GCI Wooden

Looks like Skyrush will be open today

Jack Rabbit at Kennywood back in early August. Kennywood was a new park for me this year, and this coaster really surprised me! That ride is running exceptionally well for being over 100 years old, and that double-down is unbelievably good.

Here's Dollywood's site listing the temperature cutoffs: https://www.dollywood.com/themepark/Rides/Ride-Temperature-Guideline

Looking through the Haunt site for this year and noticing a few (perhaps expected) changes. Firstly, they cut back October operating hours (Friday stays 7-Midnight, Saturday 2-11, Sunday Noon-6). I can't say I'm surprised by that move but it does seem a little strange that Cedar Fair is cutting back some parks (Like VF and Dorney having 11pm closings) but expanding others (CP/WOF being open Thursdays). Second, they cut a maze (Cornstalkers) and the scarezone by Renegade, but everything is planned to be up for operation. Likely a good move; better to have good staffing on fewer things than poor staffing on many, as far as haunts go. Finally, looks like there's no show in the Galaxy theatre this fall which is a bit of shame since that was a nice way to warm up on colder nights. Other than those couple things, it looks like everything else will be staying the same and it'll be a relatively complete event. I'm also happy that they're keeping weekend September operations even though there won't be Haunt during those periods. I don't expect to be able to get to VF this fall but those autumn days at the park are always my favorite.

Yep, even with about 180Mbps download it's taking around 15 seconds to switch from a thread to the topic listing page. I too noticed a slowdown once the forum switched away from the old phpBB forum style, but it does seem to be more dramatic recently.

Yeah I wouldn't read into that post either, seems like pretty standard language for bringing in a new season. This excites me though because in previous years they've only shown months with operating dates. Like yeah I know Winterfest in Minneapolis is a genuinely absurd idea and I shouldn't read into this, but if Toronto can do it I guess it's not that much more insane to have it in MN? I'd love to see Winterfest at VF, and if it does end up happening I'll be pleasantly surprised, but I feel like I can't reasonably expect or even hope for such an event considering how cold it gets here in mid-late December (I mean it rarely gets above 30°F)

It's looking like we'll be heading to PA for Kennywood, Hershey, and Knoebels which I'm super excited for. I've been wanting to go to Knoebels for so long, and it's looking like it will finally happen! I also might stop in at some of the small parks around me that I haven't gotten to yet, like Little Amerricka and Arnold's Park just for quick day trips.

I saw a graveyard spring up over by Berserkers so presumably it's right where Humane was.

Definitely, we would normally go to the Hacks show twice everytime we went to haunt, it was so so funny (especially as it got later - the 11:00 shows were always off the rails hilarious). I seldom left that theatre without being in physical pain from laughter. From my understanding though, the comedians came from ComedySportz Twin Cities and they lost their building since last year so that may be part of the reason they're not returning. Also I think Route 76 would be a wonderful place for CarnEvil now that there's all the new lighting in the area but it's fine where it is.

Where did you hear that Looping Starship won’t be open during Haunt? I don’t see anything about it on the park website. Looping Starship is not listed under rides for Haunt. https://www.valleyfair.com/valleyscare/haunt/attractions At VF it can be assumed that all rides are open unless explicitly stated otherwise. They don't have Excalibur or Thunder Canyon open, but I can't think of another ride in the main park that closes for the Haunt season. I'd be surprised if Starship isn't running, but I am curious about what's going on with Raging Rapids.

We discovered that Steel Vengeance makes every other ride outside of Frontiertown fantastic for early entry. We were there a couple weeks ago and were able to get 3 rides on Valravn, 1 on MF and were in line for Maverick before the park opened. We also noticed that during this time Raptor was sending mostly empty trains. I think that may be our strategy from now on, since Valravn is such a fun ride but it always pulls such long waits during the day.

Still not working as of last Tuesday.

I didn't even think about lockers being in short supply or inefficient to operate when this was announced, so that's just another blemish on the guest experience. Hoping that they can figure this out soon and get everything to work smoothly. Interestingly enough there were practically no bugs when we were there in late June this year. It was pretty dense when I was there that same week a couple years back, so I wonder if something just went awry with their typical season.

^Yeah Haunt stuff is up and I'm excited, there's a lot of change for this upcoming Haunt season. I'll put all the changes here in this post so people don't have to go over to VF's website. First off, scare-zone news. MaSCAREade is new this year, and Bloodcreek is out. I would think that MaSCAREade will take the place of Bloodcreek but they haven't updated their map so I can't say. I'm intrigued by the use of "labyrinth" and "endless circle" in the description of a scarezone, sounds like something you'd find in a maze description. I'm curious what this will look like. Maze news: Humane Habitat is out this year. Looks like it'll be replaced by Undertakers Zombie High is being reworked into a blackout maze - cleverly named "Zombie High: In The Dark" Finally, Entertainment news: - No more Hacks I'm really bummed about this, they were always a highlight of the experience. - Blood Drums is back at Gazebo this year. - DJ Tek is moving to Midway Stage. Something else I noticed is that they chopped an hour off of the Sunday hours this year, now closing at 6:00 instead of 7:00. Looks like a really good year for Haunt - other than the removal of Hacks all the changes sound really positive and I'm pumped for September 22nd when it all kicks off!

Accidental double post