Photo TR: Knott's Berry Farm 2/18

[socalMAN123]

Hey everyone!

Today I went to Knott's with my good friend Antonio(CoasterCrazy88). The park was semi-crowded and defenitly had some colder weather later on. Anyways, onto the TR!

 

We arrived at the park around 10:45. We parked towards the left of the entrance. My dad thought it was going to be a crowded day. Turns out he was right and wrong. We walked towards the park to find the lines for the tickets extremely long.

Isn't it beautiful?

Man, that's a long line

 

At this point, we waited for like 20 minutes and finally got our tickets. We walked into the park, phoned Antonio, and wait. He comes and we immeadiatly head for Jaguar, which ended up being a walk-on. It was running much faster today than I have ever seen it. It was also a lot rougher than I have ever seen it. Both Antonio and I were saying, "OW!" His restraint ended up clicking an extra notch, which provided a painful ride.

Yay or neh, you decide

 

After this ride, we proceeded to Montezuma's Revenge. Running great, like always. Didn't go very high up the spike though, which disappointed me.

Mmmm, shuttle loop

 

Our ride over, we turned to the right and walked through Camp Snoopy towards Snoopy's GR8 SK8. We waited in line for a little bit, but decided it was too long and bailed.

The park's skyline (excluding Xcelerator and Ghostrider)

 

Next, Antonio wanted to do the Screamin Swing. He decided we was going to pay for me, so we got our tickets and jumped right on. And let me tell you this, it was AMAZING. Great airtime along with some positive G's made for a pretty sweet ride.

I <3 S&S

 

We walked through the Boardwalk and headed towards Xcelerator. Now this ride proved to be very interesting today, but you'll find out more about that later. Antonio and I headed for the very last row, while our dad's sat a few cars ahead of us. Very minimal wait with two trains in operation. Of course, great ride as always. Amazing airtime and just an overall beautiful ride.

Top hat goodiness

 

After this Intamin masterpiece, we headed to the left of teh exit and rode Supreme Scream. Now this turned out to be an interesting ride. It was regular till we got to the top. When we got to the top, I was looking around at the ground below me (I'm facing the 91 right now) and looked across the street. There, in a park behind a green fence lay some shipping contatiners. And next to those containers was track. Probably track for Sierra Sidewinder. I started screaming, "Track!Track!Track!". Antonio barely gets to say "Awesome!" and we started to fall. We ended up laughing about it and went on it again later just to look at the track. Overall, the ride was running really well today, providing a much more forceful drop than past times.

I like drop towers. Especially when you get to see construction objects

 

We then proceeded out to the exit of the park towards T.G.I. Friday's. We were walking under Silver Bullet and I noticed something that wasn't there during Haunt. There was a new drive a toy tugboat 50 cent attractions in the lake. I thought that was pretty cool.

It was so cool, I took a picture of it

 

T.G.I. Friday's was really good. I had a regular hamburger which was pretty good. They sat us in the bar area even though we were under 21. I was pretty surprised about that. After about an hour of sitting, eating, and telling stories, we hi-tailed it out of there. As we were crossing the crosswalk to get back over to Knott's, I found the funniest sign I've seen for a while. Just take a look at my picture.

Brent likes food

I had to take a picture of it, it just reminded me of ACErs so much

 

We re-entered the park and walked to Ghostrider. It had a pretty significant line, but we waited anyways. The line ended up being about 45 minutes. Now the ride was great and not so great. It was great because the drops were producing some crazy ejector airtime. It was not so great because it was beating us to bits and pieces. This coaster has seen its Glory Days fly past.

Curse you evil coaster! *shakes fist*

 

After this painful ride, we walked over to Silver Bullet. As we arrived, the train stopped mid-lift. We figured it just E-stopped and got in line anyways. Five minutes later, the train was moving again. When we arrived in the station, we decided to wait for the front row, the only seat on this ride where you can actually enjoy the coaster. SB was running VERY well today. I was quite surprised at how well it was doing. Smooth, lots of positive G's, and a great helix finale. Could this be the same coaster that pretty much everyday gives boring rides? I guess it was.

Stopped mid-lift, suckers!

Part of the layout

 

Now it's time for the closed rides segment. RipTide was closed for refurb, or it was just to cold outside. Perilous Plunge was down for major refurb (drained with cranes). And finally, Xcelerator had gone down.

The Top Spin of Doom!

Great ride, too bad it wasn't open.

And this ride was down for a while

 

Now time for interesting Xcelerator stories. We decided to wait to see if they would open Xcelerator. They were testing trains that were barely making it over the top. I thought they might rollback. Turns out, a few launches later, they launch the red train, and it rolls back. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this is only the second time this has happend on Xcelerator. Everyone was walking away all disappointed, while I stood there clapping saying "Awesome! Rollback!". Since Xcelerator was obviously going to be closed for a while, we got in the 30 minute line for Boomerang. Antonio had never been on Boomerang, so it would be another credit for him. The ride was okay, not a lot of headbanging, but lots of painful positive G's. While we were pulling up the first spike, a palm frond fell off one of the trees and hit Dino. We were laughing really hard, and were glad that he didn't get hurt.

Ve-coma

 

It was starting to get dark, so we decided to do the Log Ride! It usually doesn't get you very wet anyways, but I guess tonight was different. We didn't get really wet, just damp. In one part of the ride, there is a pipe that sprays water out into the flume. It is supposed to turn off when you get like a foot away from it, but I guess it was being stupid. The water kept going, getting all of us wet.

Plastic logs, yay!

"Check out how wet we got!"

 

After are wet experience, we headed back over to Supreme Scream to look at the track again. Same ride, but it was running great today so we all enjoyed it.

Once again, I <3 S&S

 

As soon as we got off, we asked one of the ride operators in Xcelerator's station when it was going to open. He said he didn't know, so we started to walk away. Suddenly, we hear this scream, "IT'S OPEN!". So we run over to the entrance and get in line for the front row. This row is the best seat on this ride. It is amazing. Great view and unbelivable airtime.

Oh yeah, front row!

Dino and my dad prepare for the awesomeness that is the front row

 

After this ride, Antonio had to leave, so we parted ways. My dad and I headed for a last ride on Silver Bullet. I was simply blown away at how great this ride was running today. It usually is very slow and forceless, but it seemed like it was running way faster today.

These are my friends the water dummies. They like to pee on certain people.

Nice night picture of Silver Bullet

 

The ride over, the sun set, we decided to leave the park and head home. Overall, it was a great day. It was really cool to see Xcelerator rollback, I wish I was on it. So this end my Photo TR. Hope you enjoyed it!

---Brent

P.S. I'm going to the park tomorrow, so I'll take some Sierra Sidewinder pictures and do another Photo TR.

[Top Thrill Dragster]

^ I saw you at the park. Xcelerator rolls back all the time, usually in the mornings during testing. I was lucky enough during the first year that it open to be on a train that rolled back.

[socalMAN123]

^Cool! You're so lucky you've been on a train that rolled back! I'm so envious. Where did you see me?

---Brent

[cjeagle35]

I have a question with for those who have ridden Silver Bullet, as I haven't been to Knotts since they built that. What is the problem with it? I haven't really heard any good reviews of it, but I've heard lots of complaints about how "forceless" it is. I was just wondering because it seems like it has a pretty good layout and I'm hearing lots of good reviews about Patriot and how thats very intense. Can anybody give me their view on Silver Bullet?

[Top Thrill Dragster]

^^In line for Ghostrider, your TPR shirt is what caught my attention.

[SharkTums]

The only good reviews I've heard about Patriot are from the Worlds of Fun fanboys!

 

As for Silver Bullet, it's just one of those New School B&M's that doesn't have as strong of forces (this was admitted to by B&M!) as the old school ones. I guess it's fun, but it just seems to meander around and doesn't really have anything new. It's sad when the best part of the ride is an overbanked turn!

 

And yes, Xcelerator rolls back all the time. Sad it took so long to get it back up. At Liseberg they were intentionally rolling back Kanonen for us (with our peeps on it!) then they would just relaunch it again!

 

BTW, great TR Brent! Glad to see you and Antonio hanging out!

[knottslover77]

Great TR, I was about to go knotts, but than I thought it would be busy so I changed my mind.

 

--Jay

[vjgx]

Nice TR... I like the night photos.

 

As for Silver Bullet, it's good to see it running more forcefully. Last time I was there (Feb. 2nd), it was running surprisingly slow, with relatively no forces. Even the helix was boring, and many parts felt like we were stalling.

 

On an average day, I'd say Silver Bullet is a fun ride with an interesting layout, but it lacks the intensity that makes a coaster really re-ridable. The overbanked turn is cool, and the slow-speed zero-g roll is an interesting alternative to the usual quicker ones. Otherwise, it's a very smooth invert with a nice layout that suffers from a lack of intensity.

 

Xcelerator on the other hand... is always great. It's almost always smooth, very intense, and has good airtime on the top hat in every seat. Plus, it usually has very short wait times when I'm there... In fact, I've only gotten one relatively poor ride on it. Usually, the seats near the back are fine... and the ride was even running well that day. But for some reason, one of my rides a few rows from the back was very rough... tons of vibrating and rattling, and the pull-up into the top hat almost felt like a slightly smoother part of GhostRider...

 

As for GhostRider... I never rode it back in the good old days... My first ride was in June 2006. The ride nowadays is very tempermental, along with having unpredictable levels of roughness for each seat... I've had middle-row rides smoother than front-row ones, and vice versa. Overall, it's a very rough ride that's fun if you can handle some beating... Especially on the turns after the first drop, the turn before the turnaround over the station, and the turn after the ejector drop. Those turns usually crack at least a few joints in my neck and back...

 

So yeah... my opinions.

[GMAN962]

Great TR! I always enjoy TR's of Knott's. They're different from the rest. We don't get enough TR's of Knott's and SFMM.

 

Anways.....I think I saw some supports for Sidewinder when I went to Knott's earlier this month. I was on Xcelerator, so it was for like half a second, but I saw them nonetheless.

 

-Mike

[Nemesis Inferno]

Awww...Look at the tiny Screaming Swing...

 

I seriously can't wait to go to the park this July, it looks really nice with some great (and as usual, rubbish) rides...Especially the 'What Stealth should be like' coaster...

[HAJiME]

This park actually looks so much bettter than my mental image made it out to be. What's the overall atmosphere like?

 

Silver Bullet still looks appauling, though. It's colour scheme tops off the icing on the cake and it's location in the park seems really intrusive and ...out of place? It's worrying when a B&M visually ruins the skyline.

[CoasterCrazy88]

Great Pic TR Brent!

 

I had a really good time yesterday. Thanks very much for meeting up with me!

 

Yes, Supreme Scream and Silver Bullet were running much, much better! Xcelerator was great as always, and Boomerang was....well, it was Boomerang.

 

We will have to go again next year for sure!

----Antonio

P.S. Thanks for including the palm frond incident!

[arrowfanman]

Hey Brent!

 

Great PTR! Glad to see that you and Antonio managed to enjoy the park. I personally love the Screamin Swing--even if the price is quite high for that few of swings.

 

Sure, you envy someone who has been on a rollback--but I have yet to see one! I envy you!

 

Keep up the great reports,

 

-Jahan

[Jayjay719]

Awesome trip report Brent! I've never been to Knotts, but I'm looking forward to getting the credits. I have never seen a rollback on KingdaKa the many times I was at Great Advanture last year. Question, how far is Knotts from Magic Mountain? I'm thinking of going to Knotts when I visit Magic Mountain for the first time maybe this year. Loved looking at the pictures Brent, glad you had fun!

[Top Thrill Dragster]

^ Knotts is a good 70mins away from Six Flags, but that's depending on traffic. With heavy traffic it can be about a 2 hour drive.

[Shockwave]

Good stuff Brent!

 

If I have enough money and time off work, I'd think about returning to SoCal before the year is out to pick up the stuff I missed last year.

[crazyrider06]

Great Trip report, love the pictures. I so wanna go to Knott's.. It's on my to do list so it will get to it eventually!!

[Jayjay719]

^ Knotts is a good 70mins away from Six Flags, but that's depending on traffic. With heavy traffic it can be about a 2 hour drive.

 

Ok thanks! So it's not to far from the Mountain. I definately will hit up Knotts when I go to Magic Mountain. Is Knotts really that bad of a park that some people make it out to be?

[Freefallbestrideever]

^ Knotts is a good 70mins away from Six Flags, but that's depending on traffic. With heavy traffic it can be about a 2 hour drive.

 

Ok thanks! So it's not to far from the Mountain. I definately will hit up Knotts when I go to Magic Mountain. Is Knotts really that bad of a park that some people make it out to be?

No, Knott's rules!

[CGM]

It's worrying when a B&M visually ruins the skyline.

 

I'd say that silver Bullet actually looks pretty awesomme, it towers over everything on the skyline and its not half as ugly as an SLC is. The only thing that's wrong with its appearance is that the lifthill looks steeper than the first drop (which it probably is)