YoshiFan

It will still be more crowded than a normal April weekend day, I am not sure how much worse it will be though. I agree Spring Break week itself is going to be especially bad since this year the park is only open the week before Easter and not the week after Easter like last year. I made the mistake of going the Thursday before Easter as well last year and it was one of the worst trips to the park I ever had. I used my Funatics Exit Pass for Nitro and it still took 20 minutes, the regular line was almost a full queue and the Flashpass line was out of the station and down the stairs. I only ended up riding Nitro and The Dark Knight which was around 30 minutes and left after standing in Scream Machine's line and barely moving in 10 minutes. Even Easter Sunday could be more crowded since it was always a buyout for a Jewish group with passholders allowed too but this year the park is open to everyone. After NYC schools went back last year on Wednesday of the 2nd week, the park was empty. I am probably still going to take a chance and go on opening weekend on Sunday and either get there at opening or go later in the day to hopefully avoid some of the crowds. Most of the time crowds are very light, unless you happen to catch a day where there are a lot of school trips but they usually clear out by mid afternoon. I would expect little to no wait for all coasters except Kingda Ka, El Toro and Green Lantern (figuring it will have a long line the entire season unless the park is dead). If it is early June, the park closes at 6 though so be sure to get there early if you want to have enough time to ride all the coasters.

Dark Knight was May 15th, El Toro was June 12th, Kingda Ka was a little before Memorial Day. On the park's Facebook page last month someone asked if the ride would be open by Spring Break and the park said they were going to try to have it open by then, I'm expecting sometime in mid May when the park goes to daily operations (or almost daily operations since this year the park is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays until after Memorial Day), If opening day for Green Lantern is the same day as Student Council Day like the Dark Knight opening was (and it was the first day of daily operations), I am avoiding the opening. I remember reading wait times for the coaster were around 90 minutes with all the school trips there.

This year opening weekend is Scout Weekend so I expect it to be much more crowded than past opening weekends. Last year I also went on Scout Weekend (it was the last weekend in April) and to give an idea of how crowded it was, by 11, Batman's line was out of the tunnel and around 1:30 or 2:00, Skull Mountain had a line that looked to be at least 30 minutes. Even Scream Machine had a line out of the station and past the end of the stairs.

I am not happy to hear about the 1 train operations. I really liked how Shapiro wanted multiple trains running on coasters and hearing and seeing how the new management wants to cut costs wherever possible, if they are going to run 1 train to save money on a regular basis at all the parks, that is enough to make me not want to renew my SF pass for 2012 (I already renewed for 2011). Hopefully that will not be the case.

They are also closing at 4:00 some weekdays in June. I never heard of a major park closing that early unless it was because of a problem like weather.

Removal of Scream Machine at Great Adventure. It was really running well this year, especially the red train and I was hoping they would keep the ride and built Green Lantern elsewhere. Cutbacks at Six Flags. Park hours were cut for much of the season at Great Adventure (7:00 closings at the end of the summer, September weekend hours and June weekday hours cut and November operating days canceled), getting rid of Funatics, possibly getting rid of Season Pass holder nights (not listed for 2011 and other events past when the first one would have been are already listed) and even next season opening day is 2 weeks later than this season. Ride removals at Dorney Park. Demon Drop should have never been installed at a park with a modern drop tower especially because the bumper cars were removed. Now at the end of this season they are removing a family flat, Balloon Race, only to replace it with a kiddie balloon ride and they are removing all of Tot Spot's rides including Little Laser and Dragon Coaster so even with the new rides in Planet Snoopy they are losing more rides than what is being added. That leaves Woodstock's Express as the only coaster for kids under 44" now.

Coaster Cuts was a horrible concept. One of the 2 locations was at a mall about 30 minutes away from me and it was always empty. First it was expensive, around $20 which I would think most parents wouldn't want to spend on a kids haircut. The bigger problem was that most of the store was a toy store and parents probably didn't want to take kids in their to get a haircut and then see toys all over the place. The whole watching coasters part was while their hair was washed, there was a TV screen above them that showed clips of coaster POV's.

Maybe next year with new owners, they will consider opening up the coasters for this event? I haven't been to Dutch Wonderland since 2003 and would go back if I could ride coasters in November or December.

^^ That is what Hershey does for the major rides (almost all the coasters and some popular non coaster rides). They assign a boarding time equal to the length of the line and you can only get 1 boarding time at a time (so you couldn't get a time at Storm Runner and go right over to Fahrenheit) and when it gets to the boarding time or anytime after the group goes up the exit and is able to ride.

Poseidon at Europa Park Clue #1 Time - The coaster is themed to a time that has passed (Ancient Greece) Clue #2 Expired - Poseidon is no longer worshipped so could be considered expired Clue #3 Houdini - The park has a Mad House similar to Houdini at Great Adventure and Six Flags New England Clue #4 Athens - Greece section of the park where the ride is Clue #5 Aerosmith - Aerosmith has performed in Germany Clue #6: Mickey - Euro Mouse is the Mascot Clue #7: Boomerang - Freizeit-Land Geiselwind has a Boomerang coaster also in Germany Clue #8: Parthenon - Theming in that part of the park Clue #9: Enclosed - The coaster is partially enclosed Clue #10: Closed - The park is closed for the season Clue #11: Flooded - Parts of the ride are in water so it is flooded

The 1994 brochure says Road Rally was going to have 2 tracks. It's too bad that didn't happen or they should have at least made the 1 track longer, it is one of the shortest car rides I have seen. While I like a lot of the additions CF has put in the park like Talon and Steel Force, it is a shame that so many of the older rides have been removed. What park doesn't have bumper cars?

At Dorney in August 2008: First, in line for Patriot's Plunge (tube slides), people thought the Wildwater Rapids slides (body slides) were for Patriot's Plunge (the stairs run parallel to each other) and were worried how the tubes would fit in the slides. Then someone was afraid the real Patriot's Plunge slides were too small and they would hit their head in the slide. At the platform of Wildwater Rapids, there are 2 fathers each with their kid. One was around 7 or 8, the other 9 or 10. Not only did one of the kid have socks on, both kids were crying and didn't want to go on the slides. One father was pushing his son to the slide and the kid was going crazy. Meanwhile, no one else was able to slide while this was going on. The lifeguard told them to get to the side while the line started to move so I don't know what happened. Then in line again for Wildwater Rapids which are body slides, I see 3 kids jump from the Patriot's Plunge line and get into the line for Wildwater Rapids, with their tubes! Then 2 adults follow them and another group of 4 kids also jump the fence and get in line. They weren't together so 3 separate groups get up to the platform and are surprised when they find out you can't take tubes on the slides. They left them up on the platform. Now for the worst, about 20 minutes later (I kept alternating between Patriot's Plunge and Wildwater Rapids), I see 2 kids coming up the stairs for Wildwater Rapids with tubes. They must have jumped the fence as well. They see no one else has tubes and one of them asks me if you need tubes for these slides. I tell them no, and I thought they would just leave their tubes at the slide platform when they got to the top. Well these 2 idiots decide to throw their tubes over the staircase and they could have easily landed on a walkway and hit someone since they were about 30 feet up. Both of the tubes land under the slide complex where supports are and of course is a restricted area. As if that isn't bad enough, I see another kid maybe their friend jump the fence to get into the area under the slide complex to get the tube. I didn't see what happened next but one tube was still there at closing time.

I went out to the mall with my family but didn't buy anything. The deals in the stores are never that great to me, since I look for bargains all year and Amazon some amazing deals. As an example, Target had Flingsmash with a Wii Remote for $39.99 today as a Black Friday special and Amazon had it yesterday for $29.99. Toys R Us had Uncharted 1 for PS3 as a door buster for $14.99, it was $6.00 last week at Toys R Us as a clearance price.

I don't think the pass pricing is that high, it was mentioned the early pricing is $132. A pass for Great Adventure is $89.99 plus tax plus $48 for parking which puts you at over $140. I know a Six Flags pass gets you into all parks but for a lot of non enthusiasts it doesn't matter because they aren't going to to go another SF park. If the park was closer to me, I would get a season pass without even thinking twice. I guess compared to Dorney it is more expensive though since a Dorney only pass had early pricing of $89.99 with parking included.

I agree, especially since they already removed Canyon River Rapids and Coal Cracker is the only water attraction in the park where you don't get soaked. SDL is a great coaster and a perfect 1st looping coaster, lapbars only don't hurt either.

I wonder if for Great Adventure they are going to theme the Wiggles World rides back to the Looney Tunes theme many of them had before they were changed to a Wiggles theme. Agreed 100%, lots of parks in the chain could use family rides that everyone can enjoy, not kiddie rides (especially in parks like Great Adventure that already had 3 kiddie ride areas and hardly any rides anyone in the family can ride together that isn't a coaster). Thomas Town at SFMM is a perfect example. They got rid of the antique cars which to me seems like the definition of a family ride since it is something anyone can ride and they put some kiddie rides in its spot.

I have mixed opinions on this, I didn't like some of the things Hershey did to the park most specifically removing the Old Engine 99 Train Ride. They also lowered the maximum height limit on some kiddie rides (doesn't matter to me personally but I would be annoyed if I was a kid that was now not allowed to go on a ride that I used to be able to) and I hated the changing of Sky Princess with the white track to the purple and blue tracked Kingdom Coaster and getting ride of the Giant Slide and replacing it with 2 smaller slides. I just hope the new owners don't remove any of the other older rides like the Wonder House. If the park continues to be open for Winter Wonderland, it would also be nice if the new owners can consider running Kingdom Coaster. I'd be willing to drive 90 minutes to ride a coaster in December.

The same thing happens at Dorney too and they have a better coaster collection. Both B&M's and Steel Force can be a walk on or 5 minute wait while the water park is packed. I think it's because only thrill seekers will go on the coasters and almost everyone can handle the waterpark and most water slides and the lower capacity of the slides makes it more crowded since it takes longer to go on everything in the waterparks.

The launch is intense and the first time I tried the coaster I had to rest for a few minutes and one ride was enough for me. Next time I was at the park I rode it twice and now have ridden up to 4 times in 1 trip. I suggest trying it once right at opening without a line so you board the ride right away and don't have time to think about it. The ride is over so fast too which helps.

I'm surprised lines weren't longer. I know 45 minutes is still a long wait but I thought lines would be 90+ minutes.

Skull Mountain last night

Seeing report after report of how bad the operations are at La Ronde makes me not feel as bad about not going there when I was in Montreal. With so many other SF parks really having better operations in the past few years, it's a shame to hear that things haven't changed for La Ronde.

Trailblazer, Great Bear and LR (both sides) were running 1 train and LR had rows chained off. Everything else ran 2 trains except sidewinder of course but Wildcat and Storm Runner had rows closed off.

I was there the first Sunday this year, it was empty. Longest wait was Fahrenheit at 15 minutes, everything else was 0 - 10 minutes. Even Storm Runner was only a 1 train wait. I was surprised since it was around 70 degrees and sunny, perfect weather for October. Someone one another side said last Saturday was very crowded. I also went on the last Sunday in 2005 (October 30th) and it was empty then too with 0 - 10 minutes waits.

Comet at Hersheypark last Sunday night.