allenhuffman

It was operating again as of Saturday, July 16. The parts were installed, but they expected to have to stop it for a bit to tweak the control system settings. I don't know if they even had to do that at all that day (they had not by late afternoon).

The Monster was operating on Saturday again. Signs at the front gate still said it was down, since they were still expecting to have to pause operation now and then to make software adjustments. The park was PACKED on Saturday, with cars on the grass and even being parked in the hotel and RV campground areas. They said this weekend and next weekend are the busiest all year. When I finally set up my new Adventureland info pages I will have to see about a crowd calendar with information like this. It was insane! But, still short lines at many of the rides, especially later in the evening.

Hopefully I am allowed to share this... The Monster is the first installation over here, and they have found some differences in the climate in Iowa that are causing extra wear on some rollers used in the lift hill. (No issues with the coaster itself or the cars.) There is an Iowa production facility that is machining new parts from material more suitable to our climate. They are making it a priority task so the park is hopeful of a quick re-opening. UPDATE: Amusingly, local media (TV, radio, newspaper) is reporting based on the Facebook/website post and none of them seem to have bothered to contact the park (or if they did, the park did not give them any details). The newspaper says: INDEFINITELY! OH NO! But the park's information (including what they quote) only says: So I guess a possibility of "a bit beyond that day" is indefinite. Yay, headlines! www.desmoinesregister.com/story/entertainment/2016/07/12/adventurelands-new-9-million-ride-closed-maintenance/87005372/

The Monster is down at least thru Friday now as parts are machined and delivered. I'm heading out there this evening to see what they are doing.

7 minutes of raw video footage of Adventureland after dusk... Apologies for the shaky camera in some of the scenes. It's not exciting, but if you haven't seen the park at night, this is a good overview of pretty much every section of the park. [youtu_be] [/youtu_be]

Not being a regular here, it's really tricky for me to tell if this is sarcasm or serious. It seems so real!!! On Saturday, they had the entrance sign (before parking boothes) just saying "Parking $10" and not rotating through any other messages like it normally does. This made me wonder if people were rolling all the way up then being shocked they had to pay for parking (or, if they skipped five years like me, and didn't realize they'd need a $10 rather than a few bucks to park). I wonder if they have it saying "Monster Closed" there, or not until people are at the front gate.

The folks from the coaster company were supposed to be in town this week, so I bet it's for inspections (unless they truly found something wrong). (Update: Since it's open today just fine, it must not be anything serious.) I'll find out.

And speaking of stupid ... In the queue to The Underground, the lower level roof is just slats. When you go through that, you go up a ramp to get to the ride entrance, and that brings you level with those slats. They are usually FULL of trash once the park season gets busy. Cups and trash ALL OVER IT. I've seen kids reach over (or throw stuff at the trash) causing a partially full trash cup to tip and pour crap on people in the line below. Awful. That, and all the graffiti, are my biggest peeve in the park. Saturday, I was noticing that much of the trash up there was also beer cans and such ... So I guess we have stupid adults to blame too. Grrr. Clean: themeparks.disneyfans.com/photos/Adventureland/Adventureland2016/Underground/slides/20160528_201653.shtml Full of trash: themeparks.disneyfans.com/photos/Adventureland/Adventureland2016/Underground/slides/20160709_213631.shtml

This is an interesting thing. I was in the park for a few hours on Saturday evening and someone told me to go check out the barbed wire. There are dozens of those signs all over -- on the fence, on the ground -- and now that I read they were making it a priority over opening the ride up early, it makes me wonder if something happened, like some stupid kid (or adult) climbing over the fence to try to get his cap he foolishly rode on the ride with endless warning signs saying not to bring them on. If it's pre-emotive, because they know people can get killed, good for them. If it's because someone actually did climb the fence, then bad for humanity. The wording on the signs is great... "Cut your loses... Go back!" Pictures: themeparks.disneyfans.com/photos/Adventureland/Adventureland2016/NewFor2016/MonsterBarbedWire/index.shtml

Space Shot and The Monster doing red, white and blue lights for July 4th: [youtu_be] [/youtu_be]

I think the park's sample photo looked much better than the one they actually made for me I will be uploading video tonight of the fireworks show and of the color changing lights on Space Shot and The Monster.

Adventureland has changed quite a bit since I last visited in 2010. My last July 4th visit was probably 2009. Here are some things I noticed the park was doing: 1. Sometime in recent years, they have added music to the fireworks. They had a dozen or so PA speakers on stands all along the riverfront, and had a sign at the front of the park giving that location as the best place to see them. 2. The fireworks were almost 30 minutes long (there was a few minutes at the start between the opening "get ready" shot and music until the actual show began). 3. They had special red, white and blue funnel cakes. 4. They had special red, white and blue Dippin' Dots. 5. Various shops had extra patriotic decorations in their windows. 6. Some places were giving out small American flags 7. Bernie Bernard (park mascot) appears in the juggler's show, and Bernie had a red, white and blue hat on today during it. 8. The Royal Hanneford Circus ended their shows with a patriotic solute where Ameircan flags unrolled from the big top. 9. Two of the park's three bar locations stayed open past 7 . They had the beir Garten and the Abita Bar (near the riverfront) open until 9:15. Huzzah! 10. The Monster had a special light program where the ground lights were cycling through red, white and blue. (Video to be posted soon.) 11. The Space Shot got new color LED lights this year, and they are also rotating red, white and blue (but that was already in place before this weekend). Fun stuff. EDIT: Anyone know how to make the 'list' tag work?

I have had amazing results booking through Hotels.com and low-bidding at Priceline.com. I have often stayed at hotels that quoted me a $150/night price for as little as $40 (mostly in Omaha). Des Moines is small so even a "distant" hotel isn't more than 15 minutes from the park. When will you be in the park? How big is your group? Drop me a note if you want some useless park trivia while you are visiting.

It usually bops me to the left and right once each against the head rest, so if there is a trick to this, I'd love to hear it as well. I find the jostling of The Tornado also rough now that I sometimes have back pains but that is because they put square wheels on it many years ago. I'm pretty sure I read that in the Internet

I have been many times, but usually don't arrive until later in the afternoon. I have never seen the shade area full, so I think it's still never exceeding 20-25 minutes. Even on Saturday of the July 4th weekend, when they had extended the queue area at the ticket booths (beyond the big metal queue they installed this year). I expect it may still have peak periods, but I have yet to see anything. Even opening day we never waited more than 25 minutes or so.

Well, this may just be another rumor. They had the booth open yesterday: http://themeparks.disneyfans.com/photos/Adventureland/Adventureland2016/NewFor2016/MonsterPhotos/index.shtml And the outside vendor that handles it (he's been in the park ever since it opened, and also has a place inside Mall of America) said they had planned it from day one, but hadn't had time to work on it. It still seems surprising they would put up the permanent fence only to have to redo it and move it a few weeks later, but hey, that's classier than leaving orange snow fencing up for a few weeks with all the crowds.

That happened to me, too. I am not sure what I did. I think I am out of practice with message boards (thank you, Facebook).

Do you have any connections in Iowa? Many businesses get discounts for employees. Also, season pass holders can get tickets at a discount. I can't seem to find the link, but that might be the easiest. One of us might be able to help you out there. EDIT: Found it (via web search; couldn't find the link on the site directly for some reason). Pass holders can get $7 off. EDIT 2: Removed reference to my work ticket discounts in case we aren't supposed to talk about it. PM me

Thanks for sharing this! I either read about this process, or someone told me about it in the park, and wondered if it was true. What lowered it? I noticed there was a cable running parallel to the lift hill and wondered if that was part of it?

Thanks for sharing this! I either read about this process, or someone told me about it in the park, and wondered if it was true. What lowered it? I noticed there was a cable running parallel to the lift hill and wondered if that was part of it?

Sometime in the past week, they installed the shade over The Monster queue area. They also moved the temporary ropes under that area to make a zig-zag queue. At the exit, they took down the fencing and build a concrete pad and are now building the ride photo shop. I was told by an employee last week that the park forgot about designing that building in. I was skeptical of this, but now that I see they had to undo construction they just completed 2-3 weeks ago for this building, I guess it was true

KLE continues to work on The Monster lighting. They said they have made adjustments to the ground lighting so the track lighting will be more visible. I will go out this Saturday to record it again... This is starting to feel like work

Hindsite is always fun. It's hilarious how wrong the rumor of a "family coaster" was, just a few months later Looking back, I do remember years ago (10 or so?) there was rumors of Adventureland getting a "mega" coaster of some kind. I guess eventually we sorta kinda got that this year.

The fantastic lighting system was done by KCL Engineering http://www.kclengineering.com