jonskinny12

By looking at the September calendar this seems to be what they do on weekends between then and Fright Fest, other than Labor Day weekend.

I don't know how things were when you were there but I didn't feel like a third train would have made much difference at all. It was rarely stacking but I think I only saw once or twice where a train dispatched before the other one was hitting the brake run.

As far as food goes, I've been to Melt twice and thought it was great. Sharing is a good idea though, because like mentioned earlier the sandwiches are enormous. I like Chickie's & Pete's for the crab fries, but I haven't been impressed at all with any of the three entrees I've tried there. Chick Fil A is good of course, but the line gets crazy long around lunchtime. I always want to go over to Famous Dave's but I've never actually been to that one. Seems like a great idea though.

That's pretty disappointing to hear about Wonder Woman. Is it always like that? I think the grouping system that CGA has for Railblazer works well, it would just be helpful if there was a more clear separation between the Fast Lane and single rider lines. They were pulling a good combination of the regular line and Fast Lane lines and pulling from the single rider line as necessary to fill every single train. And they would fill the rows 2-3 people deep so there was never any delay there. It was rare that I ever saw an empty seat on that ride (and all 8 rows were open all day). Most of the ride ops were really hustling around too. I thought the line moved as well as I could have hoped for with such small trains.

I didn't see Railblazer down at all the day I was there a week and a half ago. We rode it all different times of the day, and as far as we could tell it was open from park opening to closing.

Yep, all of this. Crowds after investing a lot of money is a good thing for everybody. I know it sucks to have to deal with large crowds but there are ways to avoid a lot it.

I had totally forgotten that they do this with some rides. I was thinking of taking a trip to SFOT and SFFT sometime this fall or during HITP but was hoping for multiple re-rides on Wonder Woman after how much fun Railblazer was. Bummer. At least it can be used on the other great rides at this park. Not to start a war between Flash Pass and Fast Lane but this is one reason I prefer Fast Lane. I got 18 rides on Steel Vengeance over a couple days at CP in June...

Based on many of the recent names- Blue Hawk, , Crazanity, tack a Twisted/Iron/Wicked in front of the name of a recently Rocky Mountain'd coaster, recycled names (Goliath, as an example)... I get the feeling that not a lot of thought is put into the naming process to begin with- so it probably doesn't matter. Oh I totally agree about the level of thought they've put into naming recent rides. I just see people looking at this survey and trying to guess what the current construction project is based on the options. It seems like they would already have the names of any new/re-themed attractions nailed down.

Is it common for Six Flags to send surverys for names of rides that are currently under construction? It seems to be a little late in the process for that, but maybe I'm wrong.

Has anyone else had experiences with the new “moveable fluffy, fluffy bunnies filled with medicine and goo” system? I was lookin into it for my CP trip at the end of August. But based on that it doesn’t work right, I am thinking about steering clear of it. I’m having some wishful thinking hoping maybe this was an isolated event and it typically works, so I am curious if others’ experiences with this system. It worked, but I had to go through the process at each new kiosk to cancel out the fluffy, fluffy bunny filled with medicine and goo at the previous location because the "end rental" button never worked. It's still a deal if you plan on renting more than 5 fluffy, fluffy bunnies filled with medicine and goo at $2 each. If not, just rent one at each individual ride. I had a similar experience. I can't remember exactly which option I chose back in early June but I remember the whole system sucked and was confusing and the kiosks barely worked. It took some trial and error for me to figure it out. The question of whether or not you can buy Fast Lane before the park opens has come up a few times. I just wanted to mention that I bought it before the park opened for early entry at the Marina Gate ticket booth one day. I can't speak for the other gates though. Another day I bought it at the Steel Vengeance gift shop shortly after the park opened to everyone. Even if FL+ can sell out, I would assume that buying it at the ticket office before the park opens would be early enough even on the busiest days, and that way you still get your platinum pass discount.

They seem to have cancelled the video shoot for last week. It was supposed to be Thursday but I was there and there wasn't anything happened over there, and now that post has disappeared from their social channels. On their Instagram they said that they're putting some finishing touches on it after some technical rehearsals but didn't commit to any date.

^ That's funny because I definitely prefer Full Throttle. But I'm glad that people like these Sky Rockets and that they're cloning them. They're cheap (I'm guessing) and seem to be great for the parks that are building them.

My girlfriend and I went to SFDK last Thursday. It was the first trip for both of us. I hadn't ridden a Sky Rocket before and I thought Superman was somewhat underwhelming. I didn't really desire to go back. Medusa was a lot of fun but was only running one train (they seemed to be spending a lot of time trying to attach a camera to one of the other trains). Despite a short line it was still taking 30-45 minutes with only one train so we only rode it twice. I felt like it was really smooth considering its age, especially on the inside seats. The Joker, on the other hand, was awesome. It seemed to get better every time we rode it. The line was short so we were able to ride it 10 times. We thought the front was definitely the best seat on the ride, even though you miss the great first drop. In the back I felt like the pacing was just a bit off but in the front it was fine. You get some really good airtime and it packs a lot into a small layout. The ride ops though were constantly telling people to not touch the queue gates. And one time it broke down briefly and they even said that it was because people kept messing with the queue gates. I also noticed that there are a few gates for the ride ops to stand behind that have sensors, and they had to cycle those on a number of occasions before they could send a train. I've never seen anything like that before. I thought the park looked really nice. There are a lot of trees and it was clean for the most part aside from the tree with gum all over it in Joker's queue. I would come back for The Joker since I have a season pass and I would like to ride Medusa some more, but not much else was very interesting to me. Edit: I can't believe I forgot to say this. Kong is terrible. I've been on two other SLC's so I should know better by now but my GF hadn't been on one yet so I figured we might as well see if it's as bad as the others. Yep, it is. It's one of the worst rides I've been on.

My girlfriend and I made a quick trip out to northern California last week and spent Friday at CGA. It was a lot of fun. I hadn't been to this park in about 20 years and she had never been, so there was plenty of new stuff for us. We got there right at opening and hit Gold Striker first. We could see that it wasn't going to be empty so we got Fast Lane after our first ride and it was so worth it. We were able to get 6 rides on Gold Striker, 5 on Flight Deck, 16 on Railblazer, and also ride a few other things. It was also useful on our two trips on the sky ride. We even left the park for 3-4 hours during the hottest part of the day to check in to our hotel and relax and get some dinner. Speaking of the hotel, have any of you ever stayed in the Avatar Hotel? It's right down the street from the park and isn't affiliated with the park or Cedar Fair from what I could tell, but we had this picture of Top Thrill Dragster above our bed. While I think the park looks nice and we had a great time, I couldn't help but notice the lack of trees especially compared to SFDK, which we visited the day before. Anyway, on to the rides! Railblazer (x16) - This ride is absolutely insane. The back has some of the strongest airtime I've ever felt on any ride anywhere. The only complaints I have are that it's too short and the restraints can get a bit painful if you ride it a lot. After we had ridden it 8 or 9 times my collar bones started to hurt and I have bruises there now. My girlfriend's shoulders were fine but the restraints hurt her thighs a bit after a number of rides. But it was minor enough that we were still able to ride it again and again. The front seat is awesome for the view, the back seat is awesome for the airtime on the first drop. We were able to sit in just about every seat and it's awesome in every seat. I really hope that more parks get these rides. It's fun to watch too. We would just sit/stand and watch it, almost in disbelief that a ride like this exists. It looks even faster in person than in off-ride videos I've seen. Side note - Fast Lane helped us the most here. The line was almost to the entrance for a good part of the day (they were saying 90 minutes) but we never waited more than 10 minutes. They were also using the Fast Lane line for single riders as well, but taking Fast Lane before the single riders. They tried to have single riders stand to one side of the line and Fast Lane to the other, but it didn't always work. If that's a long term plan, it would help if they painted something on the concrete so people know. I do want to point out one more thing about Railblazer without it raising a huge issue (hopefully). You can feel almost every single track connection throughout the course. You can even see that they've tried to grind down a lot of the connections, I assume to make it smoother. The ride is super smooth aside from the track connections. And even those aren't too bad except on the very last turn before going up into the brake run. Has anyone else noticed this? Is it the same on Wonder Woman? Gold Striker (x6) - We didn't think Gold Striker was too rough. The turn at the bottom of the first hill was pretty bumpy but the rest of it was fine. It feels like an out of control wooden coaster. It did seem smoother in the evening, but that could have just been our perception or where we were sitting. Back seat all the way for me on this one. It was a lot of fun but not my favorite GCI. Flight Deck (x5) - I wish we could have ridden this ride more, but it was closed for a good part of the day. Luckily it was open in the evening because we rode it twice in the early afternoon and 3 times around 8:30, and it seemed like it was absolutely hauling in the evening. It blew us away and the only reason we walked away was to get some night rides on Railblazer before closing. Otherwise we would have gone a few more times. I almost want to go back for this more than any other ride because we didn't quite get our fill. Patriot (x1) - I rode this as Vortex and thought it sucked then. As Patriot it's just kind of boring. The Grizzly (x1) - Slowest ride ops in the park. This thing takes forever. The ride itself was fine, and it was really smooth. Demon (x1) - Demon is pretty fun and wasn't nearly as painful as some of the others, like Corkscrew at CP. I really like classic Arrow coasters, but there were just more interesting things to do in the park than ride this. Plus we got stuck on the brake run for about 15 minutes and didn't feel like going back. Drop Tower (x1) - The last time I was here Drop Zone was the newest ride (I think) and it was awesome. I prefer the Intamin drop towers to the S&S towers so I try to ride them at least once any time I visit a park that has one. Here are a few crappy pictures I took with my cell phone. Gold Striker ready for the day! Railblazer is fun to watch. This drop is insane but not even the most insane part of the ride. Gold Striker doing its thing. This flat spin over the water is awesome. Railblazer looks cool all lit up at night. But I didn't think night rides were any better than day rides. Overall, I like this park quite a bit. Railblazer ride ops were flying, props to them. Ride ops on most other rides were average or slow. Given its proximity to me compared to other parks, I can see myself wanting to come back again. Especially when they add a couple more things.

It seems that most people on here say that Fury is a front seat ride. Maybe it had to do with riding the front seat on the first train of the day before it warmed up, but I greatly preferred the back to the front. That first drop in the back goes on forever. It's an amazing ride either way though.

Will this be the last new for 2018 attraction to open in the chain this year? Well yes and it just got delayed again as Media Day was postponed to an unknown date Did it get postponed again after the 27th? I'm going next week and doubt I'd be riding it anyway, but I'd like to see it. Mostly I'm hoping that I'm not there right after it opens because I'd rather not have additional crowds from a brand new ride.

This guy gets it. Millennium Force (especially in the evening on a warm day) was my favorite coaster for years and years until Steel Vengeance came along. Nice review of each of the coasters! Glad you had a great time on your first trip to the park. The second to last row on Magnum is my favorite, I always make sure to get a few rides in that row. So much fun.

^ Thunderhead is an actual wooden coaster (and was perfectly fine in the front, middle, and back last year). Lightning Rod is a wooden coaster but uses topper track which makes it ride different from a typical wooden coaster. New Texas Giant and Twisted Cyclone are completely different in that their entire track is all made of steel. So putting any of these three groups into the same category to gauge how a wooden coaster is supposed to "feel" isn't really fair. Disclaimer, I haven't been on anything with topper track (LR was closed when I went last year ) so I'm going based on what I've seen and read about that. Please correct me if I'm wrong. But I've been on 3 different RMCs with I-Box track, 2 of them being hybrids.

This BBQ place is great. I was with a couple people and we all shared so I was able to sample a few different things. It all tasted great and I thought the portion sizes were really big. Prices weren't bad either. It's definitely somewhere I'll be going back to on future visits.

When I was there last month, I was able to use my platinum pass to get the fast lane deal for other people at the SV gift shop back in Frontiertown. But when I tried to do the same thing at the marina gate ticket office before the park opened, they would only give the deal for each person who had a platinum pass. Everyone in the group had a platinum pass and I don't know what the rule is supposed to be, so I didn't try to push it or anything, I was just trying to buy the FL+ passes for both me and my GF at the same time and they needed to see both passes. For what it's worth, the employee in the SV gift shop seemed pretty new while the employee at the ticket office did not.

Yes, Grizzly always opens later than the rest of the park. The time it opens is different each day, but they always have the opening time posted in front of the entrance (see my photo) when the park opens. Dispatch times are TERRIBLE, like 5 minutes per train, so a station wait that would be like 5 minutes elsewhere can be over a half hour. So you definitely want to be first on it if you want the credit without waiting for it. The ride is not rough or negative in any way, it's just a flat line, it just doesn't really move the needle. The long dispatch times arent the crew's fault though, it has an absolutely ridiculous restraint system which just makes it take forever, there's not much they can do about it. Definitely hit RailBlazer first because it will have the most consistently long line throughout the day, though it still wasn't crazy when I saw it. I checked back on it at about 2 in the afternoon and it looked to be maybe 45-60 minutes or so. The queue itself is not very long, based on that it seems like the park is counting on fairly efficient operations. FastLane was pretty much immediately load onto next train all day. Gold Striker gets really busy in the beginning of the day because it's right in front of the park entrance and people go there early because they see it first. Wait until at least halfway through the day and it should be down to 15 minutes or so if it's not an especially busy day. It has gotten rather rough lately, I actually went straight from riding Gold Striker as my last ride at CGA over to Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk where Giant Dipper was my first ride, and that 1924 coaster was a significantly smoother ride than Gold Striker. Thank you for all of this info! Not sure I'll bother with Grizzly unless I happen to be near it when it opens. The ride looks pretty boring from what I can tell and dispatch times that slow can be so frustrating.

^ Nice report and pictures! I'm heading to this park for the first time in about 20 years the first week of August and have a couple questions based on your report. Does Grizzly always open in the afternoon? And how was the Railblazer line throughout the day? I'm planning on getting to Railblazer first thing and assuming I love it like everyone else I'll get Fast Lane to ride it a bunch throughout the day. I mostly care about Railblazer and Gold Striker, since that will be new for me as well.

I've said this a few times before but I seem to be in the minority that really enjoys Vortex. It's definitely something that you need to ride defensively, and even then it will still beat you up so I understand the hate. But for some reason I really like the ride. The first drop in the second to last row is a lot of fun, and I'm a fan of the old Arrow corkscrews. My girlfriend hated it though. We were there for a couple days and she told me that if I wanted to go on it again the second day she would gladly watch me.

Great report! I enjoyed reading all of your impressions and I love the park for a lot of the same reasons. I love Magnum, went a few weeks ago and thought it was running just fine. It has a great setting for a coaster and I really enjoy the first half for that, but when the seatbelt is tightened the final run of small hills is a blast. To each their own, though. I understand why some people don't like the ride. Almost everyone has a great time at Cedar Point for their own reason and that's perfectly fine.

Well that pretty much sums up my request, thank you guys! In looking at some online reviews as of 1/1/2018 the Hilton discounted the shuttle service to Six Flags due to the park going year round and the Hilton unwilling to hire a full time driver. (beats me) I just looked at that Hilton site and it lists "Local Area Transportation". To me that sounds like Six Flags is still in play. Perhaps its just a summer thing. Worse comes to worse you walk up the hill or walk next door to McDonald's and offer someone $5 US dollars and I'm certain you will get a lift. So there is also the possibility to walk from the hotel? That would be great. I just want to point out that this walk is going to be close to a mile from the hotel to the front gate and it's uphill most of the way. And I'm not sure if there is actually a sidewalk the entire way but there's plenty of grass on the side. So as long as you're okay with that, you can definitely walk from the hotel to the park.