The Knott's Berry Farm (KBF) Discussion Thread

[SpacemanSpiff]

^^^^^ AWESOME photos, Andrew!

 

Hey everyone. I'm preparing a bit early, but can someone help me with how Sunday is going to look in terms of crowds? (I'm going to KBF on Sunday the 3rd) I'm at 49 creds, and want to make HangTime #50 (HangTime will be #50 no matter what, I have every other credit at Knott's except Timberline Twister because I'm too tall), but is that the coaster I should run to? Keep in mind that I'm going to be there the whole day (this is my yearly KBF visit), so I want to ride as much as possible. Should HangTime be first, or should I follow a different plan of attack, basically.

 

The park has been really busy this week, so this Sunday should likely be busy too and it will be hot near 90 degrees. I would run to either Ghostrider or Hangtime first. Both coasters will have waits in the 1:30 - 2-hour ranges. Xcelerator and Silver Bullet will be closer to 1 to 1:30-hour waits. The rest of the park will range from 10 minutes to an hour waits.

 

 

Also, Knott's has early entrance for Season Passholders that day, so there will likely be lines already when you get into the park unless you have a Cedar Fair platinum pass.

 

If you have early entry and can get there well before rope drop, I would head to Ghost Rider first because the line seems to build up especially fast.

 

If not, I would head to HangTime first and then Xcelerator.

[clem2754]

^^^^^ AWESOME photos, Andrew!

 

Hey everyone. I'm preparing a bit early, but can someone help me with how Sunday is going to look in terms of crowds? (I'm going to KBF on Sunday the 3rd) I'm at 49 creds, and want to make HangTime #50 (HangTime will be #50 no matter what, I have every other credit at Knott's except Timberline Twister because I'm too tall), but is that the coaster I should run to? Keep in mind that I'm going to be there the whole day (this is my yearly KBF visit), so I want to ride as much as possible. Should HangTime be first, or should I follow a different plan of attack, basically.

 

The park has been really busy this week, so this Sunday should likely be busy too and it will be hot near 90 degrees. I would run to either Ghostrider or Hangtime first. Both coasters will have waits in the 1:30 - 2-hour ranges. Xcelerator and Silver Bullet will be closer to 1 to 1:30-hour waits. The rest of the park will range from 10 minutes to an hour waits.

 

 

Ghost Rider first, then Hang Time/XCelerator. No way Silver Bullet gets a 90 minute wait. Some of the smaller coasters have had longer waits than Silver Bullet the times I have gone on the weekends.

[thrillseeker4552]

^^^^^ AWESOME photos, Andrew!

 

Hey everyone. I'm preparing a bit early, but can someone help me with how Sunday is going to look in terms of crowds? (I'm going to KBF on Sunday the 3rd) I'm at 49 creds, and want to make HangTime #50 (HangTime will be #50 no matter what, I have every other credit at Knott's except Timberline Twister because I'm too tall), but is that the coaster I should run to? Keep in mind that I'm going to be there the whole day (this is my yearly KBF visit), so I want to ride as much as possible. Should HangTime be first, or should I follow a different plan of attack, basically.

 

The park has been really busy this week, so this Sunday should likely be busy too and it will be hot near 90 degrees. I would run to either Ghostrider or Hangtime first. Both coasters will have waits in the 1:30 - 2-hour ranges. Xcelerator and Silver Bullet will be closer to 1 to 1:30-hour waits. The rest of the park will range from 10 minutes to an hour waits.

 

 

Ghost Rider first, then Hang Time/XCelerator. No way Silver Bullet gets a 90 minute wait. Some of the smaller coasters have had longer waits than Silver Bullet the times I have gone on the weekends.

 

^This is definitely true, assuming it is running two trains. Luckily this is almost always the case now that they have the third train. Even if operations are semi-decent, an entirely full queue on Bullet (which is pretty rare but definitely happens) isn't much more than an hour.

 

On the other hand, GhostRider's line is very often over an hour, even if the bottom level queue isn't full. Operations on that coaster are horrific. Unfortunately HangTime doesn't seem much better, considering the triple stacking and abundance of empty seats more often than not.

 

I absolutely love Knott's. I grew up with the park and it's one of my favorite places in the world. But operations at the park are pretty abysmal.

[firebird81]

Hangtime has an issue with the seatbelts that might affect operations. The release is kind of clunky. When we rode everyone was having problems trying to figure out how to get the seatbelt off. I am fully convinced that Ghostrider's operations depend completely on whether or not a certain 30 or so year old woman is working. When she is there, I swear its true, they get the trains dispatched in half the time they do when she isn't. But that ride also suffers greatly from all of the riders who enter from the exit side and avoid the lines. There is always a line of 15-20 people over there at any given time. When the ride first opened, they used to start a train when the one before it got to the midcourse brake run. Now the train completes the run and sits for two minutes before the one in the station leaves.It is mindnumbingly slow.

[edgeboy]

I totally agree the seatbelts on Hangtime are slowing things down. The release mechanism is not intuitive, and it greatly slows down getting people off the train, as they become stuck until someone else can come by and release them. Also, they really need a single rider line to fill those empty seats.

 

I also believe that most (though certainly not all) of the time, the slow dispatch for Ghostrider is more guest related. As mentioned, there's always a ton of people at the exit. And a ton of people crossing to put their stuff down. And invariably someone will try to bring on their souvenir bottle. "Oh, I can't bring this with me?" Then they need to undo their seat belt, get out, put it in the bin, put the seat belt back on while everyone else waits... you get the drift.

[Coastin' thru life]

Been pretty busy this week, eeh? Was thinking.of going tomorrow (Friday) night, not worth it?

[SteVeUrkle]

Last Thursday I went to Knott’s to ride the new HangTime. It was awesome and I got three rides on it in the course of my day. I love having this and Xcelerator so close to each other, it’s going to be my hangout area of the park when I go visit. Anyways here are some pictures of mostly HangTime on my day there.

 

Wow. Andrew! What a great Trip Report! It almost felt like I was there at the park visiting with you!

 

Thanks for all the awesome photos and taking the time to explain what was going on. Plus I dig your style, that Haunt T-Shirt is pretty frickin' dope!

[SoCalJasonland]

I braved a park visit today for a few hours today. Ghostrider's line was out the door and half-way to the gold mining facility. Xcelerator came in second on lines with a line to the vending machines. Hangtime stated a half-hour wait on the app, but a ride breakdown caused me to wait about one-hour. Waits for all the flats were approx one to two cycles. SOL Spin has re-opened.

 

The Calico Mine Stage is coming along nicely and apparently will have log rolling and trampolines. Wipeout's reconstruction is actually at the ride vehicle stage. And if it wasn't for school groups, it would have been pretty dead today.

Stage work in ghost town

Log rolling and trampolines

Wipeout sounds so surfing related

Wait times around 2 pm on Thursday

Wait times around 2 pm on Thursday

[Coastin' thru life]

Yeah, not looking good...well, there's always September

[thrillseeker4552]

Wait, Sol Spin opened? So you're telling me every ride / coaster in the park is now open? What?!

 

The day has finally come guys. HangTime, Xcelerator, Sky Cabin, Sol Spin... all open at once. What a time to be alive.

[Nrthwnd]

^ Now you just jinxed it.

 

 

 

 

 

Kid-DING!

[Freestyle23]

How should the lines be on Monday June 18th? Weekday, but school's out. Right after Father's day.

[SoCalJasonland]

Knott's was slam-packed busy on Friday. There must have been 30 - 40 school buses there. If the line for French Fries, "La Papa Loca", should require a FastLane, then Cartman is right and I need my own theme park. Does anyone want to help throw in a part of a million dollars to help me buy Lakeside when I get out to Denver this summer? You can't visit the park as I will be the only one allowed inside the park, but I will get you a cool tee-shirt or something for contributing. Please send one million to my go fund me page now!

 

BTW... the Knott's app showed 2 hour waits for Ghostrider, HangTime and Silver Bullet. I didn't verify any of those, but Monte was close to 40 minutes like the app claimed.

Wipeout

Wipeout

Hoedown but I had no part

Donnie Darko bunny carousel

Ouch!

Ouch!

French fry line

[SteVeUrkle]

lol SERIOUSLY Knott's you can't invest in putting any trees, or umbrellas, or permanent shade or ANYTHING covering that food line? If I know Knott's food operations, you're gonna get a sunburn just standing in that line for an hour! Wouldn't hurt to shove off with the never ending landscapes of flat concrete. How much could something like this cost? $1000? $2000? Sometimes I can't even imagine what they are thinking

 

Edited June 5, 2018 by Jew

[thrillseeker4552]

Wow. Over the hundreds of times I've been to Knott's over the last 12-ish years, I have NEVER seen the line for La Papa Loca that long.

[Skittles]

The park opens in 2 minutes! I'll be sure to give a trip report at the end of the day!

[Skittles]

Been a couple days since my visit, might as well talk about it for a bit. Lines didn't really seem too terribly long all day. The longest waits were what you'd expect; HangTime, Xcelerator, and GhostRider, all of which got up to 90 minutes. HangTime was #50 for me and a lot of fun, really glad to see such a fun ride in the Knott's skyline. Everything else was running as I'd remembered which is a good thing. Oh yeah, and in the evening I did make it out to Adventure City. Nice little park with a fun family coaster.

[laqueefa]

lol SERIOUSLY Knott's you can't invest in putting any trees, or umbrellas, or permanent shade or ANYTHING covering that food line? If I know Knott's food operations, you're gonna get a sunburn just standing in that line for an hour! Wouldn't hurt to shove off with the never ending landscapes of flat concrete. How much could something like this cost? $1000? $2000? Sometimes I can't even imagine what they are thinking

 

It's probably not as easy as you think. California's Great America has the same issues with some of their queues and in order to make certain additions, they have to rezone to obtain the proper permits to make additions to the buildings and/or its surroundings.

[Shut It Down]

I know to always take screamscape with a grain of salt, but he’s saying that the 2020 rumors are for a large coaster south of Ghostrider. Not sure where that would even be?? I just don’t see it. But we will see.....

[clem2754]

I know to always take screamscape with a grain of salt, but he’s saying that the 2020 rumors are for a large coaster south of Ghostrider. Not sure where that would even be?? I just don’t see it. But we will see.....

Based on an interview with Cedar Fair CEO, Knotts is one of the 4 parks the company is really focusing in on to develop and expand. It would not surprise me for Knott's to get another coaster in the next few years. The other 3 parks are Cedar Point, Carowinds, and California Great America.

[laqueefa]

I know to always take screamscape with a grain of salt, but he’s saying that the 2020 rumors are for a large coaster south of Ghostrider. Not sure where that would even be?? I just don’t see it. But we will see.....

Based on an interview with Cedar Fair CEO, Knotts is one of the 4 parks the company is really focusing in on to develop and expand. It would not surprise me for Knott's to get another coaster in the next few years. The other 3 parks are Cedar Point, Carowinds, and California Great America.

 

Knott's has a lot of back lot space. I wouldn't be surprised if they moved some storage spaces to other areas or even off site to accommodate the build out.

[firebird81]

I know to always take screamscape with a grain of salt, but he’s saying that the 2020 rumors are for a large coaster south of Ghostrider. Not sure where that would even be?? I just don’t see it. But we will see.....

 

They're making moves across the street for future park expansion. The Church of Reflections is moving to a Lutheran Church. That area and the picnic are next to it could be used to relocate the hotel, opening up a large area to the south of the park. Not by 2020, tho. They do have a considerable amount of space south of Ghostrider already where they house the haunt mazes. But, they've been pretty adamant about NOT destroying the aesthetic of Ghost Town. The abandoned a large coaster back there for that very reason a few years ago. I DO think the park will eventually expand southward. With Disney pricing, the HUGE tourism number OC gets (48 million a year!), Star Wars land coming all add up to Knott's having an unprecedented opportunity with the right investment to become one of the biggest players in the theme park industry...will Cedar Fair spend that money, tho?

[DBJ]

South of Ghostrider makes the most I think though. The station - if themed like a old west façade (unlike Silver Bullet), could fit into Ghost town, and if doing something like Nitro/Gatekeeper, head into the parking lots past the hotel. I think it is an interesting idea though for them (or their hotel partner) to rebuild and relocate the hotel, maybe like to southeast corner of their parking lot. Certainly would free up a lot of space.

[thrillseeker4552]

It's literally two sentences from Screamscape. B&M Giga confirmed!

 

Joking aside, I know we just got HangTime, but a wild west themed RMC Raptor (even if it's a Railblazer clone, who cares) would be amazing. Cheap, compact, highly visible, and low capacity--everything Knott's would want in a coaster!

[firebird81]

It doesn't need to be low capacity to appeal to them. They'll find a way to reduce capacity all on their own.