cwcoasterboy Posted June 13, 2011 Share Posted June 13, 2011 Each year I try to make sure to visit at least a couple of parks I've never been to before. Last year TPR helped me out with Intimidatour and I also went to the Los Angeles area on my own to visit Knotts and Magic Mountain. This year I opted for a road trip of my own. Mostly because we have friends who live in Lake George NY that we wanted to visit, we crafted a road trip that basically made a complete circle around Lake Ontario. We started out from Toronto and drove to Ottawa, Canada's Capital city and a place I had yet to see. We toured the Royal Canadian Mint and took a tour of Parliament Hill, which were both amazing. With no parks on day one of our trip, it was time to head on towards Montreal and make a stop along the way... Here's Calypso Waterpark! CALYPSO WATERPARK On Hwy 417 between Ottawa and Montreal June 5, 2011 Calypso is a brand new park, in that it opened just last year. I had seen some pictures of this place and thought it looked great and was well worth the stop along our way. A great selection of slides, two kids areas, a river and wave pool all opened with the park in year one. For this season, the park is adding 10 additional slides in what they claim is the tallest slide tower complex in North America. A beautiful park, great attractions and zero crowds the day we visited made this a really excellent experience. Since the crowds were so light (dodgy weather in the morning that soon cleared) they park ran their slides in rotation. Half the slides open for 30 minutes, and then switch. This was a great solution to low attendance, and we ended up being able to do the whole park in an hour in two circles. Here's the pics... enjoy! Next stop... La Ronde! The parks entrance and main street Really? There are dryers with the lockers... that's a new one for me... Yup... full size dryers! Not a bad idea - pay $2 to dry your stuff, and maybe you'll stick around the park for a meal or a souvenir while you wait Yeah... if you want to sit, there is no waiting First slide complex - two standard inner tube slides and a Boomerango - all 3 were excellent Ok... so according to the park brochure, there are a series of "Characters" at the park, and the attractions are loosely based on them. Pretty cool that they walk around in costume though. This is Capitaine LaPlank who has staked his claim on the pirate themed play structure Said Pirate themed play structure Next is Zoo Lagoon, which I thought was cool... ... and home to the most kick ass snake-slide ever! Next is the speedy-river attraction. No tubes, so swim away. This and the Zoo Lagoon are watched over by Wildman Jack - Calypso's own wildlife expert can tame any beast Now... I get that we're going for mystery and intrigue with the dark tunnel and mist on the river, but if I can't see into it, can the lifeguard? Just sayin... Ok... next character: Sara Max, world renowned daredevil recommends the Fast Track Said Fast Track slides Next up, two excellent family raft slides... ... one of which is a Boomerango as well Waterparks take note: This conveyor dispatch system is the only way to go! Speeds up the process and makes it easier for people to get in. Please install them. Thanks. Dr. Dunk is our next character, a water-crazed mad scientist who invented the Turbo Lab Each of the four bowl-slides on this tower is themed to a science experience. This is the Acid Test Phew... I was worried there wouldn't be enough picnic tables Yay for new Construction! Here's a shot of the new slide complex (not yet completed on our visit, sad face) The lower levels of the tower include 4 family-style body slides and two Aqua Loops The top of the tower, at 90ft tall, holds 4 tobaggon slides. These are huge speed slides with a VERY long run off that carry 4 riders in tobaggon style in-line tubes Our last character for today is Calypso herself - the Queen of the Waves. Greg is holding her Shell-Phone (she actually said that!) She resides in Calypso Palace and controls this acre of warm ocean waters. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrewoplis Posted June 14, 2011 Share Posted June 14, 2011 This look great! Calypso looks like a lot of fun! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KI Kidd Posted June 14, 2011 Share Posted June 14, 2011 Looks like a fun start to the trip! I can't wait to see the rest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WFChris Posted June 14, 2011 Share Posted June 14, 2011 Looks like this park has a ton of potential! Hope it all works out for them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carnage Posted June 14, 2011 Share Posted June 14, 2011 Nice looking park! Looks like they have as many picnic tables, as Cedar Fair parks have trash cans. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1pizza14 Posted June 14, 2011 Share Posted June 14, 2011 Looks like a really cool park! I think I might just have to make a trip there this summer. Thanks for the TR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwcoasterboy Posted June 14, 2011 Author Share Posted June 14, 2011 Looks like this park has a ton of potential! Hope it all works out for them. By all accounts the park has done extremely well. Probably most evident in the fact that in year two they are adding that much capital. Here are some pictures from trip advisor showing how long the lines were in the summer: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwcoasterboy Posted June 16, 2011 Author Share Posted June 16, 2011 We arrived in Montreal on day 3 of our trip and explored this amazing city for a day. Old Montreal is very beautiful, with lots of great shops and restaurants. We headed to Casino Montreal and into the heart of downtown as well. We had a great time. Day 4 though brought is to a park I had visited once before, but wanted to check out again while in the city: La Ronde - A member of the Six Flags Family Ile Ste. Helene, Montreal, Canada June 7, 2011 Having been to this park before I knew the layout and the rides pretty well, but it had been a few years and I was anxious to check things out again. The park was absolutely slammed from well before opening. Although the website said the park was open 11 to 7, as we walked up towards the main gate at 10:30 it was clear that the rides were open and running and they had started letting guests into the park some time before. Seeing the massive crowds swarming the gates and the rides already running with full trains, we made the natural decision to get a Flash Pass. After waiting in line at the Flash Pass office for about 30 mins (yikes!) we were out into the park to explore. By the way, the park sold out of Flash Passes that day, so it was good to be there early even if we didn't quite make it for opening! The park has a great collection of rides as you'll see below, but it is long overdue for some love. I was really taken aback at the parks general condition - it needs a coat of paint, some gardeners and they have a very serious issue with graffiti. You'll see in the report below. Next stop... The Great Escape and Six Flags Lodge! Welcome to La Ronde For inquiring minds... La Ronde is of course named after this - The Giant Wheel We took a ride up the Pizza Pizza Tower to get some aerial shots of the park - you'll see them with each ride Ah... Goliath! A very good mini-Hyper coaster from B and M. Run's two trains that they stacked every cycle, but it was running really well and delivered some excellent air time! Here's a shot of it from above - pretty simple, but it's a great ride! Next up is Ednor - the newly placed Hang and Bang Why is such a horrible ride so photogenic? Looks like they built a cement pad in the lake, doesn't look like very deep water under the ride The track comes up into the midway pretty far. In fact the transfer track is in the shed on the midway actually. Way to aim high! They were running 1 train that day, and even with a gold Flash Pass we waited over 30 minutes to ride. I did like this though, using the safety belt to hold the flip-flops Not much to see here, Dragon is an indoor roller coaster - family style. It's a decent ride and all the lights and themeing were working Toboggan Nordique is the parks mouse - not too many trims makes for a fast a furious ride! Le Monstre is the parks dual track wooden coaster. They had both sides open, but only running one train on each. It was a pretty slow moving line... ... even though we by-passed most of it using our Gold Bot! It was running well, and we had a really good ride on it Vampire is a mirror-image clone of the other Batman coasters at Six Flags. A great, intense ride! Maybe some landscaping? Though I guess it's better than parking lines on asphalt Vampire and Cobra - Cobra was closed for the day Best-ride-name-ever! You can see the Vekoma Corkscrew, Boomerang and the Splash Boats here... Ever wonder what happens to log when they can't be used on the flume anymore? Ta Da! Never seen those before - didn't get to ride, but they looked cool! Disco-Ronde plays actual disco music while riding! I saved a few shots for the end to demonstrate how the park needs a bit of attention - I think this may have been an actual garden once Not sure what this used to be, but it doesn't look good at all The entrance to the S and S tower with a smoking area to the side of it... The 'Flash Pass' Entrance at the Boomerang (for real!) The exit from the Boomerang Just one example of the graffiti in the park - a big issue that I hope they deal with But on a happy note - we left with a chicken hat! Oh wait... sorry, Un Chapeau du Poulet! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerrykoala2112 Posted June 16, 2011 Share Posted June 16, 2011 Great report and photos, you showed the whole park very nicely. La Ronde doesn't look that bad of a park! I'm really looking forward to it on the North East Trip, especially Goliath, Cobra, and Le Monstre. It's a bummer that they stack trains, even when running 2 trains. It looks like a well-rounded theme park and must be a Montreal treasure to have this park still operating! It was a shame Cobra was closed the day you guys visited, I really hope it's open when I'm there... Gotta ride the all important Intamin Stand Up Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
samisthabomb Posted June 17, 2011 Share Posted June 17, 2011 The Flash Pass line for Le Boomerang is ALMOST as bad as the one for SFOT's Batman! "Go down this maintenance road, then around this corner, then past this backstage area, then up these stairs, then through one of the three rusty doors!" Other than that and obvious groundskeeping issues, La Ronde looks like a great park with a decent coaster lineup. Oh, and I love that Vampire even has the same archway entrance as Batman! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts