Gardaland’s Bigfoot Coaster

The European amusement park, Gardaland, has announced that “Magic Mountain,” a Vekoma double loop corkscrew rollercoaster will become “Bigfoot” in their next season.

Magic Mountain, a steel sit-down coaster, is situated on the lower level of the park as the park is set on a hill. It has been operating since 1985 making it the oldest coaster in the park. It stands at 98ft 5in above the ground and 2296ft 7in long making it last a total of 2:00 exactly. Its main elements are a double loop, double corkscrew and a rising helix.

Gardaland is the third-most-popular theme park in Europe and is between Peschiera and Lazise, at Lake Garda in Italy. Built on the eastern shore of Lake Garda at Castelnuovo del Garda, the park opened in 1975. It has expanded steadily in both size and attendance, topping 1 million visitors annually for the first time in 1984. By 2007, attendance reached 3.4 million.

Run and operated by the Merlin Entertainments Group, the park is promoted as the first one in Italy. It currently is home to six roller coasters and a total of 56 rides. The coasters are named Blue Tornado, Sequoia Adventure, Orto Bruco, Mammut, Fuga da Atlantide, and, of course, Magic Mountain, which shall be changing its name.

From the artist’s conceptualizations being shared, there seems to be some confusion in whether the name will incorrectly be spelled “Big Foot” or correctly as “Bigfoot.”

Nit-picking, cryptozoologically-speaking, I have to point out that the tracks shown in the logo are stylized Yeti tracks, based on the Eric Shipton 1951 photographs, and not on Sasquatch/Bigfoot prints. Other elements of the pictured Bigfoot, such as claws, fangs, white beard, and white eyebrows, are fantastic characteristics often found in amusement park and fictional Bigfoot-Yeti figures. For example, the Disneyland’s and Disney World’s Yetis have claws and fangs. The movie Harry and the Henderson’s Bigfoot, Harry, has made the white beard a mainstay in model Bigfoot since 1987.

It will be interesting to see what Gardaland does with their adjunct waiting area “Bigfoot Research” display. Perhaps they will use John Green’s, Grover Krantz’s, Jeff Meldrum’s and my books to assist them, and get it right.

Loren Coleman About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.

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