LiftThrill

I like SFOT because even when it's 100+ there's plenty of shaded areas and trees over by Titan/NTaG, Runaway Mountain, and of course Justice League and Mr. Freeze have the indoor queue. The mist fans around the park are great when they're on. Plus they have a rapids ride with actual atmosphere/theming which is awesome! It's not too hard to stay cool at SFOT.

SFOT next week. Really excited for it since I haven't been since 2016

Smoke

1. Raging Bull @ Six Flags Great America - extremely rerideable, and outside of the one trimmed hill that everyone and their dog complains about for whatever reason, has a really fun layout with really good airtime and sideways hangtime, especially in the back left seat 2. Diamondback @ Kings Island - floater buffet in an excellent setting, plus it has a splashdown so obviously it must be perfect because it does the splashy splashy *3. Mr. Freeze: Reverse Blast @ Six Flags Over Texas & Six Flags St. Louis - intense and ridiculous rides that don't obey the laws of coaster anything and are all the better for it *4. Cannibal @ Lagoon - incredibly smooth inversions with an amazing first drop and, of course, lap bars! *5. Valravn @ Cedar Point - everything except the lap bar comment from Cannibal applies here. 6. Magnum XL-200 @ Cedar Point - idk where the complaints about roughness come from, but the airtime is definitely painful in some seats/seatbelt positions. someone has probably written a novel on each and every possible combination of seat-related factor and how it affects the airtime on this ride. *7. Wicked Twister @ Cedar Point - these things are fun, but nothing special, and for whatever reason this one is over 200 feet 8. Titan @ Six Flags Over Texas - laughably bad layout with no redeeming qualities except that it's smooth and that it's not Firehawk *not traditional hypers

Moon

Does anyone know why Carowinds has a ride entitled "something" on queue-times?

If coming to an e-stop on the midcourse causes a concussion, then Boomerang brakes cause a f*cking skull fracture. why are people like this????

The layout looks really fun and unique. I'm not a huge fan of the S&S vests, but due to the layout it'll still be pretty awesome with them. If they get this running with lap bars then it'll be pretty high on my bucket list (at least until six flags announces clones of it everywhere lol). Great addition for Kennywood!

The only other GCI I've been on is American Thunder, which was WAY smoother than Thunderhead. AT was much more similar in track interaction to the two Gravity Group coasters I've been on, but Thunderhead rode more like an older out and back like Judge Roy Scream or Roller Coaster @ Lagoon. It wasn't nearly as rough as Raven or The Boss, but I still feel like I hit it on a bad day. Next time I'm at Dollywood I hope it's running smoother than last time.

I rode Thunderhead 5 times in various seats (including the front, back, and some middle rows) in 2016 and while it wasn't anywhere near the roughest woodie I've been on, I found that the roughness detracted from it more than other rough wooden coasters. Why? Honestly no clue.

it's a new kiddy coaster that'll put all other kiddy coasters to shame

Towers

MF seriously feels like it never loses speed, and the raw energy in the station at night is unmatched.

If Mystery Mine was at any park not named Dollywood, it would probably suck, but since it IS at Dollywood, the random A$$ layout, slight jankiness, location, and theming make it a truly one-of-a-kind ride. We're still deciding between Smoky Mountain Christmas or a BGT/SWO spin for Thanksgiving. It's pretty hard to go wrong between those two, from what I've heard. If we choose SMC I'm gonna have to pack every hoodie I own because my winter gear is a little lacking (living in Texas and all)

Michigan's Adventure doesn't actually exist. It's a figment of everyone's collective imagination. (except cedar fair)

Awesome TR as usual! I haven't been to WDW in forever because it usually costs an arm and a leg to get in

We didn't have any stuff with us that day, so there wasn't any need to. If we had cared enough we probably could've just lied and said we had a locker or something.

Wicked's launch does continue up the top hat, which is pretty cool and unique. We didn't see any tube stations in front of rides, though if we had REALLY wanted to bypass the system we probably could've just asked some people who rented tubes to borrow them while they sunbathed.

Bourbon

That's good to know. The Subway in-park didn't seem to overcharge as much as normal in-park restaurants, so it wasn't a huge deal. Mostly we just wanted to wait out the power outage. ------------ I don't know why, but for some reason I never end up getting pictures from the last park day on ANY of my trips. I missed out on pictures on Day 2 of SFOT in 2015, Dollywood in 2016, and now Lagoon Day 2 in 2018. It's either laziness or my desire to just ride stuff instead of taking pictures all the time finally kicking in at the end of the trip. Who knows. Taking advantage of BounceBack!, we found ourselves once again at the world's largest family-owned park. We began the day by waiting 15 minutes for Cannibal, getting another awesome ride on it (if you're gonna ride it you better go for an edge seat. it makes it 10x better), then attempting to walk around through the locker area for a second ride. This is when we discovered the stupidest park rule to ever exist in any park ever. Apparently, if you didn't pay for a locker, you have to walk through the gift shop and all the way back around to get in line, whereas people who paid for lockers can just go through the (perfectly open!!!) locker area. What kind of dumba** rule is that???? They probably don't even check if you actually have a locker, but who came up with this? If someone wants to ride your ride again, but didn't have anything to put in a locker (we just got ice water cups every hour or so), you make them walk around a hilariously long loop just to get back in line??? I have so many questions about this rule, and I really hope it was just one idiot employee pulling stupid sh*t out of his a** and not a rule that park management actually wants anyone to enforce. Anyway, we walked all the way around for a second spin on this steep-dropped beast, then checked out its next-door neighbor, a really unique flat ride that does some really bizarre stuff. Yup. We rode Samurai (which had been down the entire day prior) and had a fun time, then headed to Lagoon A Beach to check out some of the (hopefully) fun slides there. The very first thing you'll notice is a money grab that puts Cannibal's lockers to shame. You have to pay to rent tubes here. Between that and the Cannibal locker rule, our second day at Lagoon was starting to feel a lot more like a day at a corporate park than a day at a family-owned park. Look, I get that this park needs money, but there are better ways to get it than charging people to use tubes and making people buy lockers to get better access to the entrance of a ride from the exit. Either way, we hadn't brought the money for anything but water cups, so it was time to check out the body slides and only the body slides (luckily there's a grand total of like two tube slides, so the tube rentals are even more of a ripoff). Almost every slide is connected to one of two complexes, so the first stop was the really tall complex that has two big-drop body slides (the kind you see at every waterpark ever with the big ~45-degree drop), two long blue body slides, and one tube slide (that we didn't do thanks to tube rentals being an upcharge). The two blue body slides were first, Sea Snake and Rip Curl. Sea Snake was pretty much the most boring water slide ever invented, and combined with some back-breaking seams it wasn't exactly the most pleasant experience either. Rip Curl was a little faster, and while its seams were a little rougher, it had some fun moments, namely a pitch black tunnel that lasts about 3/4 of the ride. SFOT needs to add one of these longa** tunnels to the second half of each of Titan's helices to increase the realistic theming of actual death. Next were the two body slides with the huge drops. Liquid Lightning has the bigger drop, so that one was first. I saw some bigger people actually get stuck in the flat section before the drop, and that pretty much sums up the experience. It's fun, but the section before the drop is really slow and you only speed up in the second half of the drop. The other slide with a big drop is called The Drop, and despite having the smaller drop is a far superior ride in my view. You start by going through a fast clockwise helix, then switch directions Maverick-style into a super tight counterclockwise helix, then out of nowhere you see a faint light and go flying down the huge drop. After the big tower slides, we headed to the smaller tower with the Twist/Shout/Holler/Wipeout/Whatever speed slides. The one on the far right was closed, but overall I quite enjoyed these ones. Following that we were pretty much done with the waterpark, so we headed to the dry park for a ride in the back row of Roller Coaster, two rides on Spider, a ride on Wicked, and then a relaxing and fun SkyRide trip to the other side of the park, where we took a last sunset ride on Cannibal before departing the park. ------------ Some things to note: - the waterpark water here is freezing and if it's not at least 95 degrees you're probably gonna be at least a little chilly if you're spending most of your time hopping in and out of water with the whole slide dealio - I seriously had a hard time remembering the names of the slides and had to check Wikipedia because Lagoon's own website apparently doesn't even know what slides they have in their waterpark. Some names may be mixed around as a result. - The efficiency of the tall slide complex is absolutely terrible. Because the three slides on the lower level end in the same pool and the two slides on the upper level end in the same pool, they can only have people in one of the taller ones and one of the shorter ones at a time, leading to some lines that are way longer than they could be if they literally added some dividers between the exit pools instead of having the slides end in the same pool. ------------ Samurai - An absolute blast of a flat ride. Unpredictable enough to not be nauseating and forceful enough to still be entertaining. I still prefer giant frisbees and Screamin Swings, but after those I can't think of a flat I like more than Samurai. Sea Snake - Complete waste of a slide. The most interesting part is a super mild double down that does nothing except maybe give a little extra speed that is burned up in the next five seconds of the ride. Rip Curl - The tunnel of death is hilarious and there's even a pretty good drop while in the tunnel of death. Most of this ride is spent in the tunnel of death so I honestly have no clue what else this slide does besides the tunnel of death. Liquid Lightning - The layout is pretty much the same as Otto @ Splashin Safari, with a helix and a drop. Pretty fun but the drop doesn't have the kick to it that you'd expect from a big drop like this. The Drop - Insane sensation of speed through the figure-8 thing and then a big drop that's taken at a ridiculous speed, especially compared to Liquid Lightning's. Quite enjoyable and the best body slide at Lagoon A Beach. Twist, Shout, and Pipeline - I have no clue which of these is which, but that's okay because they're all about equal in my book. The sensation of speed, drops, and high banking make these some of the most fun slides in the park. Probably tied for my second favorite slide here after The Drop. SkyRide - The real star attraction of Lagoon, this classic ride/relaxing travel mechanism hybrid allows for a slow but comfy trip from Wild Mouse all the way to Cannibal or vice versa. Considering there's basically nothing in between, you're not missing a thing by taking it! ------------ Ride Scorecard: Cannibal x3 Samurai x1 Sea Snake x1 Rip Curl x1 Liquid Lightning x1 The Drop x1 Twist x1 Shout x1 Pipeline x1 Roller Coaster x1 Spider x2 Wicked x1 SkyRide x1 Exercise Scorecard: Steps x11k ------------ Top 10 Water Slides BEFORE Lagoon A Beach: 1. Wildebeest @ Splashin' Safari 2. Bermuda Triangle @ White Water Bay 3. Whirlpool @ White Water Bay 4. The Viper @ ZDT's 5. Big Bender @ White Water Bay 6. Dragon's Revenge @ Schlitterbahn New Braunfels 7. Mammoth @ Splashin' Safari 8. Thunder Rapids @ White Water Bay 9. Master Blaster @ Schlitterbahn New Braunfels 10. The Viper's Tail @ ZDT's Top 10 Water Slides AFTER Lagoon A Beach: 1. Wildebeest @ Splashin' Safari 2. Bermuda Triangle @ White Water Bay 3. Whirlpool @ White Water Bay 4. The Viper @ ZDT's 5. Big Bender @ White Water Bay 6. Dragon's Revenge @ Schlitterbahn New Braunfels 7. Mammoth @ Splashin' Safari 8. Thunder Rapids @ White Water Bay 9. Master Blaster @ Schlitterbahn New Braunfels 10. The Drop @ Lagoon A Beach

SFOT closes rides when there's lightning halfway across the world (only slightly exaggerating). SFGAm is definitely better with that kind of stuff, but knowing Six Flags I wouldn't be surprised if they actually closed something when there's lightning 30 miles away, lol.

If you have the money, budget for Flash Pass. We did a similar ~5PM-closing spin and got to ride most of the good coasters, but if it's in the cards, you're 100% gonna have a better time with FP. If the weather is nice, it's probably gonna be fairly busy (25-60 minute waits for most coasters). If you get lucky, the weather will screw around enough to keep crowds light but not enough to actually close anything. Otherwise, Goliath is great in any seat but back car is definitely the place to be. Raging Bull in the very back row is the only seat. X-Flight is awesome in the front left, and likewise, American Eagle and Batman are front seat rides.

Iron Rattler in the second to last row on Friday.

The Lake Erie area forecast is gonna change every three seconds anyway, go ahead and go tomorrow. The crowds will be lighter and you'll get the true Cedar Point Rain Roulette experience.

Terror