JG-77

Any one have any idea how busy the park gets on a mid-late September Saturday/Sunday?

From what I understand (which could be wrong), it depends on how busy the park is. If the park is empty enough that they’re losing money, they may use weather as an excuse to close, but if it’s crowded enough that they’re making money, they have been known to keep the park open in a hurricane. Besides KK I think most rides will run in the rain.

Do crowds differ much from a Saturday to Sunday?

Anyone have any idea what lines and crowds might be like on a saturday or sunday here?

Wild One @SFA, last week!

I think mine updated automatically since I already had it in the app before, but it was a month or two ago so I forget the exact circumstances in which it updated.

If you scan your membership into the app, it shows up as the next tier.

I think he said there were mechanical issues, but I only talked to one op about it so not 100% reliable info.

Visited yesterday, had a great time! Crowds were light and distancing was easy. Mask wearing varied a bit from time to time but overall was maybe 70% wearing it correctly, I was more disappointed with the number of staff members wearing their mask incorrectly, maybe 1/8 employees were wearing it wrong. Impressively, most of the queues I waited in actually were adequately distanced, which was very nice to see. I'm glad to report that all rides as far as I could tell were open. I arrived around 1:30 and stayed to close. Lines were very short for pretty much everything, and operations on the coasters were acceptably efficient given the low crowds. All coasters except Ragin Cajun and Wild One ran one train. Superman and Mind Eraser's other train was actually nowhere in sight. An op on Superman told me they expect the blue train to be out of service for the season, and I think I was able to spot it partly disassembled in a backstage area from Wonder Woman. Harley Quinn looks like the ride itself is largely complete. The seats are installed and it looks like the platform is too. They just need to put in the operator's booth (unless I missed it) as well as landscaping and the queue line. Tip: for the best views of the construction, ride the riddler ride, you can see it up close without obstruction as you exit. Both Wild One and Roar are getting fairly rough, but their still fun, and Wild One's roughness is largely because they don't let you sit in the middle rows of the front and back cars, which usually give the smoothest rides. They were both running fairly fast, which is nice. Jokers Jinx, in addition is its great repaint, also has a new automated pre-ride spiel spoken by some guy doing a Joker impression, which while I'm not sure whether it will ultimately help or not, was fairly loud and easy to hear and understand. I got my first front row ride on Mind Eraser (or on any SLC for that matter). The ride was snappy and intense, and while I don't mind the headbanging too much (the padding is softer than on a B&M OTSR), the shoulder restraints are really painful, and literally prevent you from putting your arms up. Vest restraints would really improve this ride. I also finally did the kiddie coaster. Unfortunately, since I was riding with my sister, the seat belt (which crosses both riders) barely fit over the two of us, and the metal part dug into my gut painfully the whole ride, which made it more difficult to enjoy the surprisingly good laterals, particularly in the last turn. I also rode several of the flats, and the biggest takeaway is that SFA has my favorite Scrambler I've ridden. It has a reasonable long cycle, and it runs fast. 10/10. Oh, and Wild One's ACE landmark plaque has returned, now prominently positioned on a brick pedestal!

What % would you say were wearing masks? Do you think I'd be able to distance most of the time if I came on a monday-thursday?

Flyers ops always varies from operator to operator, on my visit a couple weeks ago I was able to snap like crazy, so it’s really just a matter of luck!

I'd assume so, you can check on the website here: https://www.hersheypark.com/explore-the-park/rides/ Closed rides have "- Temporarily Closed" (like the water coaster) or even "- Closed for the season" (like Storm Runner) written after their name. They should probably make the closed rides more obvious like with red text or something, but it is what it is.

The Saturday I visited had fairly long wait times for most rides, and both Twister and Phoenix ran one train, and I waited like 15-20 min each. Many of the flat rides had pretty long lines that I chose not to wait in, partly because they were long, and also because it's harder to distance in many of the flat ride queues than in other rides. Personally I'd recommend a Sunday or weekday, but you can still have fun on a Saturday.

Nice report! Shame about the fate of Skyrush path. Oddly enough, the park maps on the website still include it! I wonder if that means they plan to reopen it or that it's so much of an afterthought for them that they forgot to remove it. Glad the new additions seem to be a success!

Let's revive this thread! My favorite theme park soundtrack has to be the one for Karnan at Hansa park, it's something to behold!

On my visit, physical distancing was definitely an issue, but I actually quite liked the reservation system. My visit was on a Friday, and it was definitely busy. Not sure how bad the park is on a Sunday. Most of the time thanks to the virtual queue I barely stood in line making distancing mostly feasible, though this was not help at the waterpark unfortunately, since as of my visit (a couple weeks ago) no water rides were on the virtual queue. If it weren't for the virtual queue I would not visit the park, that virtual queue is the main reason distancing is possible.

Have you been at all this year? I hear the new owner is much better at getting lost coaster open

Important note: the $45 pass is for all rides and slides, if you’re only going to be at the dry park, it’s only $34, which I find reasonable. We actually visited about a month ago on a lightly crowded Sunday, and enjoyed our visit a lot! Also, I’m not sure how it happened (it wasn’t mentioned anywhere on the website) but for some reason our wristbands all came with $7.50 (I think) of in-Park currency that was valid for food and games, which was awesome! While mask compliance was pretty poor (like 30% only counting people wearing them correctly) since there wasn’t any enforcement, but we were able to maintain distance the majority of the time.

Yep, and I've already visited Adventure Park USA, SFA, Waldameer, Bay Beach amusement park, and Holiday World. I've been making sure to always distance as best I can, and keep my mask on. Hoping to hit Knoebels and Hershey later! Have you ridden your favorite roller coaster within the past 2 years?

While we're on the topic of credit whoring, I'd like to remind everyone that Kosmo's Curves is actually a good ride worth a moderate wait, and is not just for a credit.

It looks like they're doing some serious retracking/reprofiling based on the photos and videos I've seen, I expect it to be down for the season.

I thought the Smiler was in England...

Yep, pretty sure it's thermal cameras, along with metal detectors

How painful is it with a loose seatbelt? What's the restraint made of?

Is the magnum seatbelt trick just wearing the seatbelt really tight?