Villa Volta; Haunted Swing or Mad House? -

Okay, I'm obsessed by that stupid Villa Volta thing in de Efteling. I can't help it. I've been on it just once in my whole life (although I've seen the outside of it just weeks after it had been put into service) and now I'm nuts about it.

And when I'm nuts about something I want to prove as much as possible in its favour. Bandits and CBs not included.

A Haunted Swing is a curious and rare thing you find on fairs and funparks. You're basically in a small room, on a swing and the room around you begins to spin...

Here's a Haunted Swing from a funpark or something called "Idlewild": link The Swing itself is appropriately called "Dinny Lizzy's Saloon".

The people are sitting on a platform which appears to be stationary; it's not moving while the room moves around it. That way you get the impression you're going upside down. Look at how the people aren't fastened to the benches they're on.

And here's a picture of the inside of Villa Volta: link
Look at the people; they're strapped to the benches with metal bars. And look at the people sitting at the front row. They're all sitting with their hands between their legs or on their knees. That's because the bars are lowered so close to your body that your arms are pressed against it. Now why would there be bars? Simple. The swing of Villa Volta, or the "gondola" as we call it here, moves.

Here's the Villa in action (completely empty except the filmer, by the way): link
Note the beautiful music.

You can't really see evidence of the gondola moving. You'd have to feel it. But there's a small indication; the "wall" kind of thing with the moving mirror on it is actually a swing arm. (look at how Dizzy Lizzy's Saloon doesn't have a swing arm) On top of that swing arm are a statue or a woman and two vases. You can see the vases are moving when the house moves. There are probably weights attacked to the bottom of the vases, but nobody's sure on that. They're not programmed to move. They react on the movements of the gondola.

The guy who made the Villa was actually inspired by a Haunted Swing. The Haunted Swing's of an old principle; they existed since the 1920s. As said before it LOOKS like you're on a swing, but there's actually a drum or a cilinder moving around you.

In the Villa it's like this:
The swing moves from left to right and can go 30 degrees sideways. So 30 degrees to the left and 30 degrees to the right. The cilinder around it moves in opposite direction. At top speed, when the house is revolving completely, it moves at twice the speed of the gondola. That creates a perfect illusion. Also the music and the flickering lights enforce that.

Neither the gondola nor the cilinder are directly operated by engines. The gondola is operated with hydrolic pistons. (there's got to come an engine into play SOMEWHERE, otherwise it wouldn't turn and have a whole array of computers inside) That way the gondola can be lowered into place when the Villa breaks down or when there's an emergency. (thanks to that physically challenged people can in theory make use of the Villa as well; it won't ne hard to lift them out in case of emergency) The cilinder is operated by large wheels. This cilinder can also be lowered into original position should something go wrong.

Villa Volta was the first Haunted Swing that actually had a large, moving swing and is thus the first Mad House ever built. There are some more of them; I think Walibi World, also in the Netherlands, has one, but it's said to not be as good as Villa Volta. And I've seen picture of Mad Houses in Asia.
There were smaller Haunted Swings with moving swings before, but they were... tiny. More like Mad Shacks.

Building the Villa cost 5 million. Now I still don't know how much that is. The site on which I saw that info said "5 million". The problem is that the Villa was built in 1996, when the Netherlands still had Guilders. The site's much newer, so I don't know if the site meant Guilders or Euros. If it was Euros then the house will have cost $ 7478503.00 (today) That's about 7.5 million bucks. If it had been in Guilders it would have been I don't know, because Guilders don't exist any more. In 1996 it would probably have been a LOT less in Dollars because the Dollar was strong back then.
Anyway, the music's another thing which makes the Villa exceptional; it contributes to the revolving sensation. It's not necessarily scary or exiting, but it's impressive. I'm dying to learn and play it on my Casio CA-100, one of the most hated keyboards on the planet and built in 1991. So it's much older than the Villa. @_@

Here's the music of the villa: link

I love my Casio.

Anyway, the Villa's a Mad House and not just a Haunted Swing. I have decided.