JG-77

Thanks for the advice!

Had a mini heart attack when I saw the rumor on some random YT thumbnail

Thinking of possibly heading to the park on Wed or Thurs. Any idea how bad crowds typically are during this time of year for HITP?

Got a similar Survey for SFA, SF seems to be doing a really good job with exploring new concepts like these!

Most of my Roar rides have ranged from meh to actually headache inducing (particularly in the very back row), but my most recent 2 front row rides during a HITP evening were actually really good, with strong pacing, laterals, and some airtime, and decently smooth. Wild One was also running great, I've almost never had a bad ride on it unless riding it in the back row of a car. That ride seems to always be flying no matter what time of year. While parts of it are a bit rough, IMO it's more of the charming classic variety than the uncomfortable and painful variety. I like this ride both in the very front and in 2nd to back.

The trick to enjoying a ride on firebird is: 1. Be tall enough that you can stick your head forward and avoid some headbanging. Yeah this one is just luck with your body shape. 2. Sit in the back row, inner two seats. Riding with these strategies I actually quite enjoyed my ride, even though there is still unavoidable headbanging going through the corkscrew.

I guess yesterday was the last day it was open. FWIW there were no in-park indications that yesterday would be the last day for Toro.

Oh wow, I timed my visit yesterday well!

Glad you liked the report! I only rode Batman once toward the beginning of my visit. We waited longer on the stairs than I expected (probably another 5 min than I would have expected), but idk if that was just slow dispatches or if it had brief technical issues. I didn't notice it go down after riding it, but I didn't pay much attention to it after my one ride.

Just came back from a visit here. I chose this day specifically because it was a weekday during the magic time between fright fest and HITP where the whole park is open but there are no special holiday events to drive up crowds. It turns out, today absolutely was the perfect day to visit. The weather was beautiful, everything I cared about was running, and the crowds were super light - I rarely waited much more than 20 min for a ride, and many rides were station waits! Arrived around 12:30 and left at 7 (park close). Mask wearing was decent enough (maybe 75%ish wearing it correctly) though distancing was often somewhat challenging, as I expected from other's reports. No pics, sorry! Rides we rode along with relevant notes/observations Justice League, x1, 5 min wait or less, got a score of >70k I think Batman, back row, x1, line was down the stairs, the stair tunnel thing was infested with ladybugs, but I'm not complaining since I find them cute. Forgot how awesome this thing is, intense and super snappy without much headbanging! I might like this a bit more than Nitro! Nitro, x2, line was down the stairs but the ops lived up to their reputation, dispatching trains right as the one behind it hits the brake most of the time. Great floater as usual, and somewhat intense helix, though the midcourse did slow us down quite a bit. SkyScreamer, x1, 10-15 min wait El Toro, x2, one in row 17 (op granted request), one in row 1 (got lucky with placement, and decided I'd give it a shot despite knowing row 17 is better). It's running really well, and with the warm weather the ejector was insane, and the turns after the RT hill were actually pretty fun. Front row only has 3 ejector moments, but while they aren't as strong as the back, they might be a bit more sustained. If you've already ridden Toro and get the chance at a front row ride, I'd recommend trying it at least once, but back is definitely better. Kingda Ka, x3, very front, very back, and middle-back. Holy crap, this was a station wait! Not sure when's the next time I'll see that, so we took advantage of the opportunity and rode 3 times. KK ran reasonably consistent, with no extended downtime beyond maybe some 10 min or so spurts. Front row KK is every bit as awesome as people said, and back row KK wasn't as brutal as people made it out to be. Shaky and rattly, yes, but certainly not unbearably so. IMO any row in KK is a blast, but that front row ride, with that 100mph wind and the view, is something else! Zumenjaro, x1, nothing particularly different from my previous rides. Fun and (if you're afraid of heights) scary climb to the top, seconds of intense anticipation, then a drop which after the initial kick, just feels like you're kinda moving downward really fast as opposed to falling to your doom. Beware of the brakes, I had my head stuck out a bit forward, and the brake caused my torso to bend over forwards uncomfortably as we decelerated Green Lantern, x1, Snappy and very intense, it does hurt your legs especially in the latter half, and it can be described as an endurance test in some regards. If you're OK with the super strong G forces on your legs it can be fun. Probably the most positive G heavy ride in the park IMO Superman, x1, running both trains with impressive dispatch times by Superman standards. Awesome pretzel loop, followed by just plain fun. Twister (the Twix ride), x1, very short cycle, but what they did have was pretty fun, I think we got like 4-5 flips. Bizzaro, x1, front, almost a walk-on, two trains and dispatches before the other train hit the brakes. Fire was working, misters were off probably because of the time of year. Fun snappy ride, but there is some unfortunate headbanging. Mine Train, x1, 2nd row (front was roped off) run, old school ride. Janky arrow profiling of course, but it actually tracked pretty smooth, just prepare for the wild Arrow transitions especially towards the end lest you slam into the person next to you or into something else! Also holy crap the front gives legit ejector on that last hill before the mandatory photo-op turn (you know which one). Sorry Skull mountain, you're first drop is great, but the mine train has you beat. Sky ride, x1 (Mine train --> skull mountain). Excellent skyride, especially at night. For some reason they were using the left hand queue to load the right-hand gondolas, not sure why. Skull Mountain, x1, stopped by under an hour before park close, walked right on to back row. First drop is still awesome as usual, with the rest being typical family coaster twistiness with disco-skull in the middle and no other theming. Don't they usually play music inside this ride? It felt weirdly quiet Wonder Woman, x1, finished the night with this one, by far the longest wait at over 30 min. First ride on a giant pendulum (the closest thing I'd done before is HP's Claw) and yeah, it's awesome! The swings are super high, you get turned a little upsidedown, and the bottoms of the large swings pull some great G's. Add to that a reasonably long ride cycle and you have a great way to end off the night! Worth noting: all coasters I rode ran two (but not 3) trains, except the mine train which ran only 1. All rides had groupers, some of which granted requests, and some on which didn't. At KK, the grouper allowed me to let some parties ahead of us so that we could nab front row, but when I tried it again later he wouldn't let me, perhaps because I had already done it once (it was the same guy). Overall, I had an excellent day here, probably my favorite of my 4 visits so far! I hope to visit again soon, thanks for reading!

I'm considering heading up here either on election day or the Thursday afterward. Any advice on which day would probably be best crowd-wise, and what sort of crowds I might expect? I'd probably arrive between 11am and 12pm and stay there until 7pm. I'm hoping that being a weekday and not being fright fest could work to my advantage, but I'm still on the fence about it, and I know crowds here are often unpredictable. Any thoughts?

I visited HP about a week ago, and one thing I feel the need to talk about the biggest surprise of the trip: the arcade by Great Bear. While I know the park had a few arcade areas, this arcade was large, and most notable: had a ton of retro games priced at their original 25/50 cent levels! I bought a card with $5 value and my sister and I killed about an hour or so playing Street Fighter II, retro wack-a-mole, Mario Bros, and a lot of Pinball. While some machines could use some maintenance (looking at you Millipede), they largely all worked just fine. They also had a selection of modern games that I felt were mostly fairly priced considering we were at a large amusement park, mostly at around $1/play for the newer games. For anyone who is able to visit Hershey Park somewhat regularly and is looking for what in my opinion is a hidden gem in the park, I recommend the checking out the arcade by Great Bear!

No pictures, I would have forgotten about it if it wasn't mentioned here, since at my age I don't really have any reason to pay attention to bars at amusement parks.

And the award for cheapest shipping costs on a roller coaster goes to:

Skyrush last sunday!

That's a lot of interesting insight, thanks for sharing

Yes, but they're not the same as the roast beef stand pierogis, the ones everyone raves about.

From what I hear, it's about 45 min of driving, with additional time if you want to explore camp aventura Edit: nevermind, I forgot it's drive through this year. Edit2: The website says to budget 3 hours to drive through

Sad to see with the roast beef stand, it was open when I went in mid August

I believe so, there was indeed an open bar near Harley Quinn

There has been no announcement for any parks as far as I know. If any SF parks are adding something new for 2021 other than their 2020 project, they have not announced it yet, and if they do announce something, parks will do individual announcements.

On my visits, face coverings were well enforced, while distancing was enforced somewhat (more than other places like Holiday World) but it would have been nice to see more regarding distancing.

That's great to hear! If anyone here has ridden it, I'd be interested to hear how the new car rides.

Interesting, Impulse is no longer marked as closed on the website, I wonder if it's an error if if we could actually see Impulse reopen by next weekend!

You could probably cover most of the shipping costs with just one truck going back and forth for a day!