famous faces were invited to join a portion of adrenaline, among which Wendy Van Wanten and her son Clément and daughter Estelle, Anne Somers, actrice Marilou Mermans, Sophie Dewaele, Kobe Van Herwegen, Walter De Donder, Aimé Athony, Chris Cauwenberghs and Luc Caals. They all agreed that this attraction had a great wow factor.

With a price tag of “6 million euro”, this new rollercoaster is the most expensive attraction at Plopsaland De Panne. 

Ride Experience

The ride departs from the station.  It gives you a rather cramped feel. The trains consist of three rows of two persons per row in kind of a V position. The train itself is setup as a kind of stage, where the last row is higher than the first one. The train looks quite nice too. Its golden color, with black brackets stabbing nicely on the turquoise-blue track with a beige support. A very great choice of colors indeed. The seats themselves feel very comfortable, so do the brackets, which rarely is the case with other coasters.

The starting signal is given, and the train leaves the House of Anumbis with a bend. As the train accumulates speed, it brings us to the launching area where the magnetic field of the linear synchronous motor (LSM) fires it up to top speed. The launching area includes an Egyptian looking strip arch, with the familiar eye. It feels a bit unreal, and in my opinion does not quite connect to the natural environment through which Anubis rages. But the launch itself is sublime, particularly spicy, yet comfortable. At full speed you go vertical towards the top and enjoy a full dosis of airtime, to make a steep dive to the right immediately after the top. Then the track goes slightly left and turns into an Immelman inversion. Just for a while, you are upside down and then dive down into a half loop.

The G-forces press you into your seat, the speed increases towards the next hill, with a tiny bit of air time. You dive down again to the next element, called a "diving loop, in fact, the opposite of the first inversion. The combination of these inversion elements, Gerstlauer defined as "cow hitch", which is in fact a "clove hitch" knotting technique embedded in the appearance of this roller coaster element.

After this, the track goes left upward, towards the break section, better known as mid course block brake. Then we dive down to the left, over a short hill into a nice turn near the ground, enjoying the beautiful last element, initiating a barrell roll, where the train goes through a sort of corkscrew, to pivot the axis of the roller coaster rider. The element taken at a constant moderate speed, before the train finally halts in the break section.

Our Opinion

Anubis: the Ride is not only a gem to watch, it truly is a fantastic roller coaster, which offers a rather complete roller coaster experience.

Upon boarding the front row, it is pretty difficult to pass the operator, who is by the way quite helpful and friendly. The exit is even more difficult, because it is as tight as you could think it.  The attraction does not seem to be suited for disabled people, who might want to ride this roller. That is a bit unfortunate for a park that would want to appeal to all audiences.

A second drawback seems to be the capacity. The park is very popular and crossed  this year the milestone of 1 million visitors, a great achievement indeed. A theoretical capacity of 700 visitors per hour for this attraction seems quite low, though. It is also sad that not always all trains are fully booked, perhaps precisely because of the tight nature of the station. Better opt for a single riders line, perhaps?

These few flaws do not prevent this roller coaster to probably become the most favored and promoted Belgian and Dutch coaster fanatics attraction. We wonder how soon we will welcome a similar coaster at the sister parks.