TR: Bay Area Trip 7/13/2008-7/20/2008

[rcdude]

Hello. This is my first trip report, so I hope you like it. Due to the length of the trip, there will be four parts, each covering two days of the trip. Unfortunately, I didn't bring a camera so there are no photos.

 

Day 1: Sunday 7/13/2008

 

On Sunday, I left my grandma's house in Costa Mesa for a trip to visit my cousins in the San Francisco area for a week. Me, my brother, my sister, and both of my grandparents went on this trip. We left at 9:30 a.m. and drove all day, arriving at the Holiday Inn in Santa Clara around 5 p.m. My aunt and cousins came down and arrived at the hotel at about 6 p.m.

 

Day 2: Monday 7/14/2008

 

Today was the day for California's Great America. We left the hotel at 9:50 a.m. so we would be at the park at opening. When we arrived, we decided that we would go to the Action Zone first and work our way around the park clockwise. I will post the report for this park by area in the order we actually did them, giving a brief description of the rides in the area and a ride count.

 

Action Zone:

 

The Action Zone was the first area of the park we visited. When we got there, we found out that Grizzly didn't open until noon, so we decided to come back for it later. All the rides in this area had walk-on waits all day (My definition of a walk-on is 5 minutes or less).

 

Psycho Mouse-Psycho Mouse is one of my favorite wild mouse roller coasters. Everyone in our group except my grandma rode it and thought it was an excellent family ride. My sister and cousin ended up going on it a total of five times during the day, however I only rode twice.

Survivor: The Ride-This was one of the rides I was looking forward to. It was actually quite fun, but it was a little on the tame side. I expected that it would go faster, but it didn't.

Centrifuge-This is another ride I was looking forward to. However, it didn't really feel much different from an ordinary scrambler, so I didn't bother to ride a second time.

Drop Tower-Up until riding this, I had never been on a drop ride not built by S&S. Although the drop tower was fun, I think I prefer the S&S drop rides. This one is just over too quickly. However, it was good enough that I went twice. I even convinced my grandfather and aunt, neither of which are crazy about drop rides, to try it on the second time. They both enjoyed it, but once was enough for them. By the way, I think Drop Tower is one of the lamest names for an amusement ride. It's even lamer than Flight Deck.

Grizzly-I do not know why people say this is the worst wooden coaster in the world. I actually prefer the Grizzly to the Giant Dipper. I ended up going on this ride twice, but on the second time the ride seemed rougher so I didn't want to go again.

 

County Fair:

 

For some reason, the County Fair area had the most waits all day. We went here before we had lunch, and didn't bother to return to this area again because of the lines.

 

Barney Oldfield's Speedway-I think this ride may have had the longest wait in the park (35 minutes). Either way, it was a fun ride, but not worth doing more than once. My cousin wanted to go again, so my grandmother took her on while the rest of us went to do the coasters in this area.

Invertigo-Invertigo was the most crowded roller coaster, with about a 25 minute wait. I went on this ride with my brother and my aunt. Everyone liked it, but no one wanted to go a second time. This was my aunt's favorite ride at the park. I personally like it better than a boomerang, but not as much as a giant inverted boomerang (Deja Vu).

Demon-Surprisingly, this was a walk on. I went with my anut, brother, sister, and grandfather. Everyone liked it, although all of us thought it was too rough to ride again.

Berserker-This ride was a walk on, so everyone except my grandfather and aunt rode (they don't like spinners).

 

Boomerang Bay:

 

After the County Fair, we had lunch and then headed to Boomerang Bay. We ended up spending about two hours in here before most of us were ready to head back to the rides. My aunt and cousins stayed longer since they were having fun. My grandparents just watched while we were at Boomerang Bay.

 

Ripsnort Ridge-This is one of the body slides in the waterpark. It basically just drops off. Went on twice since there was no line.

Screamin' Wombat-This is the other body slide. Once again, went on twice since there was no line.

Great Barrier Reef-The wavepool. I didn't go in here much, but my sister and cousins did while the rest of us did the body slides. It looked pretty standard.

Didgeridoo Falls-The park's family raft ride. This was the only ride in Boomerang Bay with a wait, although it was only about 20 minutes. Everyone who went on this liked it, and my aunt, cousin, and sister thought it was the best slide.

Downunder Thunder-This is a slide taken in a two person boat. It is very short but is a lot of fun. My brother and I thought it was the best waterslide. My cousin didn't like it at all.

Tasmanian Typhoon-All of us agreed that this was too dry to be a waterslide. It is another boat ride, but is in the dark.

 

Orleans Place:

 

The only ride we went on in Orleans Place was Flight Deck.

 

Flight Deck-This ride was fun and was a walk-on. Although this is probably one of the worst B&M Inverted coasters, I thought it was the best ride at the park. My sister agreed. Although it made my grandfather feel a little sick, he thought it was the best ride in the park.

 

All American Corners:

 

We did rides in All American Corners at different points during the day. I thought this was the most disappointing area of the park, but my cousin liked it better than anywhere else in the park.

 

Firefall-I was actually looking forward to riding this. My brother and I got in line for the ride, but it broke down once we were on and we had to sit in those painful restraints for five minutes. Once they let us off, I decided that I didn't really care about riding as the ride didn't look as good as the one at Knott's Berry Farm. My brother went on by himself later and said it was a waste of time.

Orbit-This is an interesting ride. It is a type of ride known as the enterprise. You sit in a small cage on a giant wheel that spins around, then tilts up to a steep ange. I really liked this ride for some reason. My brother, who rode with me, said that it felt like something used to train astronauts.

Flying Eagles-Everyone was looking forward to this ride. Unfortunately, no one other than me was really crazy about it since they couldn't learn how to fly it well. I managed to figure mine out about a minute into the two minute ride. My aunt and grandma figured theirs out sooner, and my siblings and cousins couldn't figure theirs out. No one thought it was worth the 20 minute wait.

Rip Roaring Rapids-I didn't actually ride since it was 6 p.m. and I didn't want to get soaked. My brother, sister, and cousins rode it and all thought it was one of the better river rapids rides in California.

Logger's Run-We all went on Logger's Run. It had about a 15 minute wait, even at 6:30 p.m. My grandparets complained about how wet it was, but everyone else enjoyed it completely.

 

Celebration Plaza:

 

We didn't get to Celebration Plaza until near the end of the day. Because of this, Whitewater Falls was already closed. By this point, we had split up and my grandparents had taken my cousin and sister to Nickelodeon Central while I did rides with my aunt and brother.

 

Vortex-Vortex is honestly my least favorite B&M coaster of any type. It seemed a bit rough for a B&M. Nevertheless, I ended up riding three times since my brother kept wanting to ride it (he really likes stand up coasters) and they let us stay on because there was no wait.

Celebration Swings-We only went on these because there was no wait and they were loading as we walked by. It is a standard waveswinger. I ended up colliding with an empty swing a couple of times during touchdown. Luckily, they have a pad on the back of the swings.

Carousel Columbia-I've heard that this is the world's tallest Merry-Go-Round. I don't know if it's true, but we rode on the top deck anyway. I was surprised that the one ride Cedar Fair doesn't have seatbelts on is one that usually has them. I saw kids switching horses and riding sidesaddle as it went around, but I think they were friends of the operator since they didn't get in trouble.

 

Nickelodeon Central:

 

The only ride I went on in Nickelodeon Central was the Rugrats Runaway Reptar. We only went on it because there was no line when I led my grandparents over here to babysit my cousins and sister.

 

Runaway Reptar-This is a borderline kiddie/family coaster. I thought it was a decent ride, but everyone complained about the size of the cars. My brother said that the ride was a waste of time. I didn't think so since we had already done every other major ride in the park (except Vortex, his favorite).

 

We ended up staying at the park until 10 p.m., which was closing time. In addition, we spent so much time at the locker and doing other things like shopping and using the bathroom that we were actually followed out by the security guards. My grandmother felt embarrassed. I thought it was kind of neat being one of the last ones in the park, since there were less than ten cars in the lot when we got out there, including both of ours.

 

After leaving, we had an hour and a half drive to my aunt's house in Kentfield. It took about fifteen extra minutes because we got lost by making a wrong turn out of the parking lot. We got to their house around midnight and went to bed.

 

Part 2 coming tomorrow. Part two contains Six Flags Discovery Kingdom.

 

Total Ride Count So Far-31

California's Great America-31

[rcdude]

Day 3: Tuesday 7/15/2008

 

On Tuesday, we had a rest day at my cousins house in Kentfield. We didn't really leave the house at all, so it kind of turned into a videogame marathon day.

 

Day 4: Wednesday 7/16/2008

 

Wednesday was the day for Six Flags Discovery Kingdom. This was a park I had been to once before but had gone on only a few of the rides. Since the park was about a forty-five minute drive, we planned to leave at 9:30 a.m. to get to the park by opening at 10:30 a.m. Unfortunately, due to delays in leaving and some traffic, we didn't end up arriving until 11:00 a.m. This park was way more crowded than California's Great America, although I was still able to do all the rides I wanted to, except for Boomerang Coast to Coaster, which was closed. For this park, I will post the individual ride reviews in the order we rode the rides.

 

Roar-This is the smoothest wooden coaster I have been on as well as my second favorite. The only wooden coaster I like better is Ghostrider. My grandfather said he liked this ride better than Ghostrider, but my cousin didn't like it at all. My aunt and brother both liked Ghostrider better. I would have liked to gone twice, but there was a 65 minute wait due to one train operation and I didn't feel like waiting again for the only roller coaster I had ridden on my previous visit.

V2: Vertical Velocity-When I was watching this ride while in line, I thought it looked like a pretty boring shuttle coaster. The ride ended up completely blowing me away. I think this is probably the best shuttle coaster I have been on, except for Deja Vu. My brother said that it was a pretty unique feeling when it stopped on the front spike. I ended up riding twice, which is something I rarely do on a shuttle coaster, especially when it has a 50 minute wait.

Tony Hawk's Big Spin-This was another surprising coaster. It is probably the best family coaster I have experienced, even better than Sierra Sidewinder. Everyone except my grandfather rode it and liked it, although my grandmother said it was a little too jerky. I went twice, despite the 45 minute wait and the ride opening a few hours after park opening, something I rarely do on a family coaster. On the second ride, I went with my brother and my cousin, and we made the weight so uneven in the car it felt like a gravitron when it was spinning.

White Water Safari-I don't know why we wasted time on this ride. We waited 25 minutes for this river rapids and didn't get very wet. My grandmother sat off so she wouldn't get wet but we all came off pretty dry. I prefer the rapids ride at California's Great America to this waste of time.

Cobra-One of the two walk-ons for the day. This was a pretty decent borderline kiddie/family coaster. Everyone in our group rode it and thought it was fun, but I'm glad there was no wait as I don't think I would have wanted to wait more than five minutes for it anyway.

Medusa-Medusa was the coaster I was most looking forward to at this park, and it didn't disappoint. I think it is the best roller coaster in Northern California, although I like Scream better. Medusa seems to lose its intensity at about the midcourse brakes. My brother liked it better than Scream, and my aunt and sister, neither of which have been on Scream, just liked it. We went twice since it was well worth the 25 minute wait.

Kong-Three words describe what this ride feels like when it rolls onto the brakes: My head hurts. This is one of the roughest steel coasters I have ever been on. It is rough even for a Vekoma. Everyone else I rode with agreed. I think that if B&M built a roller coaster with this layout it would be better than most of their inverted coasters, but this ride was horrible. Either way, I'm glad I got to experience an SLC, especially with only a 20 minute wait even though only one train was running.

Shark Experience-This isn't really a ride as much as it is an exhibit. You stand on a conveyor belt that takes you through a tunnel under an aquarium. Unfortunately, the conveyor belt was broken so we had to walk. I like the one at Sea World San Diego much better.

Monsoon Falls-Monsoon Falls is just a regular splash boats ride. However, this one seemed to be wetter than most since it had water bombs around the turn and next to the bridge, as well as a straight drop. We only had to wait about 5 minutes since we waited until around 5 p.m. to ride. My brother, cousin, and grandparents waited off to avoid getting soaked.

Tasmanian Devil-This was an interesting flat ride. I thought it would be similar to La Revolution but it was a bit different. The swinging on this ride wasn't as intense, but the spinning was a lot worse. I actually got off this ride feeling a little dizzy, and it had nothing to do with getting hit by a stuffed animal someone lost. My brother and cousin rode with me and both liked it but had a similar reaction. Luckily there was no wait so we didn't waste time making ourselves slck.

 

We stayed at the park until 8:00 p.m. On the way home we stopped at a Carls, Jr. for dinner. We got home around 9:30 p.m. Everyone was in bed about an hour later.

 

Part 3 coming tomorrow. Part three contains Waterworld California as well as a non-park experience we did.

 

Total Ride Count So Far-43

California's Great America-31

Six Flags Discovery Kingdom-12

[rcdude]

This is the non-theme park portion of the trip, however I thought it might fit in as a trip isn't usually all about amusement parks. Either way, I will try not to write as much as the previous two posts.

 

Day 5: Thursday 7/17/2008

 

On Thursday it was time for a waterpark. We decided to go to Waterworld California. My grandparents stayed at home since they aren't that interested in waterparks. Since it was a forty-five minute drive, we left at 9:20 a.m. We ended up getting to the park at 10:10 a.m., twenty minutes before opening.

 

Waterworld is a pretty average waterpark. I like some of the ones in Southern California better, but I like Waterworld California better than some. However, a few of the slides at Waterworld California were pretty unique compared to what is available in Southern California. For this park, I will just give an overview of what slides the park had and a few comments.

 

Extreme Tube Slides-Waterworld California had one of those funnel slides, this one had the generic name of Tornado. The park had two and four person inner tubes. The ride was pretty fun, but it felt a little tamer than other funnels. The park also had a half-pipe slide, where you ride on a double tube through a half pipe. This was probably the best ride in the park, but the line moved incredibly slowly.

Extreme Body Slides-The park had a couple slides that just had one long drop. I tried both of these and they seemed pretty standard. Once on each one is enough for me. Neither of these felt very steep compared to some other ones.

Tube Slides-The park had a tower with about four open/enclosed double tube slides. Unfortunately, these were closed so I didn't get to ride them.

Body Slides-This park had about three types of regular body slides. On the main tower, there were four open/enclosed body slides that just twisted and turned. Two of these were pretty boring (one of each type), one of the enclosed ones was decent, but the best one was one of the open ones. Next to the kids area, the park had a tower with a small open and a small enclosed body slide. Neither of these were that great, but the enclosed one was better. All of us were laughing pretty hard when my aunt got stuck on the slide. The third type of slide was the kind where you fall like five feet into a deep pool. The park had an open and an enclosed one of these too. They opened about two hours later than the rest of the park and closed about an hour early. They were fun the first time but the second ride was kind of boring.

Raft Ride-This park had one of the best family raft rides of anywhere I've been to. Up to four people could ride in the raft. The ride went pretty high on the turns and actually felt like it was going to tip over on a couple of them. Unfortunately, this was the one ride in the park that got pretty crowded.

Kids Attractions-The park had about six really short body slides in the kids area, in addition to a couple play structures and a lily pad walk. It all looked pretty standard.

Lazy River-The lazy river was pretty good, but it was freezing cold. I got out after only one lap because it felt like icewater. The river also had barely any current.

Wavepool-I didn't actually go in the wavepool for very long since I'm not a very big fan of them, but it looked like the waves were slightly larger than average.

 

We stayed at the park until 6 p.m., which was park closing. Everyone was tired by that time. The park was also pretty empty. I was actually the only one on the whole tower the last couple of rides. On the way home, we stopped at the nearest Mcdonalds for dinner. We got home about 7:30 p.m. Everyone went to bed around 10 p.m. so they would be well rested for tomorrow's activity.

 

Day 6: Friday 7/18/2008

 

On Friday, we decided to do something a little different that none of us had done before. Instead of going to another park, we went canoeing on the Russian River. It was a pretty fun experience, but the canoes took a lot of work to paddle. They were the keel-less inflatable kind, so it was almost impossible to keep them going straight. Once again, my grandparents stayed home, but my uncle decided to come. We thought that this would be shorter than it actually was, but everyone enjoyed it. It took us close to six hours to complete the eight mile stretch of river. My brother and cousin ended up accidently crashing into a concrete pillar from a brigde, then ran into a tree and fell overboard. Other than that, there were no mishaps. Along the way, there were a couple of rope swings to play at, so we stopped to do that. My uncle and I ended up finishing before the rest of our group, which were having difficulty and being blown upriver by the wind. They arrived about twenty minutes later. Since everyone was tired and having difficulty paddling, my aunt tied the two canoes with my brother, sister, and cousins in them together with a life jacket and swam the canoes the last half mile. My aunt says that next time she wants it to be a maximum of five miles and an approximately three hour trip. She would also like to use the canoes with keels. When we got home (after stopping at Subway) everyone was pretty tired. My brother, sister, and cousins went to bed while I stayed up and played Apples to Apples with everyone else. We were up until close to midnight since we had nothing going on.

 

Part 4 coming tomorrow. Part four, the final part, contains Gilroy Gardens Family Theme Park.

 

Total Ride Count So Far-70

California's Great America-31

Six Flags Discovery Kingdom-12

Waterworld California-27

[rcdude]

Day 7: Saturday 7/19/2008

 

On Saturday, we had another rest day at home. My aunt and uncle had a few friends come over and we went swimming in the pool, despite all the water in the past two days. We also played a lot of games (both board and video) and just talked with each other. Everyone went to bed early since we had to leave early the next morning.

 

Day 8: Sunday 7/20/2008

 

On Sunday, we packed up the car and left around 9:15 a.m. We had decided that we would stop at Gilroy Gardens Family Theme Park on the way home, a park none of us had ever been to. We arrived at the park at 11:30 a.m. It took us a little longer to get to the park since we missed the exit and had to get to the park from the main part of Gilroy. We then missed a turn and didn't realize it for about five miles. Either way, we got to the park and found it relatively uncorwded. We only had about four hours in the park before we had to leave, so we went for the more unique rides first. I'll review the more unique rides individually, then give an overview of the park's other attractions.

 

Rainbow Garden Boats-These are the infamous spinning boats. They didn't seem like they spun nearly as fast as I have heard people say. However, they did spin. All five of us liked them. It's a good thing we went on this first as it only took us about five minutes to get on, but it looked like close to a half hour wait when we got off.

South County Backroads-This is a very well decorated car ride. The cars are electric so there is no gas pedal. This elminated the bumping problems found on gas powered car rides like Autopia and Barney Oldfield's Speedway. We rode both tracks, which are nearly identical but travel in opposite directions. I prefered the 1950's track because of the car wash, but they were both fun.

Quicksilver Express-This is a mine train roller coaster. It seemed less intense than most other mine trains since it is specifically a family ride. The ride is fairly boring until after the second lifthill, then it picks up a little and is a decent ride. However, it's a little tame for me. Since it was a walk-on, I rode twice. My grandmother said the ride was too rough for her and didn't ride the second time.

Sky Trail Monorail-This is the lapbar monorail. Everyone enjoyed this ride. It provides a pretty good tour of the greenhouse. However, it is a little on the short side, and not something you need to do twice.

Timber Twister-This is the park's other roller coaster. It is a kid's coaster, but it is good enough that it's worth doing. I ended up riding a second time since my grandfather was finishing lunch the first time we rode and he wanted to ride. The second time I rode, my grandmother took my brother and sister to play carnival games.

 

The park has several other rides and attractions, but these are more generic. They include: The Paddle Boats, which you take out on a lake for ten minutes; The Mushroom Swing, which is just a themed version of the waveswinger; The Pinnacles Rock Maze, which is a walk through maze and took us about five minutes to get through; Bonfante Falls, where you walk under a waterfall and get slightly wet; The Coyote & Redwood Railroad, which is a five minute train ride around the park; Several various gardens and shows; and some flat rides that are themed for the park and I didn't bother to ride.

 

Overall, this is a great small park, but it's not really the type of park for me. I don't think I'd go back unless they got a new major attraction, especially since they charge $30 for admission and I got everything I wanted too done. The park, however, has beautiful landscaping, easily better than anything else in California. My grandmother said that if she lived around the park she would get an annual pass and visit just to walk through the gardens.

 

We left the park around 4:15 p.m. to head home. Due to construction delays, we didn't get home until 11:15 p.m. We stopped at a Mcdonalds for dinner on the way home. Everyone was tired when we got home and went to bed.

 

That's it for this trip. This was the big amusement park trip of the summer for me, although I've got the Orange County Fair next week. In addition, I will be going to Cedar Point at the end of August as part of a trip I'm doing to my dad to the great lakes area. I'm pretty excited about that since I've never been to any major amusement park outside of California, least of all Cedar Point.

 

Ride Count:

 

California's Great America-31

Six Flags Discovery Kingdom-12

Waterworld California-27

Gilroy Gardens Family Theme Park-11

Total Ride Count For The Trip-81

# of Coaster Credits-8

[Tmcdllr]

Lot's of great info there and for your first TR that was pretty awesome, I found it very informative but I have to disagree on a couple of things.....

Flight Deck-This ride was fun and was a walk-on. Although this is probably one of the worst B&M Inverted coasters,

One of the worst??? Although it is extremely short it is still very intense and certainly not one of the worst, are you kidding me?

 

Grizzly better than Giant Dipper? I gotta ask you, what planet are you from?

[Mechanic]

I believe your grandmother's comment about how nice it is to just walk through the gardens at Gilroy Gardens is right on the mark. We've taken my mother, mother-in-law, and my uncle, all who are in or near their 70s, on different trips to the park with our family. Each of them have commented on how they could spend hours just leisurely enjoying the beautiful landscaping that surrounds you just about everywhere in the park. I would encourage anyone considering a visit to not let the lack of "major" rides influence your decision. And, for what it's worth, their swinging ship ride, "Banana Split", is in my opinion, better than the ones at the other nearby parks. (I hadn't noticed any mention of that ride in your TR, so I figured I'd just throw that in)

 

As for you somehow coming to the conclusion that Grizzly is in any way superior to Giant Dipper... I'm sorry, but you're simply wrong. It's ok though. We all make mistakes. Accept it and move on.

 

Flight Deck "probably one of the worst B&M inverts"? That's certainly a matter of opinion. Learn to listen to Grandpa. He has better opinions than you.

 

(Please note that those remarks are being made tongue-in-cheek. Don't take it personally. I just couldn't resist.)

 

All in all though, I give you props for taking the time to provide a well-detailed TR, even if we don't necessarily share the same opinion on a few of the rides.

[Tmcdllr]

^Ok that was a little harsh and I apologize. Flight Deck is definitely not the best and certainly not the worst B&M inverted coaster but I am sorry you did not like it.

 

I want to ask you though, between CGA and SFDK, which park did you like better and why? Was it the rides, atmosphere or appearance, park layout, etc? And if you could pick only one coaster from those two parks as your favorite which one would it be?

[rcdude]

Thanks for all your feedback. I'll try to answer all the questions as well as I can.

 

I have only been on three B&M Inverted roller coasters (Flight Deck, Batman The Ride, and Silver Bullet), and all of them are extremely fun. The only reason I pick Flight Deck as the worst is because it is extremely short and is the only one I have experienced any headbanging on. Even though it was only at one point, I thought it was pretty unusual for a B&M to have headbanging. Also, I have been on Flight Deck the least out of the three (4 rides, compared to at least 5 on Batman and at least 12 on

Silver Bullet). Either way, its just my opinion.

 

As for the Grizzly Vs. Giant Dipper debate, I have only been on the Giant Dipper twice. They were both on the same day, but the two rides were very different. On the first ride, I really enjoyed it and that time it was better than Grizzly. The second ride is the one that I really didn't like. On that ride, I decided to ride with my hands up (something I no longer do on wooden coasters) and on one of the turns I got thrown against the side of the train so hard I thought I had broken something. It ended up that I just got a pretty good bruise to one of my shoulders because of how I was sitting, but it is mostly that ride that I remember. If that hadn't happened, I would probably like the Giant Dipper better. Either way, it's just a matter of opinion like the Flight Deck thing.

 

As far as the parks go, I like California's Great America better in every way except for the roller coasters, because Six Flags Discovery Kingdom has way better coasters than anything at California's Great America (except possibly Flight Deck). California's Great America has some rides I haven't seen anywhere else I've been, such as the Centrifuge, Survivor: The Ride, The Berserker, The Orbit, and Flying Eagles. It also has an included waterpark, which is a relief in the middle of the day. The theming is also way better and you can't beat the walk-ons. Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, on the other hand, has great roller coasters (for Northern California) like Medusa, Roar, V2: Vertical Velocity, Tony Hawk's Big Spin, and also has non-ride attractions like the animal exhibits. It probably has better food as well. Although I liked Gilroy Gardens, it is in a completely different league than the other parks. It is not so much a ride park as it is a look at the scenery park.

 

If I had to pick one roller coaster as my favorite, it would probably be Medusa. It is the longest roller coaster at either park, probably the most intense, and is also the smoothest. Although it is a great ride, it is nothing in comparision to some of Six Flags Magic Mountain's and Knott's Berry Farm's roller coasters.

 

Overall, this trip was fun, but I don't have a huge desire to go back to any of the parks anytime soon, especially with Six Flags Magic Mountain only an hour and a half from where I live. However, next time I go up to visit my cousins, I will probably stop by California's Great America again to check out their new wooden roller coaster.

[tkkyj]

I was surprised by all the advertising at SFDK when I went... There are movie ads on most of the trashcans, the P.A. system is barking out offers at you wherever you go, and even the wildlife areas have Toyota vehicles parked up on the grass. It seemed extra extra blatant this year when I went.

 

CGA seems like more of an escape from that... so far.

[Tmcdllr]

^^Good stuff, thanks.