SFDK TR- weekend of July 27th, 2008

[roland303]

It was a fantastic day at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom this last weekend with awesome cool weather cooperating. It helped that a potentially nightmarish trip (nine adults, seven children) went as smoothly as it could have gone. On to the TR!

 

I had never been to the park before, so I was eager to hit some rides before it got too crowded. Thanks to some good advice from other TPR members (mahalo to everyone), I was able to hit everything I wanted to and even a couple of things that I didn't. The park itself is set in a nice area by the bay, with an brackish inlet coming up to the backside of the park. While there is construction all around in Vallejo, the park manages to be somewhat scenic if not entirely beautiful. The funny thing to me is that the park's coasters are all laid up front, with V2 hanging over the entrance like...uh....hmmmmm. Must..avoid...genitalia...references... . Anyways, I guess it does build the "anticipation" a bit. Medusa is a sexy piece of machinery that manages to be the best ride in the park by a hair. Kong is splayed out right next to Medusa; unfortunately, it suffers greatly by comparison.

 

After wrangling the family together, I split off with my 8-year old niece and her stepbrother to hit Roar!. There was barely a line and I have to say it doesn't disappoint at all! While not having much airtime, it does have some nice speedy drops and great lateral forces. Pretty fun although it lacks something to make it really awesome. Yeah, they've only got one train in operation and the other looks like it's being mothballed or worked on. Too bad:(. Still having a smile on my face, we walked across the park to meet up with my wife and her parents. My wife was gushing about the Boomerang coaster and my smile faded away like a drunk uncle at the family reunion. BUT I never have been on one, so I had to go do it. It is exciting in a fashion but when we went backwards through the inversions, it was more like "oh sweet jeebus". My wife, however, went two more times on it. I love that woman, I tells ya!

 

We hit a slew of kid's stuff after this and let me say that this park is awesome for kids ages 2-10. It really has a lot of stuff geared to them and my 2-year old daughter, Amaelia, was no exception. There was a ThomasTown, a LooneyTunes Seaport area, and the tropical/African themed area (which I forget the name of)- all loaded with slides, fountains, mini-rides, etc. On top of that, the animal attractions really are integrated rather well in to the park. My daughter loves giraffes and tigers and all that and really had a blast checking out the animals. I personally have mixed feelings about zoos and caged performing animals but recognize the education and entertainment value they can have for the general public. How else you gonna see lions and cougars? Also, the shows are generally great even though we only hit two- the Shouka killer whale show and the walrus show. Amaelia was so amped up during the techno-fied Shouka show I thought she was going to have an aneurysm! She loved it and I have to admit it was pretty good.

 

After catching that show, me and the wife ditched out to ride Medusa, one of my new favorite coasters. Mind you, I have not been on lots of coasters or been to tons of parks but this ride was great. The line moved fairly quickly despite being super busy in the park and I just loved it. The drop is probably the best part and the Immelmans(?) were pretty cool. Yes, it's very smooth. My wife then ditched me to go on it again with her friend- Thanks hon!!

 

Finally, I wanted to hit Roar! again but the line was moving out the building so I opted for V2. Honestly did not know what to expect but I really liked this ride. It was not rough at all and to be honest, it has the best drop in the whole park (going down the back spike). Really fast and a neat sensation going up over the park on the forward spike. The line was like five minutes, tops. I was impressed with the operations at this park. Kudos to the staff there!

 

And that was that. No Tony Hawk (line was consistently an hour or more), no Kong (looking at the people strapped in those restraints, I felt their pain). Overall, the park was a great family experience and it definitely had a nice array of rides to satisfy most tastes. I would like to think it could use a real top-notch ride or at least some tweaking on their existing rides (two trains on Roar! please?). Maybe a good drop tower or dark ride would be nice but to be honest, it really is being nitpickey. This park is aiming for a real family experience and has combined thrill rides, shows, and both zoo and aquarium experiences for a real wide variety of entertainment. And it was a great experience, can't wait to go back.

 

Some random comments:

-The whitewater rapids ride looked very underwhelming.

-The Dolphin Harbor exhibit had some sad dolphins in there. One even had a floppy dorsal fin!

-Shark Experience was cool if a little short. I like sharks and I wish they had more educational aspects to the exhibit.

-Maybe because I'm getting older but my tolerance for spinning rides is almost nil. That's why I skipped things like Tazmanian Devil.

-Oh yeah! The food was pretty sucky!

The familia. Dork on the right would be me.

Part of Looney Tunes Seaport, where we spent a lot of time. Pretty fun for the kids, I must say.

The ice cream monster has awoken.

GIMME SOME CANDY!!! Hey Lady, I'm Shouka, I'm kinda of a big deal around here.

Wife and friend's daughter enjoying some shade.

Of all the coasters, this is the most memorable....for the wrong reasons.

Random tiger shot. This one's thinking "Why can't I live at the SF Zoo?". That's a Bay Area insider-joke...kinda.

Little Bunchkins gets her peach fix out of the way before heading to the park.

[R.C.]

Great trip report! I'm really glad you and your family had a great time at the park. The different experiences that you can have at SFDK are what makes SFDK such a great park. It is too bad that you weren't able to get on Tony Hawk, it is a fun little ride and you didn't miss anything by not going on Kong.

 

I'm inclined to agree with you're rankings for V2 and Medusa's drops. They are both great and I have a hard time deciding which one I like better. It is too bad that Roar has only been running one train this season. I'm not entirely sure what's up with the second train, but it's been missing the entire season.

[Alpenguy]

Random tiger shot. This one's thinking "Why can't I live at the SF Zoo?". That's a Bay Area insider-joke...kinda.

I get it!

 

It's nice to hear SFDK is keeping up the kids areas, I remember having an absolute blast there way back in the barely post-Redwood City days with all sorts of net structures and other things that partly disappeared in the early SF takeover.

[roland303]

Great trip report! I'm really glad you and your family had a great time at the park. The different experiences that you can have at SFDK are what makes SFDK such a great park.

 

Thanks! I was surprised on how well the zoo/aquarium displays went with the park overall. The rides by themselves are good but wouldn't make a fabulous park. And it helps that my daughter goes ape*&^% over animals in general. While not everything is geared for the whole family, there are so many varied attractions that any age of person can find something. I am glad my two-year old had such a great time, I was a little worried that she would be overwhelmed or scared by a lot of things. The funny thing was, she kept wanting to go on the big coasters like Roar! ! She'd point and go "Coaster.. I RIDE."