coasterer

You're a hero!

Solid questions. 1. What is the best park visit you had in 2017? I really really loved Port Aventura. I'd have to say that one, although I had a couple memorable days where I was on a rush layover and banged out some obscure parks. Coming off a plane a little buzzed and running around a city is one of my favorite things. 2. Have you ever traveled to a park with a specific ride in mind only for it to be closed all day? Definitely. Missed Hulk at Universal AND Kraken at Sea World on separate visits to Orlando (though at least I knew they would be closed). Drove out of my way to Clementon Park, Rye's Playland, and Camden Park for the their woodies and each had their respective largest woodie closed. Didn't pay to go into any of them, just turned around at the gate and left. 3. GCI or Gravity Group? Pick one. Gravity Group has the edge, but I do enjoy GCIs, and even love some of their better ones. I prefer CCIs to both of these. 4. How many different parks did you visit in 2017? 11, and most of those were because I was in the area for work trips or they were on the way to visiting family. 5. How many times did you visit your home park in 2017? None times. Wasn't worth it for me this year. 6. What was the first RMC you rode? It was Twisted Colossus, but I had to go back and check. I rode TC, Medusa, and Goliath all within a few weeks of each other. 7. Best view from the top of a lift? Medusa Steel immediately comes to mind, although MF and the coasters at Ocean Parks obviously are great as well. 8. What new-for-2018 roller coaster are you most anticipating? Pick one. Cedar Point's RMC, but beyond the RMCs there actually isn't too much I'm super excited for. I am enjoying watching the Asian market expand though. 9. RMC or Intamin? You can only choose one. Intamin for me, they're just a little more classic. And there are more of them. 10. What was your favorite new-to-you ride of 2017? Almost everything I rode in 2017 was new to me, and there were a few good ones. Shambhala was so dreamy. Flying Aces too. 11. Money is no object. You can travel to any park in the world right now by snapping your fingers. Where are you going? Gold Reef City or Parque Espana - take me far, far away please, somewhere fairly obscure. 12. Have you ever made out with someone in a queue line? Actually yes haha. 13. What is the last coaster that changed your top 10? I have Shambhala down at #10 steel, that was the only change from this year. Last year I saw changes from Fury, Outlaw Run, and Lightning Rod. 14. Disney or Universal? Disney definitely. 15. When is the last time you witnessed someone puke at a park? I've taken multiple friends to parks that have ended up puking haha. Last one was probably a few years ago. 16. How many new credits did you pick up in 2017? If you don't count, take your best guess... Only 26. My quietest year since I started keeping track 12 years ago. 17. You're at Magic Mountain. You have a one hour ERT session on ONE coaster of your choice. You choose... Probably Twisted Colossus, yeah. 18. Name a coaster or ride that you passionately dislike. I really don't like most of what seems to often pass for major new installments these days - the 4d coasters, the Sky Rocket IIs, that sort of thing. 19. What is the most amount of money you've spent on a Fast Pass? Never have I ever. 20. Skyscreamers or Windseekers? Windseekers I guess 21. What is your most recent B&M credit? In reverse order, added Shambhala, Dragon Khan, Banshee, Diamondback, Mako, and Manta this year. 22. Best adult beverage at a theme park? (under 21: whats your favorite beverage you can only get at a park?) I actually don't drink at theme parks, it's too expensive for me. I definitely drink after theme parks though. 23. Most irritating coaster nickname/abbreviation? Don't get particularly upset about any that I can think of. 24. Butterbeer or Dole Whip? What's a Dole Whip? Lol 25. Favorite steel coaster *under* 100 feet? Medusa Steel definitely, although I forgot that was under 100 feet until I checked. Then Atlantis Adventure 26. What's the best bathroom at your home park? The closest one. I rank a lot of things and keep a lot of lists, but this is not one of them. 27. Nighttime ERT on Lightning Rod or all-you-can-eat Cinnamon Bread? You can only choose one. I mean, Lightning Rod. 28. If it were in your power, what coaster would you relocate to Knoebels? Blackpool's mouse! 29. What is the last thing you remember eating in a theme park? Honestly, I can't. I don't eat at parks. 30. Your favorite coaster got equipped with on board audio x Spotify. What's your hype track? None for me. I like my coasters all na-tu-ral. 31. Name the most disappointing ride you took in 2017. Joker at SFDK (while hungover) and Furious Baco did not meet my hopes, dreams, and expectations. 32. Airtime hill or Zero G Roll? Actually Zero G Roll. It's probably the only thing you could have said to not make me immediately choose air time hill. 33. What is your favorite coaster/ride built before 1970? Oh gosh I have no idea. Matterhorn? 34. What's worse - splashed by malaria lake flume water or dripped on by chain lift grease? I just hate being wet so bad. Water for me. 35. Name an Intamin coaster on your bucketlist! Expedition GeForce is the only big one left on my list. After that it's Skycar lol, and some of the newer China installations, like that triple launch. 36. You just won a 3 day trip with hotel and airfare included. The catch is you have to choose between Disneyworld or Cedar Point. Which do you choose and why? Disneyworld. We just had a kid, and I know I ain't payin' to take my family to Disney any time soon. 37. Floater or Ejector? Ejector. 38. What was your worst park experience of 2017? Unfortunately, Stricker's Grove. Wanted to like it, but it was super super crowded, making it a get-us-the-heck-out-of-here sort of day. 39. Name your favorite coaster under 41 feet tall. Jungle Storm in Bahrain, changed my life. 40. End your post with an aerial shot of one of your top 5 coasters. KATUN!!!!

I love lists! (Missing Q and Y) A - Atlantis Adventure B - Boulder Dash C - Cornball Express D - Dragon Khan E - El Toro F - Fury 325 G - Goliath - Walibi H - Hades (the old version - after that is... Hair Raiser???) I - I305 J - Jungle Storm K - Katun L - Lightning Rod M - Medusa Steel N - Nemesis O - Outlaw Run P - Prowler Q - NO Q R - Rampage S - Storm Runner (Shivering Timbers, Skyrush, and Shambhala cloooose behind) T - T-Express U - Underground (by default) V - Voyage W - Wild Mouse - Blackpool (in memoriam) X - Xcelerator Y - NO Y Z - Zippin Pippin

What a great surprise! Honestly, I had resigned myself to it being gone. This is the good news we all needed after Blackpool's Wild Mouse! The world needs MORE Intamin woodies, not less.

Just saw the news on FB! Is this completely out of left field?? It literally never crossed my mind to worry about it coming down any time soon. I really really enjoyed my rides on it, a lot, and loved that this kind of ride still existed.

Fun topic - I've never thought about making a list like this, and it's given me reason to go back over my year! A pretty coaster-light year for me - I rode almost no repeated coasters, as I prioritized spending time and money to knock out a few heavy hitters that I haven't been on. Even parks I had been to before worked out where I didn't have a ton of time to reride a lot of previous credits. I didn't even go to my home park (SFOG) this year! Weird. But there were definitely a few standouts. In the order I rode them: Flying Aces Nefeskesen Mako Lightning Run Storm Chaser Mystic Timbers Diamondback Banshee Dragon Khan Shambhala Honorable mentions to Manta, Medusa and Joker at SFDK, Formula Rossa, and Red Force

1. Katun 2. Nemesis 3. Alpengeist 4. Afterburn 5. Banshee --- 6. Batman clones (favorite is the first, and my first, at SFGAm) 7. Raptor 8. Flight Deck 9. Red Dragon 10. Great Bear 11. Black Mamba 12. Silver Bullet 13. Blue Dragon 14. Talon 15. Patriot 16. Nemesis Inferno Still have yet to manage to ride Montu somehow. And I've always thought Pyrenees looked incredible. Nemesis Inferno is the only I remember to be actually somewhat disappointing.

I haven't been to MA in about a decade, but my memories of Shivering Timbers rides still hold up against a lot of other rides. I loved that thing, and I'm glad to hear it still rides great. Like you say, it doesn't beat out the top top tier of some of the RMCs and Intamins today, but it's right up there after that. For a couple years after I rode it, I had it ranked 2nd after Voyage. I still rank Shivering Timbers in my top 10 woodies after all these years (which is obviously arbitrary), but speaks a lot to the impression it made on me. I think with MA, Shivering Timbers is SO much better than everything else that it can really make the rest of the park pale in comparison. Parking my butt in Shivering Timbers' last row and not moving is the only thing I think about when I think about MA, but you did a great job of highlighting the park's other offerings. Thanks for the report!

Thanks for posting! My favorite part of Siam Park City was the Tagada! And the fact that the left-to-rot shuttle is totally unguarded.

Thanks for the report! Great to hear you had a good time. My wife and I lucked out and happened to be making the drive from Atlanta to Chicago the day they were open in mid-August, so we made the detour. I had really been looking forward to this park, but the place was slammed and some of the clientele was less than pleasant. It ended up being an in-and-out-and-never-again place for us, but it's great to hear another perspective!

Thanks for posting! I'll also be keeping an eye on this - I enjoy reading your commentary.

Turns out, it isn't too hard to make your own list so I took a whack at it. Hesitant to have my name attached to anything that is so open to criticism from ignorant people or internet trolls or [gasp] hyper-opinionated coaster geeks, but here goes. Hopefully you guys find this one at least moderately less sucky. http://www.listchallenges.com/100-great-roller-coasters-for-real-enthusiasts

85/100! It seemed a lot of the ones overseas I was saying "Oh wow that's lucky I've actually been on that one". Others were like "whoooooo what why how???". Can a moderately competent, sane, and well-rounded enthusiast please make a more accurate top 100 list?

Was at the park yesterday for the first time. The place blew me away. I knew it was going to be nice, but I absolutely loved the theming and diversity, and just how enormous the place was. I ran to Red Force first thing (it really took me off guard when EVERYONE pelted forward at full sprint. I'm used to casually jogging my way ahead of everyone.) I was on maybe the second or third train of Red Force, and right away they had a few technical difficulties and slow loading problems. "Oh boy," I thought, "we're in for a long day." One of the ride attendants actually went to each person waiting and tried to explain IN THEIR LANGUAGE. Poor thing, haha. The first people she goes to: "Spanish?" "Niet, Russki". Ride op, sigh: "English okay?" "Da." She explains. Next pair, the guy starts off right away "Bonjour!" And she sighs exasperatedly before explaining in French, and on down the line. Couldn't believe the customer service in that regard. 2 minutes later the ride is back running and I was proven vastly mistaken. The ride ops were amazing on Red Force. Super quick in and out, and within seconds we were rolling out the station and blasted immediately away. Honestly, I was not expecting much out of Red Force and was seriously considering skipping paying the combined park fee entirely (but it was only like 6 euros extra so it was no problem), but I was very pleasantly surprised. I loved the rolling launch. It felt very fast and forceful (I've been on all the fast launchers and was on Formula Rossa even earlier this year, so I was expecting to be underwhelmed but it held its own!). The ride up was smooth, there was air at the top (though not sustained), the view of the coast was perfect, and then the drop was magnificent. I also absolutely love TTD's and KK's twisting drops, but this one was very nice too. Well worth the extra 6 euros. I rode it three times back to back (thank you single rider line), took a lap of the park, and was out by 10:30, a half hour after rope drop. That was enough for me PortAventura is spectacularly beautiful in every regard. I've spent a lot of time in Asia so had special affinity for the back half of the park, and loved every corner of it. Replicating the Great Wall in the lead up to the back B&Ms is just brilliant. And having Dragon Khan on a raised Forbidden City-esque platform? Just amazing. I've been dying to ride Dragon Khan since I discovered the internet back in grade school and it did not disappoint one bit. A little old and shaky for sure, but good ol' classic B&M 90s forcefulness,and I loved it. The barrel roll had me literally shouting with joy. And Shambhala is just a masterpiece. The perfect theming, detail, and concept for a B&M hyper, and they delivered seamlessly. I was counting literally 5-6 seconds of pure airtime bliss on almost every hill. Got 4 rides in during the day and probably rank it as my favorite B&M hyper now, finally topping Behemoth which I've considered the best B&M hyper since I rode it in 2010. Hurakan Condor was simply brilliant. The woodies and mine train on the park's left side were a little underwhelming. Stampida's wait was excruciating as the ride op would let on literally 3/4 trains of express pass people consistently. The layout was so forgettable that I didn't even bother reriding for the second side. Saw similar things at Shambhala, but the single rider line more than made up for it. Furious Baco was my last stop of the day before collapsing on the train back to Barcelona exhausted late afternoon, and again the ride ops for FB were just miserably slow. Again, 1/2-3/4 trains for express pass people, and I ended up in the second row. "What the heck," I said, "How bad could the outside seats reeeeeeallly be????" Lord have mercy, I about died. I can handle rough, but that was just brutal. Full apocalypse brace mode the entire way through, completely unrideable. What a shame. I loved everything else about it though. The setting, the theme, the layout, the swoop over the water, the barrel roll... but good Lord. Oh well. I would looooooove to come back one day and spend a couple days in a resort with my family. Really just had such a nice time, and would love to go through again at a more leisurely pace.

Was at the park just briefly this morning on our way through town, first time since 2007 - and I have to say, I was blown away. The park was beautiful. Way nicer than I remember it being. It felt like an entirely different park. It was well-kept, nicely landscaped, nicely filled out, more modern, clean, and the crews were just killing it. Had a wonderful couple hours. Just had time to ride what was new to me (Mystic Timbers, Diamondback, and Banshee), and really enjoyed all three. I was highly, highly impressed

Just spent the morning at KK... holy crap, I just got my butt whooped by Storm Chaser. I know it's had some mixed reviews over the last couple years, so I was expecting it to peter out by the end into the lower tier of my RMC rankings, but good Lord! It was almost too intense! The first half was very ride-able, until the twisted turn around thing, where it just felt like it got faster and faster. The last 4 hills had me screaming in agony/delight/surprise/pain? I can't even tell you. After 4 laps I had to go sit on a bench and snack on something, which I don't think I've ever had to do in my 12+ years as a coaster enthusiast. I liked it I guess? In some ways it way exceeded my expectations. In other ways it was almost too brutal. So I'm confused as to where to put it. It made Joker's Revenge, which I rode a month and a half ago, feel like wimpy sloppy garbage in comparison. 2 more to go (Wicked Cyclone and Wildfire), and no plans to get to either of them before 2018 rolls out the new batch!

Top 5 parks (in no order - I'm not sure I really have a "favorite" park) Blackpool Pleasure Beach - Love the vibe and the way everything interacts with the path and other rides. Love the old school woodies, and the mouse is amazing. Cedar Point - This thing is as much legend as it is experience. The end of many a pilgrimage and countless day dreams. How can you not love CP??? Adventureland - I absolutely loved the retirees working here. So wonderful. And Outlaw and Tornado both delivered awesome rides. Hershey Park - Super solid line up, unique coasters, good use of setting, and Storm Runner / Sky Rush combo. Love it Busch Gardens Europe - Took a 6 hour road trip here and back with friends in college in one day. One of the most exhausting but wonderful days of my life. Alpengeist remained near the top of my list for many years. (Honorable mentions Slagharen and Indiana Beach - both of which used to be so charming and at the top of my list, but have since undergone significant change or loss of charm) Top 5 parks bucket list Grona Lund - I've seen it, but it was winter. I love the way everything wraps around everything. And the rides look awesome too. Gold Reef City - I love obscure theme parks, and this one tops the list, mostly because of Anaconda. Parque Espana - All about Pyrenees Busch Gardens Tampa - one of the only major US parks left for me, will hopefully get out there sometime this year or next Tokyo Disney - It was the last Disney left for me before Shanghai opened. This one still obviously pulls more weight though Honorable mention: Port Aventura (But we'll be there in two weeks so it's about to drop off the list anyways)

LOL, I don't have a non Intamin/B&M/RMC in my top steel until I get to 24th. I stop ranking things after around 50 for both wood and steel, and I could only come up with 9 total from those lists, all of which I legitimately really like Thundercoaster - Tusenfryd Jungle Storm - Bahrain Phoenix Phantom's Revenge Avalanche/Hellcat - Timber Falls Superman El Ultimo Escape - Six Flags Mexico Wild Mouse - Blackpool Lisebergbanan Viper - SFGAm

Are we for sure convinced that Kennywood and Silverwood are NOT happening? I read through the last several pages so I am caught up (ish), but I know there was a lot of speculation around those two but as far as I understand it there was no legitimate proof? Wasn't Gwazi even tossed out there as a hypothetical? Would anybody mind catching me up on ALL the rumors that have been tossed out there and their current standings of probability? Mean Streak Hurler SFOG Cyclone (?) Japan whatever Silverwood and Kennywood? Any others?

^^That's a good point, honestly I forget that Medusa is that small. There was just something about the setting, pacing, and perfectly sustained intensity that makes Medusa SO Much more compelling than Joker, despite the comparable heights. Lightning Rod is so crazy I don't even know what to do with it in terms of ranking, but Medusa has to be in my top 5 favorite coasters of all time.

Just rode Joker. Kind of meh compared to the rest of their repertoire. I don't know if I love their style on some of the smaller scope rides. Their coasters ride much better when the elements are larger. But then again Goliath .... Updated list: Medusa Steel - I just love this ride so freaking much. Lightning Rod Outlaw Run Iron Rattler Texas Giant Twisted Colossus Joker Goliath Should ride Storm Chaser later this summer, and then will just be missing Wildfire and Wicked Cyclone.

I went! Back in probably 2011? It was cool but I don't recall riding anything. I don't remember if the rides were closed or cost more or what, but the salt mine itself was worth an afternoon if you're bored and in the area.

I rode Mako this weekend. For those of you into ranking things, are we in general agreement that it's the best of the B&M hypers with 4 across seating? I wasn't super blown away by it upon riding it the first time, but after a few more laps and a bit of reflection, I think it was smoother, cleaner, and had more airtime than most of the others. It has a pretty classic layout, but does enough at the end to stand out. The first drop was really great, and my favorite part of the entire layout was the low speed hill before the MCBR. I still think Behemoth is the best of the lot for B&M's hypers, but if we're just talking 4-across seating, my list now ranks Mako, Goliath (SFOG), Nitro, Raging Bull, Apollo's Chariot. Thoughts?

We'll be in Kissimmee over Memorial Day weekend, and I'm pretty bummed about the timing. I'm very much looking forward to this thing! It looks really great

Oh man, if Intamin revived the plug n play woodie concept after a decade now, I would die of excitement!!!