buck funny

Very much a matter of opinion. Personally, I can't imagine it ever being worth it. You're kidding, right? I get that the cost might be a bit much, but I visited on a Wednesday (granted it was in July), and every major ride had at least an hour wait, many had more than that. We only stopped to hit up Goliath and RB, but if we would've stayed the whole day we would've felt the need to get a FP. SFGAm has some of the longest lines of any park I've been to. Chicago could use another amusement park. Great America once had solid operations up until a short few years ago. I think they've gotten to the point where you "need to get a FP" because they've cut their operating budget and reduced their efficiency to near nonexistence. You know, to match how most of the chain runs. It bugs me when parks aren't that busy but have slow inefficient operations and let tons of people by with flashpasses. It seems like they are saying "pay double or suffer and wait all day". If they had half decent operations nobody would need a flashpass.

was that the crazy mouse from mount olympus that had the accident? The restraint came open and a guy fell out.

it is up for debate wether it is worth it even with a short line... but anyway. It is one of a kind and probably worth doing once. I also forgot to mention thunder run, which is an old schwarzkopf powered coaster that they installed into the mountain. Unique and pretty fun. I usually hit it first, then the fly then vortexx.

go early for opening time. hit the low capacity rides up the middle before it gets busy: wmg, fly, vortexx. levi and behehoth go through lines fast because B&M. don't forget orbiter, one of the few surviving huss giant enterprises! get there at 10, leave at 2 and go for lunch somewhere else with better, less expensive food.

Or they could give it the Collosus treatment and set fire to the lift hill!

Those Dippin' dots guys usually have their fingers on the pulse...

depends on frame of reference. from the point of the rider, you are being pulled down towards the track because the centrifugal forces from the loop are greater than the force of gravity (trying to pull you away from the track when you are at the top of the loop) so it is a net pull towards the track. Your friend on the ground watching sees you being pulled up away from the ground as he has a different frame of reference (assuming he is standing upright still). the clothoid loop enters with a gentler curve (larger radius) and therefore lower normal g forces pulling you towards the track because at the bottom it is adding to the earth's gravity. once your train goes beyond vertical the centrifugal forces are now working against gravity. the radius tightens to make more g forces to compensate for earth's gravity trying to pull you out of your seat away from the track. on top of that, you go faster at the bottom and slow down as you go higher at the top. centrifugal forces are proportional to velocity and radius of curve. With a bit of math you can make the normal forces on the rider constant throughout the loop by altering the radius from large at the bottom to small and then going large again as you pull out. Loops tend to look like cursive 'l's We have mr stengel to thank for working that out.

if a retaining wall breaks. On the good side, a little rain might mean the poor fish don't dry out.

^oops. it was sunny when i started to post. It it is nice i will go otherwise i have gardening to do. I need a coaster fix though...

Despite the flight deck thing i had a good time and was glad i went. maybe they could pass the message on about the belts. I could get it to go in but not far enough to engage. The ride op tried to help and it was really close but no dice. Ride ops were friendly and helpful, but not very fast. Considering it was maybe the second weekend opening i guess they need more time to get experience. Regarding arrow loops, i have a soft spot for them, since i grew up with the one at wonderland. I always found if you keep your head back against the headrest and look up into the loop it works well, and you feel the g forces strongly. I found this demon smoother than it's cousin in gurnee when i was there last june. I don't like arrow/ vekoma cobra rolls since you change from right to left ot right again and if you aren't careful you get a clunk clunk clunk against the otsr. The B&M standups i have been on were worse for this and i spent the ride looking up the track to see which side to brace to not get clobbered.

Hey does anybody with a season pass want to meet up for the ERTs? They are sundays between 9am and 10 am. A different area is scheduled each week. It is Leviathan area tomorrow. I don't know if it is for regular season pass or just platinum? Since i got platinum and parking is included, i could go for a couple hours and then leave without feeling guilty. I only live half an hour away. I was going to go tomorrow and then may stick around until lines build up around 11:30 then go home for lunch. I will have a green hat, glasses and answer to Doug. Probably at the back of the train!

^Was he laughing that you went on a slc headbanger voluntarily? Despite a few relics of the paramount 'dark years' it is not a bad park to have as a home park. I really like vortexx too, more than the magic mountain one that hit the tree! It is a bit wild to come into the final brake run and see the whole structure shake back and forth when you stop.

I went last saturday since i have a platinum pass from my home park and i was nearby. I have been to great america chicago and was curious to see it's twin park. I also love B&M inverts so wanted to try top gun. Thanks to a guy at the ticket booth! I asked if i could get a discounted pass for my friend and he got in for $20. Staff were friendly and did a good job. The parking lot was pretty full but the park wasn't too crowded. They do a good job to hide their queue lines though, most of the people there were probably in line somewhere. Ride ops were 'stackin 'em like six flags could only dream of! I realize they have only been open a few weekends, but wow! it was about a 45 minute wait for anything. We went on goldstriker first. It was a solid cgi woodie (gci? cga? vga? whatever...) fast paced and lots of nice banking all the way through. I wanted to ride one of their coasters while still sort of new since they seem to et beat up badly over time. The last one i had been on was gwazai in january a week before it closed. I really enjoyed it but my friend who is not a coaster nerd but is a good sport screamed the whole way through. I didn't want to ask if it was screams of joy or fear or a bit of both... It was kinda cool that you could look into people's office windows while coming up the lift hill. I got a lap on bayern kurve (or whatever they call it now) for nostalgia . Demon seemed way smoother than it's gurnee cousin. ridiculous long wait for a third rate arrow looper, but by the time we realized how long the lineup was we were half way through it. It looks like they had a train track with tunnels behind it that have been ripped up. My friend had fond memories of grizzly so we went to go on it until we saw the lineup, but he wondered if my platinum pass worked as a fastpass, so we went up the back, and the ride op said no, buy we managed to get through on a " can you let us through just this once?" thanks! It is not a really challenging coaster but it was running well and we had fun. it was more my friend's speed. I had a look at the arrow wild mouse, which was neat to see since it is unique, but i wasn't willing to wait an estimated 45 minutes. We also skipped the skyride due to long lineups. as it turns out it took less time to walk than the line would have taken... Got a ride on the schwarzkopf enterprize and noticed that it had cobwebs on the support arms. Really? would it kill you to brush them off let alone pressure wash before season opening? Fun though. We next went on Top Gun. Maybe someone can correct me, but is this what Wonderland would have gotten if it weren't for cedar point's supposed 100 mile ban. instead, slc headbanger.... damn you whoever made that call! Even the themeing is way better. "flight deck" as wonderland's is now called looks like a decommissioned air base in comparison. It did seem like it was a shorter track than many Beemer inverts i have been on. Paramount legacy? Montu at bush gardens has got to be one of the best, and of course the original Batman @gurnee! And for the sucky part. after waiting through the hidden que lines, and the realization that they were actually running 2 trains, despite stacking the second train for what seemed like 5 minutes, we made it to the station. I sat in the seat and brought the restraint down only to find the seatbelt would not fit. Im not skinny, but not that big and have been on B&M inverts at at least 6 other parks. I asked if they had any rows with larger belts but they had never heard of such an idea. They mentioned something about not having a belt extender yet. sucks to be me. the one coaster i wanted to ride didn't fit. walk of shame... Maybe an in'n'out burger 4x4 animal style will take the sting out... I was going to try the B@M standup, but it was getting late at that point, and my friend had been a good sport up to that point and i didn't want to send him home with a concussion. so we went home. been there done that, don't really need to come back, no t shirt.

^ Oh crap. white flags are code for Vekoma!

valvoline would be smoother

I thought i heard that somewhere but wasn't sure. it leads to the question why there but not here. The sad part is that it is one of the few positive relics of the paramount years...

Unrelated to all of that... Does anybody know when they stopped using the special effects for Back Lot Stunt Coaster? I never rode it as Italian job since it was built during my 'dark years' where i wasn't going to wonderland, which conveniently coincided with the 'Paramount years'. I think when i went 4 or 5 years back some of the outside flame effects were on. but last year i didn't see any. also without the water splashdown at the end it doesn't make so much sense. (maybe it was just off in the early season when i went.) Is it a maintenance issue, or some kind of safety issue/ missing special parts they can't get anymore, or just 'couldn't be bothered' I enjoy the launch and initial helix, but the later part suffers without any reference points.

Fahrenheit clone with the name Celsius? or kelvin and make it 273.13' high canadians are always getting metric and sae units mixed up.

and it's not even a coaster to boot! but it is a nice air conditioned cave to escape the midday sun.

I went to the park friday, they had a bonus night for season passholders, and i bought a platinum pass because i was going to go to some of the american parks this season. I figured i would get the photo taken and maybe have a few preseason rides. The platinum pass is not a bad deal at $198 canuck bucks + taxes and fees = ~$229. it looked like it was also $198 usdollars if you buy it there, so you get a 20% savings on the exchange rate to boot. It includes parking and is good for any cedar fair park. I figure if you use it 3 times it pays for itself with ~$20 parking and ~$60 admission. Friday was a really nice day in Toronto, and i guess a lot of people had the same idea because the parking lot was fairly full. They processed the pass really quickly and i was in. It was crowded and there were lineups for everything including big lineups for food. i heard a rumour they had run out of hot dogs. Operations were slow which i guess i understand being the first day, but it looked like they weren't sure of their procedures. I usually go on dragon fyre first as a warmup, and because i remember it from when it was new. It was lined up down the ramp and i noticed a train waiting in the final brakerun for as long as i was there, so i gave it a pass. I never did see a train go up the lifthill, so i don't know if it got shut down early. I got a ride on the HUSS ufo Nightmares, and was on after 2 cycles. the only problem was that each cycle took almost 10 minutes to load and check! While in the line i noticed Leviathan was taking at least 2 minutes per cycle to send a train. The lineup was all over the back and i gave it a miss. I rode Wilde Beast because i had heard it got retracked. The first drop was much better and closer to when it was new. After the second turnaround it got a bit rougher, and the later half was kinda rough since it was dark i couldn't tell where they had put new wood in. I was in the second row of the first car and i could feel it bending or torsioning where the lapbars which were mounted further forward of the seat moved right and left on corners. Made me think of the movie Tin men where they argue about the guy's car 'the frame is probably bent". Having said that, the last wooden coaster i rode was Gwazi, so it wasn't too bad... The bat broke down twice while i was in the wilde beast lineup and they had guys in pickup trucks driving around fixing things. I guess when you have a bunch of machinery that has sat idle since october and then you start it up there will be a few bugs to be worked out. I didn't have a lot of time and didn't feel like spending it in a slow moving line so i left. On the way out the fountains looked cool with colourful lighting. It is a pretty good looking park and they keep it really clean compared to others i have been to, so we are lucky to have it. I really like wonderland, partly because i grew up with it, I will go back on a slow day when kids are still in school. since i only live 30 mins away, i will probably pop in for short visits now and then. having a pass that includes parking might make it a bit easier.

Does anybody really care how many coasters you claim you have been on? I don't know of a credit auditing service. If it makes you happy count it. Travel the country to ride every vekoma boomerang and SLC headbanger you can get your hands on if you feel it is important. I won't be in line in front of you. I haven't tried to count how many coasters i have ridden but don't let me stop you.

is that part of the famous helix of death? looks like brackets for the catwalk Japanese style!

Ummm but aren't they closing it because they can't afford to repair it let alone tear it down/ replace it with something else? I rode it for the first/ only? time 2 weeks ago and enjoyed myself but found it an unusual experience. It was rough in a way i haven't experienced before, it was if it had square wheels/ missing bearings. There was a rumbling vibration in the wheels, that happened both when it was going up the lift hill as well as through the course. I have had worse experiences with a woodie - Le Monstre @ La Ronde, Wilde Beast @Wonderland and the one at Knotts Berryfarm. They tended to bash you laterally whereas gwazi just vibrated. We rerode gwazi in a different seat and it wasn't as rough. Vibrating woodie aside, it was a fun track, and my 9 year old friend loved it. It was his first wooden coaster so he didn't have a lot to compare to , but you have to start somewhere. People had mentioned the slow ride ops/ separate seatbelt/ lapbar checks. Basically with the lapbar down, there was no way of reaching the seatbelt. I don't know how other parks with the same trains manage? But, with less than 8 passengers in the station, it did not take long to dispatch. While in the park I saw the train crest the lift hill with as few as 2 passengers. I am a bit disappointed by the hater posts, especially from ones who acknowledge that they have never ridden gwazi. It is like saying 'I never watched the movie but hated it'. Maybe karma will come through for you and they will replace it with a SLC headbanger or a vekoma jr hang and bang. I am glad i got a chance to ride gwazi!

went on gwazi last week. wow, so smooth! and no wait time!

In nearby Berkeley, Chez Panisse is the birthplace of the local food movement. Make a reservation though. 'Berzerkeley' is not as difficult to drive in as San Fran, and there are a lot of cool little places. You could even take the bart to the airport from there.