coneyislandchris

I personally liked it a lot more than Storm Chaser. Storm Chaser just felt like a collection of elements, this feels like an actual ride. And though there's a ton of little bumps, nothing like the end of SC that just jerks you around rag-doll style.

Just used it last year. Second row was the only row I could ride in on Apollo's Chariots... and second row back were the only rows I could ride in on Alpengeist. Nothing else was a problem!! (But that was just my experience) We were just at the park on Sunday. InvadR has been added to the Quick Queue. Row 6 is permanently blocked off in the station and exclusively for Quick Queue guests that come up the exit ramp. They were sending train after train with that row empty. Meanwhile, at Verbolten, the line attendant was letting Quick Queue and accessibility pass guests into the main station and choose any row they liked. They only had one of the two loading areas operating at the time and three trains cycling.

Either I've been losing weight or they are the loosest set of RMC restraints yet. And I haven't been sticking to my diet. I think we'll probably miss each other this time. We're heading to BGW at the crack of open tomorrow to pick up our passes, get a few rides in, and then head back up north in the mid-afternoon. We've got an Easter Egg hunt scheduled with the extended family out in PA on Sunday morning so we're having to cut this trip a little bit shorter than I had originally hoped.

Lmao, you gotta love enthusiasts. Ride has been open maybe 180 minutes in late March. The review in question was from someone that was literally on the FIRST TRAIN OF THE DAY, before noon, when the weather was in the low 40's, and maybe one train had cycled prior to it. I know this because my son and I were ALSO on that first train. "Slow and lethargic" is bullsh*t. It took its time getting back into the station after the last turnaround, but besides that? It was pretty goddamned relentless. Honestly, so far this ride is a collection of RMC's greatest hits. You've got the inverting drop from Storm Chaser, followed by a gigantic overbank that is so much of a goddamned improvement over Hurler's turnaround it's sickening, straight into the trio of hills that provide airtime to a ridiculous degree. I realize this is a hybrid but honestly those three airtime hills in a row felt like ejector I'd expect from a hyper, not a hybrid. And then everything else that follows? A big gigantic mess of bunny hops tossing you out of your seat, half-inversions and full inversions, all like a bucking bronco is daring you to hang on for life. And this was after the FIRST ride of the day. The kiddo and I rode it eight more times during the preview event. It only got better as the weather and wheels got warmer, even with the majority of the invitees choosing to forego additional rides in lieu of "oh hey, free burgers, oh hey, free mac and cheese, oh hey, let me get seconds and thirds". Even with a half-full train this thing was riding great. After we got off the first time, the kiddo turned to me and said "You know what, I give it 100 percent!". Is it a perfect ride? No, probably not. But it's a hell of a lot of fun, up in the top ten percent of coasters I've been on for sure, and one that I'll gladly queue up for every time I visit. They got it right IMO. And anyone complaining about a lack of speed needs to check themselves for real. God, I'm glad I'm not that jaded yet.

I'm already down in the area (because I'm a f***ing idiot who booked a non-refundable room for Wednesday night a month ago) and all the snow that got dropped on the park is in the process of melting. It's thin hoodie weather outside with next to no wind and no clouds. I expect a full train of eager riders is going to make this thing absolutely fly tomorrow. Also, it's impossible to judge a ride based off of footage alone; I learned that lesson the hard way from the Skyrush POV. "That's it? It looks boring" quickly became "OH SHEEEEEEIIIIIIIIIIII--" when I rode it the first time.

^^ Yeahhh I don't have the patience to sit through 17 minutes of that sh*t.

Yes, the all-season drink bottle is valid at all parks, as is the all-season paper cup plan as well.

Yep. Nothing special but nothing terrible either. You can't beat the location though... it's nice to be able to walk from your room right to the front gate. I'm going to be staying there again next week when I go down for TT's opening.

^ Fly: The Great Nor'easter at Morey's Piers, Hulk at Islands of Adventure -- but both of those had years of operations under their belt before the complete track replacement.

I mean... technically... EVERY day is free admission day when you don't charge at the gates...

Sorry to go back a few pages, but clearly this thread moved pretty fast... For reference, my wife is terrified of roller coasters. She's slowly been getting over it, but even now going into our fifth year of marriage it's still baby steps. I was super proud of her last year when she finally managed to do The Dark Knight and Skull Mountain at Great Adventure, two of the "biggest" coasters she's been on to date. We visited Dollywood about three weeks after that, and I had made mention that well, they had a "family" coaster there that our 2-year-old daughter MIGHT be big enough to ride (spoiler alert: she was about half an inch short at the time). We rounded the corner from Tennessee Tornado, she took one look at the massive, imposing structure high off the ground and immediately noped the f*ck out of it. Yes, it has a 39" height requirement, yes they consider it safe for young children, but given the height and minimal supports she was like "I just don't feel comfortable getting on that right now". The only ones she ended up doing during our visit were Whistle Punk Chaser and Blazing Fury. That being said, she did end up doing the alpine coasters at Goats on the Roof and Ober Gatlinburg, and she felt much more comfortable on those since they were so low-to-the-ground at almost all the spots. There's a vast difference between stuff like wild mice and classic wooden coasters that have 8 million supports, and something like Firechaser, which was quite literally terrifying for her to even look at. If this new suspended coaster ends up being enclosed on all sides, it might be a little less nerve-wracking for her.

^ I'll be there that same weekend, Simi. All we can really do is just hope at this point. I'm sure they're still shooting to get it opened this month.

^ Knew that was coming as soon as I saw "Belgian waffles" without Waffle de Lys being mentioned. Seriously WTF guys? I see some returning names but their omission is a crime.

Hangtime looks sick as hell. From the layout to all the little details, this looks like a perfect coaster for the park. Can't wait until it opens! (And then can't wait to get back to the West Coast!) Thanks for posting the photos & videos from the tour!

Further to Robb's point... My family and I watched a lot of the Winter Olympics over the past several weeks. The entire time we watched it via their streaming app, we got exactly one -- count 'em, ONE -- commercial for SeaWorld in the mix. That commercial can be viewed here. Notice anything missing? There were literally no shots of any of the rides or non-animal attractions at any point through the 30-second commercial, and the only reference being made to it being a theme park is in the tagline "From Park To Planet". My son didn't even realize that the commercial was for a theme park, much less one we have season passes to. For all intents and purposes, it was a wasted 30 second spot. It might have a feel-good message but it's not going to get guests through the front gate. I agree wholeheartedly with Robb's thought that they really need to start emphasizing exactly WHAT SeaWorld is aside from shots of the ocean and random people in SeaWorld uniforms running into it.

^ Am I the only one perpetually annoyed by the piers' staged roll-out? What kind of business do they typically do during the period where only Mariners Pier is open?

Checking in here as well! I went hard for weight loss in 2016 after a humiliating near-walk-of-shame on Batman during HITP -- I was worried I'd have to get off, thankfully my friend got up to help me out and helped push the OTSRs down, but it still took both him and a ride op to get me buckled in. It was quite literally the tightest I've ever been in a coaster at the time, and I didn't feel good about it. When I weighed myself afterwards, I came in just a touch over 280. Yeah... not good. So I ended up doing what several others have already mentioned -- starting a steady routine of walking at least 10,000 steps every day if not more, and counting calories using the MyFitnessPal app to try and make sure I am taking in less than I'm burning off. Around this time, too, Pokemon Go became really big and I used that as a distraction/motivation to keep me out there walking around on a daily basis. It worked for me and I ended up dropping down from 280 to 225 at my lowest. I went from wearing pants with a 44" waist and a belt that was on its last notch to buying new pants at a 40" waist and using holes on my belts that I hadn't ever used before. Rides where I used to be stapled suddenly felt more free and fun, and I wasn't worried about any potential walk-of-shames. Then, late in the year, my mother passed away. And the routine that I had stuck to for months kind of fell by the wayside. I started eating more and making less choices. I didn't walk nearly as much if at all. The weight started going back on. It was just a few months ago where I noticed that these 40" waist pants were feeling tighter and tighter, and I didn't like it. I wasn't happy with my body. This is going to sound silly, especially since I'm not a die-hard sports fan, but the turning point was during this year's Super Bowl. After witnessing the Eagles win the big game, I said to myself... "if the Eagles can win, then I can get down under 200 pounds by the end of the year." Since then, I've been going back to my previous routine which worked for me. Weighed in that first Monday after the game at 253 lbs. In just a few short weeks, I'm down to 246, and I'm planning on keeping it up as much as possible -- even more so now that Spring is coming and this cold, crappy weather is finally dissipating. Fingers crossed!

After about a year of not playing, I've been back on that Pokemon crack for the past three weeks. Once again I'm using it as an excuse to get out and do more walking. I guess I missed a lot of the old legendaries while I wasn't playing, but since coming back, I've managed to nab two Rayquaza -- and just got a Groudon this morning before work. While we were out on Saturday at a FEC in Jersey, we ended up doing the community day event where we just hoarded a ton of Dratini and evolved some special Dragonites. I'm kind of surprised to see it's still going and popular enough that I can routinely manage to find 20 person raids in Manhattan (funny, because I never usually see more than three or four people at a time... guess spoofing is still a thing, too?).

Yeah, I honestly couldn't care less about it being there. It's one of those places I'd personally flat out never eat at for a number of reasons. Now, on the other hand... who do I talk to about getting some Shake Shack franchising opportunities at parks like CP? At this point I'm not sure when I'm going to get back to Cedar Point. I was hoping to make the journey westward towards the end of May, but my son doesn't want to go back until he hits that 52" mark so he can finally get on Maverick, TTD, Valravn, Gatekeeper, and Wicked Twister. (Can't blame him for that, it's gotta be torture seeing these and knowing you won't be able to get on them.) At the current moment he's about 1.5 to 2 inches shy. So unless he hits a mega growth spurt sometime over the next two months, we may not make it out there until the late summer/early fall season. Thankfully, I don't think Steel Vengeance is going anywhere.

^ God DAMN. The fire effect on this is jaw-dropping. It is without a doubt visually stunning. Can't wait to see an actual POV when it opens!

I seriously thought you were talking about IKEA at first... Plot twist: the coaster is actually manufactured by IKEA. Six Flags will begin assembling it in-house soon and probably won't finish until Spring of next year. It will all go wrong at the eleventh hour when they discover they're missing two pegs, one Phillips head screw, and an Allen wrench.

Stunning photograph. I love that angle.

At the moment, it's looking like I will be down Virginia way for opening weekend at Kings Dominion and Busch Gardens Williamsburg. After that, I've booked tickets mid-April for my first ever trip to the state of Texas, where I'll be hitting both Six Flags parks, SeaWorld, and probably ZDT so I can check out that awesome wooden boomerang. I'm tentatively penciling in a mini-roadtrip over Memorial Day weekend to head out to PA and Ohio to get my Steel Vengeance fix and probably hit up Kings Island as well. The rest of the summer, no concrete plans as of yet, but in November I'm hoping to get the family and myself down to Florida for the kids' first visits to the major Orlando parks and, if time permits, also Busch Gardens.

Heard about this a little while ago. I'm sure I must have ran through it as a kid but I don't have any lasting memories of it, but if that's what they determine they need to do to make the best of their situation, then farewell. I hope I can get down to Ocean City at some point this year with the family and see what's left of it from my childhood.

^ ^^ ^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^ etc... Offseason is HARD, y'all.