DirkFunk

I hadn't really looked at the list of closed attractions and restaurants before on Screamscape until today. Jesus, that's a long list of stuff that's closed or about to be closed permanently/go seasonal. I'm trying hard to keep an open mind going into my visit there in September, but it ain't easy. I guess it says something about what devotion BGT's fans have for the park compared to other places given the relative lack of outrage over so much of the park getting shuttered to save cash. If this happened at a Disney park, there'd be suicide pacts formed in the TTC.

I spent a lot of time in the area when I was young and remember walking what must have been a couple miles down the beach to get to this park prior to it having a coaster. In fact, I was the guy who alerted that they added a Dragon Wagon to the park to Duane w/RCDB. There's some definite differences with the surroundings to Ocean Beach in New London, CT, but that's pretty TL;DR material. Water Wizz's old mat slides were a blast when I was like, 9. Kinda shocked they're still there.

Pavilion actually did pretty great business. Too bad the space it was on was theoretically worth more as condos at one point than an amusement park. Then the economy crashed, and now there's nothing there.

:sigh: His profile says he's coming from West Michigan, so odds are good he's flying to the region. Even if he wasn't, he probably has to ask for time off well in advance with his job, which makes rescheduling a trip to Virginia somewhere in the realm of difficult to expensive to "no". Just rescheduling a trip sometimes isn't an option in life.

Kansas City: Worlds of Fun, owned by Cedar Fair, has some pretty significant stuff Oklahoma City: Frontier City, second tier former Six Flags park with....not much. Denver: Lakeside, which is a really cool and fairly unique traditional amusement park that pretty much should only be visited at night. There's also Elitch Gardens, which has no real gardens, is a second tier former Six Flags park and doesn't have any really quality rides. Amarillo: Wonderland Park, which is small and perhaps charming but honestly who knows? It is Amarillo. There's a few people who made the trek. Not sure I'd tear myself away from something more interesting for it. Does have a bizarre OD Hopkins looper. Des Moines: Adventureland, which also has a bizarre OD Hopkins looper, CCI's lone dark ride, and some other bizarre stuff. Those are the significant ones. You're also heading into the Midwest during fair time. Most of the significant fairs in the US may be along your routing: Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Iowa might be during the time frame that you're stateside. The midways aren't gonna be as spectacular as most large European fairs, but fairs in the US typically have strong agricultural roots and often have more "cultural" or local flair to them. There's also the occasional permanent attraction at these things which can be pretty rare. Kansas, Iowa, and Minnesota State Fairgrounds all have permanent Old Mill rides that only operate during the fair, for instance.

Thank you. Thread could end here.

Perkins inside Breakers. Breakwater Cafe has a buffet and is right next to Sandcastle. I can't speak for that at breakfast but I thought their dinner service was crap. There's also a small donut/bagel shop in Breakers that sells defrosted baked goods.

Is this where we chime in and say "Theme parks are trying to make money"? A couple years ago I went to SeaWorld in the "offseason" and they kept Kraken closed until the afternoon. I supposed that saved them money, and I've been back since, so I guess I wasn't so upset about it that I refused to return. Of course, they had to build a B&M flying coaster in order to get me back in the gate. I don't like this sort of idea because its the classic example of spending more money to get less in return, which in turn makes the idea of theme park geared vacations less appealing. But for a lot of people, they won't care, won't see it, etc etc etc.

I think I will go to Orlando and stay at the Marriott because of the slides and not go to Disney across the street! yeah, right! Or they might go to the Marriott because the convention they're travelling to is there at the big convention center attached to it, and this makes it more appealing to those who are thinking about paying out of pocket to take their families to Orlando while they travel on business.

The last one in the US that was being moved was with PB&J Happee Days Shows (yes, that is a real company) but I believe they finally took it off the road.

http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20130620/NEWS10/306200076/Holiday-World-family-feud-reveals-new-twists?nclick_check=1 Some chestnuts from this article:

LOL kill the messenger? Really? Somehow I doubt there's a black market of Knotts or Scandia Fun Center guides out there to compare with anyways.

Arison is much richer than Fain for a multitude of reasons and has a public face because of his ownership of an NBA team. But every time something happens with a Carnival ship, Arison can't necessarily be there, nor should he be. Nor should Fain with Royal Caribbean. That you perceive the situation differently isn't something Carnival Corp. can much help, and Arison has to deal with the additional criticism because of his position, wealth, etc.

Bro, I'm not going to argue who has more degrees, who's company controls more marketspace, who's worth more money, or any of that. Arison and Fain have very different public profiles, and that Arison gets more publicity comes with the territory that he occupies compared to that of Fain, who up until this page in the thread no one even referred to existing. At this point, Fain hasn't done anything publically himself regarding the fire on the Grandeur and I don't hold it against him. Why should he? No one died. The ship didn't sink. No one is crapping in the shower. He has other things to worry about like the board getting replaced by stockholders.

Well, frankly, I don't think anyone cares about Richard Fain enough to follow him around, no diss to him. He definitely doesn't own an NBA franchise to go see games at. Arison does, and he probably exerts as much control over Pat Riley as he does the individual CEOs of the brands of Carnival Corporation. So really, no one knows what Richard Fain was doing. He could have been at the links, meeting to deal with shareholder issues, snorting lines off a hookers back, whatever. TBH who cares? RCCL did the right thing.

Thing is, Goldstein isn't the equivalent of Mickey Arsion. Richard Fain is. He's not showing up in person for this. That's what the holding company has CEOs of the individual brands for (Goldstein for RCCL, Cahill for Carnival).

The Disney difference revealed. OK, that's probably a pretty horrible way to title that but, seriously, flying the guy back to India? Uhhh.

The average park goer (I refuse to say GP because other than Robb and Elissa on occasions when they work, 99.9995% of people in this hobby and on this forum pay to enter the park like everyone else, me included) will respond positively to a "forceful" attraction. There's no argument that they won't. At the same time, unless you have a park with a ton of "forceful" attractions where you've essentially put yourself in the position of training the people going that it's what you offer, I don't think they're specifically going to demand that. At Holiday World, things might be different. I don't see that at Cedar Point. I see the people visiting there like they are at most parks: they're not dead to the novelty of flipping upside down and finding that thrilling in and of itself. They're fun (IMO), the capacity is high, the rides work. Honestly, if I'm looking for a thrill, I'll go ziplining or skydiving or whitewater rafting or something like that. I'm not gonna get that kind of thrill with almost any coaster, so as long as the rides meet those three criteria, I'll be happy to ride it. I wouldn't wait two hours for it, but I wouldn't wait two hours for any coaster on Earth.

If Rye Playland was operated by a private company that specialized in operating amusement parks, it would probably do just fine financially. Playland has always had to turn to outside people to run everything there on a concessionary basis and the people writing those contracts basically have no idea what they're doing. IIRC Playland doesn't even own the log flume they have and collects a pittance of its ticket value. Things like that are why Playland supposedly doesn't make money, not because the community "doesn't support it" or whatever. Which goes back to the question about Sustainable Playland: The belief, correct or not, is that they have no interest in the long term preservation of Playland, and that they are actually working on behalf of the local neighborhood (not Westchester County as a whole) to get rid of the park and increase their property value by cutting down the park size. If the facility isn't so large that it is unsustainable in the market, and the switch to a gated facility combined with complete financial management is the actual core problem (which is what many of them would likely argue in return), then the Sustainable Playland plan doesn't necessarily fix that but does plenty to dissuade people from continuing to come in the future.

5 people in the average cabin of any mass market ship would be extremely tight, but I have no idea how big a stateroom you've got.

It might be if they got thrown off by a mob of enraged Filipino crew members. I am putting nothing past the news at this point but I'm guessing that's probably not what happened.

This forum has a definite bent towards Royal Caribbean love which is fine. You mention your wife but no kids: Do you have kids? Are they going?

The ship was already delayed nearly a month because of upgrades supposedly related to the electronics and backup systems based on the Triumph problems. Sure looks now like those cancelled passengers on the first two scheduled cruises got bumped off because the ship wasn't done being rebuilt. SMDH.

Ehhh, I don't know that I'd call the waterslide package on both Breakaway class ships or the Illusionarium/fireworks setup on NCL Getaway something intended for a "mature" clientele. I think they're both going for roughly the same sort of passengers, they're just slightly different paths to get there.

To make this very brief, it is important to understand what exactly Intamin is. Do they sell rides they themselves design and manufacture? Yes. They have also been, moreso in the past than now, a ride broker. They sold rides other people designed and built; Schwarzkopf, Von Roll, Willy Buhler, Giovanola, Waagner Biro, etc. They still do that.They will probably always do that. One thing that changed Intamin's approach is the association they have with Stakotra, who does the bulk of their fabrication these days.