Six Flags New England (SFNE) Discussion Thread

[bobbie68Macaroni and Donkey]

Thanks for the reports. I haven't gotten up there yet but planning on Sunday if the weather is good. We really enjoyed it last year and it extends my theme park fix.

It will be interesting to see what goes in Panda Express! This year we enjoyed the new outdoor buffet by Goliath.

We have a DP and will get the hot chocolate that is really a good deal!

I hope the weather cooperates later in the season would like to go up till New Year's.

[coasterbillWhy do I still have a donkey title???]

Great report! Hopefully it's cool if I piggyback with another brief report from Saturday.

Even though we live less than two hours from the park this was somehow our first visit of the season. Since our last visit we've somehow managed to hit Great Adventure, Over Georgia, Discovery Kingdom, America, Over Texas and Fiesta Texas despite this park being closer than all of them. I don't really know how that's even possible but somehow it is.

That said, the park definitely managed to leave us feeling like we really need to get up there more often. New England is a really nice park with every coaster sporting a nice paint job, rides with cool light packages everywhere and a bit more of a focus on aesthetics than we're used to from it's sister park in New Jersey.

Obviously the park's two star attractions are closed for Holiday in the Park but it creates a small-park atmosphere that's actually quite charming and in a way it makes us appreciate the other coasters more. There's also no shortage of things to do between the great rides, great shows and awesome lights.

Some people would shovel the whole walkway but that's really way more effort than Six Flags is comfortable with so now we have cones and caution tape.

After exercising extreme caution we made it to the gate!

For whatever reason we made this our first stop. Normally I don't particularly enjoy Boomerangs but we find Flashback to be totally smooth and generally a lot of fun. It was really awkward ascending that second spike while listening to Jesus music on full blast though. I sort of felt like it was a sign that the ride was about to kill us and send us to the afterlife but no... it was just a really, really good boomerang somehow.

I always joke that regardless of crowd size, season, weather conditions, raptures or acts of god the line for Thunderbolt is always 25 minutes long. Fright Fest Saturday with every other ride posting a wait time over an hour? 25 minutes. 200 people in the park? 25 minutes. State of Emergency declaration in Massachusets due to Dunkin Donuts and Sam Adams forcing locals to display the ability to pronounce the letter "r" correctly when purchasing their products? 25 minutes. That said, for the first time ever we actually caught it at 15. I still can't get over the shock.

PS: The ride is butter smooth and tons of fun per usual but it's Thunderbolt so you already knew that.

The giant ornament epidemic has spread, but this is the OG

The lights looked great!

Tree lighting! PS: Six Flags serves Dunkin Donuts beer because it's Massachusetts and of course they do.

This was our first trip to the park since they added Harley Quinn and it's an awesome addition. Not only is it one of the best rides in the park but it looks great from basically everywhere (especially when the lights come on).

Beautiful...

I scored a quick Joker ride at some point. As usual Brit sat that one out.

Batman being awesome per usual. This ride is incredibly underrated.

Brit's crazed marshmallow arsonist face. I prefer my marshmallows with a nice brown exterior. She prefers her marshmallows on fire.

We had a great time at Holiday in the Park. The lights and atmosphere were awesome, the rides were great and we really enjoyed the show. That said, we had one major takeaway...

We first got Six Flags season passes when we were kids and I've been going to this park pretty routinely since around 2000 or 2001. On our first ever visit we rode Mind Eraser and I vowed to never subject myself to that piece of sh*t ever again. There were bad rides and then there was Mind Eraser which was almost in an elite class of terrible. About 15 years later I rode again during Brit's first visit to the park and if anything I hated it even more than I did the first time I rode it.

When they announced that it was getting new trains I barely cared as I had no intentions of riding it ever again but Boldikus came up and I gave it a shot. I didn't enjoy my ride as I spent the entire thing bracing for impact but I admitted when we hit the brakes that it was actually somehow okay.

We rode again during Holiday in the Park last year and once again I prepared myself to embrace the suck but once again it never came. It's hard to enjoy a ride when you're bracing for pure misery at every turn but after last year I sort of admitted to myself that Mind Eraser was somehow no longer terrible and I was excited to ride again this year.

"No longer terrible" is an understatement. Mind Eraser is f*cking great. We rode it once after our first Harley Quinn ride and absolutely loved it. We thought it would still be a one and done but that’s not exactly how it played out.

At the end of the night we planned on hitting Harley Quinn but it was down and didn't seem like it would be opening up any time soon. Initially I figured we'd head over to Batman, but without even really discussing it we sort of just made our way into the Mind Eraser queue instead. I love Batman, but this ride is every bit as good. It might actually be the best coaster open for Holiday in the Park. There's no headbanging to speak of and when you can actually enjoy it it turns out that the SLC layout is action packed, super intense and sort of awesome. The double barrel roll is insane and has incredibly tight clearances, the first element (that used to just be the element of death) is great and overall the ride is basically awesome from start to finish.

I love Mind Eraser. What the f*ck????? We actually managed to ride a few times, ending our night with a front seat ride on the last train of the night. Not on Batman... not on Thunderbolt... not on Fireball... on f*cking Mind Eraser.

It's a Holiday in the Park miracle!

I know it's hard to justify traveling too far for this event with the two star attractions closed but if you're within a few hours of the park then I strongly recommend their Holiday in the Park event. Plus, you should really come and check out Mind Eraser... it's bangin' (but not in the normal Mind Eraser way, lol).

Everyone else: "Holiday in the Park will never work at Six Flags New England. It's too cold and nobody will show up in such frigid temps"

New Englanders: "Yeah actually give me two scoops of Ice Cream and I want fahkin sprinkles too!".

[Philrad71Why do I still have a donkey title???]

I always joke that regardless of crowd size, season, weather conditions, raptures or acts of god the line for Thunderbolt is always 25 minutes long. Fright Fest Saturday with every other ride posting a wait time over an hour? 25 minutes. 200 people in the park? 25 minutes. State of Emergency declaration in Massachusets due to Dunkin Donuts and Sam Adams forcing locals to display the ability to pronounce the letter "r" correctly when purchasing their products? 25 minutes. That said, for the first time ever we actually caught it at 15. I still can't get over the shock.

Thanks for the trip report, Bill (as well as Sluggo)...the park looks great!

[boldikusFounder of the Cult of Skank Mountain]

Great stuff, Bill. Park looks awesome!

[Canobie CoasterWhy do I still have a donkey title???]

Great report! I agree 100% on Thunderbolt's line. That queue is always filled since the ride's capacity is so low, but the queue can't hold more than 30 minutes worth of people.

Those new trains are on Mind Eraser/Riddler are a godsend. Wasn't the Great Nor'Easter still terrible with the new trains before the retrack? If so, I shudder to know how rough that one was.

[Sluggo77“Fear can make a donkey attack a lion”]

Great report! Hopefully it's cool if I piggyback with another brief report from Saturday.

Thanks everyone! Bill thanks for your better than mine addition. Wish I knew you both were at the park. Would have been awesome to meet you. This is really a great event at SFNE and I totally agree that Mind Eraser “The Riddler” may be the best coaster open during HiTP. Crazy to say about an SLC but true. The new restraints/trains have totally improved this now fun and aggressive coaster.

[ytterbiumanalystWhy do I still have a donkey title???]

Hahaha, you guys do theme parks right. For some reason my wife also enjoys burnt marshmallows. It's weird.

[coasterbillWhy do I still have a donkey title???]

Great report! Hopefully it's cool if I piggyback with another brief report from Saturday.

Thanks everyone! Bill thanks for your better than mine addition. Wish I knew you both were at the park. Would have been awesome to meet you. This is really a great event at SFNE and I totally agree that Mind Eraser “The Riddler” may be the best coaster open during HiTP. Crazy to say about an SLC but true. The new restraints/trains have totally improved this now fun and aggressive coaster.

Yeah, that sucks that we missed you. I was the asshole walking around in a Jets jacket blisfully ignorant of the fact that the Jets were playing New England that weekend (I'm a casual fan at best but it's a warm jacket and that's all I cared about). I'm surprised I wasn't thrown over the park gate by an angry mob.

[Canobie CoasterWhy do I still have a donkey title???]

I think Patriots fans feel sorry for the Jets at this point.

[Sluggo77“Fear can make a donkey attack a lion”]

Well that makes two of us. I left my JETS jacket at home though LOL.