Today we drove from Massachusetts to Tennessee, a drive time of nearly 12 hours, despite what you’d imagine though we had a great time. 2 best friends chatting about anything and everything, eating the many snacks that littered the car and blasting K-pop, that’s a pretty good time to me.
This 12 hour drive also forever hardened us, what’s a 6 hour drive to a park when you’ve driven 12 to Dollywood?
Upon arriving in Pigeon Forge I was instantly buzzing, I know some find these so called tourist traps tacky but to me Pigeon Forge was alive and bursting with energy. Though we only scratched the surface of what the place offered it felt amazing knowing that there was always something happening and something to do.
To increase my excitement, when I turned on the TV in the hotel it started on a channel about all the things to do in Pigeon Forge and I was presented with a friendly Southern man unironically telling me not to feed the bears for everyone’s safety.
Day 8
Dollywood
Pre Lightning Rod, Dollywood looked to be a beautiful park to visit, in a beautiful setting, with a solid coaster line up. The kind of place you know you need to visit one day and know you’ll realy enjoy it. Then they added the Rod and everything changed. The park and that coaster became unmissable.
It was dark we when arrived in Pigeon Forge last night, so just imagine our reaction on the 10 minute drive from our hotel to the park. Pigeon Forge and the Smoky Mountains are stunning and the perfect setting for a park.
We pulled into the car park still in awe of our surroundings and soon found ourselves on the tram to the park entrance. The tram itself was such a nice experience and I couldn’t think of a better introduction to Dollywood. I’d never felt more welcomed to a park than how the staff running that tram made me feel. We haven’t even entered yet and I already love Dollywood.
Lightning Rod
I struggle to think of a recent coaster that’s hit the scene with as much impact as Lightning Rod.
When announced it set the scene on fire, once opened it instantly became a legend and even bested the immense hype during it’s contruction to become the favourite coaster of many. Then the rod had it’s imfamous period of unrealibility but this only helped to build a character for the brand new coaster.
I was desperate to ride Lightning Rod from the moment I knew of it’s existance, long before I knew how awesome RMCs were. Did it live up to my very high expections then?
Not quite but I’m not at all disappointed.
The Rod’s launch lift is unlike anything else in the World, it’s ridiculous but fantastic. Dolly’s humps don’t deliver airtime as strong as I was expecting but they are still very enjoyable. Lightning Rod’s main drop ejects you and pins you to the restraint the whole way down, stealing Wildfire’s best feature. Then you hit the pot hole at the bottom of the drop, more character on show from the Rod.
From here until the quad down things are really good fun but in my opinion nothing mindblowing. If you’ve ridden other decent RMC creations then the middle section of LR probably isn’t going to blow you away.
Then the quad down happens and Christ do things turn intense suddenly. From the moment you hit the first part of the quad down, until the turn into the brakes things get serious. The ejector air starts vicious but keeps getting stronger until the speed hill under the brake run tries to break your legs it ejects you so hard.
Finally you hit the brakes at what feels like 50 mph, just after things have gotten insanely good. The Rod is a short ride as it is, so it’s a bit of a tease that things end this way. Would keeping the coaster going have led to it’s ending being weaker though? It’s possible.
After 20 laps over 2 days I ended up ranking Lightning Rod just below Wicked Cyclone and that’s far from a bad place to be.
Praise must and will be given to awesome ride team that were in charge of the Rod during our 2 days at the park. They were extremely friendly and sounded genuinely interested during our conversations with them. Wonderful bunch of people making a fantastic coaster just that little bit more special.
It’s now I need to mention that just walking around Dollywood is a pleasant experience. The sights and smells at almost every turn really help take you to a place and time I’ve never been before but wish I never had to leave. On route to Blazing Fury I remember stopping mid sentence and shouting “oh my God, they have eagles”, before running off to get a closer look.
Blazing Fury
Blazing Fury, the park’s legendary dark ride/coaster hybrid was great fun. The dark ride sections were charming and the surprise drop had more ejector than Superman.
This coaster was a lot better than I was expecting it to be, it was smooth, it had a fun layout but it’s still just an Arrow Looper though. More enjoyable than the actual coaster was a man behind us making really loud comments throughout the entire layout. With my favourite being, “here comes the WORST PART”, just as we started to descend the drop.
Wild Eagle was my first B&M Wing coaster that understood how to properly use the hardware. Soaring through beautiful scenary and elegant drawn out inversions with the Eagle just felt right and made for a fantastic experience.
The operator of the Eagle needs a mention too, I can’t think of another time the operator of a coaster has started a meaningful conversion with us.
Next up was FireChaser Express, Dollywood’s Gerstlauer family coaster and my God was it awesome.
Don’t you dare look at this coaster’s stats and judge it poorly because I’m telling you now it’s much more enjoyable than coasters double it’s height and speed. This little beast has everything, launches, airtime, a backwards section, amazing theming (including real fire) and a stunning location.
We rode this thing countless times over our 2 days in the park and it never stopped impressing me.
On route to Mystery Mine we discovered some empty rocking chairs overlooking a beautiful fountain. More so out of curiosity than anything else we decided to take a seat. This few minutes of bliss allowed us to fully comprehend just how lovely Dollywood is in so many ways.
While we rocked and an employee with a banjo played a tune to the couple sitting near us, me and Heartline both had the same thought, Dollywood might be our new favourite park.
I’d been interested in checking out Mystery Mine for a long time and this heavily themed Gerstlauer Eurofighter didn’t disappoint.
While it’s fair to say the coaster rides strange and jerky in places thanks to being an early example of the Eurofighter, I found these flaws quite endearing and amusing. That said it’s the extremely high levels of theming that really make Mystery Mine a must ride. Oh, and the soundtrack.
Next up was the park’s Funtime drop tower, these guys make some of the best tower rides out there and this one, named Drop Line, was equally awesome.
Whistle Punk Chaser
Ticked off the park’s kiddy cred next, there was no strange looks or comments by the operator though, he was far too friendly and content for any of that crap. I forgot to take a picture but believe me when I say this tiny coaster looked fantastic, possibly the best themed kiddy coaster I’ve ever seen.
Thunderhead
Would all the powers of Dollywood make this GCI creation a suprise hit?
Not quite, it’s still quite a fun coaster though, if a little forgettable. I’d have happily kept riding it if wasn’t for the fact it was quite rough and started to give me a headache.
Next we went to try Dollywood’s famous cinnamon bread. I’d read everyone online raving about it but I always thought nah, it can’t be that good, oh it was.
Special mention to the staff in the shop, who despite working flat out to meet demand were incredibly friendly.
We spent the next 20 minutes in rocking chairs, tearing into our cinnamon bread, getting dangerously sticky hands and watching the Rod in the distance, if that doesn’t sound appealing to you then we can’t be friends.
After letting the bread settle and washing our hands, we stumbled onto Barnstormer, the park’s Screamin’ Swing. These rides are always great fun and Dollywood’s example, to no surprise, was heavily themed.
With that we’d done everything we wanted, including many re-rides, so we opted to spend the rest of the day with the Rod, absolutely content that we’d be back again tomorrow to do it all again.
Day 9
Not wanting to spoil it and have too much of a beautiful thing, we decided to start today by checking out a few +1s located in Pigeon Forge.
First up was the Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster, my first ever alpine coaster, I loved it.
The never ending lift past beautiful scenary made me feel quite emotional actually. This didn’t last long though and I was soon flying back down the mountain at full speed. It was pretty intense actually, mostly because you’re fully aware you’re sitting on a small plastic tray hurtling down a mountain.
Next we went to Island in Pigeon Forge to tick off their SBF spinner, was too easy, next.
Following that we headed to NASCAR SpeedPark to try to ride their Zierer Force but it wasn’t to be. We walked in and up to the desk, “is the coaster open today?”, the women gave a slight look of disgust before replying with, “no”.
Finally we stopped off at Rocky Top Mountain Coaster, another alpine coaster, this time right outside of Dollywood.
Whereas Smoky Mountain was 1 massive lift and 1 long descent, Rocky Top was several lifts and much smaller decents, this made for a slightly weird experience but it was different enough from Smoky to avoid repetition and still good fun.
The views were equally as stunning as before but my favourite moment was when I was climbing one of the lifts and an announcement played saying the bears were coming. Is this a genuine warning I need to take notice of or a joke? I seriously don’t know and I need to get off this slow ass lift and lay down some power just in case.
Dollywood Again
I’ll take you on a mostly photo only tour of how we experienced our second day at this wonderful park.
Now back at the start of the park, we got some drinks and snacks before deciding to ride the train, this was a genius idea.
Dollywood’s train isn’t your normal theme park train, this was a full size steam locomotive and it took you on a seriously long route around and outside of the park. This was far better than your normal 5 minute sit down on a park train. The staff were fantastic yet again and the train seriously felt alive as she shot embers everywhere and scared children with her whistle every 2 minutes. Everything at Dollywood is above and beyond, it’s wonderful.
With that, all there was left to do was ride Lightning Rod until we had to leave. The perfect way to end 2 incredible days at one of the greatest parks in the World.
It surprised me (and ultimately gave me a cold), just how different the climates can be between states in the US. 4 park days of mid 20s and mostly sunshine would quickly change to early 10s and moderate rain on and off all day, just by driving 4 hours north from New Jersey to Massachusetts.
We were a little worried as we got to the park, it was cold, it was raining, the car park was deserted and this was Six Flags. Luckily though while we parked we noticed that the tram that takes guests from the car park to the park entrance was approaching.
Things were already off to a much more pleasant start than Great Adventure. The friendly tram driver amused us, the staff at the entrance were very welcoming and everything looked in much better condition.
Another reason things were going to be much more pleasant than Great Adventure is the park was deserted, which meant unlike yesterday, we’d get to go at our own pace, instead of running around and getting stressed about re-rides.
I made this statement just after we arrived, “it’s awesome that they’ve got everything open, I wouldn’t be surprised if they reduced opening hours though, which I completely understand and we’d have easily done everything as many times as we’d like with these crowds, so no big deal.” Oh how Six Flags would make me eat those words but that’s for later…
Great Chase
First up was the park’s E&F kiddy coaster. How come Six Flags let adults ride these and Cedar Fair don’t? Either way, another plus for Six Flags New England.
Much like Twisted Timbers, Wicked Cyclone on paper acts as a back up attraction beneath a monster Intamin. Also like Twisted Timbers, Wicked Cyclone blows the park’s so called icon coaster away at each and every turn.
I have to mention the coaster’s colour scheme first, RMC’s seem to always auto default to unpainted wood supports and dark red track, which looks awesome, but Wicked Cyclone wanted to stand out and it really does with gun metal grey supports and striking orange track.
Then there’s the theming, which I wasn’t expecting from Six Flags. Themed signs, storm chasing vehicles and equipment in the queue and weather alert videos in the station. This all helps to make Wicked Cyclone stand out a bit more than just another kick ass RMC.
And it really does kick ass…
Wicked Cyclone starts with a straight not far from vertical first drop which provides awesome ejector but from there I’ve no chance of explaining the order of the madness that happens next. The best I can offer is, it’s a long ride with a perfect mix of ejector air and inversions, with very little way of knowing what’s going to happen next thanks to the coaster diving in and out of the structure.
While I slightly prefer Twisted Timbers, because it was has stronger airtime moments, I could completely understand someone saying they prefer Wicked Cyclone.
I was 2 “proper” RMCs down and I was already struggling to rank them, yeah the RMC hype is still real, apart from Wildfire of course…
The very friendly ride team allowed us stay in the back row for 3 rides back to back, I had insisted to Heartline that we got 3 in the morning because I regretted not doing the same with El Toro yesterday. This plan would end up being a very good one…
1940’s woodie but she ain’t no Comet, fun enough though. What I did enjoy strangely, was watching engineering reassuring the newly hired ride staff that it wasn’t an issue after they noticed sparks from the coaster’s oldschool friction brakes.
A coaster that’s intriged me for a few years now, not because of what it is but because of how it’s ranked so highly by so many, despite, in my opinion, it looking undeserving of praise that high. Maybe I’m wrong though, let’s find out.
I’m sad to say though Superman didn’t do much for me and is in my opinion not a patch on Expedition GeForce or Walibi’s Goliath. I’d rank it about the same as I rank Thunder Dolphin, a quality coaster that doesn’t really ride like an Intamin Hyper should. In my mind, with GeForce being the benchmark, Intamin Hypers should be all about the airtime and all moments that aren’t airtime are moments wasted. GeForce has some of these dead spots, Goliath has more, Dolphin and Superman are more dead spots than anything else.
Also, probably because of a previous accident on another Six Flags Intamin Hyper, Superman has big clunky lap bars that kill the few moments of airtime that could have been really good if they were the standard T-bars.
While taking photos after our 2 laps of Superman, a parkwide announcement went out informing guests that due to inclement weather conditions rides would close today at 4pm, instead of the original 7pm. No issue, predicted it, was prepared for it, thanks for letting us know.
Catwoman’s Whip
Next up was the park’s Tivoli coaster, it felt nice riding this knowing we had plenty of time left for re-rides on Wicked Cyclone.
So with the mouse done and those closed, we had completed the park, with re-rides, with plenty of time to spare before our final hour with Wicked Cyclone.
We went on a picture lap of the park, which produced some of the lovely photos you are seeing now and we went for some lunch, which produced awful pizza that I’m still regretting now. We also went on a search for some decent merch but to no avail.
Buzzing with excitement we hired a locker and ran to the entrance of Wicked Cyclone at about 3pm. On route we noticed a man was standing at the entrance and the chain was across. Oh no, Six Flags New England you were doing so well, please tell me this isn’t what it looks like…
The man, a member of security, spoke to us as if he knew everything he was saying was wrong on many levels, his voice broke and he looked everywhere but in our direction.
“Ride’s closed.” “What do you mean? The announcement said rides will now close at 4pm.” He looks around looking nervous. “Yeah… well… we’ve gotta clear the area…” “So we can’t go on the ride?” Bear in mind the coaster is still cycling laps with the same people on, with loads of free seats. “No…”
What an utterly crushing and disappointing way to end the day. Me and Heartline were defending the park’s decision to close early, enjoying our day at the park, saying how nice all the staff were, now because of this crap everything was soured. We planned around the new closing time, which we understood the reasoning for, in order to get a last hour with Cyclone but now it’s closed another hour earlier and we’re leaving in disgust.
As we left the coaster continued to cycle with the same people, the same empty seats we should have been in, right until we assume park close at 4pm.
Heartline was right, you can never have a properly good day at a Six Flags or Cedar Fair park, they will always do something to ruin it for you…
Thanks for reading, click here for my next report, where we visit one of the best parks in the World, Dollywood.
My first Six Flags experience and immediately things were not quite what I was expecting. I had assumed with this being one of the chain’s most invested in and visited parks that it would at very least be presentable but no. It turns out the mighty El Toro and Kingda Ka are located in a park that at times resembles a scrapyard.
All we could do was laugh out loud as we pulled into the car park to see several fading coasters crudely plonked right on the tarmac, seperated from us with rusty barbwire fences.
The entrance plaza was a complete shambles too, people everywhere, in all sorts of queues, none of them moving, not the best of starts this.
Once we finally got in we ran to El Toro, observing yet more decay on route.
El Toro
Let me start by saying I absolutely love Intamin prefabs and love what the prefabricated style allows Intamin to do with their wooden coasters. Of course by this I’m referring to their ability to feature insanely strong moments of ejector air.
T Express, another Intamin prefab, was my favourite wooden coaster before coming face to face with the bull, but there’s no doubt El Toro is everthing T Express is and then some and some more.
Both coasters feature insanely violent first drops that eject you in a terrifying manner, both coasters feature a first air time hill that ejects you into orbit and pins you to the restraint for what feels like a lifetime. It’s from here on out though that the monsters go in separate directions. T Express scales thing back a bit, while the bull is only just getting started.
“You really liked that first air time hill didn’t you? How about another but this time it’s even more forceful?” That’s what the bull asks you and before you have time to answer once again you are violently thrown into your restraint.
Slight time to catch your breath during the turnaround and a nice pop of air over a speed hill up next. Have things finally calmed down?
Nope, next up is the single strongest moment of ejector on El Toro, on the coaster’s famous Rolling Thunder hill. Hands down the strongest ejector air on a wooden coaster and if wasn’t for Skyrush probably the strongest ejector on Earth.
Following this brutality you enter what’s known as the bucking bronco, several low to the ground high speed turns that provide crazy laterals and a real out of control feeling. This is a perfect ending to El Toro for 2 reasons. Firstly it’s something very different from what came before but with the same level of intensity. Secondly during the bucking bronco El Toro rides much more like a genuine woodie compared to the ultra smoothness prefabs are known for. Whether intentional or not everything suddenly getting out of control and a little less smooth is in my opinon a really fun way to end the coaster.
I knew after just one lap that El Toro was my new favourite wooden coaster but I’d only come to love and respect it more with each and every lap after.
As the queue was short and this was an Intamin I convinced Heartline to let us do 2 laps back to back to start the day, which was a struggle on legs already wounded by Skyrush.
Was I honestly excited to experience the tallest coaster in the World? No. Having ridden and been bored by 3 smaller clones, I knew that Ka was going to be a one and done and offer very little to me. In truth though it offered even less.
Kingda Ka, at least when we visited, had absolutely no atmosphere and no hype at all around it. We strolled through an empty queue playing techno music, walked straight into a plain looking station, boarded the tallest coaster in the World without as much as one announcement letting us know that and then we were off. A coaster like this should be all about the spectacle but it just felt sad and unloved.
I was never going to love Ka but I’d have loved to have seen staff bigging up the stats and getting people hyped up, guests freaking out, just anything, but no, we’ll all board in silence and then have casual conversations while waiting for the launch, awesome…
My 4th B&M Flyer and the 2nd worst, the coaster might as well have ended after the always fantastic pretzel loop.
Superman was in a right state too, the queue decorations and track were faded away to almost nothing and the station exit path takes you into the car park surrounded by the previously mentioned rusting barbwire…
Heartline, a B&M Stand Up veteran, instructed me on how to best survive one of these awful contraptions, to his credit I did walk away mostly intact but it was a miserable time all around. Togo made stand ups that were really enjoyable, B&M and Intamin created torture devices, who let that happen?
The best part of the whole experience was an incident that occured in the station. We got to the air gates with plenty of empty seats left on the ride, the ride host shouts at the operator, “open the gates man we’ve got some riders!”, the operator with fear in his voice then responded, “I can’t open the gates!”. Probably not funny to you, never gets old to me.
Hilarious statements continued over lunch as we witnessed a man in disbelief loudly proclaiming, “I don’t like rides!” to his friends while sitting on a bench outside the World’s best wooden roller coaster…
Runaway Mine Train
Next up was the park’s Arrow Mine Train, which I managed to completely forget the second we hit the end brakes and wasps happened. What I’ll never forget though was Heartline’s disgust at the coaster’s exit path, which was completely blocked by many large people all glaring at us as we attempted to get past.
Bizarro
It’s been a couple of days, how about another boring, slightly rough B&M floorless? Sure, but do you have one that’s faded and neglected? This is Six Flags Great Adventure sir, of course we do! Nice…
Even if the coaster itself was awful, which it isn’t, I’d have still walked away with a huge smile on my face because it’s Skull freaking Mountain. I’m officially a member of the cult now.
My 3rd Batman clone, way better than Diavlo, no where near as good as la Fuga. In keeping with the aesthetics of the park the waiting block before the station was covered in litter and sick…
I honestly quite enjoyed Dark Knight, sure it’s just a Wild Mouse in the dark but it’s at least something a little different. Also the theming, while not great was far better than I was expecting from what I’d seen of Six Flags up to that point.
Joker
My first S&S Free Spin outside of Arashi and I was honestly terrified that Joker was going to ride the same, it didn’t. Infact it was pretty boring and I’m not sure how to feel about that. On 1 hand Arashi is one of the scariest and most intense coasters on Earth and I’m never fully ready to experience it but on the other hand it’s sad to see such a watered down coaster when you know what they can be capable of.
The park’s Zierer kiddy cred wasn’t named or labeled on the park map so we assumed it was either closed or for kids only, thankfully though and after some strange looks we were actually able to tick it off.
Harley Quinn Crazy Train
And with the park’s Tivoli knocked off we were finally done and able to spend the little time we had left in the park with the bull.
For reasons unknown time just slipped away like never before at Great Adventure. I found myself asking was it really worth knocking off all the filler for the count over getting more re-rides on El Toro.
Thankfully though I never had to answer that question and we found ourselves back in the lair of the beast with a little under an hour till park close.
Sadly though El Toro was now running 1 train, which meant we only able to get 2 more laps, a total of 4 today, which I’m more than happy with, it’s just a shame after how hard we pushed that it was operations that kept us from more time with the bull.
Our 3rd lap was give or take the same as our morning rides but it was our 4th lap that was truly special. It was properly dark now, there was a chill in the air and as we ascended the lift I was shaking with excitement, full of emotion. El Toro made my select list of coasters that hit me on an emotional level.
Six Flags Great Adventure, if not for the bull would have been a massive disappointment, a park full of fading clones, a neglected and underwhelming icon coaster, an awful stand up coaster and a watered down Free Spin all presented with as little effort as possible.
Thanks for reading, click here for the next part of my report, where we’re asked to clear the area at Six Flags New England.
Hersheypark was a park that I knew little about, which in this case means I knew it was the land of Hershey chocolate and the home to the monster that is known as Skyrush.
And there she is, as viewed from the park’s currently under construction new entrance plaza.
This is what we came for, so we wasted no time in joining the small queue that was formed outside the yet to open main gate. Before we had time to properly comprehend what we were getting ourselves into though, we were up the stairs and into the lair of the beast.
Skyrush as you’ll no doubt know is an Intamin Wing Coaster, the trains are 8 rows long with 4 across seating, with the centre 2 seats riding above the bright yellow track and the left and right seats winged out from the train hanging in mid air. Where these wing coasters become the absolute weapons they are, is in the winged seats. Riding in the centre will offer a much more tamed back experience.
For my first ride on Skyrush I was seated on a centre seat, which as just explained is certainly not the right way to experience it. How was it though?
It was amazing, far more intense, with much more aggressive ejector airtime than I had ever experienced on an Intamin Hyper before, possibly the strongest ejector air I had ever experienced come to think of it.
You’ll never be able to notice it offride but the first drop is angled in such a way that about half way down it you are violently ejected forward into the very minimal restraint. Take it from a man who’s very rarely scared or put off by coasters anymore, this trick is absolutely evil and I love it.
So in the centre seat, you get to experience the evil ejector drop from hell and some of the World’s strongest ejector air over Skyrush’s many regular airtime hills.
That sounds really good, why are saying it’s all about the winged seats? We’ll come back later to find out…
By the way I apologise now for the lack of good photos of Skyrush, as stated earlier the park were constructing their new entrance plaza, thus blocking access to large areas around Skyrush.
Time to dust off the park’s other coasters before another fray with Skyrush.
Sooperdooperlooper
This Schwarzkopf terrain looping coaster was fine, if a little forgettable.
Comet was awesome, a truly fantastic wooden coaster built in the 40’s that offers a better ride than many modern woodies. Crazy airtime, minimal restraints, bags of character, I loved Comet.
Great Bear
Great Bear was an interesting, if ultimately not very impressive B&M Invert. On the plus side it didn’t ride awfully like Alpengeist.
Hershey’s Arrow Mine Train, I’ve got nothing to really say about it.
Wild Mouse
I have to give the park credit for just how damn efficiently they were running their Wild Mouse, even more so because there was no queue at the time. We just strolled into the empty station, boarded a mouse sliding through, got the cred, jumped out the mouse as he slid back through the station. Exactly what you want when you’re dusting off filler.
Wildcat
In yesterday’s report I stated Wicker Man had soured my opinion of GCI, then InvadR wasn’t all that great. So how was Wildcat the company’s first creation?
Lots of corners with not much happening… I was kept amused by laughing at how disgusted Heartline was with the experience. He was always the bigger GCI fan, so watching his stone face as we hit corner after corner was hilarious to me.
I’ve heard a rumour they are going to RMC this? Please.
I do apologise for the lack of photos of the last 3 coasters, I left my phone in the Skyrush lockers.
After getting it back, we visited the park’s Subway, after discoving American Subway kicks some serious freaking ass.
Well this one didn’t…
Can I have a footlong please? No.
Can I have herbs and cheese bread please? No.
Can I have swiss cheese please? No.
Could you toast it please? No.
After probably the worst Subway of my life, we got back to the coasters.
Cocoa Cruiser
Starting strong with the park’s Zamperla kiddy cred.
Lightning Racer
Next up was Lightning Racer, a pair of racing GCIs, that I found to be rather good actually, much better than Wildcat at the very least. Good pops of air, some fun laterals and the always welcome inclusion of racing.
Clone Maurer spinner in a badly themed warehouse, featuring the only large queue of the day, disgusting.
With that unpleasantness out the way though we had ticked off all the available coasters at the park. Fahrenheit, Storm Runner and Sidewinder had not opened today and we had given up hope by now, assuming the park were going to use the excuse, “it’s Springtime in the Park boys, not full season, so suck it”.
We did another lap of the closed coasters however.
Fahrenheit had a train with test dummies in, with a plastic sheet on the floor, so that’s probably a no then.
Sidewinder, a Vekoma Boomerang, was not worth the effort of a deeper assessment…
Storm Runner had a large rabble of people collecting outside and we could see operators in the control tower, this looks promising. We had nothing better to do than ride Skyrush until it quite literally breaks our legs, so let’s join this crowd and see what happens.
About 5 minutes after we joined, the coaster began testing to applause. I’ve always been interested in the complexity of Intamin hydraulic launch coasters, so it was a joy to witness launch after launch. Not that much later, long enough to get sun burnt though, the coaster opened, once again to applause.
Storm Runner
I’m so glad the park managed to get this beast open because it’s awesome, my joint favourite Intamin Accelerator Coaster, with the other being Speed Monster.
Storm Runner, much like Speed Monster, bucks the Accelerator trend in that they do more than just intense launch, top hat, brakes.
The coaster is a great mix of intense and snappy inversions, crazy ejector and insane amounts of positive G.
On leaving the coaster we spoke to a friendly looking member of staff and asked him why Fahrenheit wasn’t running, his reponse caused us to laugh in his face. “It’s too cold”, he tells us, while it’s mid 20s and him and I are both currently violently sunburnt…
After this we had an evening meal, rode the park’s observation tower and rerode all the stuff we liked, minus Skyrush of course, we had a plan for that madness.
And the plan was this, spend the last 90 minutes of the day getting utterly destroyed by it.
To recap, centre seat on Skyrush = strongest ejector air on Earth and easily one of the most intense drops ever created. Finally now though I’ll answer what happens when you take the floor away and sit on the wing, absolute carnage.
Firstly everything gets extra intense, I didn’t expect it at first but just having somewhere to put your feet is a God send when you’re dealing with negative forces this intense. I can’t stress enough the feeling of helplessness Skyrush’s wing seats instill in you, you’ve got no where to put your feet, nothing to hold onto, you’re completely at the mercy of the beast. No matter how many times you’ve ridden it, I’ve no doubt at every air time moment, of which there’s many, you’ll find your hands trying and failing to grab onto something and your legs shooting in all directions in a failed attempt to find something, just anything to stop you from being ejected into orbit.
Secondly and most importantly, Skyrush is designed with countless moments made to absolutely wreck you if you made the poor decision to the sit in the wing seats. What look like harmless banked corners offride, what ride like snappy changes of direction in the centre seats, are designed to violently eject you sideways in the wing seats. It’s absolutely terrifying.
In the right seats, Skyrush is one of the scariest roller coasters on Earth, one of the most intense coasters on Earth and features the BEST ejector air on Earth.
Even after countless rides Skyrush NEVER got predictable, NEVER lost it’s intensity and ALWAYS scared the crap out of me.
With every cell in our bodies screaming no more, we rode Skyrush until it closed, loving every second, screaming every second, this was it guys, I’d been waiting too long to find a coaster like this.
I am in no way exaggerating when I tell you that me and Heartline limped to the car that night but it didn’t matter because we were both grinning like idiots, Skyrush is the good stuff, trust me.
Hersheypark is a lovely park, run by friendly staff, with a great coaster line up, it is also home to one of the finest creations on Earth, a monster they call Skyrush.
Thanks for reading, click here for day 5, Six Flags Great Adventure, the home of the bull.
After an extremely dense but otherwise amazing pancake breakfast, we made our way to the 2nd park of our trip, Busch Gardens Williamsburg.
While maybe not as exciting as it’s Floridian cousin, the Willamsburg park had always really intrigued me, with Alpengeist, Big Bad Wolf, Verbolten, Griffon and Drachen Fire being legends of the coaster World. Enough talk, let’s go explore this beautiful Virginia park.
It was raining to start today, which meant the car park was almost empty and we got to park in the special premium car park for lazy people free of charge.
The crowds really never picked up throughout the day, which lead to a very relaxed day with a healthy ride count.
Grover’s Alpine Express
Due to staggered openings of certain areas of the park, we started things off with the park’s Sesame Street themed Zierer coaster.
We were unsure if we were premitted to ride the coaster, so we slowly slithered our way into the station waiting for any of the ride team to give us any kind of reaction. They didn’t, they didn’t even look at us, thankfully the children already seated in the train welcomed us onto the ride and demanded we joined them in putting our hands up the whole way round, which of course we did.
The morning’s rain reached it’s peak while we waited at the empty airgates but this didn’t deter us from riding in the front row. What followed was a hilarious mix of drowning, riding blind and badly thought out transitions, which combined to create a rather enjoyable, if hard to replicate experience.
After our battle with Nessie, we battled for Eire on the park’s simulator based VR attraction, which was far better than I was expecting.
Firstly you are given the helmet which later becomes the VR headset while you are queuing, this massively reduces faff later on and allows everyone plenty of time to get it adjusted correctly.
Secondly the ride itself is good fun, featuring a charming story that’s nicely enhanced by the VR aspect but unlike other VR attractions, Eire doesn’t push the tech out of it’s comfort zone.
Griffon
Think I’ve said it before but I’ll say it again, Dive Coasters, with the exception of Valkyria, do very little for me. Big drop, long drawn out forceless inverions, end and sadly Griffon is no different, though it does look fantastic.
Alton Towers’ Wicker Man had soured my opinion of the once unstoppable (in my eyes) GCI, InvadR was to be the first of many GCI’s in 2019 that would once again disappoint me.
Now please don’t get me wrong, it’s fine, a good coaster even, it’s just got nothing on the likes of Wodan, Troy, El Toro and most frustratingly Efteling’s Draak. I say Draak because they are the same exact height, almost the same length and both were built to cater to the family audience, sadly though Draak kicks all kinds of ass while InvadR’s fine I suppose.
I was so excited to finally get to ride this legendary B&M Invert.
Much like Volcano from the previous day, I had seen Alpengeist on TV when I was a kid and had dreamed of riding it one day, well today was that day and we all know the saying about never meeting your idols right?
Alpengeist is very good, as almost all Inverts are but it’s nowhere near as impressive as I wanted it to be. The layout doesn’t flow with the vicious intensity that other examples do, leading to several off putting dead spots.
Sadly however the biggest issue with Alpengeist is it’s rough. That awful old school B&M rough that leads to instant headaches in me. There’s every chance I may have warmed up to the coaster’s layout issues if I was able to ride it more but I really didn’t want to spoil the rest of my day at the park with a nasty headache.
Verbolten, the coaster I was not so secretely the most excited for, ended up being my favourite at the park.
This Zierer coaster, built on the old site of the legendary Big Bad Wolf, throws so much at you over it’s 3000 feet of track. A pre launch section long enough to get you nervous, a forceful launch into pitch darkness, airtime and crazy laterals in the dark, special effects, a drop track, another forceful launch, time to take in the surroundings before the big drop, the big drop itself and finishing with a very enjoyable section back to the station.
In parts it’s great, as a package it’s fantastic fun and a breed of coaster I wish we had more of in the World.
I’m stating this now before I upset anyone, B&M Hypers do very little for me personally. I’m not a fan of floater air (I’m all about being ejected) and I get little enjoyment from the so called sensatation of speed these coaster models offer. B&M Hypers also mostly just blend into each other in my head, all featuring a big drop followed by various floater hills before you hit the brakes. I say this now because Apollo was the first of many Hypers on this trip.
Apollo’s Chariot was fun, I enjoyed it, can we please go back to riding Verbolten though?
Thanks to the rain we had managed to ride everything we wanted by lunch time.
After lunch, which was much better than the farce at King Dominion, we went for rerides, before deciding we were satisfied and happy to leave mid afternoon.
Busch Gardens Willamsburg is a lovely park, beautifully themed and landscaped, with a great selection of rides. As amazing as Verbolten is though, it does feel as though the park is missing a truly stand out World class coaster, one that will perfectly compliment the park’s current line up and push the park to an elite level. Wait.. What’s happening in 2021? Oh god, Verbolten I’ll see you soon.
Our logic with leaving the park early when we were done was to get some more night rides on Twisted Timbers, however when we got back to Kings Dominion we were presented with a locked gate and a massive sign saying “closed early for rain”, you’re not telling me they pull this crap in yet another country…
Thanks for reading, click here for the next part of my report, when we visit the awesome Hersheypark.
In April 2019, Me and Heartline went on a tour of the East Coast of America. This was my first time visiting the States and I was extremely excited to finally see for myself if it’s the coaster Mecca I believed it to be.
We had been discussing a plan very similar to what we ended up doing for years, so to see it finally realised was quite special. I know I say it all the time but this is to date my favourite trip I’ve been on, 2 best friends road tripping across the US, riding many amazing roller coasters, for almost 2 weeks, perfection.
Day 1
Our story begins with an American Airlines flight to Philadelphia. This was my first time using the airline and I was rather impressed. Large drinks flowing on the regular, lots of food offered and it was all edible, massive selection of entertainment and friendly staff.
My real first taste of American people was the slightly crazy and over the top women working at the car hire desk. They offered to upgrade us from awfulness to a Mustang but Heartline wasn’t sold, so awfulness it was, we did get the choice of it in red or white though…
After picking her up, we had the best Five Guys of my life and then drove to our hotel in Triangle, Virginia.
Day 2
Kings Dominion
My first taste of the American park scene was to be Kings Dominion, a park I knew rather a lot about thanks to their unique coaster line up.
I had it in my head that most large American parks, mostly those operated by Cedar Fair and Six Flags were going to just be large concrete jungles dominated by steel monsters, but first impressions of King Dominion were rather positive. Areas of the park are nicely landscaped and far more trees than I was expecting were on show.
Intimidator 305 – We decided to start things off with what I’d consider to be the park’s icon coaster, Intimidator 305.
i305 is an Intamin Giga Coaster, one of only 6 Giga Coasters in the World and the best Giga Coaster I’ve ridden, but it’s nothing too special…
Things I like about i305
The first drop. It’s over too fast but it’s intense.
The corner after the first drop. It’s far too intense and caused me to grey out every time but because of that I liked it.
The violent changes in direction. There are few coasters out there that throw you about as viciously as i305, so once again, thumbs up.
The sensation of speed. No not the boring wind in your face making it hard to breath, it’s those brutal changes in direction that make you realise just how fast you are moving.
Things I don’t like about i305
Lack of airtime.
If they had found a way/the budget to have combined the i305 we have with an airtime machine, then it probably would be mentioned in the list of the World’s best coasters, but for now, I respect it, I enjoy it, but I don’t love it.
Flight of Fear – Next up was Flight of Fear, an enclosed Premier launch coaster, I found it to be rather enjoyable. The launch was much more powerful than I was expecting and thanks to the coaster taking place mostly in pitch black, the first half of the coaster felt out of control and really disorientating.
Twisted Timbers – My first RMC conversion, hell let’s just call it my first RMC full stop because Wildfire did little to nothing of what everyone promised me that RMC are famous for. Did Twisted Timbers though? It did… and then some.
Twisted Timbers is freaking fantastic, easily one of the best coasters on the planet and after only 1 lap turned me from an RMC doubter to a cult member.
Stupid amounts of ejector air delivered in insane fashion, perfectly executed but seriously messed up inversions, near perfect pacing and all while I’m laughing until it hurts at just how awesome this coaster is.
Straight into my top 10, where it’s still sitting strong over a year later.
Dominator – I wrongly assumed Dominator, King Dominion’s massive B&M floorless coaster was going to be pretty good and slot in nicely as the park’s 3rd best coaster but no. It’s boring, it’s quite rough, nope nothing at all to excite me here.
Grizzly – Slightly larger but much less exciting woodie now, Grizzly.
Heartline had told me that you can never have a perfect day at a Cedar Fair or Six Flags park and it was while waiting to board Grizzly that this curse struck Kings Dominion, when operations descended into a complete embarrassment.
Guests board the train, bars are locked, then ride team walk up and down the train making sure everyone looks tall enough to ride, if they spot a shorter looking child then they manually unlock them, measure them, argue with the parents, give the child a wristband and finally get them back in the train.
That would be dumb as hell if it happened just the once but it was happening with multiple children on every train and Christ was it frustrating to watch.
My feelings on Grizzly are best summed up by what occured on the brake run. Teens behind shouting that it was the most painful experience of their life and felt like a car wreck, while I’m thinking to myself, I just rode it, but I can’t remember it at all.
Throughout the day we were forced to keep walking past the recently closed forever Volcano The Blast Coaster. This really sucked, especially because it’s a coaster that I used to be obsessed with because I saw it on a TV show about the World’s best coasters when I was a kid.
Racer 75 – From the forgettable Grizzly to another forgettable woodie, this time one I photographed even less, worst of all though it wasn’t even racing…
Back Lot Stunt Coaster – Another Premier launch coaster, this time outside with an attempt at theming and it’s pretty good fun.
With everything knocked off in good time, we were able to spend the evening/night having multiple re-rides on Twisted Timbers. I really couldn’t have even imagined a better way to end the first day of our trip than riding this outstanding coaster as the sun went down around us.
I really enjoyed my day at Kings Dominion but I’m well aware that my opinion of the park is massively boosted by just how amazingly good Twisted Timbers is. If Timbers hadn’t been Twisted and i305 was the park’s best coaster than I know I would have walked away disappointed.
I said I’d be back, so here we are. An attempt at a more relaxed day at Magic Mountain. Priorities: Still need X2 and the kids creds, TC til I bleed.
All started very familiar. The long walk, the security scan, the staring intently at X2 not running while waiting for the gates to open.
Took exactly the same route to find it still wasn’t running. But “it should be open later.” Ok.
Tatsu while we’re up here then? Nope, not open.
Oh good, Ninja again then. S’alright.
Superman is closed for the ‘weather.’ Well isn’t this a strong start. Yes it was a lot quieter, but what good is that when nothing is running?
Gold Rusher – Closed.
Riddler’s Revenge – Closed. Well I’ve achieved nothing but leg pain in the first hour, let’s get some +1s.
#1 Road Runner Express
+1.
#2 Speedy Gonzales Hot Rod Racers
+2.
Canyon Blaster – Closed.
Tried my luck on Magic Flyer – Denied.
Scream! – Closed.
Had a couple of laps on the magnificent beast that is Twisted Colossus to lighten the mood.
Was equal parts pleasant and depressing to walk straight onto Goliath after that 2 hour queue last time. Only ever sat near the back of the train for that drop, think it’s best to keep it that way.
And Full Throttle completes my mostly unsuccessful lap of the park. Wait a minute. I see a 4D coaster going up the lift hill while I’m stuck on the brake run for this. Yes! Let’s go let’s go.
Ran all the way back up the damn hill to hear on approaching the entrance: “X2 is currently experiencing a delay in operations, not sure how long but we recommend you stick around.”
What a tease. Joined the queue anyway, waiting about half an hour at the splitting point with a handful of other guests who all eventually gave up. It could have been some sort of incident rather than technical problems because people came out of the station much, much later, one girl in tears and being consoled by her friends. Then the queue (just me) was cleared – “come back later.” Not the best of signs.
Tatsuuuuuuuuuw was open now and seemed more intense in the front row, so that’s a plus.
This was better on a middle seat and knowing how to prepare a little. Still not great, though I admire the scale of it and how long the layout goes on for.
Preshows were no better knowing how to prepare a little. Stand closer to the door? Everyone else was doing that as well. They clearly all feel the same way.
After that little detour X2 was now open. Again.
#3 X2
Is everybody in? I’m going to stop saying that now. I’d built up that soundtrack way too much in my head and instead the station was in complete silence with zero atmosphere. All I got was confused. Where can I put my glasses? Oh too late now I’m sitting on the ride. Well that’s worrying. Bloke next to me has them on too: “You sure about that?” I ask. “I just bend them round ma head.” “Yeah but these are like the most intense rides ever.” I say with concern. No reply.
To be kind – it’s not very good. The glasses stayed on fine. It lacks the sheer insanity of the other S&S 4D coasters somehow.
Never thought there’d be a deadspot on a ride of this nature but it really crawls through that corner over the station, in the upright position with no rotation, giving you time to think. And I’m not comfortable with that time to think. The best thing about these models usually is having absolutely no idea what’s happening to you from the moment you hit the bottom of the first drop until the brake run. What else in the world can do that to you? And if this can’t, what’s the point?
It’s rough in a different way to what I’d experienced before, repeatedly slamming your calves into the seat towards the end (legs are taking such a battering in this place), instead of throwing you up and out of it in a playful/terrifying manner. The back row of one of the trains was completely closed off, with engineers and perhaps even someone who had been externally called in scratching their heads and lingering between the brake run and the station, taking the brief window of opportunity to have a quick look at the seats and play with the restraints (which were taped down) between dispatches. I said it wasn’t a good sign.
The fire is cool. Can’t help but think it would have been nicer to turn the layout around and have something like that as a spectator moment for offride guests too, rather than in the middle of nowhere. Shame, but set complete.
Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnope.
Noooooo.
No no no.
There we go.
Spent the rest of the day seeing how much more bruising my legs could handle. Only downside to this RMC is a lack of picture opportunities.
And so ends the trip really. Was gonna do Universal but ran out of steam by the last day and couldn’t justify the cost of ~£110 per head for a whopping TWO ‘new to me’ attractions and nothing else exciting. There’s always next time. Cheers for reading.
Summary
New creds – 53 Total parks – 12 B&Ms – 8 (don’t know what else is typically American) Current savings on car parking costs – $221 Best coaster – Twisted Colossus Spites – 8/61 (13.1%)
So here we are, back on resort. Another unnatural 8:30 start at a theme park to beat those crowds, let’s kill it again. This was looking to be a very different task to the other resort gate as I cannot deny the impressive number of attractions I had on my list for the main park, which sounds even better when most of the clones of rides I’ve done in their other resorts weren’t included in the list.
#1 Space Mountain
Powered to Space Mountain where I got another confirmation that something at Tokyo was actually wrong and it wasn’t just me. This one runs properly and it’s amazing. Music? Check. Effects working? Check. So dark you can’t see the track? Check. Hauling arse and actually a decent ride? Check. Sad it stayed busy and never got back on it.
Not a fan of Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage. The way it’s presented makes it quite clear that they’ve slapped another IP on an older ride and not really done much with it other than a few screens and some obnoxious movie quotes. Easy win for 20,000 Leagues.
This looks exciting though. Until it broke down. Turns out it’s a tad temperamental. Grabbed a fastpass while they fixed it and then got stuck outside Toon Town. Didn’t know they did staggered openings here, but this area was roped off for a few more minutes.
#2 Gadget’s Go Coaster
The few minutes was worth it, allowing us to get the +1 with maximum efficiency.
Didn’t particularly need to ride Roger Rabbit. Went to have a look anyway. Also broken.
#3 Matterhorn Bobsleds (Right)
The Bobs are back and they’re good fun. The animatronic yeti slithering out at various moments was rather amusing, as was the tracking of the ride and the way it manouevred itself endlessly downwards in a clunky fashion. Had to ride a bit defensively with a bag in tow but that added to the enjoyment. Didn’t expect the splashdown at the end. Ahead of it’s time.
Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride was new to me. Old school style dark ride crashing through cardboard cutouts at a million miles an hour. Not sure why it was in London, he lives in the countryside doesn’t he? Had a good moment of recklessly driving down a pier which reminded me of Santa Monica the other day.
Couldn’t find the entrance to Alice and the park was starting to get faffy with a million pushchairs in the way at every turn. That’s enough of Fantasyland for now.
#4 Big Thunder Mountain
Ol’ Big Thunder. Can’t go wrong with them really. Good effects on lift 3, good interaction with other trains and lots of other little details. Still tamer than the Paris version. Grabbed a fast pass for Indy before moving on.
Christmas strikes again. Tokyo gives me a sub-par ride cos it was the first week in SEPTEMBER… and now this one is closed so they can get rid of Christmas. Annoying. I want to ride an actual Haunted Mansion.
Well I’ve not come across a Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh that starts outside. This could be different. It has the hilarious Twilight Zone effect when he falls alseep while I wasn’t paying attention. But not a patch on the trackless one. Better than the copy paste one?
Splash Mountain is sponsored by Ziploc here and I got given a ton of free themed bags. Ride wasn’t as fun as I remembered and then the boats were all stacking really early at the end, repeatedly crashing into each other, hard.
Another Disney another Pirates of the Caribbean. Looks like I’ve stopped taking pictures of them. Almost identical to the last, just the bonus Jack animatronic was on the left rather than the right. Obnoxious locals spent the whole ride talking loudly and making dinner plans. It’s fun what you remember.
Jungle Cruise again lacks the spectacle of Hong Kong, but also now the acting talent of the Japanese. At least the non-stop dry humour jokes were kinda funny.
Indiana Jones Adventure was disappointingly not as good as I remember either. Having only done each one once I couldn’t say how different they are or what was off about it other than lack of the hilarious smoke blowing bloke and the ending not getting me at all like it should have.
Found the entrance for Alice in Wonderland. Can this be as good as Blackpool? It’s a hard comparsion, but the latter’s charm of playing the wrong music and having crude characters ride in the car with you cannot be denied. S’alright.
Storybook Land Canal Boats was a thing. You get a live guide, but with little to no enthusiasm.
Think that was everything ticked off except the other side of Matterhorn (+1). Got up to the same place as the first time we tried to ride and it broke down again. This was a more severe one as they instantly cleared the 90 minute queue and gave everyone a free re-entry fast pass on their ticket. I admire that efficiency.
Time killing time then. Waited a ridiculously long amount of time for the low capacity monorail that was only running 1 train and they don’t force people to use as actual transportation (so they don’t ever get off) meaning hardly any seats are ever available. I don’t admire that efficiency.
Downtown Disney still haunts me. Had an Earl of Sandwich cos I remember it being one of the best things about Paris and knew it wouldn’t give me MERS. Didn’t disappoint.
Back on the monorail. Waiting got so bad that there was some form of incident kicking off and staff had to ‘escort’ a guest somewhere. Could have opted to walk back to the park, but when in Rome.
Bobs was back. Had to be that strange person and request the other side, but it worked (#5 Matterhorn Bobsleds (Left)). Yeti on screens on the lift featured more than I remembered the first time and the track was even clunkier.
Fastpassed some other random attractions for a laugh. Had absolutely killed the time management again, Monorail being by far the longest wait, everything else being too easy.
Thought Star Tours would be the same as ever but then Darth Vader rocked up and tried to choke us and Boba Fett was chilling in orbit where his dad died. Don’t remember that before. I have now learnt that there’s loads of sequence combinations you can get including some really new stuff, so it’s always worth a shot if you’re a fan. Crait! I want it now. Might actually get me excited about the ride.
Thought Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters would be the same as ever but then it was.
Baby castle.
Baby castle by night. Not projecting on that are we?
Previously on my trip reports: Normally these shows are pretty special right? A magical moment to end the day, a world class spectacle, lots of big tunes and tears. Disney at it’s finest. What followed was hilarious, but quite possibly the death of Disney. They’ve got the usual song tying it all together about magic and dreams come true and life is a party and all that, but it came across as way too far up its own arse when it’s so specific to a day at this theme park and not just the brand in general. Mickey is titting about as always but the highlights were, in no particular order: low resolution footage direct from the Star Wars simulator, a celebration of the paddle steamer(I lost it hard at this point) and some flat rides no one cares about. The actual highlight? Probably saying ‘Yay, the Pirates of the Carribbean theme’, because it reminded me of Shanghai. No, it was the paddle steamer, that was the defining moment. The moment it couldn’t recover from. There were no fireworks, very few special effects, a couple of pyros and zero interesting graphics which were also steppy and of poor quality. It ended to absolute silence. And then everyone left, probably all thinking ‘where was Let It Go?’
So this was the stage for the evening show that I was becoming skeptical about. Tokyo’s was such a massive disappointment and this looks… different. The staff were claiming it didn’t contain fireworks and the viewing areas (if you hadn’t got a fast pass, for a show? eww) were complicated and restricted at best. We camped out what looked like the best spot for peasants. They used the forcing people to stand method nearer the time, but had staff around doing Disney trivia questions (not nearly international enough for my liking) and giving out stickers so that made the time pass much less painfully. It really was the prime peasant spot until some Mexican kid tried to barge through and nullify our 2 hour patience. The sun’s getting real low.
Well they’ve done it. Words cannot describe how good this was. Not being at the castle allows for a lot more physical events to happen so you’ve got a stage show with hugely elaborate props and sets. The theme here was imagination, and I’ve got one hell of an imagination, so I can relate this time. There’s also the water in front of the stage so lots of awesome water projection an-OH MY GOD THERE’S A 200FT PIRATE SHIP sailing towards us out of the smoke with 50 actors on it doing crazy stunts. It’s got Rapunzel with actual boat and song (I’m allowed to have a favourite princess). It’s got a massive physical dragon and tons of fire. It’s got fireworks (so they knew all their trivia, but didn’t know that). It’s got the damn steamboat we were meant to be ‘celebrating’ in Tokyo and there’s 100 characters on it dancing. I’ll celebrate it here. And I’ve got goosebumps thinking about it now. Best ending show in any park by a significant margin. Faith restored.
Strategically had a Big Thunder booked for just after the show to let the crowds disperse and have a fun little night ride. I like the way this town section lit up at night, but the camera didn’t.
Strategy worked and that was that. Just need Florida now to complete the Disney set. How basic.
My 4th and final visit came in the form of attempting to beat the morning rush. They spited me by changing the designated car park on this day and making me walk further to get into the park. They also must have been spiting me with some sort of hotel guest Exclusive Ride Time on GhostRider because it ALWAYS has a queue – 30 minutes at park opening. Got my back row ride at last with a guy from King’s Island who was disappointingly unphased by my knowledge of his park. I guess ‘What’s in the shed?’ really did make national news.
Slithered over to #1 Timberline Twister (the real reason for the visit?). Until now it had always had too much of a queue to face being turned down from this kiddie ride for height reasons. I generally don’t try my luck if there is a physical sign saying ‘we actually have a written rule here, so not a chance, you strange person’, but after a bit of quick maths this maximum 69″ is almost achievable. I think I’m 70. Managed to get on by trying to look both small and casual at the same time. It was easier to climb into than both Coast Rider and Electric Eel. My first Bradley & Kaye and proud. Park complete.
Goodbye Knott’s. I’ll leave on that happy note.
Time for some sightseeing.
Some sign. Don’t see the fuss.
City looks quite nice though.
Some star. Don’t see the fuss.
Chinese Theatre looks quite nice though.
Captain America texting behind his shield & the bloke from the Hangover loitering with Pennywise. Don’t see the fuss.
That thing looks quite nice though.
Ended up in a Home Depot after this for reasons I forget. Turns out we could have just seen the Hollywood sign from their car park.
Not much to report here. Spent some time in Koreatown checking out the local music shop scene for some Kpop albums I needed, then moved on to here:
Day 10 – Pacific Park
Driving on the wood of the pier was fun. Parking was at a premium and other drivers would seem to have preferred if I ran some pedestrians down over spending any precious seconds giving way.
#1 Santa Monica West Coaster
Storm clouds rolled in to greet us just as I got to the ticket window. Got the standard story about stopping in rain – no refunds, but the card is good any time. Not too much to lose then.
They were seriously thinking about it, but it didn’t rain too hard. Got a couple of wet laps. Uninspired layout of course with the double ended helices of doom. The couple of humps in the middle are decent enough in the back. Job done.
There’s the beach. I believe it’s usually a little busier.
And there’s the sea.
More Knott’s
The rain continued into the evening and I thought I’d chance another quick stint at Knott’s – only 1 lap on the woodie in 2 days had left me wanting more. It was quiet and not particularly wet, but almost everything was closed. Got a very rude response from the staff to a status enquiry at the entrance of Ghostrider.
Hangtime was the only thing running so spent some more time getting acquainted with those nightlight rides. It was suffering as the only work horse of the evening. Broke down twice in an hour, once with me on it. Got to see some engineers scratch their heads and play with the manual block releases while the station roof dripped on my leg for half an hour.
