coasterbill

So we just spent the day at BGT (our second visit ever) and since we stayed from 10am to 1am for regular operation and Howl O Scream I'll probably write a full report soon but I just have to say, Montu and Kumba... dear god. I don't smoke but I need a cigarette. How did that company go on to build the Carowinds Intimidator and Silver Bullet? The same company that said "hey let's take a pretzel loop at a million miles an hour and rip everyone's faces off but somehow make it ridiculously smooth" on Montu and "let's build the most ridiculous Zero G roll ever designed ane let's take it so fast that without the restraints it would throw all the riders to Cuba" on Kumba should not be building crap like Intimidator, Hydra and Silver Bullet. B&M got some of their swagger back with Fury for sure but god what I wouldn't do for them to start building rides like Montu and Kumba again. To have both of these masterpieces in one park is amazing.

Everything should be open except the water rides.

Outstanding pictures! Thanks for sharing.

I'd love for you to be right. Roar in it's current form is a terrible coaster.

Lol he must. Then again doing a goofy show about the stock market is damn near impossible so I guess he kind of has to be like that.

It's sad to imagine what this park would look like if it were shut down for good and abandoned. ... actually it would probably look like any normal operating day. Never mind.

Any idea what's going on at the park tonight? The rides don't seem to be running but there are a ton of people on the midway.

Big Bad Wolf, but out of the ones that are still operating I give Tennessee Tornado the slight edge. Honorable mention goes to Magnum, Ninja, Vortex at Canada's Wonderland and the Bat.

That's not a small observation at all, everything involving Sky Ride is a major observation.

The difference between the middle seat of any car on Blue Streak and any other row is like night and day. It's much smoother in that seat, now we only ride Blue Streak (or really any 3 bench PTC except Phoenix which is flawless everywhere) in those middle rows. One thing I've always loved about Cedar Point is the fact that they never throw in the towel on a ride. On Friday it sounds lik Dragster opened for the night around 11:30 pm and they opened Maverick right before park close on Sunday. Good for them... I really appreciate the way they always do things like that.

I have to say that I've never experienced any vibration on Cyclone. It's one of the smoothest coasters I've ever ridden.

Oh no they were brutal. The guy at the panel wouldn't even open the gates until the train dropped off the lift and was somewhere over by Mind Eraser and then would cause massive delays by yelling at people for leaving loose articles on the platform. Then the train would be ready to dispatch but the seat checkers wouldn't be paying attention and he's have to yell their names and point to their positions like he had just decided hitting interval was a priority. Then at the end of the night he was yelling at this kid to leave (another employee, probably against the child labor law clock as a few ops were talking about that) and as soon as the kid left one of the higher ups came over and stood behind the panel and for the rest of the night this guy was acting like he was a Gatekeeper op or something who was obsessed with capacity. He looked like an NFL quarterback pointing and barking orders at everyone else to hurry up and get in position so they could get the trains out even though all day he couldn't possibly be bothered to even open the damn air gates.

Great report, glad you had fun. I think the most shocking thing in that whole report was that Thunderhawk was actually running 2 trains. A day without Thunder Creek Mountain is like a day without sunshine.

Okay, so just a few thoughts from yesterday... - This is the best trip we've had to SFNE in a long time. It may be because we were drinking most of the time but in any case, it was a lot of fun. - We got there at opening (since the park opened at noon) and we had the idea to head to Goliath first since if there was nobody waiting they might let us wait for the front (the only good seat on the train). They actually did, and it was a great ride. It's too bad we'll rarely ride it though because being assigned any other seat means you're in for a world of pain. - It was freezing yesterday but crowds were very large and really didn't die down much. At Great Adventure crowds usually thin out a lot about 90 minutes before close on cold nights but not here, everyone seemed pretty used to it. Despite the large crowds, lines were manageable. Bizarro, Batman and Wicked Cyclone were at about 45 minutes most of the day, the only rides with hour waits were Goliath and Pandemonium. The longest WE waited for anything was an hour for Pandemonium. We like Pandemonium... don't judge us. lol - Bizarro's operations were hilariously awful. Probably 5 minute dispatches... We rode twice, both in the front. We actually ended up on the last train of the night in 35 degree weather in the front. We got stuck on the lift for 10 minutes but ended up having a great ride once they finally got it going. - Last night after having a ton of Sam Adams drafts throughout the day (when in Rome), we came across a bar by Scream. They had a few taps including one for Leinenkugel Summer Shandy. I knew it was probably just still there from the summer but I asked if they seriously had it and sure enough they poured me a tall shandy. It was pretty awesome walking around a park drinking a Summer Shandy when you could barely feel your fingers and Goliath was closed due to low temps. Nobody else cares but hats off to them for keeping the Shandy flowing. Long live summer. - Speaking of low temps... they pretty much don't care. They had a sign in front of Goliath all day saying that it would cease operations in low temps but it ran until it got below 40 degrees and then it finally closed. No other rides had signs like this and none of them shut down. Splashwater Falls was actually open until about 2 hours after it got dark but I didn't see anyone ride it all day. If they still had the flume I'd have hopped on but for a stupid ride like Splashwater Falls I opted to stay dry. - Everything was running great, Bizarro was running slow obviously but it was still fun, Wicked Cyclone is out of control and awesome and Pandemonium, Thunderbolt and Batman were all giving great rides too. - We actually found a Batman grouper that acknowledged the existence of the Front Seat line signs! Sure he didn't let anyone wait and pretended that "They tried it for awhile and it was a mess so they just haven't taken the signs down yet" but at least he acknowledged the sign was there. For the record they never "tried" anything, they've always just pretended the signs weren't there. - So um... I sort of discovered something yesterday and I'm a little ashamed to admit this in public but the first step towards solving a problem is admitting you have one so here goes. We... (god this is tough)... ...like... ... Flashback After seeing full queue's for Pandemonium, Sky Screamer and Wicked Cyclone we noticed a short wait for Flashback and for some reason I can't explain we decided to ride it. We had so much fun on it we actually rode it again later. It's a far superior ride to Goliath (unless you're in the front of Goliath) and it wasn't rough in any way, shape or form. I know I'm supposed to hate Flashback but I really kind of like it. I don't know what's happened to me. Overall we had a great time at the park. Hats off to them for running basically everything in temperatures where other parks would be closing things and hats off to the ride staff as they were all doing a great job yesterday (except the Bizarro crew).

We're at the park. We got a front seat ride on Goliath and I can confirm that it actually doesn't suck up there... I really wish they'd let you pick your seat, I'd actually ride it a lot more often if they did. Oh and we're playing the Bizarro train stacking drinking game so if I never post again assume we died of alcohol poisoning...

I'm sure you're right and there is some kind of limit, but rest assured that it was phlying... sorry... flying during PPP and it was really cold at that point. I was convinced we were about to die, easily the best ride we've ever had on it.

I would think Flying Turns could run in the cold. They have heaters on the wheels while the ride is parked in the station. They were on during PPP.

That would seem to be the complete list. The only coasters I could see them adding to that list are Blackbeards and the Kiddy coaster. It sounds like they'll close off Golden Kingdom and anything beyond the boardwalk which could be done pretty easily.

How is the lift entry painful? It is probably one of the smoothest rides I have ever been on. Because for every coaster in the world there's an enthusiast ready to complain about how rough it is.

So who else loves the fact that now we can just answer this question with... "riding Nitro"? February should be the only month with no operating days at local parks. ... gotta love it.

If you want to ride Goliath for some reason, ride that as soon as the gates open. If you're not a credit whore then just skip it because it sucks and head right for either Bizarro or Wicked Cyclone. The only can't miss rides in the park besides the obvious 2 are Batman, Thunderbolt (just because it's a classic and it rides really well but don't expect insane forces or airtime) and Sky Screamer. Pandemonium is a lot of fun too but it's a clone. Houdini is a cool ride if you haven't ridden the one at Great Adventure but unfortunately it's closed for a haunt maze. Also, ride Bizarro at least once in the very front (don't do it first thing on such a cold day... give it some time to warm up). Yes the line is long, but just do it... trust me.

I'm beyond excited for Holiday in the Park. This is my favorite addition since El Toro. I just hope they stick to their lenient weather policies... If they do this event will be awesome and it'll really make the offseason much less painful.

With that forecast you'll be fine. I'd imagine it might take them a little while to get a few rides moving (the water dummies will get plenty of use) but once they get going it shouldn't dip below the point where they'd need to close anything. Every park is a little different but at parks Ike Dollywood and Carowinds it needs to be at 40 degrees for some rides to start running but once they start running it needs to fall into the mid 30's before they close. Some parks are a little different (Hershey is more strict for example and Great Adventure keeps dispatching until the ride valleys because Yolo) but that's the general rule for most B&M and Intamin coasters as far as most parks are concerned. If it's windy and cold that could complicate things though so keep an eye on the wind forecast.

All of them are excellent rides but this is an easy one for me, Raptor. I consider it the third best coaster in the park after Millennium Force and Maverick. I absolutely love that ride.