USA 04/19 – Six Flags New England

Day 5 – Six Flags New England

Continuing on from things not being how they were expected, this park is in a very unassuming location in a field past some houses. Reminded me of a more European setup.
Similar to Busch, it was raining on arrival and we joined about 10 other cars in a mostly empty car park.
A tram took us from there up to the bridge over to the entrance. A local man on board made the statement – “Monday, rain, no liiiiines.”
Good.

Narrowly avoided taking a guest survey, got a warm welcome and headed into the park. Didn’t seem to be any need to rush, so decided to use the hit things as they physically appear in front of you approach.

Started strong on the smallest ride with a confused but friendly operator. Probably his only customers all day.

Pandemonium was decent, if a little wet. Finally found a Gerstlauer spinner that actually knows how to spin. Taken me long enough.

From there we hit the main event, after the usual locker faff.

Wicked Cyclone was stupidly good. Again I hadn’t really entertained the notion of any of these RMCs having themes, but it was nice to see some Strom Chasing equipment in the queue and hear the station audio talking about weather reports.

The ride itself felt like a really strong mixed bag of elements. After an amazing first drop, inversions and intense air time hit you almost alternately in parts while it hauls its way through the structure, so you’re never quite sure what’s coming next. Many of the hills have a lot of variation in banking which make for a great deal of fun and it has that double hump element they do very well which fools you every time.

We were allowed to stay on in the back seats for 3 rides in a row before moving on, as the station was completely empty. Loved it.

Boomerang was down all day. What a pity, never mind.

Giant Inverted Boomerang was also down all day. Seems to be missing a train. That’s 1/3 success I’ve had on these beasts.

Thunderbolt went down as we entered the air gates. This again.
Turns out it was nervous new staff who had seen some sparks on the ride and called a friendly engineer who watched it go round again to reassure them that nothing was actually wrong before reopening.

It rode alright, it did a few things. Very forgettable though.

Time for the supposed world’s best coaster as of 20 years ago.

Didn’t know it had weird trains with stadium seating, these ain’t the T-bars I know and love.
Didn’t know some of these Intamin Hypers were chain lift, this ain’t the cable I know and love.

It had some airtime, but not a patch on something like Expedition Geforce. The layout is even more drawn out with extra corners and very large manoeuvres that don’t really do much and the last 2 hills feel like a bit of a bonus rather than the focus of what the ride is trying to do, so it doesn’t quite fit into their category of ‘airtime machine’. Which suits some people I guess, just not me.

Wasn’t anything special to me unfortunately. Wouldn’t call it any more significant than the B&M hypers of the previous few days. I’d try and make excuses for the ride about the fact that it was cold, wet and had empty trains but, you know, Wicked Cyclone.

The wild mouse nearby wasn’t ready for us so we hit the 2nd of these Tivolis in 2 days. +1.

Followed by the 2nd of these S&S Freespins in 2 days. This one was even less intense again, pretty much failing to flip at all, resulting in an altogether different experience that was a lot more comfortable and still quite fun.

Another forgettable B&M floorless. Shorter and more to the point, but nothing different or particularly exciting about it.

Looks nice though.

SLC with vest restraints. Could have been worse. Noticed some guests taking rerides of it. Good on them.

The mouse was open by the time we got back round to it, so park complete for what was running. All taken at a rather leisurely pace.

Went for some lunch, at which point we heard a parkwide announcement. “Due to poor weather conditions, we will be closing the rides at 16:00 today” (instead of the scheduled 19:00).
That’s not ideal, but fair enough we thought. It’s been quiet enough for us to get everything done with time to spare, and probably the same for everyone else in the park. Still got time for a picture lap and an hour with the RMC to close the day off nicely.

So we almost liked a Six Flags park.

Took some pictures as planned and headed over to Wicked Cyclone at 15:15. Paid for a locker before running round to the entrance, just out of pure excitement of what was to come. A member of staff was there, with the entrance chained off.
“The ride’s closed lads.”
“But, why? It was meant to be 4pm.”
“Yeah well…” Quote of the day – “gotta clear the area.”
“Right…”

Went back to the lockers and promptly left the park.

This was such a disappointing move by the park/him and completely soured the whole day and park experience. The ‘area’ was completely deserted other than in the station, and the ride continued to run with a small group of people on it for the entire time we were walking out of the park, getting into the car and driving away (so until 4pm like they claimed).
We could have been on that train enjoying the ride as well, but were denied 45 minutes (+3 hours) earlier than advertised. That’s what I like to call ‘pulling a Phantasialand.’
There’s just no decent explanation for it other than it being a written rule that Six Flags have to be a dick to you at some point during your day, otherwise they aren’t doing their job properly.

It was a shame that the survey people weren’t still at the entrance to receive the good news as we left the park, but we did get one to fill out by email a few days later. That was fun.

Oh well, better parks to come.

Day 6