Holiday World (HW) Discussion Thread

Bought tickets for our somewhat local road trip out of STL on 7/27. Technically as a SFSTL employee my son gets two free tickets, which we have been used before, but there was no way to do that on the website and in the current climate it seems churlish to make an issue out of it. I will just support the park and pay for the day and be happy they are happen.

HW has officially canceled their Halloween event and will be closing at the end of September.

Has anyone else been lately?

^ I was there last Tuesday. It was torrential downpours all day so the park was empty. For that reason, it was easy to social distance.

Staff members were wearing masks, but most guests were not. The hand sanitizer was widely available at ride exits. I didn't notice any wipedowns in between trains, but they could have rigged the virtual queue system so the wipedowns occurred during an unavailable time. Holiday World was having at least one empty row between parties except on Thunderbird, where they loaded every row.

The virtual queue system worked seamlessly. I walked right onto every ride when my time was called.

Nice! Were they running more than 1 train? Did you enjoy Voyage more this visit vs previous?

All of the coasters were running one train, but that may have been because of the bad weather. The park was really empty.

I thought Voyage was running just as good this year as it was last year for HoliWood Nights.

I was at the park a few weekends ago (on a Saturday), and they were running 2 trains on both Voyage and Thunderbird. Just one train on Raven/Legend. I can also attest to the park running the virtual lines about as well as one could really ask for. Towards the end of the day, as the crowd died down, most of the staff were letting people enter the rides even before the timer on the ride reservations was fully elapsed, which was pretty cool.

I was there on the 4th of July. Easily the busiest day they've had since they opened. There was around 15,000 people there. They didn't use virtual queues in the waterpark. They do plan on using it on the major water attractions soon. They're trying their best to encourage guests to social distance, but no one listens or cares. They're having trouble staffing the park. Raven and Legend only have enough staff for one train ops. They're still hiring and training lifeguards. 4 of their water attractions were closed. They were using the lazy river to train staff most of the day, but it did open later. Cheetah Chase is really fun and focuses on speed, but is third best water coaster in the park. I was able to score a night ride on Voyage and it was running unbelievable and absolutely out of control.

They've definitely got some kinks to work out on busier days. My advice to everyone, avoid Saturday's and go any other day. That will be the only day of the week they're busy. Crowds have been really light this year besides the 4th. They've closed the park early due to low attendance at least 2 days I know of. They're gonna ride out the rest of the summer hoping the waterpark draws better crowds and cut their losses and close September 27th.

I mentioned this in the Kentucky Kingdom thread, but I can't say that I'd recommend a visit to Holiday World this season.

With the face masks / coverings being "recommended", I'd say we maybe saw 4-5 groups actually wearing a mask while we were there (on July 4 no less). If it weren't for most crowds being in the water park, we would have left immediately.

We were able to get the four coasters done within a couple of hours, but the lack of distancing on top of no one wearing masks was all-around awful.

The only silver-lining was that the virtual queuing worked really well - and we were able to "wait" for most of the rides while we were waiting to board after we were scanned in at the beginning of the queues. Just seems like a waste without a mandatary face covering policy.

That's totally up to you. You knew going in that mask weren't mandatory so what did you think was going to happen? I've said this elsewhere but if you are truly worried about catching the virus, it's probably best not to go to an amusement park right now, even one with a mask requirement. I do agree if they have one they should be enforcing it but that isn't the case here.

Anyway, it sounds people are really getting into the virtual queuing thing. I hope one of the positives that comes out of this is that it becomes more common place. If some park out in the middle of nowhere can do it, then others can too! (Still a regular standby line would be nice to have too.)

That's totally up to you. You knew going in that mask weren't mandatory so what did you think was going to happen? I've said this elsewhere but if you are truly worried about catching the virus, it's probably best not to go to an amusement park right now, even one with a mask requirement. I do agree if they have one they should be enforcing it but that isn't the case here.

In all honesty - I thought there would be a 50-50 face covering crowd (similar to a grocery store that doesn't require them). I understand the risk involved - just wanted to share what I experienced in case others are on the fence - or had experienced other parks that do require them and thought it may not be as bad.

I mentioned this in the Kentucky Kingdom thread, but I can't say that I'd recommend a visit to Holiday World this season.

 

With the face masks / coverings being "recommended", I'd say we maybe saw 4-5 groups actually wearing a mask while we were there (on July 4 no less). If it weren't for most crowds being in the water park, we would have left immediately.

 

We were able to get the four coasters done within a couple of hours, but the lack of distancing on top of no one wearing masks was all-around awful.

 

The only silver-lining was that the virtual queuing worked really well - and we were able to "wait" for most of the rides while we were waiting to board after we were scanned in at the beginning of the queues. Just seems like a waste without a mandatary face covering policy.

I didn't have a problem distancing from others because of how well the virtual queue system worked. And what I've seen at other parks seemed to hold true at Holiday World as well, if guests saw me in a mask, they tended to give me some distance.

I unfortunately had a similar experience at Holiday World today, to the point where some guy was literally breathing on my neck and I had to turn around and politely ask him to give us some space. I was frankly shocked at how little most people seemed to care about distancing...or any other kind of etiquette.

Regardless, I had a super fun day introducing my 21-month-old nephew to amusement rides! He’s definitely a thrill junkie in the making!

While I was at guest relations Saturday, I witnessed a family of like 4 or 5 walk right through the middle of a line of people without saying excuse me or anything. Some girl in the line said something to them and told them they’re supposed to be social distancing and the mom of the group turned around and told the girl who said something to “shut the hell up about that nonsense”.

On another note, if you do go on a Saturday, get there early before opening. It’s not a free for all at the front gate and security anymore. They only let one group at a time at each metal detector and admissions gate. So it take a while to fish through all of that. The line to get in was over an hour long at noon on Saturday.

The line to get in was over an hour long at noon on Saturday.

Should have put that on InLine and hand out wristbands as you pull into the lots.

While I'd like to visit for the first time since ~2014 I just don't think I would feel comfortable or have that great of an experience. Maybe another year, Holiday World!

Was at the park today, again. For the park, I’m really glad to see attendance up. They’re really getting good at operating with the procedures they have in place. Security checks and admissions moves much faster today. Waterpark is fully operational outside of Kima Bay. Staffing is still an issue. Not all Food Stands are open. Raven and Legend only running with one train and two person crews. My gut feeling is there won’t be two train operation on either ride all year.

Really took advantage of inline reservation today. Grabbed some fudge and sat in air conditioning while waiting for The Legend. Checked in line for The Voyage right after I scanned for Legend and basically waited in two lines at once, since the actual queue of Legend was moving slow with one train. When I got off Legend, my 25 min wait for Voyage was over and with 2 trains there, I walked right on to the ride. Also grabbed a quick lunch while waiting 40 mins for Thunderbird.

Last time I was there, I had a hotel in Jasper. I left around 3 to go check in. We left to come back to the park at 7 and there was an hour wait for Thunderbird and I reserved a spot as we left. Drove 30 mins back to the park and by the time we got there and walked back to Thunderbird, it was time to ride. Also checked right into Voyage as we checked in for Thunderbird that night as that line was an hour long too. I was able to secure a night ride while also grabbing some dippin dots and sitting at a bench waiting for 30 mins.

I’m really starting to see why a lot of people in the industry thing virtual queuing is the future. It’s a much more productive way of managing your time and securing the rides you want to ride. If only the majority of the gp were more accepting of new technology..

I’m really starting to see why a lot of people in the industry thing virtual queuing is the future. It’s a much more productive way of managing your time and securing the rides you want to ride. If only the majority of the go were more accepting of new technology..

I have not been to a park with a full on/majority virtual queuing system. Just the occasional fast pass at Disney... I really hope it is the future though. Glad it's at HW. Six Flags sent out a survey about it a few weeks ago, I really hope they look into it beyond the survey

Screenshots from six flags apps this week suggest virtual flash passes and skip the line passes are coming. Seems they have a virtual queue system ready to go sometime soon.

Any idea how crowded the waterpark was? I'm going to HW in a little over a week, and would like to check out the waterpark, but I'm worried about social distancing (or lack of it).

Waterpark was less crowded yesterday. Longest wait was 30 mins for Cheetah Chase. Mammoth and Wildebeest were both 15 mins. There’s enough room in the lines to social distance as long as other people are trying to do so as well. I found that if you make it known you’re trying to social distance, people tend to respect that and give you your space for the most part. There was enough room in the wave pool and lazy river to social distance. My group floated in the lazy river with 2 extra rafts to help distance are selfs from other people when we felt like we were getting too close. We made sure there were enough rafts floating around before we did that. If there hadn’t been, we wouldn’t have gotten in.

Waterpark was less crowded yesterday. Longest wait was 30 mins for Cheetah Chase. Mammoth and Wildebeest were both 15 mins. There’s enough room in the lines to social distance as long as other people are trying to do so as well. I found that if you make it known you’re trying to social distance, people tend to respect that and give you your space for the most part. There was enough room in the wave pool and lazy river to social distance. My group floated in the lazy river with 2 extra rafts to help distance are selfs from other people when we felt like we were getting too close. We made sure there were enough rafts floating around before we did that. If there hadn’t been, we wouldn’t have gotten in.

They board by the group. There are no single riders or boarding 2 separate groups in the same raft. In the dry park, your seated by the group on the coasters and then they separate the groups by a row. Thunderbird is the only ride running at full capacity because each row is at least 6 feet apart. The only thing different they do would be not allowing single riders to ride together in the same row. They also assign seats at each coaster. Boarding by groups is how they do it on all their attractions and then they socially distance you from the other groups. Honestly I like their way how they’re running ride operations better than most parks are doing it. The only down fall is it’s causing them to allocate staff in places they wouldn’t normally do it. I personally think it would be better for them to block off rows on Raven and Legend so they can pull the person assigning rows up to check restraints and be able to run 2 trains and decrease the wait for those rides.

Do you think Holiday World will add anything for the 2021 season it will be there 75th anniversy

I think they'll add more operating days and hours. That's about it.