Mike Laycock finds the rollercoasters of Lightwater Valley as thrilling as ever.

IT is now 14 years since I joined boxer Frank Bruno as he launched the world's longest rollercoaster.

Lightwater Valley named it The Ultimate, and, with one and a half miles of twisting and turning track, it certainly was the ultimate rollercoaster in those days. Frank reckoned it was fast and frightening, and compared it to a spell in the ring with Mike Tyson - if you know what I mean, 'arry.

As I paid a return visit to the theme park near Ripon, I wondered if the ride - still the longest in Europe - was still thrilling visitors.

It was a Saturday in August with perfect theme park weather - sunny but not too hot - and I feared I might be in for long and frustrating queues, but I waited no longer than 20 minutes to go on the Ultimate or any other ride.

Harnessed into my seat, and starting the long, slow, clanking climb up the first slope, I felt that familiar sense of excitement, coupled with a little dread, that only a good theme park ride can produce. I knew that, statistically and logically, I was going to be safer than I was driving from York to Ripon, but I still knew I would feel as if I was about to be thrown out of my seat as I hurtled down the precipitous slope at umpteen mph, or that my head was going to be knocked off as I later thundered along S-bends through woodland and dark tunnels.

And so it came to pass - the same white knuckles on the bar, the same old thrills. Excellent. But the six-minute ride was also rougher than I remembered, with passengers thrown from side to side on some of the bends.

My wife, daughter Gabrielle and her friend Josh did not brave the Ultimate, but they did enjoy most of the other, slightly gentler rides, from the Ladybird (children's rollercoaster) to The Twister (a moderate rollercoaster in which the cars twist round as you whiz round the track). We got slightly wet in the Falls of Terror (a water chute) and wetter still in Toad Hole, a boat which rushes down a chute before splashing into a pond.

In glorious sunshine, the attractive parkland, which features woodland and a lake, was an attractive place to spend a day. And as we walked to the exit, I concluded that Lightwater is still an ultimate day out for North Yorkshire's thrill-seekers.

Fact file

Lightwater Valley, Ripon.

Admission: Over 1.2 metres: £15.50, under 1.2 metres: £13.95. Under 1 metre: free. Family ticket (for 4): £55.80.

Open every weekend in September and October from 10am to 4.30-5.30 pm.

Further information:

0870 458 0040, or visit

www.lightwatervalley.net

Updated: 08:45 Saturday, September 03, 2005