Valleyfair Old photo's?

[BlackWidow]

I was at Valleyfair today and I just love it. Renegade the new wood coaster from GCI was a blast. The lines where very long today for every ride, it was a school day, so there was a lot of kids there. Other then that I loved everything about the park. I recently saw some pictures of Cedar Point in the 80's before they got all there huge coasters put in. I was wondering if anybody had some old time photo's of Valleyfair in the 80's to share, or just general thoughts of the park.

[Axman]

I went in 1999 and had a blast. The park was still milking Wild Thing as their new coaster, so there wasn't many other "big" rides to speak of. I enjoyed all of the coasters except Excalibur, because it was it was just short and bumpy. I remeber them having a nice collection of flat rides, Like Trabant and Northern Lights, as well as an inviting little water park.

 

Before the Power Tower was Tot Spot, which was an unnecessary kiddie play area. They already had Camp Snoopy and Bearenstein Bear Land at the time. Also, the area home to the sky coaster and mini golf was a seperate area from the actuall park, like CP's "Challenge Park". With the addition of Steel Venom, it seems they decided to open it all up, which was an other good decision.

 

Wild Thing was intense and full of air, Corkscrew was painless, and High Roller was a fantastic classic woodie. Wild Mouse was also quite good, and extremely smoothe for a wild mouse.

 

Things seem to have only improved for that park since I went, so I hope to go there again some day.

[ValleyfairFan]

^Not to quibble, but Valleyfair has never had Camp Snoopy. But you're right with Half Pint Park and the Bearenstein Bear Country it wasn't a huge loss to lose tot town. Especially considering most of the activities rides got moved to either Bear Country and Half Pint Park.

 

The one major difference I can remember is Rails which used to be where Mad Mouse currently resides, very similar to Wildcat at CP. The capacity was horrible, but it was a fun ride. I also remember a petting zoo where Hydroblaster currently resides. Kind of similar to CP's if you've ever been there. I have a few old pics of the Games Midway where Trabant (Now Wheel of Fortune) used to reside (RipTide is there now) and it definitely looks much improved.

 

Basically I just echo a lot of sentiments that others have mentioned. In terms of World Class Coasters, I think the park has one now with Renegade, and Wild Thing used to be in that category, and it's still a very fun ride. The best thing about the park is the atmosphere. It's laidback, and really it's just a great place to be. It's got a great "feel" to it.

[steel]

Man, I wish I could have ridden Rails. That's one of my biggest regrets. If I had been born just a few months earlier I would have been tall enough. Then they had to go and destroy it. But Mad Mouse was my favorite coaster for a long time after that.

Also, the park still has Trabant, they just moved it back across from Looping Starship. They call it Wheel of Fortune now.

 

Back then, Challenge Park wasn't even connected to Valleyfair!. If you wanted to, you could ride RipCord without paying park admission. It's too bad that that isn't the case now, but at least they got Steel Venom out of the deal.