AmyUD06

@bert425Not saying I told you so, but....

Fair enough. Hopefully for you by that point they'll be selling daily Fast Lane.

Look, I get it...staying at Breakers or Express can be awesome for a trip, especially the first one, but if getting on as much as possible is your priority, the Platinum Pass + All-Season, All-Park Fast Lane is the better option. You get the same Early Entry perks from the Platinum Pass as you do from staying at Breakers/Express, and you also get the ability to bypass lines all day for all three days. Even if your wait with the FL+ is 30-45 minutes, that's still a hell of a lot better than the 2-3 hours waits you'll encounter without it. Now if money is no object, absolutely combine the two (stay at Breakers and go for the PP+FL option), but if my choice is one or the other, I know which one I'd go for.

I reiterate my earlier stated notion of buying a Platinum season Pass along with the All-Season, All-Park Fast Lane, through one of the Cedar Fair sites that is offering it. You do not need to go to that park for it to be valid at Cedar Point. This way, you'll have Fast Lane Plus for your CP trip, and can do things at your leisure. It's Labor Day Weekend. The park is going to be slammed. You also get Early Entry with a Platinum Pass, so you don't need to stay at one of the Cedar Point Hotels.

I had inferred it from the fact that SFGAdv's site has two options to buy Power Hour tickets, one for Passes/Members and one without, and the fact that the website states that "a ticket is required for everyone" whereas SFStL's just says "reservations are required for everyone." But I could be mistaken.

Doesn't appear that they're charging Season Passes/Memberships, as they rightly shouldn't. *coughSFGADVcough*

Stopped by the park for a few hours today with my father to burn off the Bring-a-Friend I had with my Season Pass before it expired. Not worth a full TR, but here are some notes: -Reservations were checked by no one. -Row skipping on coasters is a thing of the past; though my dad and I did get our own car on both Justice League and Dark Knight. -Social distancing in queues was actually a thing! -Season Flash Pass holders were directed to a booth separate from the main Flash Pass building to pick theirs up; it was located near the old entrance to Old Country across from Sky Screamer. Not sure if this is the way it will be moving forward. -Dark Knight with the roll-up doors on the sides of the building open completely ruins the point; it was pretty much daylight in there. -El Toro was back to its normal awesome self after a disappointing ride last fall. It must have been the cold. It is now back up to my #4 woodie. -It had been several years since I was able to get on Kingda Ka in the front. I don't remember it being this good. I still prefer Dragster for the restraints, overall smoothness, and "all-in-one-push" launch, but yeah the way it just goes "nope, let's go a little faster" twice during the launch sure is something. -The park really doubled down on the "marijuana is prohibited signs." There's like 5 in every smoking zone and a ton more around the park that weren't here last year. Guess that's what happens when your Governor "legalizes it"....no one actually reads the bill to realize that it's not really allowed outside of your home. -They have brought in a bunch of outside contracted security staff to manage the park entrance screening and queue lines. Not sure if this is permanent or just due to most of their college-aged staff not yet free from school and able able to work. -All in all, a decent visit.

Hey now, I hang out by myself at parks all the time. The last time I went to a park with someone was 2019, pre-COVID.

Bill is sadly right.

End of June should be good anywhere in the country. Some school districts run in to the first week or two of June.

Weekdays in July and August, if anything like last year, should be manageable. I think the longest I waited for anything at KI was an hour for Beast.

Fast Lane passes are not being sold on a daily basis yet; its possible that they won't all year. Right now you can buy an all-season, all-park Fast Lane for all Cedar Fair parks through one of the sites that are selling them (that will be valid at Cedar Point), but as I mentioned it's super pricey. Two days at CP, especially weekends, are advised even with Fast Lane plus...there's just that much to do. Many major rides do not drop you right in the station either (Millennium Force and Raptor are the biggest offenders), so you might still have 15-30 minutes from the "merge" point. Steel Vengeance, at its height before COVID, got 45 minute Fast Lane waits and it DOES drop you in the station. Going on a Saturday and Sunday without a Fast Lane....you might have to skip out on some things. If the decision really is a "this year OR next year" and not a "this year AND next year" thing, I'd say you should wait for next year.

Amen brother. My trips before having it and after were night and day. My only desire for single-day FL sales is for when I bring friends who don't have the same enthusiasm for parks as I do. Normally I spring for it for them, but dropping another thousand for someone else who won't go half the times that I do takes some thought. Though I have to say I'm surprised that CF hasn't caught on to the "trick" of buying Platinum Passes and add-ons through CW's site and started mandating that you "check in" with whatever park you bought the pass from first like SF and SEAS do.

Haha....$299 is for the Kings Dominion-only all-season Fast Lane. The all-park is $875. I added it to my Platinum as soon as they offered it last year after two kinda miserable trips to both CP and KI without it, and then got 3 days at each park with it. For me, that paid for itself. The fact that its valid all this year too is just icing on the cake. If you go to the parks enough it's doesn't work out that bad math-wise. Figure $150 a day at CP, $75-95 a day at KI or KD...you really only need like 7 days (or 5 to CP) to make it worthwhile. I've reached the point in my life where waiting with the public more than 15 minutes makes me want to blow my brains out, so it's completely invaluable to me.

I second this notion.

KI's Fast Lane has said "on sale soon" pretty much since they closed last season. The only guaranteed way to get it right now is to add the All-Season, All-Park Fast Lane Plus to a Platinum Pass using one of the sites that's offering it (such as KD).

Everyone in SoCal (and the rest of the country) had the same opportunity to travel to parks that weren't shutdown as anyone else. I don't think Newsom was exiling those who left the state (but it wouldn't surprise me if he was). Skimming back through the past few pages here didn't give me the impression that there were "serious doubts"...Six Flags is owning pandemic operations everywhere else, there's no reason to imagine it would be different there. The only doom and gloom came from Californians, who, pardon my stereotyping, tend to have somewhat of a "we're special compared to everyone else" attitude. EDIT: Look, I'm not trying to be argumentative. I just think that Californians are making a much bigger deal out of this than they should. The companies figured out how to operate in a pandemic last summer, there's no new special magic that needed to be applied here.

I guess you're right, but I tend to think those are BS too. Not sure if this is the same thing, since these are occurring on days the park would normally be closed (Thursdays, 2 Fridays) or are closing stupidly early at 5PM (Fridays). Rather than just add them as operating days to the calendar, giving the SP/Membership more value, they're choosing to run it as a "limited" event with an upcharge. And I shouldn't be surprised, this the Six Flags that charges extra for Halloween walk-throughs.

LOL $5 EXTRA for Season Pass or Membership holders, to only ride the coasters and probably even more limited food options than normal. Wonder how they explain that one.

If you're going to be spending 3 or more days total combined between Kings Dominion and Cedar Point, buying the Platinum Pass makes sense. By purchasing that, it opens up the option of the "All-Season, All-Park Fast Lane Plus" add-on. It's pricey ($875, on top of the $202 for the Platinum Pass), but if you're going to do the trip this year that's the only way to go. If you're coming all this way, you might as well add in a day at Kings Island (about 3.5 hours drive south of Cedar Point, in Ohio near Cincinnati). It may not show on the main web page, but if you go into Kings Dominion's ticket-purchasing page, it'll show up under "2021 Add-Ons." Note that it does NOT show up on Cedar Point's site, but that doesn't mean anything. EDIT: Yeah, there's Dorney Park too, which is about a hour away from PHL. With the Platinum Pass, you could drop in and knock out their major dry park rides in like 2 hours. EDIT 2: You say the "last weekend of operation" for Cedar Point in August...that means Friday the 27th through Sunday the 29th. Note that Kings Dominion and Kings Island are currently scheduled to be closed the Monday-Thursday before and after that weekend. That may change, since Dorney is showing weekday operations (except Tuesdays) during the same time frame, but who knows. Note that you'd also likely save a little bit of money (and a whole bunch of time) flying from Virginia to Ohio rather than driving all the way back up to Philly Airport. There are a buttload of tolls in Maryland, and the saved gas/tolls will probably be more than the service fee for returning the rental car somewhere other than where you picked it up. EDIT 3: Since you didn't lay out your itinerary, here's how I would tackle all of the parks you mentioned given their operating calendars, plus Dorney and Kings Island, and Knoebels...which the fact that it hasn't been brought up yet is criminal. -Thursday, 8/19: Fly into Columbus, OH and get a hotel centrally located between KI and CP. -Friday, 8/20 and Saturday, 8/21: Two Full Days at Cedar Point -Sunday, 8/22: Full day at Kings Island -Monday, 8/23: Fly into the Philadelphia Region, hitting Dorney Park quickly after you land. Get a hotel centrally between Hershey and SFGAdv -Tuesday, 8/24: Full day at Hershey -Wednesday, 8/25: Full day at SFGAdv -Thursday, 8/26: Half-day at Knoebels, then drive to Virginia. This will be a 5-6 hour drive with stops for bathroom breaks. Get a hotel centrally located between Kings Dominion and Busch gardens -Friday, 8/27: Full day at Busch Gardens. -Saturday, 8/28: Full day at Kings Dominion. -Sunday, 8/29: Fly home.

So, basically SFMM is currently like CP/KI/Hershey/SFGAdv/<insert major US park of your choice> last summer. Why are people surprised?

You know these are designed to be assembled in a matter of days, right?

Last year, front row for me was the least brutal. It was still pretty bad though, to the point where unless your daughter is concerned about building her credit list, it would probably be in her best interest to skip it. Then again, kids have more resilient bodies than us adults LOL.

Keep the dream alive LOL.

Maybe I've missed some sort of official announcement, but is it safe to assume that the full park won't be open (meaning everything currently marked "Temporarily Closed" will be running) until May after the Food & Wine festival?