The Rise and Fall of Oakwood

 

Taken in June 2022

From Oakwood Theme Park's opening in 1987 (then known as Oakwood Leisure Park), the park has grown from a simple wooden fort and go cart track into having an award winning wooden roller coaster (which, when opened in 1996 remained the newest wooden roller coaster in the UK until the opening of Wickerman in 2017), the UK's first beyond vertical drop roller coaster and countless more unique and thrilling attractions. Despite this, Oakwood now is known as one of the worst theme parks in the UK, looks terrible and is subject to endless tabloid ridicule for being 'unsafe'. How on earth did it get this bad?

Humble Beginnings

Oakwood Leisure Park opened in 1987 near Narberth, Wales, owned and developed by the McNamara family (one of which went on to found Bluestone Resort a short walk away from the park) after the controversial introduction of milk quotas. Yes, that is correct; a theme park started by dairy farmers with absolutely zero experience in the entertainment industry and, initially, no real concept as to what a theme park even was. Their farming business was being pillaged by the unfairness of milk quotas and they needed to diversify quickly. Not the typical route for most farmers!

It's partly the reason why I, like others who are born and bred Welsh, have a soft spot for Oakwood. It was family owned (more on that later) and was started by individuals who had to be creative to survive in the economically harsh and rural Pembrokeshire.

Slowly, over the period of the late eighties and early nineties, Oakwood invested greatly in smaller family-oriented attractions, like Jake's Music Hall and Gold Mine, both of which have videos on YouTube here and here respectively if you're interested. It could be argued that when this area of the park opened, themed around New Orleans, is when Oakwood went from being just a small leisure park to an actual 'themed' park.

Courtesy of Bruce Cassi

This is all very riveting stuff (panto audience in my head shouts "No it isn't!"). The park was on a consistent upward trend in terms of popularity, visitor numbers and cashflow. And this only continued with the addition of Snake River Falls, a semi-enclosed water ride in which riders board an inflatable dingy which can accommodate approximately two people (maybe three at a push) and you are sent down the chute of sharp corners and drops). This trend of investment only accelerated.

Going Vertical

In walks John Wardley, a highly praised "entertainer" as he puts it, to think of something big for the park. He's already highly acclaimed for his work opening Nemesis at Alton Towers and at this point has decades of experience in the themed entertainment industry, something the McNamaras did not have. They wanted something big to attract the thrill seekers as well as the families, particularly those who did not want to drive for hours on end to one of the already established parks like Alton Towers or Blackpool Pleasure Beach, or didn't have the money for that.

John Wardley had initially tried to convince Alton Towers that a wooden roller coaster would be a fantastic addition to the park, but was shot down by the directors, as their image of wooden roller coasters was that they were "old-fashioned" and "unsafe". John's dreams of a brand new wooden roller coaster were demolished (until 2017, when the park finally built their woodie). The McNamaras were also unconvinced by the idea of a wooden roller coaster for exactly the same reasons, but due to the limitations the park had in terms of capital, and the fact that they could source all of the materials needed for construction locally meant that they were eventually convinced to build what would go on to be one of the highest regarded wooden roller coasters of all time.

Megafobia opened in 1994 and was built by Custom Coasters International, their first coaster to be built outside of North America. John's dream came true, and Megafobia still goes on to thrill and entertain those as one of the best roller coasters ever constructed twenty-eight years later. The park recently invested two-million pounds reprofiling and retracking some of the elements of the coaster so it can continue to thrill and entertain for many more years to come.

My photo of Megafobia in the station in 2022 on a very quiet day before the £2m rework.

Leave it out to dry

After the addition of Megafobia as the park's main attraction, the park wanted something unique. It was in 1997 that Vertigo, a 'sky coaster' opened. This attraction opened as an upcharge attraction in which two or three people suit themselves up skydiver-esque suits, are hoisted to the top of a tower and, at the pull of an orange cord, fall freely underneath what is an extremely large metal arch, creating the sensation of flying or skydiving. It's likely the closest thing you'll get to flying or skydiving without actually going skydiving. 

If you're curious to see Vertigo in action, there's an excellent video of it here. It really is quite impressive.

Image courtesy of Matthew Wells

The "Leave it out to dry" name is not in relation to Vertigo, however. Vertigo is, as mentioned before, an upcharge attraction that although is unique and interesting, barely anyone has actually experienced. In my hundreds of visits to Oakwood, I have seen people on it maybe eight times. It uses a horrible amount of space, too. Space that could be much better used for something which more people want to do.

One of those things that people might want to do more is cool off on a nice summer's day; Pembrokeshire does get quite warm in the summer. It was the next logical step to install a major water ride.

Introducing Hydro in 2002, a Shoot-the-Chute Megasplash manufactured by Intamin. For such a small park to get such a big ride was impressive and widely praised within the community. However, many argue that it was this very ride that started the Rube Goldberg machine that ultimately led Oakwood into the sorry state it's in today. Still, only three of these were ever made and this one, still operating after twenty-two years, is the last of its kind in the world. There's good reason for that.

Hydro with its notorious blue train before the rebrand, courtesy of Hywel Williams

Due to an unfortunate flaw with the OEM restraints installed by Intamin, riders had a small but still slight risk of being ejected over the drop. In 2004, Staff failed to check the restraints, and the restraint of Haley Williams was left wide open. Realistically, the boat should have never been able to be dispatched. This happened on two occasions with the Intamin Megasplash models, one incident in America in addition to the 2004 incident in which Haley Williams, sixteen, sadly died. 

The health and safety executive (HSE) charged Oakwood in 2007 for not ensuring guests were properly and securely restrained, and Oakwood pleaded guilty. The park was fined £250,000 and charged £80,000 in legal costs.

The park attempted to rebrand the ride by painting the boats red, installing new and improved restraints, as well as renaming the ride to Drenched.

Drenched in action, the only one of its kind left in the world.

This incident had serious irreparable damage to the park's image which the park has always tried, but failed to, shake off. The park still receives a flurry of videos on the internet and tabloid articles about how the park is unsafe twenty years later.

Beyond Vertical

The incident had such an impact that what was meant to be their newest attraction, Speed Euro-Fighter (later renamed Speed: No Limits) was delayed until 2006.

Speed opened to become the UK's first beyond vertical drop roller coaster and one of the new Gerstlauer Eurofighter models they offered (hence the initial "Euro-Fighter" in its name). Speed was widely applauded by the community as a fantastic (and almost too ambitious) addition for such a small park. In my opinion, in terms of the ride and not theming, it's far better than any other Eurofighter in the UK. To this day, it's generally well maintained and has a queue time of less than ten minutes. Despite its quality and ability to thrill, it seems the park has always considered it second place in its line up of attractions.

The original Speed advertisement, one I remember watching as a five year old!

Despite the difficulties that the park had faced without the financial pockets of a large international corporation, it seemed that the park was still on the up. Not quite the ninety-degrees that Speed was ascending at, but still on the up. This all came to a very sudden and dramatic halt.

Nails In The Coffin

In late 2007, offers were made to the McNamara family by the Spanish group Aspro to purchase the park. In early 2008, the deal was finalised, and Oakwood was sold to Aspro, the owners of the Aqualand and Blue Planet attractions. Out went the continuous investment into the park's growing line up of attractions and in came Oakwood falling victim to corporate austerity.

Aspro continue to own and run the park to this day, and this ownership was generally seen by the community, including myself, as the final nail in the coffin for Oakwood becoming a serious competitor to some of the already well-established UK theme parks. From my experience of visiting the park for over fifteen years, I have seen a sharp decline in the quality of attractions offered, cost cutting, profit maximisation to the extreme (yes, hotdogs really do cost £6) and a seriously concerning lack of investment. Rides have closed or some remained standing but not operating (SBNO) for extended periods of time. For example, Bounce, a Huss shot-'n'-drop attraction ceased operations in 2016 awaiting a refurbishment which was completed in, drumroll please... 2022! Disgusting. What was the New Orleans area has become a glorified Tarmac theme-less area, what was Neverland (their newly refurbished family area) was grossly overspent and featured subpar attractions from the closed Camelot park, and what was a park on the up became one of mediocrity.

As a result of this mismanagement, Oakwood has had dwindling visitor numbers since 2014. According to various people I know within the community, the 2024 opening of the park was a disaster. Half completed winter maintenance, late opening, and still no new attractions. It's for this reason that I made the conscious decision to not renew my annual pass. Why would I spend my hard earned cash on a company that treats our heritage as yet another business venture?

A New Hope

I know that the previous section has been all doom and gloom, but fear not; there is hope. Aspro, very recently, appear to be investing in the park. They recently completed a reprofiling and retracking project of Megafobia costing £2 million, ensuring that future generations of thrill seekers can enjoy the ride as I did fifteen years ago. 

Some of the newly reprofiled Megafobia track

There is also some work taking place at the old Spooky 3D ride, an indoor dark ride which used UV-enabled paint to provide a three-dimensional effect with various spooks and scares. Recent videos provided by Oakwood show that the ride has been completely ripped out and work is taking place for a major refurbishment.

This is all very good to see, but what do I think? Do I think that this is really the best way to get Oakwood back on track?

What I Would Do

Do I think this is the right path for Oakwood to take? Perhaps. If Megafobia truly needed this work to keep it running for the foreseeable future (judging by my last ride, it definitely did) then fair enough; Why wouldn't you want to maintain such an iconic attraction?

Is it a good long-term strategy to only invest in this? No, of course it isn't. Although roller coaster nerds can see this as the next best thing since sliced bread, roller coaster enthusiasts don't pay the bills. It's the general public that pay the bills. In my experience, the general public couldn't give that much of a monkeys about a few reprofiled drops. Nor do they care about a retheme to a dark ride.

What Oakwood needs is, and this might sound slightly cliché but I think it's true, is a new major attraction. A new roller coaster would be its saving grace. Probably not B&M, but perhaps an Intamin or Gerstlauer attraction given the park's slightly less than advantageous financial position. This continuous investment is what makes parks like Thorpe Park, Alton Towers and Pleasure Beach so successful. The public aren't stupid, you know.