coneyislandchris

Its a matter of monkey-see-monkey-do. Enthusiasts are notorious for it. My running theory is that its because enthusiasts are such f*cking nerds and generally have zero social skills whatsoever that they kind of go along with what other enthusiasts say/do. The evidence is there: just look at they way Six Flags is consistently bashed, even though you can usually find many of the same things people gripe about @ Six Flags parks happening at many other parks as well, but somehow its more of an issue if its at a Six Flags park. Hell, this forum has an entire thread dedicated to doing just that. A perfect example of this type of thing is the poster two posts above mine who has provided a superficial list of reasons why Dorney is bad, even though he has never even been there. Personally, Dorney is fine, if you just take it for what it is. I don't pine to go there all the time, but I enjoy my visits. On paper, particularly from an enthusiast standpoint, the park seems like it sucks. But Dorney is very clean, very well landscaped, has a unique layout, has a great flat ride collection, a huge and solid waterpark, has a few really good (and a couple of great) coasters, a great Haunt event, and there is never a wait for the rides. Not to mention not one but two Chickies and Petes. Absolutely none of that is a bad thing. You want the real reason the park gets bashed here? Simple: they haven't added an original coaster in 12 years. That's it, that's all.

Knoebels this weekend for my birthday, then next weekend I'm flying out to the west coast for David Lynch's film festival. Gonna see about hitting Knott's and/or Magic Mountain while/if I have some down time at any point.

Well, Blackpool looks thoroughly amazing. Hopefully I can make a trip across the pond one of these days because that looked and sounded like a total blast from start to finish!

I like how they act like that's actually a thing. There are no such "fans"... just those of us that have been subjected to enough of it thanks to our kids that we have developed Stockholm Syndrome.

Okay, I actually couldn't recall from memory, so I had to go through my photo backups in order to piece together the timeline. Ended up being way more than I thought. O_O Like Andrew above, I'll mark the new ones/first time visits with asterisks. January: Six Flags Great Adventure February: iPlay America [FEC] * March: Kings Dominion Carowinds * Busch Gardens Williamsburg April: Six Flags Great Adventure (2nd visit) Six Flags New England Luna Park NYC Six Flags Great Adventure (3rd visit) Knoebels May: Six Flags Great Adventure (4th visit) Luna Park NYC (2nd visit) Deno's Wonder Wheel Park Morey's Piers Casino Pier * June: Knoebels (2nd visit) Funtown Splashtown USA * Palace Playland * Canobie Lake Park * Fun World Nashua [FEC] * Six Flags New England (2nd visit) Lake Compounce * Quassy * Rye Playland * Kings Dominion (2nd visit) Busch Gardens Williamsburg (2nd visit) July: Meadowlands State Fair [carnival] Luna Park NYC (3rd visit) Dorney Park Morey's Piers (2nd visit) Playland's Castaway Cove * August: Fantasy Forest NYC Six Flags America * Kings Dominion (3rd visit) Busch Gardens Williamsburg (3rd visit) Dollywood * Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster [alpine] * Goats on the Roof [alpine] * Rowdy Bear Mountain [alpine] * Dollywood (2nd visit) Gatlinburg Mountain Coaster [alpine] * Kentucky Kingdom * Six Flags Great America * Indiana Beach * Kings Island Cedar Point Waldameer * Knoebels (3rd visit) September: Dorney Park (2nd visit) Hersheypark Hersheypark (2nd visit) Kennywood Six Flags Great Adventure (5th visit) I may have a problem. I'm still planning on visiting Knoebels for another three days around Phunfest time, I need to drag the whole family back to Great Adventure to process our 2018 passes, a friend wants to take the kids back to Luna Park during their Halloween stuff... oh, and I'm flying out to California next month for David Lynch's Festival of Disruption, and would kick myself if I didn't visit at least one of the LA area parks while I'm there. And I'm sure I'll be getting in a few Holiday In The Park visits at the various parks that are hosting those events.

Sounded like you had a really comparable time to my first visit to Great America, Bill, right to the random downpour out of nowhere in the middle of the day. Only thing was, in my case, the rain happened right as we were walking to American Eagle. "Oh, it'll be fine," I told my kiddo, "we'll be in the station momentarily." How f*cking wrong I was. I'm still amazed that you had such a different opinion of Viper Backwards. We ended up riding it twice, once in the front/back row, and once in the back/front row (okay, well, second from the back/front, because they had the actual front row of the train roped off due to broken seat restraints). And my kid's usually pretty critical of any ride that beats him up. Last year's visit to Cedar Point, his roller coaster adventure ended early after a particularly rough ride on Mean Streak where he didn't want to ride any more roller coasters for the rest of the day, and this year at Cedar Point he ended up being one and done on Corkscrew, immediately swearing it off with a vehement "I'm never going to ever, never, never EVER ride that Corkscrew EEEEEVER AGAIN!". And yet he came back for seconds on Viper. Personally, I thought it was fine, not great nor terrible, I just thought it was interesting to go through the familiar Cyclone layout backwards for once (okay, twice in this case). It's crazy how much Goliath gets crapped upon by enthusiasts for its length. Would I like it to be a bit longer? Yeah, sure, who wouldn't? But as far as what was built and what we got, it's still a stupid amount of fun. That zero-G stall is absolutely amazing and unlike anything else I've ever experienced. If Six Flags ever cloned a RMC I wouldn't mind seeing one of those down the turnpike at Great Adventure, haters be damned. Oh yeah, and Whizzer is awesome. I can't believe they were actually legitimately considering tearing it down.

Awesome! I can't wait to see what they replace it with. That would be a great expansion pad for the park's next major addition like a haunt maze or another chicken tender stand. Ain't that the truth.

This looks like an awesome (and yes, overlooked) park for sure. I haven't been out that way yet mainly because I have some really negative associations for Missouri thanks to a crazy ex-girlfriend and her crazy family, but I might have to bite the bullet and head out there next year! How common is someone Lightnin' Loopsing it up? I witnessed this happen last year at Discovery Kingdom on Medusa as well, and it took about two minutes of the ride ops yelling at him for him to realize, oh wait a minute, I DON'T HAVE ANYTHING HOLDING ME IN.

Popped in for a couple hours today. Only my fifth visit of the year -- been too busy hitting all the other parks that I've been neglecting my unofficial home park. Got in the gates pretty quickly at opening, immediately bounced over to Joker to throw my crap in a fluffy goo bunny for two hours, and worked on hitting up the west side of the park. Yes, that includes my phone, thanks to their new-this-season rules that prohibit any "loose" articles even in zippered pockets, so I bit the bullet and tossed the phone in -- so that means no pictures for this report. (Sorry! Wall of text incoming.) Against all my instincts telling me to go to El Toro and marathon the crap out of it, I ended up walking over to Kingda Ka first, and was handsomely rewarded with a front row ride on the first train of the day. Always a rush! Afterwards, took the long deep walk back to Zumanjaro, where I was again the first rider of the day... and the only rider two times in a row. The ride ops asked me if I wanted to ride again once I touched down, and I said... "um... sure! But won't I be f*cking over everyone at Kingda Ka?" "Oh, no, not at all. It's down for maintenance right now." Yup, they got two trains out the gate before it went down. Par for the course around here. Cut through the Wild Walkway to get over towards El Toro, and was thoroughly impressed by the size of their lion cubs. They've grown so big! After acting like a crazy cat lady for them (and the other miscellaneous animals on display, such as the goats and flamingos), I finally dragged my butt out of that section and hit up Toro... only to see them still cycling empty trains at 11:30 with a line all the way back to the lockers. Noped right out of there and decided my time would be better spent getting twisted. So instead I migrated to the far back corner and got a quick pair of rides on Bizarro; one all the way in the back row, and one in the front. Of course they were running three trains with only six riders (at most) per train, why wouldn't they be? Still, always a good ride, still my favorite floorless, and one of the few that I put up with the mild ear-boxing I get from B&M's OTSRs. (Funnily enough, I never seem to have that problem on Batman: The Ride... but that's another story for later.) After a pair of Bizarro rides, my plan of attack was to hit the fort to get in a single lap on Runaway Mine Train and then take the Skyway back towards Joker, where I parked my luggage. RMT... the nostalgia is powerful with this one, as it's one of my earliest roller coaster memories, when I was but a kiddo of my own visiting the park with an aunt who's no longer with us. I can't NOT ride it whenever I go. They ended up retracking a portion of that airtime hill right before you go over the lake, and although I had heard bad things about it, it's not too terrible and hardly noticeable. More noticeable audibly than anything. By the time I got off the train, I noticed that El Toro was now sending screaming patrons through its course, so I put the skyway on the back burner (sorry, Bill) and jogged back over to the Bull, where the crowd had already been processed through enough that I was able to get a walk-on in car 5's middle row. Viva la Bull! It was full of a lot of first-time riders today, and it was great to hear their screams of terror turn to joy. She's running great as ever! After asking someone what time it was, I discovered I still had about 20 minutes left on my locker rental, and so I hopped in a relatively short line for Joker, made even shorter by the unused single-rider line leading straight to a party of three. Score! We headed off to the purple side, and they definitely improved this thing since last season. We got three complete rotations in full, and when we weren't flipping, we were upside down. Glad to see it's doing good, and hopefully the next time I come with the kiddo, I'll finally be able to get him on it (now that he's done the ones at New England and Great America before actually getting on the one at his home park). Hit up my locker, grabbed my phone to find out that I had exactly one minute left on the rental. Boo-yah. Since it was getting close to 1, I swung over to Primo's and grabbed a chicken caesar for lunch, walked over to the Skybar and got some lemon-lime seltzer out of the Coke Freestyle machine, then continued walking over to Granny's so I could chill out at an air-conditioned table. Powered through that because I had dates with the east side... and first up, I wanted to feel the intensity. Aw yeah... Skull Mountain incoming! Walked through the structure and was greeted with a mild crowd in the station, but no line for the back seat. The kids, they just don't KNOW. Unfortunately, it appears that someone else couldn't handle all that intensity, because as soon as the folks in the last car walked off the ride, we were greeted by a certain smell... and what looked like the remnants of Six Flags' "Famous" Chicken Tenders all over the front of that car. The ops team did their thing to clean it out, and while they cycled that car through a few times to let it air-dry, they brought in the second train. Unfortunately it was really sunny out today, so the, uh, pitch blackness of Skull Mountain couldn't be experienced in its full glory, what with all the sunbeams poking through. Who cares? Still got thrown out of that seat going over the drop. Still got to rock out to awful death metal. It is everything you expect as it always is. Next up on my hit list was Nitro, and over here I was greeted with a walk-on in the second-to-last row thanks to them running three trains and cycling them through with crazy speed and total efficiency. They were pushing them out so fast that I made the decision to walk all the way back around and actually wait for the front row... which took all of three minutes. Nitro's not the tallest, fastest, or most twisted hyper out there, but again, who cares? I absolutely love the insane amount of floater air it provides and I would be happy to ride this non-stop for a day. But after my third lap on Nitro, and time ticking down before I had to make the drive back to Queens, I decided to check out Batman for a lap or two. Unfortunately, I was stymied there, as although there was no one posted at the gate, the ride was down for maintenance. Rather than run out the clock waiting for that, I walked back towards Metropolis for my first look at Justice League. Hadn't been at the park since it opened. Looks way impressive, but the line was silly long at that point, so again I put it in the pile for next time. I still had a few minutes to kill before I had to hit the road, so I wrapped up my day with a few games at the Studio 28 arcade and a Dippin' Dots for the walk back to the car. Clock hit 3:00 PM, turned the key on the ignition, and with four hours, thirteen rides, a lunch, and a snack under my belt, I called it a successful half-day at the park. -- Minor edit; I just went back and counted... apparently this was technically my fifth visit this year, not my third. I'm counting New Year's Day at HITP, plus apparently I forgot one other time.

Definitely good to hear about the Gravity Group connection. I haven't been on many yet, but I've enjoyed what I've rode. If this thing is half as good as Wooden Warrior the kids and I will be happy campers indeed... and with it being only 40 feet tall, I might even be able to talk the wife into it! And Michael, as a dad of little ones, when they're 40" to begin with you don't want them doing that much on their own anyway. 40" with companion is fantastic IMO.

This looks like it could be surprisingly awesome. Getting some good Wooden Warrior vibes off of this one, or maybe an InvadR Jr. Here's hoping my daughter gets up to that 40" minimum by next year, it looks like she'd love this one! Plus: No beer jail! Minus: No beer, period. It's still gonna be weird for solo enthusiasts. I expect a ton of awkward glances and staring at anyone without kids.

Oh, didn't realize you were starting a brand new thread for your European reports! Completely missed this until just now. Good stuff -- as always, I enjoy your photos and writing. I have actually seen one of those DodgeArm things over here, not at a park but as part of the Great Allentown Fair last year. I want to see a park take it a step further and do Wipeout: The "Ride", complete with mud pits and the big balls (and I'm sure a lengthy waiver, as well).

Back when I had a job out on Long Island that required me to drive from one end of it to the other, I would pass by Adventureland a couple times per week. Somehow, I never stopped in... mainly because I saw it was about the size of a Dunkin Donuts. Who knew that they could stuff so many rides into that tiny little space? It's on my to-do list for... you know... sometime. I think I still have PTSD from driving the LIE and SSP on a daily basis that I really have no urge to get out there. Even going to Jones Beach for a concert gives me a bunch of nervous tics. That unexpected log flume might actually do the trick to get me out there, though. Whenever I do work up the nerve to check it out, I think I can probably save some cash, because Groupon is spamming me literally every day with discounts for this park as well as for Quassy and Lake Compounce. EVERY. DAY. (Why haven't I just unsubscribed from their crap yet?)

The Phantom's Revenge at Kennywood this past weekend. God, I love this ride!

We are at the park today and Log Jammer has been down all day so far. The latest word is that they are expecting it to open up around 5 PM, but we'll see. Edit: not looking likely. Double edit: I stand corrected. It's open now and the masses have flocked to it.

What a terrible report. Not nearly enough drinking in this one.

Really glad I talked my wife into making a trip out there this weekend. Hopefully I'll be able to convince her to get on her second flume ever... and the first one in a log.

After Fright Fest, El Toro and Kingda Ka don't run either. You might want to move up that date. They have the last two years. They've run the first two "bonus" weekends of November, only Frontier was closed right after Fright Fest. Source: I was there. And so were you. And the year before. Well, poop. My memory is going bad. I could have and would have sworn they were closed those bonus weekends. Damn you for using my own words against me!

After Fright Fest, El Toro and Kingda Ka don't run either. You might want to move up that date.

I like this comparison and logic. Unfortunately I think it flies in the face of most hardcore obsessives who have the compulsion to codify and rank everything down to the last minute detail and then argue unyieldingly about why their picks for numbers 1, 2 and 3 are better than YOUR picks for numbers 1, 2, and 3.

Assuming everything goes to plan, Kennywood on Saturday. If not, probably Great Adventure sometime shortly thereafter to get the kiddette's pass processed.

We gotta get that map updated. The P.O.S. ain't broken anymore!

^ ^^ Ah, my bad, I wasn't aware of the history of Honker Dinger Derby. (Still my favorite name for a ride ever.) Carry on.

So, skip one Haunt completely in favor of extra time at Hershey? Don't do that. There is the possibility that the preview plan will not be active during Hersheypark in the Dark. I was looking up stuff earlier this week about the preview plan and the Sweet Start (morning ERT), and found this: Or, at the very least, call the park to confirm they will honor those tickets if you're interested in spending a couple more hours there.

Says the guy who literally registered yesterday with no context or elaboration.