DILinator

Like I said, every other park, and park chain I've been to with my little guy has no issue with it, and it doesn't slow anything down. It's just one of those maddening policies that CF has, that frankly, in my opinion, doesn't really have any merit behind it. I think I've seen others mention it here as well (maybe even Shark Tums?), but they aren't really the most "family friendly"chain when it comes to smaller kids, especially when you look at the amount of coasters with higher height restrictions. It'll be a moot point in about a year, but it sure was annoying going to CF parks this year, and last.

I have been delinquent in posting about my trip to CP last week with my 4 kids, so in response to this is as good a time as any! We were there at the park on Thursday, the 19th, in celebration of my Birthday that day! I hadn't actually been to CP since mid-2018, for a variety of reasons, but prior to that, I'd been every years for decades, often multiple times. So this was a long overdue return. At any rate, as it pertains to your questions NegativeGLover, the operations at the park seemed pretty good, for the most part, and as Mike240SX mentioned, the only main rides down were TTD and maXair. When it comes to the crowds, at least on that day, the claims of not being able to have a good day at the park without Fast Lane proved very untrue that day, as it was not very crowded at all, with the only real wait of the day on Steel Vengeance during our first ride at park's opening to the public, and even that was less than 45 minutes. My kids waited about 30-45 for Valravn as well (I didn't ride, as I was with my youngest who is too short for the B&Ms still), but that was the only other wait over about 25 minutes. Most rides were walk-ons or station waits. The three older kids actually went to SV for their final ride of the night, and instead of getting only 1 ride, they got 3, back to back to back, as the wait was only on the stairs each time. 3 NEAR WALK ONS OF STEEL VENGEANCE IN A ROW! Amazing! So yeah, I'd definitely say, at least based on that Thursday visit last week (which was when Michigan schools were still out, which seemed to be most of the people there), crowds are way down from their insufferable Summer levels. Getting back to my mini-TR, it was an absolutely awesome day at Cedar Point, and a great time as a family was had by all! It also reinforced what I've stated repeatedly over the years about the best way to visit CP being smart about WHEN you go, vs. going in the Summer, and wasting (in my opinion) two or three times the gate price on skip-the-line passes. Sure, some people have no other option about when they go, and what they do with their hard earned money is their business. But as I've maintained for decades, if you're willing to be flexible about when you go to CP, and can go when schools are either still in session or have started up again, you're going to have a much better time at the park, AND your pocketbook will thank you as well! We hardly spent anything at the park last Thursday (other than a fabulous meal our first time at the wonderful new BackBeat Que restaurant! A great addition!), and had what we all felt like was arguably our best day ever (cue groans) at Cedar Point! I have a lot of negative things to say about Cedar Fair as a company, and am one of their sharpest critics, but there were definitely a lot of positives to take away from the visit, and given what I'd heard over the past couple of years since I'd been, I was expecting a bad day at the park, and it was anything but that. Their absurdly awful policy of not letting kids who are too short to ride, wait in line with their parents and walk through at the station makes the mentally ill patients I work with daily look sane, and they are woefully out of sync on that issue with literally every other park I've been to over the past couple of years that isn't a Cedar Fair park. However, unlike Michigan's Adventure, which appalled me with a laundry list of negatives when I finally returned there this year as well, that was pretty much the only negative from the day. It exceeded expectations, and left my kids and myself very satisfied! One last exciting thing from the trip I wanted to share, was that I went in fully expecting not to be able to get a final ride (at least at CP) on Wicked Twister, which has always been one of my favorite underrated coasters there. I was unable to fit on the coaster back in 2018, the first time I'd ever been "Walk of Shamed" on a coaster, and tried the test seat on Possessed earlier this year, and didn't fit, so I figured even with my recent healthy lifestyle change, weight loss, and inches lost around the belly, it would be a no-go. I tried the test seat out for the heck of it though, and fit! I then made it on the coaster itself, in a glorious final comeback, and it was awesome, and so satisfying to be able to ride it again! So, all the work and the foods I love that I've given up for the past couple months paid off, and it was a very exciting and rewarding moment! Just know that if you saw me at Holiwood Nights, and you saw me at a park now, you would definitely see a different me, and one who is in a lot better shape, and will make his Dr. happy next month when checking in! It was actually that weekend (including KK) that was the final straw in showing me I needed to get serious about getting healthier, and losing weight, or I was going to ruin my enjoyment of parks, and also continue ruining my body. Thanks as well to those who have encouraged me in my weight loss from this site - you know who you are!

Hey! That's the weekend I'm targeting on making my annual trip to Haunt with a couple of my kids and my girlfriend! It'd be great to meet up with you, AND Prozach and wife if they come as well! Maybe RawkinCoaster will make her usual appearance (KI's Haunt is where I first met her as well) also!

Oh wow! So you were there Sunday? I was there that day with one of my kids, but we were only in the dry park from 5-7, and only rode Thunderhawk and Shivering Timbers during that time.

Which day were you there?

Front row on Shivering Timbers, last train of the day on Sunday, with my son, celebrating his 13th Birthday!

Username checks out.

I have a number of issues with them, personally, but all of that aside, just from a practical standpoint, it boils down to this for me as well. With 5 of us every time we go to a park, there is no world where it's practical, or economical to do.

Never. I hate them with a passion hotter than the sun. (The only possible exception would be for a foreign park that I may only go to once in a lifetime.)

I still don't get all the complaints about the vest restraints on the B&Ms. Other than the first season on GateKeeper, where they did seem to have a tightening problem, I haven't noticed that in seasons since, and I find them generally comfortable. I certainly prefer them to head banging and stinky hard OTS restraints!

Anybody expecting Cedar Fair to ever care about anything other than extracting the ultimate amount of money for themselves, or care about things like guest experience, or satisfaction, is deluding themselves (and yes, there's a lot of participants in that delusion in enthusiast circles, including this site), and is ultimately going to be disappointed and frustrated with any Cedar Fair park. Learn to love the small, independent parks, like my kids and I have these past couple of years, and you won't care so much that Cedar Fair and Six Flags parks alike care more about money than they do about you, and whether you have a good time at their amusement parks.

I'm going with my kids this Saturday, the second time for most of us (after HWN), and I can't wait to experience it with my youngest for his first time ever! Whatever's open, will be open, and I'm sure it'll be a great time there for the whole family regardless!

Speaking of unique rides, when I made my first visit out to this wonderful park last week, my daughter and I rode the Looper, and that sure was a blast! Hopefully they can keep it in good working order, since it sounds like it's one of the last operating flats of its type left! Since I haven't done an actual TR from my brief trip (that ended up being two brief trips) to the park, I thought I'd mention a few of my thoughts in highlight fashion. First of all, much to the chagrin of many of you I'm sure, the nature of my trip was such that I didn't have a full day on either end of it to do Knoebels for a full day, and as such, we had to pick and choose what we did, and focused primarily on coasters for this particular "tasting" of the park. I definitely plan on returning with my kids to the park for a full day, full "Knoebels Experience" in the future, tentatively next year for PPP. So rest assured, just because we didn't do something this trip (such as the Haunted Mansion), doesn't mean that your suggestions went unheeded, but rather it was just the particular dynamics of our visit, and the time we had allotted that kept it out, and it is still on our radar for the future! So, on our way out to New Jersey to spend some time on the shore with my relatives, we stopped at Knoebels around 4, Wednesday the 14th, for the Sundown admission, and got our wristbands unlimited riding. We had an amazing time at this small, family friendly, and very warm and welcoming park, and look forward to returning again in the future! One of the positive thing to come out of the last year plus, and the pandemic altering plans, has been my kids and I have been going to a bunch of smaller parks like IB, Adventureland, Holiday World, and now Knoebels. We've enjoyed our small park experiences so much, it's kind of spoiled us to the point where going to the bigger parks (like Cedar Point) seems much less attractive now. We had an opportunity to pop back into Knoebels on the way back for about an hour, while we were in the area, and took advantage of it, getting a couple more rides in, and getting some merch we were unable to get the first visit through. So, technically, I left home before my trip never having been to Knoebels, and now I've been twice! Great park, and definitely a place we'll be going to for a much longer period of time to get the full experience in the future! Thoughts: Phoenix lived up to expectations, mostly, and ends up as my favorite coaster at the park, barely! My first ride on it in the back seat didn't give as much air as I expected, but I was riding with my 7 year old, and was cognizant of not fully letting myself go, so as not to freak him out. So that could be why. My second ride, in the front row, was much better, and my third ride, which I've already forgotten where it was (sorry, do I lose my enthusiast card now?) was absolutely awesome, as I was flying out of my seat left and ride, and practically standing on the way back to the station. That final ride cemented the coaster's place as the best in the park, narrowly edging my biggest surprise of the trip. Twister just doesn't get the attention it deserves I feel, due to the tremendous hype over Phoenix. I do see people mention it as underrated more and more, and I can understand why, as it was REALLY a great coaster! It seemed SO fast, and brought some exciting laterals to the experience, much like The Legend at HW. I don't hesitate to say that I prefer Twister over The Legend, however, and myself, and all my kids were big fans as well. I think my 7 year old may have ended up preferring it even more than Phoenix. It's a very unique coaster, and in addition to the speed and twister elements, it had some great moments of airtime as well, making it a complete, and exciting coaster experience! Impulse was my 4th of that type of coaster (vertical lift and drop, single car - not talking about manufacturer or specific ride type), and while I really enjoyed it, it's no Monster or Fahrenheit, and I'm not sure if I prefer it or Hydrus more. It's still a great addition to the park, and a fun coaster! One of the fun tidbits from the trip was that my 7 year old was not ready to ride coasters that go upside down when we went to the park last week, and waited off the ride while I rode it with my other three kids. But after a week of being an increasingly brave "coaster kid" (what he calls himself, nothing to do with any group or organization), which included him making Hydrus his first upside down coaster, he wanted to ride Impulse, so we made sure to do so when we returned to the park, and he enjoyed it as well! Black Diamond was closed the first visit we were there last week, and we never made it over there the brief time we stopped in on Tuesday this past week. Flying Turns was also down both visits, obviously. The rest of the rides we made it on were great, such as the Flyers, which lived up to expectations, and gave my best ride on that type by far! We also rode Stratosfear, and of course the iconic Bumper Cars, which were super fun, and caused much mayhem! We didn't eat a lot, but we did seek out and eat from the stand made famous by CoasterBill's photo, getting the fantastic pierogies, as well as the roast beef, plus some birch beer, and chicken fingers. All of the food was excellent, and definitely lived up to the hype! I look forward to trying a number of the other other highly touted food places when we visit next time! That's probably enough for now. The bottom line is that myself, and my kids, and more satisfied Knoebels fans now, and we are very grateful to have finally made it out to this wonderful park! Thanks again to all of the many of you who have contributed recommendations over the years regarding this place, as I definitely thought about them as we were there!

Jersey Devil at SFGAdv, on the last train of the night, in the dark! Boy, was it hauling, and giving a great ride at the end of the night!

Got back a little bit ago from going to GAdv with my kids for their first time to the park, and we all had a great day, on a manageable day crowd-wise! (The same could not be said for Hurricane Harbor, apparently, based on them reaching capacity again, having a security incident that briefly closed the park, and then making the decision to go pass-holders only the rest of the season!) Even my 7 year old rode everything he could, including Zumanjaro, and Jersey Devil! Jersey Devil was my first RMC Single rail coaster, and our first two rides in the morning underwhelmed me, at least based on my expectations for it. I rode first in the front seat, then the back seat, and while the back was definitely better than the front for air, it wasn't as wild as I was expecting. At the end of the day, after dark, and presumably, after the coaster had sufficiently warmed up throughout the day, it was a different story! I rode in the 4th seat from the front, and 3rd from the back (on the last train of the night!), and both were awesome rides, wild, and full of airtime, just like I was anticipating! So clearly this is another coaster that gets better as the day goes on! Waits were manageable all day, with none ever topping a half hour for JD (I hate the "Coaster" part of the name, so I just ignore it, FYI), so that gives an idea of the crowd levels of the day. It broke down a couple of times, just that I saw, but never seemed to stay down long. All in all, it was a great coaster, and a great addition to the park! I love the area around it, and I'd say it settles in nicely as the second best coaster at the park, behind The Bull! I'm not sure what our longest wait of the day was for, but it felt like it was for the parachutes ride! lol Only two chutes were operating, which turned what seemed like a reasonable line, into one that pretty much matched the wait time for Superman nearby (I went on Parachutes with my 7 year old while the older three kids went on Superman, and there wasn't much time difference between our experiences!) The longest wait of the day may have been either Kingda Ka (with a breakdown included), or Green Lantern (for obvious reasons), but even those topped out around 40-45 minutes. Not bad for a Summertime day at GAdv, and we were able to pretty much do the whole park that we wanted to do! We skipped Joker because we're not crazy about it in general, and we preferred to get more rides on JD. I attempted to get on Wonder Woman, which would have been my first Giant Discovery, but as it had been doing all day, it broke down as soon as I entered the line, and it was near the end of the day, so I didn't bother staying in line. I don't think it opened again. It also was pulling a large wait, it appeared. The longest wait time of the day on the app was stunningly Nitro, which was listed as 70 minutes! I couldn't believe it, as B&M Hypers are usually people eaters. We rode it early in the day and it was a walk-on, but we skipped a second ride at night due to the wait. All in all, a great day at GAdv, and I have to say this is definitely my favorite SF park for rides, and thrills! My kids also loved it, and my 7 year old looks forward to coming back when he's over 54", so he can ride everything he missed this time around! I have a few other thoughts about the day, and the park, but I'll have to post them at a later time, as I have to crash right now, as we're hitting the road to make the 12 hour trip back home in about 8 hours.

Twister at Knoebels, just a little bit ago! An extremely underrated coaster! I felt like I got more air on it than Phoenix, somehow!

Current situation...

I was planning to visit the park Thursday while visiting my relatives in New Jersey, and with the Jersey Devil downtime news, pushed my visit back as far as I could, until Monday. So here's hoping, and fingers crossed, that'll it'll be up and running by then! Regardless, none of my kids have ever been to the park, so there will still be plenty for them to do there that'll be brand new!

Well, I'll be going to Indiana Beach a few more times this year (we all got Season Passes), and I plan to make an appearance at MiA even (a very rare occurrence, even though it's the closest park to me!) So I imagine we should at least be able to meet at the latter park, hopefully! (I think I'm planning on being there the 8th of August, currently.)

Thanks for the report! I was trying to squeeze Lakemont into my trip East next week, but ultimately, I couldn't make it fit in the time allotted that I had, and their Thursday-Sunday ride operating schedule. Hearing that Leap the Dips is still very much a hit or miss (and usually miss) chance of being open, I'm glad I didn't bend over backwards to make it happen, as chances are it would have ended up being closed anyway. Hopefully someday I can make it out there, while I'm already in the area, and catch Leap the Dips open!

^Good to know. I'm definitely not traveling all that way to sit on my couch again!

In your opinion, what is the best coaster at Dorney? Talon? Is front, or back better on Steel Force?

^I'll make sure we hit up the flume then! I've always enjoyed a good flume (still miss WWL at CP - though I prefer Maverick obviously), as long as I don't end up completely soaked. Sounds like splitting up into two groups, with my oldest son (who is as tall as I am now) in the other boat, will be the best plan. Thanks for the tip! I definitely plan to ride Hydra multiple times, assuming the crowds are as low as I've heard they tend to be. I like B&M Floorless coasters more than most to begin with, and have always loved the look of Hydra, and been intrigued by the jo-jo roll. So I'll want to try it both in front and back for sure!

I'll be going to Dorney FINALLY for my first time, and taking my 4 kids a week from today! We're hitting it on our way to my relatives on the Jersey shore, so we'll only be there for the last 4 hours or so as well, so the above information was helpful. Thank you to all who chipped in advice! Just to confirm: The log flume is a must-ride here, correct? I seem to recall hearing that over the years, beyond just from Bill! (I'm also still excited to finally ride Hydra after all these years, no matter what all the naysayers about it have said! )

^That's great to hear! Every picture I've seen just shows that open area, and I'm thinking to myself what a wonderfully awful bit of added theming to the ride it is!