Kumdori Land & Expo

After a quick 5 minute morning walk to the river at the end of the road and back we made our way to Kumdori Land. This park was part of a much larger Expo land for the '93 Expo. (some information about daejeon)

Whilst we'd come to realise that most of the Expo site was now abandoned the park was still doing reasonably well. Having said that, on the day that we were there the park were not going to open any of the rollercoasters because of the H1N1 curfew, but Flora our translator was able to get them to reconsider and they did open them all for us. Super!

I'm always up for trying new stuff and this morning I was trying some of this Fanta grape juice that you're encouraged to shake before you drink. Fortunately the gas isn't that bad and you don't get covered when you open it however when I had first swig I discovered the drink was fully of Aloe Jelly, which I didn't expect. There was much amusement at my expense as I choked on the drink and spat it out. But once I was over the original shock of that the drink itself was quite nice.

the aliens in the city posters were also to be found outside the park entrance. That nice looking building was a castle on this side but some sort of dry ski slope on the other.

A "Seven Mole" bash the mole on the head game, which only features 6 mole holes. I have no idea where mole #7 comes into it. Perhaps he's the one that escaped, put a turd on it's head and moved to Seoul Land.

Not having the same budget as Lotte or Everland, the park had not gone too overboard on the Halloween theming but some of it was better than others.

Is this the Korean James Bond?

The big yellow coaster like Seoul Land is called Black Hole 2000. I think in the past the park must have had some sort of space theme, that at least would explain the galaxy sign (see the signs section for that) and the alien statues around the park.

The park does have a big wheel but suffers from the same problem as Everland in that the windows are tinted...except for 3 that the majority of the club tried to ride but were denied entry too. Being the first to ask though, we didn't have that problem and were able to take some photos that others couldn't. In their defense I think the park staff said that later on the cabins were getting too hot (they weren't ventilated) so they would only put people in the tinted ones. Because we got their early the cabins must not have been that bad.

Black Hole 2000 and the park surrounding it. You can see that the park isn't that big at all and the coaster totally dominates the park. The dome building houses the indoor coaster, which was a lot of fun. The final coaster is the green one just beneath the hill after the loops. That was the worst coaster in the park but it has to be said the worst of a good bunch.

The Kumdori Coaster is a rollerskater, and not too bad at all.

The final coaster is an indoor one and really good. Perhaps the best coaster in the park.

This is the Expo site. Each of the funky looking buildings housed some sort of attraction during the Expo.

The club making their way up the ramps to the station for the Black Hole coaster.

The Black Hole coaster wasn't that bad at all actually. I liked the initial helix, which offered a nicer start than the usual big drop. The loops were comfortable to ride and the ending had a half corkscrew manouveur that was pretty cool too.

Perhaps the coolest Kiwi Fruit ever. This is their fruit themed teacups ride.

This golf buggy has seen better days. This isn't part of any ride whatsoever.

The park has a booster ride but I don't recall it running today. In fact I didn't really spend that much time in the park at all really. I was more interested in the Expo site so having ridden the coasters and taken some photos from the wheel it was time to say goodbye to Kumdori and go to explore Daejeon Expo.

The first building we entered housed a large exhibition all to do with energy, how its produced and how we should conserve it. It wasn't bad at all but aimed at school kids, not adults.

Some of the other buildings in the Expo complex, most now lying empty and un-used. A real shame to be honest but this is pretty common with Expo sites I believe. The city is given the money to produce the buildings but not maintain them and if the city can't get private firms to sponsor them then they'll fall into disrepair. Having said that the buildings were all still looking good even if they're no longer used.

The dome was being used and housed a 3d cinema, which myself and Jeppe saw a show in. We were the only ones.

Archimedes having his Eureka moment. Part of a small display of famous scientist dudes.

A lot of club members were interested in a monorail track that was passed on the way to the park. It turns out that its actually a maglev system to get people from the Expo Park to a large Gallery/Conference centre some distance away. However it looked like this was the first building to feel the effects of nobody coming to the Expo anymore and had been closed for some time.

On the South side of the Expo complex is this cool bridge. A nice simple suspension design. Beyond it lay more exhibition centres, a massive park and a large residential area.

This is the centrepiece of the Expo. It's 93 metres tall in line with the year the expo was held. It's also partly open to the public and for a small amount of Won we were able to ascend the spike to the donut and take a look around. Actually our ticket also gave us access to the higher viewing gallery but it was roped off...that didn't stop us going up and having a look anyway.

Looking South from the tower. Now you know how I knew what lay across the river.

Some other views from the tower.

I took the opportunity to take some wide-angled photos of the park too.

Underneath the tower lies this rather massive drum, which the sign proclaims is the largest in the world. I don't know if that's still true. It is pretty big though.

Kumdori was alright as a small park, albeit it with a big coaster. The Expo land was fun to explore but a little sad to find it mostly empty and un-used.

From that half-day park visit it was time to head to another half-day park nearby.