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Mt. Olympus Water & Theme Park Discussion Thread


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I rode it the 2nd day it was open (a Sunday in June) and it was great, but still very rough (except the new part) by most standards. One weekend later, it was noticeably rougher. Should we have a poll to guess what the outcome will be?

 

I went on opening weekend and was able to get 11 rides in a rode in before I started noticing any of this ridiculous roughness. The tunnel has always been a bit shaky (It never hurt, though) but the bottom of the first drop was too much. I guess it's been riding worse then opening weekend?

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I think if Mt. Olympus wanted a coaster that inverts, they should have just added a Vekoma boomerang or something like that.

 

hehehehe... that's a multi-layered joke, depending how you look at it! Could you imagine riding the roughest of all the roughest Vekoma Boomerangs?

 

I guess it's been riding worse then opening weekend?

 

From what I've been hearing, yes. Unfortunate. The first day I was there, some kid was showing me his bleeding elbow the ride gave him.

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I think if Mt. Olympus wanted a coaster that inverts, they should have just added a Vekoma boomerang or something like that.

 

The next good Euro-Fighter I ride will be the first one, but I've always thought it's a type that would work well for Mt. O - compact, yet most of them ably cram several inversions into the small footprint, relatively inexpensive, and just gimmicky enough for a place like Wisconsin Dells (OMG! Vertical lift hill and beyond vertical drop? Radical!). Same applies to S&S and their El Loco, though I'd say they deliver more in the ride experience category.

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  • 1 month later...

http://www.wiscnews.com/wisconsindellsevents/news/local/article_5f4e64ea-dc79-50ce-a524-f0952b87bbb4.html

 

Mt. Olympus Water and Theme Park purchased the Concord Inn and Monaco Motel, a deal that owner Nick Laskaris said was completed Wednesday.

 

The purchase means he has 1,300 rooms now, and he said he’ll only slow down in acquiring more motels when he sees a decrease in the number of customers seeking them.

 

The Laskaris family business has taken over numerous motels along Wisconsin Dells Parkway in recent years.

 

Laskaris promotes his family’s business by offering free admission to Mt. Olympus Water and Theme Park with stays in one of the resort’s rooms.

 

He said he’ll keep adding rooms until the business can’t fill the park anymore. The park has a 16,000 person per day capacity and now it averages about 10,000 to 12,000 visitors a day in the summer, he said.

 

Unlike some other large resorts in Wisconsin Dells that have sites in other states, the Laskaris family is concentrating their business in the Dells area.

 

“I’ve had no interest in going into other areas,” he said. “I love the Wisconsin Dells area and that’s where I hope to stay, invest my money,” he said.

 

Laskaris said he likes the area, his family is here, and it’s a good place to raise a family.

 

His family has been in Dells since the 1970s, he said.

 

He pointed out that Mt. Olympus Water and Theme park is a family-run business with his wife, Eva, and two daughters. He said he has more than 900 employees.

 

Sixty employees have to be added to take care of the most recent properties he purchased, he said.

 

The resort usually paints its buildings blue and white in keeping with the Greek theme.

 

The Laskaris family purchased the additional hotels because of their functionality, too.

 

He said the customers like to drive up and park outside of their motel rooms, a feature many of the smaller motels built along Wisconsin Dells Parkway offer.

 

It is a difference from other resorts that have many rooms opening into long, enclosed hallways.

 

He said it makes sense to refurbish the older motels because he doesn’t want to build too many rooms than what is demanded in the area if he were to build completely new accommodations. He also said he doesn’t have to build everything else that a guest might need, like restaurants, in a more insular resort. He encourages guests to venture out to dine in restaurants that are already established in the Dells area and offers discounts for guests to do so.

 

“These visitors need more than just Mt. Olympus to go to; they need the whole area, the boats, the Ducks, all the different attractions and the shopping,” he said, adding they need the river, too.

 

He also said his strategy is better for the environment because he isn’t taking up more land with new developments.

 

The newest hotels to Mt. Olympus Water and Theme Park will have new carpeting, remodeled bathrooms, fresh paint, new furniture and new bedding, Laskaris said.

 

The remodeled Concord Inn and Monaco Motel are slated to open by Memorial Day 2014, he said.

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Oh wow, is there not some kind of monopoly commission is the states to stop this?!? The hotels are incredibly expensive (seemingly owing to the "value" of free park admission) and there is hardly any competition because he is buying everything!

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In an interview he said he doesn't buy 2 trains for Hades cause it costs money to maintain 2 trains.

 

HA HA HA HA!

I dont think that a second train would cost more than buying a motel.

 

 

That's what I thought when he said. Even my Mother who doesn't keep track of coaster stuff thought he sounded cheap.

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Oh wow, is there not some kind of monopoly commission is the states to stop this?!? The hotels are incredibly expensive (seemingly owing to the "value" of free park admission) and there is hardly any competition because he is buying everything!

 

And he buys everything because he (essentially) controls the zoning commission and can basically vaporize anyone who doesn't sell to him. That's your core problem right there.

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I fell for the, what I like to call a near-con, of the park's hotels. The website had decent images and made the room sound good - we go to check and our room is over a mile away and the only "Mt Olympus" connection to the room was the key and room number sign. Everything on the inside, from the card on the phone to notice on back of door called it the "Pine Hotel." The room didn't even have AC (unless you count the small window unit in the bathroom). Seems like they buy up hotels, throw their eletronic lock system on the doors and call it their own without switching out anything on the inside.

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Well, Hades is still one of my favorite rides of all time (and I know I'm in the *very* minor minority), but I can honestly say I'm not a big fan of the operating style of Mt. Olympus. Being so close to the Dells, I've never stayed at any of their locations and I figure I never would want to. The procedure does seem to pretty much be 1) Buy out location 2) Put some Mt. Olympus title on the location 3) Move on to the next one. The motels they buy out aren't very grandeur and they make very few, if any, improvements once they acquire it.

 

I’m all for having people come visit and have some fun in our neck of the woods, but it’s becoming a little harder each year to want to give them my money, and I’m almost getting to a point of advising people not to visit. The only nice things this year were the revamp on Hades and buy-one-get-one admissions towards the end of the season; everything else is a tough sell. I’ll still go for Hades next year, but there had better be at least some attempt of maintaining the ride.

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It's about time Webster updated their dictionary to include this place under the definition of "shady".

 

Well, Nick would do the maintenance on the coasters and upgrade the hotels, but he's busy with other things...

423490_10151174080604180_300265848_n.jpg.e5f1df555b5bd7b4f2d61812a6536753.jpg

this dude really took this picture of his wife/house/car

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I certainly can't think of a better place to drive around in a Ferrari than in the Wisconsin Dells!...It's like the 'Miami' of the midwest!

 

In all seriousness, what the man chooses to do with his money is his business. With that said, a part of me feels jibbed knowing that a small amount of my money went towards 'those' (open to interpretation)

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Aside from it looking like his wife didn't spend much money on a hairstylist, who cares what he does with his money? It is his family business, he can do whatever he wants with it.

 

Clearly keeping costs down through hiring sketchy ride operators and not going above and beyond with maintenance are part of his business model, and so long as people keep coming to the Dells and visiting...

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Me? I'm just amused at the trashiness of the photo. Look, he can do whatever he wants. If he's taking advantage of the system to basically destroy the town's independent operators and put everyone out of business, that's not something I can anything about. But he's also the theme park industry's version of a slum lord. There's nothing to cheer there unless you're part of his family or a sociopath.

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