Zand

Sorry I never got back to you guys...I was trying like hell to get all the essentials in just in case tomorrow is a washout. Just barely got it done. After the train I headed for Orion. Listed as a 90 minute wait, ended up being a little over an hour. Rode somewhere in the middle. Its a fun ride but incredibly short. Some good airtime moments and a couple forceful turns but don't blink or you'll miss it. Liked it a little better than Diamondback but my favorite coaster in the park was still to come... After a quick drink I made my way to the other side of the park to get my last new credit, Banshee. Quick 20 minute line and got front row. There was only one drawback and it was that there was a bad wheel on my car that caused a lot of vibrating. But otherwise, this just knocked Raptor off my top B&M invert spot. Packs an incredible punch from start to finish, maintaining a great pace and the mix of inversions and helixes is second to none. I think it's far and away the best coaster in the park. After that excellent ride I took the trek halfway to Kentucky to ride Bat. Another 20ish minute line, ended up in the middle somewhere. I didn't remember much from this ride when I was last there 14 years ago, but this is surprisingly punchy and forceful for an arrow suspended! Kinda short, but tons of fun. After that, it was 7:30ish and had to get across the park for my final stop, Beast. Unfortunately no night rides on this trip, but this was as close as I could get. 45 minute line, rode somewhere in the 4th car. This was much more wild and powerful than I remember it. Even with the trims all over the place, it really powers through the first section and those straightaways aren't boring like I remember. And that helix! Not rough to the point of being painful but it sure throws you around pretty good. I think I like Mystic Timbers a little better, but this came way up my list tonight and thats a hell of a 1-2 punch of woodies on that side of the park. 8:00 came fast and unfortunately I only got in 7 rides in a little under 6 hours. So while the crowds were a bummer, this park truly has become real awesome in the last 10 years. Amazing invert, two fantastic woodies (and Racer is good too from what I remember), 2 B&M hypers that are slightly underwhelming but still pretty awesome, a top notch suspended, and a nice supporting cast. I definitely want to come back soon, maybe in October with FP booked so I can get lots of night rides. Back at it tomorrow, hopefully the weather cooperates a little bit. Planning on doing rainy day things like Festhaus and the Brewhouse, and Flight of Fear. If the rain holds off, hopefully the crowd does too so I can get some good riding in. Unfortunately gonna have to skip the Reds game I was planning on, but I'll certainly be back here sooner than later. I suppose if I were to have a ranking here, it would be... 1. Banshee, 2. Mystic Timbers, 3. Beast, 4. Orion, 5. Diamondback, 6. Bat, 7. Flight of Fear, 8. Racer While they don't have a Steel Vengeance or a Maverick, that's easily a better top 8 than Cedar Point. Which I thought could never be beat. The fact these two parks are in the same state is crazy. Hell of a 1-2 punch for Ohio. Makes up for being stuck with the Browns and Bengals.

75 minutes at Diamondback turned into 35 minutes for a back seat ride. Pretty good ride, a little rattly and not quite as much airtime as I've heard but still a pretty solid ride. Hit Mystic Timbers next, again being told 75 mins but ended up being 45. Rode in front, freaking awesome coaster! Tons of airtime and fun forceful turns. Inside of the shed was super hot. Just hopped on the train as it was loading when I got off Mystic Timbers. After the train I'll probably hit Orion and Banshee just to get through the rest of the new to me stuff. It's crowded for sure but a lot of it is school groups who seem to be slowly heading out. Luckily the crews have been great so far. Food lines do look extremely ugly though.

Got in the park about 15 minutes ago. In line for Diamondback. Half of the first set of switchbacks are full. Queue Times says 75 mins, we'll see. They seem to be cranking trains out. Can see Orion cycling empty trains from here.

Pouches are gone. Honestly the locker thing would be fine if they did it right. They're free, easy to use and easy to get to.

Can you report back on crowds around 1:00? I'm arriving around 1:30-2, have to decide on the fly whether to get FL+ or not. Just want to make sure I have time for a couple rides each on Banshee, Orion, Diamondback, Mystic Timbers, and Beast. Just in case they close tomorrow. If the lines are like 30 mins or less I'll be good.

Based on what I read from opening weekend, it seems like the SV situation is a easy fix because it's a fix they already had in place! Partially fill the tunnel with both FL and standby, let people do the locker thing, then FL goes left and standby goes right. I don't understand why they got away from doing that. When I took my last ride, the sign for standby said 60 minutes and FL said 30 minutes when there was literally no standby line before the merge. And the line ended up being opposite if you got put in the wrong line. Honestly the two lines dont look that much different in length. But if you have someone at the station who has no idea how to do their (rather simple) job, it makes a bad situation worse. They were filling the ramp on MF which ticked me off too as that further devalues FL+. 2 out of 4 rides that you have to pay extra for both shove you into 20-30 minutes of the standby line which is plain wrong when you are spending $115+ on the service. I know 3 years ago on MF they weren't filling the ramp. Again, why did they go away from that? It only makes the greeters job harder because then they have to deal with getting yelled at by old people in tye dye shirts.

For the next 13 hours or so, I can say Millennium Force. Fine by me.

Few more points from the rest of today, where I got to experience the best and worst of the CP 2021 experience. After lunch I hit Raptor while I was there, grabbed front row after a quick FP line (regular line looked pretty short anyway). Skyride was closed today so walked up and randomly walked into Matterhorn as it was loading while I walked by. Definitely not a ride I expected to hit today, but what the hell! Waited about 15 minutes to do some Iron Draggin'. Always gotta hit it once even if it's kind of a lousy ride. Followed that up with another MF front row ride as there were only 2 groups lined up for it. Headed back to Frontier Town for a walk on ride on the excellent Skyhawk followed by a not so excellent walk on of the Mine Train. Those restraints are brutal and the ride isn't anything to write home about. Might add it to the list with Rougarou and Corkscrew of coasters that I wouldn't be sad if I missed each trip. Here comes the "worst of CP" I mentioned at the beginning of the post. Got to Steel Vengeance at around 6:45. Wife didn't want to ride so she sat outside and waited. I went into the FP line to find that the standby line was also empty. Put my stuff in the lockers, then was directed to the line on the right. They were doing such an awful job at pulsing the line that two guys that were in front of me in the tunnel got sent to the left side and got on the ride FIVE trains before I did. I had to bite my tongue to not ask the girl working the top of the stairs if she knows how to count. But, I did ask her if I could get in line for the back (since, you know, that and the front have dedicated lines built for that reason) and she coldly said "actually, you can go to row 3". While I was waiting for row 3, she let the people behind me line up for the front. I kept my mouth shut and enjoyed the ride, but good god lady. Finally got off at 7:40 (yes, it took 45 f*cking minutes to get on the ride from the lockers because someone can't count) and saw the line was already closed and some guy with a pony tail and tye dye Kings Island shirt was SCREAMING at the guy working the entrance. My wife said they closed the line at 7:20 and had turned away a few hundred people. She also noted people who got in the regular line 20 minutes after I got in the FP line got off before me, and I was like yup. While most of the rest of the park seems to be back in typical CP shape (which is generally good), Steel Vengeance is still a clusterf*ck of epic proportions. Got on the train to head through Boneville to the front of the park (unfortunately with the tye dye douchebag right behind us) and saw the MF line was still open as we pulled up. I made it in at 7:57 and they kept it open till 8:05. Against all odds, the grouper let me get in line for the back, and then upon return they popped open the magic gate and told everyone to go ride again so they could let the front row line finish up without moving them to other parts of the train. I can't believe I was still in the same park as I was at Steel Vengeance. Total ineptitude at one end, and thankfully ending on a great note at the other. Simply put, that left side line at Steel Vengeance after the lockers needs to be FP only. And if you're going to use both sides as the regular line, for the love of god put someone up there that can count to f*cking twelve. And let people line up for the front and back like every other coaster in the park. Maybe just move Millennium's crew over there for a day and show them how it's done. Other than Steel Vengeance it was a great day. Rode everything I wanted to, multiple times for most. Still a bit of stacking going on but things seem to be smoothing out. Hell, I think TTD ran nonstop in the combined 14 hours I spent in the park. After a rocky start, I'd say CP is finally getting it together. Now just need to get those old hours back. Heading down to KI tomorrow and Wednesday. Wed looks like a washout, but maybe it'll stay light and I can have the place to myself. Will take what comes with the weather, but will be sure to ride what I can tomorrow in case I'm shut out Wednesday.

Doing pretty good with FL+ today. MF and Steel Vengeance have merge points pretty far back but didnt wait more than 20 mins (other than deciding to wait for the front on MF and getting caught in a 20 min breakdown). Valravn had a super long Fastlane line this morning (onto the midway) and just came back and rode it with a 30 min wait. Hit Maverick twice, TTD twice, and Gemini as well. Grabbing some crabfries right now then probably back to Frontier Town.

Didn't end up riding much today but had a nice afternoon. After Magnum I tried to ride the smooth Arrow next door, but it went down so I moved along. Got over to Frontier Town and Maverick and Steel Vengeance were also down, not that I would've waited in a long line today anyway. We ended up buying some tickets for Frontier Festival and had some different beers. Hung around over there for a couple hours enjoying the atmosphere. Always loved Frontier Town and the added entertainment was nice. I did try to hit Maverick when it reopened but the whole queue house was still full so decided not to bother. Finally at 6 we started walking up Frontier Trail towards the front. MF had a good line still. Rougarou probably had no line but it blows so I kept walking. Lots of people waiting to drag iron so walked past that. Finally ended up over on the Twister midway and that was deserted. Rode the CP Windseeker for the first time, which against all odds was operating in a slight breeze. Nice ride, kinda disgusting view of all the dead fish on the beach from the storm. Could smell them from the line. Wicked Twister was a one train wait and rode in back. I love this stupid thing. It never has a line, the launches are fun, it's smooth and the weightless feeling on the spikes is pretty cool. I know it's totally overshadowed by almost everything else in the park but I'd be sad to not have it to fall back to on busy days. Gatekeeper next...maybe 10 minute wait and rode right side near the back. Never been much of a fan of this, but always worth stopping by if the line is short. The bouncing kinda makes me nauseous and I never have that happen to me on any other coaster. Went to hit Raptor, but it was down so went over to Blue Streak. 4 train wait or so (and kinda slow ops) but always a solid ride with decent airtime. Best ridden after a few beers at Chickies and Petes! Better news that that Raptor reopened while I was in line and it was 7:45, so that's where I finished up the night. Front row ride and the bugs were coming out. Raptor just has a batsh*t pace start to finish and IMO is the best B&M invert (disclaimer: I havent ridden Montu). I know Alpie has an awesome half, but for the total package Raptor has it all the way to the brake run. Glad to get the front of the park taken care of tonight, so I can use FP+ to focus on Steel Vengeance, MF, TTD, and Maverick tomorrow. Does anyone know if Steel Vengeance will be open at early entry tomorrow? I know its a Monday but not sure if the holiday makes a difference. If not I'd rather just stay up front and hit Valravn a few times.

Are they doing seat assignment garbage on every ride or did I just catch Magnum at the wrong time. I've never seen them do it here before except on Steel Vengeance (which I understand). SFNE was still "social distancing" last time I was there but was still filling the station on Superman, Riddler, and the other usuals so I don't want to see any Covid excuses. On the other hand, crews seem be moving quick after reading your post earlier. Good to see.

Got here around 3:00. Definitely not as insane as I expected it to be, especially considering it's in the 60s and sunny. Have FP+ tomorrow so kinda walking around hitting stuff with shorter lines. First ride was Magnum...no seat choice for absolutely no reason (that station is huge...totally unnecessary not to allow people to line up in there). Got stuck in a wheel seat and have a splitting headache. Guess I'll try to drink it off lol.

When the best operating coaster isn't even a coaster... Bought FP+ for Monday. $116 each but it'll be worth it.

To hell?

You just scared the sh*t out of me lol. This is a better alternative than the one their neighbors to the north settled on.

The park ended up granting me reservations for Sunday after I emailed them. Hoping to not buy Fastlane but if I do it would be Monday. Why the hell isn't the park open till 10pm on a holiday weekend?

So now that my aforementioned trip got kinda flip-flopped, what shoulf I expect crowd wise on the Tuesday and Wednesday after Memorial Day? Hoping not to have to buy Fastlane now if crowds are projected to be light enough. Bummed to be missing 10 pm closings for night rides. Also, probably going to the Wednesday Reds game instead. Also a day game. Lol

You can still buy day tickets for next Sunday but no more season pass reservations. Talk about giving your core customers the middle finger. I'm just gonna go to bed before I discover more things that set me off.

I never had any other reservations since they never opened them up for Tuesday/Wednesday (since they knew they were going to do this last week). So this is the first time I tried to make reservations. When I first went in, Sunday and Monday were open. I clicked Sunday, after entering my info it gave me an error message so I refreshed and then Sunday was gone. But it let me get Monday.

So I figured now that I'm forced to go on Sunday and Monday next week, I should get my reservations in. I signed on and clicked Sunday and tried to make the reservation but it gave me an error message. I refreshed and went back in and suddenly Sunday is sold out. I got Monday but now I have nowhere to go Sunday unless I go to Michigan's Adventure? Not sure how far that is from DTW...wasn't looking to drive all over the Great Lakes region though. I am absolutely LIVID at this park right now.

To me, it's not even so much that they changed the schedule. It happens, whatever. But I called Hotel Breakers literally 8 days ago because the website said there were no rooms available and said to call for further information. So I called and they said they were full for the dates I was looking for. They didn't use the words "sold out" but I assumed that's what they meant. That same day I booked the flights and car, and later on ended up booking a room off site since Breakers was "full". I also bought a Platinum Pass for both myself and my wife mainly so we could get early entry. Probably would've been cheaper to get a couple 2 day passes and pay for parking, but I figured it would be supportive of the park to purchase their premier product and it would also be an excuse to take a ride to KD this year. Then the rumor popped up here yesterday (as well as in the comments on the park's social media pages) about the June closings. So I joined in and asked the park the question by email as well as on Facebook and Twitter, all of which were ignored despite the park answering questions about every other subject. Naturally, they decided to take the Friday Afternoon news dump route, and buried the announcement underneath the whole $20 an hour announcement. All of this a mere 10 days before the first affected date. Piss poor communication at its finest. This isn't some rinky dink regional park where 99% of the patrons are there on day trips from within an hour or two drive. Outside of Disney and Universal, this is one of the top destination parks in the country and I know I'm far from the only one who booked something one of the weeks in June. Some people will probably just do what I'm gonna do and go to their sister park 3 hours to the south. But I'm sure there's also a lot of people who don't have a season pass and booked at a non-resort hotel who are pretty much left in the dark since this happened so last minute, and for some airlines, car companies, and hotels are past refund points. I strongly disagree with the assertion that booking this was a gamble. If I booked it 6 months ago or even 3 months ago, sure. But I feel that it was almost the opposite of a gamble to book last week. We're at the point where things are opening up quickly AND many people who haven't traveled in 15 months are all booking vacations now. Every industry is trying like crazy for people to take their first vacation with them to try to make up the money they lost last year. There's going to be staffing shortages everywhere and people need to be patient when they visit other places. But literally every other industry (and seemingly every other park in this industry) is doing what they can to bring in as many people as they can. If they have to limit attendance to their respective businesses so that theyre not overrun, they do it. Cedar Point knew before today that this could potentially happen. If theyre that short staffed on employees, they wouldve known that by now AND they know they're not going to be able to hire hundreds or thousands more employees overnight. Two weeks ago, they lied and stated they have adequate enough staffing to be ready to go. Instead, they got caught with their pants down and didn't bother informing anyone until the absolute last minute when millions of people are finally travelling. Sorry for the long rant, it just really pisses me off how poorly this was handled and communicated. I'm lucky to have a backup plan (and I believe my room in Sandusky is refundable still). Others arent going to be so lucky and the park's attitude was basically "oh well. BUT LOOK TWENTY DOLLARS PER HOUR!!!"

It takes talent to become worse than Six Flags at customer satisfaction and general operations, but Cedar Point has blown the doors off that conversation this year. Edit: They put a post up on Twitter and shut off replies ?

My backup plan is to do the trip in reverse...CP Sunday/Monday and KI Tuesday/Wednesday. Didnt want to do it that way but that's what it's looking like. CP will be a sh*tshow of epic proportions on Memorial Day weekend and Fastlane is like $40 more than at KI (plus by all accounts, will still have massive lines). Plus one of the bonuses of being at KI on the holiday weekend was 10PM closings and night rides. Won't get that on Tue/Wed. Funny part is on CP's Twitter, other people have caught on that they're totally ignoring questions about the June calendar. And Tony Clark's latest post has all replies blocked. I dont understand why they need to hide this apparent plan for June. Just announce it and get it over with.

11 days out and the calendar still shows this... Between flight, car, hotels, and passes I paid almost $1400 for my wife and I for this trip. And yet here we are 9 days away from leaving and 11 days away from the CP portion of the trip totally sitting in the dark. And the park won't answer ANY questions about June. I get that they're short staffed and it's early season, I really do. I would understand it if I got there and half the rides were closed and like 2 restaurants were open in the whole park. But this is WAY too late for them to pull the plug on entire days that they still have showing as open on the calendar. If theyre really planning on doing this, then stop hiding it so that people who planned on being there can change things up before it's too late for hotel refunds and stuff.

You have to be sh*tting me. I just booked flights, a car, and hotel last week for May 31st-June 3rd.