Author: On A Rail

Road Trip 2014: Day 4

After another short night, we took off for the last of the 2 hour drive to Dollywood. Thankfully it seems the rest of the world had slept in this morning because the roads were mostly clear. Kentucky has great scenery which helped pass the time. By now, driving has gotten pretty old.

Dollywood is already one of my favorite parks so I was excited to be getting back to the park. Dollywood has one of the best blends of theme park elements—great theming, atmosphere, rides, food, and employees. It all feels very genuine. We arrived sufficiently early enough that there weren’t a huge amount of people in the park yet. Their parking lot is about 10 cars wide and a mile and a half long which makes for some difficulties if it’s crowded. Once inside the park we decided to temporarily shelve our morals and buy a paid line jumping pass. This is a great buy at Dollywood, being only $20/person and covering all the major rides in the park.

With our Q2Q unit in hand, we were able to reserve rides on one coaster while riding another one. This made for a day packed full of re-rides that wouldn’t have been possible with today’s crowds. Even at its busiest, Dollywood never has huge queues, but today Thunderhead and Wild Eagle had lines barely out of their stations. Mystery Mine and Firechaser Express however had long queues the entire day, making the Q2Q a necessity.

Firechaser Express is a new for 2014 Gerstlauer family coaster with 2 launches and forwards/backwards elements. In short, the ride dominates this genre with a solid ride that both kids and adults will love. I always appreciate unique rides and this is no exception. The station is an end spur of track—riders launch out and return back in via a switch track. After the initial short launch, a large lift hill leads to a relatively lengthy coaster section with airtime, sweeping drops, and weaving corners. At the middle of the ride, the train stops in a show building full of great effects. To end this section, the train launches backward through an exciting few drops and corners and back into the station. The coaster isn’t going to making any enthusiast top 10 lists, but the ride is pure fun all the way through and themed to a detail level befitting of the park.

Launch out of the station

All of the other coasters were repeats for me, so it was interesting to see how they had changed since last time. Wild Eagle has aged well over a few short years and has not picked up the major vibration other B&M wing coasters have been reported to suffer from. While the layout is a string of standard B&M inversions, the ride still manages to be fun and exciting with plenty of near misses of the supports or surrounding trees. Wild Eagle’s only issue today was slow loading. Tennessee Tornado looks like it should be an uncomfortable ride, though thankfully has remained somehow smooth. It’s a shame Arrow folded before they could make more rides like this one. One train operations didn’t help things on this ride today, resulting in far longer waits than normal. Blazing Fury is still as confusing as ever. Some effects have been updated to mixed results and the ending water splash has been removed due to what I suspect must be maintenance issues. More of Mystery Mine’s effects were working this trip than last trip, though I still noticed quite a few broken or missing elements. In particular, the wall projections heading up the 2nd lift hill make a noticeable difference when they’re not working. The ride itself is a mixed bag depending on how good you are at bracing for impacts. It certainly can’t be described as a smooth ride, though some of the transitions are fun. The ending inversions are weirdly smooth for elements that look like they should be incredibly painful.

One of the coolest ride entry signs.

Thunderhead was the last of the coasters to ride today and I was pleased to see how well the ride was running. While the vibration gets a little more noticeable each trip, the train was flying through the layout today and producing incredible amounts of airtime throughout the entire ride. Thunderhead still has one of the best GCI layouts that not only weaves throughout itself an incredible amount of times, but also feels like it goes on forever. I may need to re-evaluate Thunderhead’s placement in my top 10 after today. When your head is cut off the top of the onride photo, you know the airtime is strong.

While I don’t normally do water rides at parks, we decided to take a spin on both the Mountain Sidewinder and River Battle. Mountain Sidewinder is one of those rides that makes you wonder how it’s still open. Riders are weighed prior to riding and paired up in groups of 4 or 5. Essentially the ride is a glorified water slide on a 5 person toboggan raft careening down what feels like far too fast of a course with far too tight of corners. Amazingly we somehow didn’t flip the raft and ended up having a good time. Surely the days on this ride must be numbered, but I hope it sticks around a little longer. Much more sedate was River Battle, an interactive splash battle ride. While the ride was a blast, we ended up completely soaked and with tired arms from continually shooting the water blasters.

This ride feels amazingly unsafe.

Another great themed ride.

No trip to Dollywood would be complete without food… especially their famous cinnamon bread. The park has an incredible amount of restaurants. Don’t expect to be eating healthy either—this is traditional southern food. Thankfully it’s all excellent and I’m sure I left 7 or 8 pounds heavier than when I arrived.

For the summer, Dollywood is staying open until 10pm and also doing nightly fireworks displays. We managed to catch most of the show from on board Firechaser Express, making for a unique viewing experience. We ended the night on Wild Eagle… a completely pitch black ride save for the onride photo flashes. Dollywood continues to be one of my absolute favorite parks… today certainly didn’t disappoint.

This concludes our parks for this trip! It’s about 3am as I wrap this post up and we’ve just arrived in Athens, GA for our overnight stop. We’ve driven farther in a short amount of time than I’d ever care to do again, but the trip itself was fantastic—especially the new rides I was able to add to the list. If I’m able to find some time I’d like to do some future posts expanding on some of the thoughts and observations from this trip. Until then, here is out final ride list:

Lightning Run (Chance Rides airtime coaster)
Thunder Run (Summers & Dinn wooden coaster)
Banshee (B&M inverted coaster)
Bat (Arrow suspended coaster)
Firehawk (Vekoma flying coaster
Vortex (Arrow multi looping coaster)
Beast (PTC wooden coaster)
Diamondback (B&M hyper coaster)
Backlot Stunt Coaster (Premier launched coaster)
Adventure Express (Arrow mine train)
Racer red (John Allen wooden coaster
Racer blue (John Allen wooden coaster
Teddy Bear (Ralph Stricker wooden coaster)
Tornado (Ralph Stricker wooden coaster)
Wild Eagle (B&M wing coaster)
Firechaser Express (Gerstlauer launched coaster)
Mystery Mine (Gerstlauer Eurofighter)
Thunderhead (GCI wooden coaster)
Tennessee Tornado (Arrow multi looping coaster)
Blazing Fury (indoor coaster)

Road Trip 2014: Day 3

After finally getting a little bit of sleep we got an early start to Kings Island, arriving before the park had opened. Being July 4^th, we expected huge lines and a park packed to the brim full of guests. While that would be the case later in the day, apparently people are less willing to get up for openings than we are. Having last visited in 2007, I had two new coasters to add to the list which we would prioritize—Diamondback is a B&M hyper coaster and the 2^nd to feature the staggered trains. Banshee is a new for 2014 B&M inverted coaster which took records for longest and fastest of the type. Kings Island is one of those large parks filled to the brim with a ton of average coasters. Hopefully these two would give the park the kick it needed.

Following maybe the slowest ‘running of the bulls’ in our park experience, we got to Banshee’s queue entrance to discover lockers are required in lieu of the usual Cedar Fair station bins. This was disappointing since payment was required, though it would be immediately forgiven after seeing the operations. What queue had built up by the time we got in line was sped through in no time thanks to a minimum of seven operators checking restraints all of which who were all but running to get the train set. I haven’t been this impressed by coaster operations in a very long time. Being our first ride we opted for the front seat to begin. I was incredibly happy to have Lighting Run crack my top 10 yesterday and was even more surprised to see a second slot in there with Banshee. You see comments from time to time about how B&Ms have become forceless. I’m happy to see that this is not at all the case. While the snap transitions between elements aren’t prevalent, the ride is smooth and forceful through the entire layout. No pre drop element makes for an almost vertical first drop followed by a series of huge inversions. The first half is noticeable mostly for the speed while the intensity really kicks into gear in the second half. All along, the new restraint design which essentially copies their wing rider coasters is a fantastic open design that virtually eliminates any headbanging. Perhaps the only real conceivable negative is the level inline twist towards the end of the layout. While the element itself is not unpleasant, it breaks up the pacing and just feels out of place. That is about the only knock however on what is a fantastic overall coaster and likely my favorite by the Swiss duo.

Cool Sign

Threaded loops are neat. This is the first on an inverted coaster.

This much reverence is not deserved for a coaster this bad.

Our wonderful experience of Banshee’s operations quickly crashed back to reality with Firehawk, the park’s Vekoma flying coaster. Combined with the park’s Fast Lane queue jumping system, we spent over 30 minutes in a queue of only 5 or 6 trains worth of people. These rides have never been my favorite. Today was exemplary of this fact. As we pulled out of the station I realized that my lap bar had about a 5” gap to my thighs. This meant that the entire ride was spent with the ankle brace and the chest harness took my full weight which was not only unnerving but also incredibly unpleasant.

This ride was unpleasant in just about every way.

Back in 1979, the Beast opened as the tallest, fastest, and longest wooden coaster in the world. 35 years later it’s still the longest and still a very good coaster despite the best attempts by the park to make it otherwise. It’s impossible not to notice the trim brake down a large portion of the first drop, the trim on the first hill, and the trim just after that. While the ride is still relatively smooth, it’s likely because the ride is traveling at about half of what it should be. All the elements of what made the ride great are still there, but the park has insisted on killing all of what made the coaster great. It’s been sad to see this coaster slowly drop down on my list over the years, but it’s notched down a couple more places after today.

Onward to trim brakes!

As the park slowly got busier, we still managed to find oddly short queues. Diamondback’s queue moved quick enough to have us into the station within 15 minutes and into the front row. B&M’s staggered hyper coaster trains lengthen what used to be relatively short 9 car train into an 8 car train of about twice the length. Because the train is so long, the difference between front and back is exaggerated even more. Diamondback features a layout reminiscent of Nitro at Great Adventure. While the ride had quite a lot of nice airtime, I was disappointed with only 2 true airtime hills after the mid-course break run. Instead, the park opted for a water splash element—the first and still only non-dive machine with this feature. On our second ride, I discovered that you can, in fact, stick your arm into the water splash. 4 hours later my shirt is still not dry. We preferred the back to the front on the ride, though they both had great airtime throughout. It slots into the middle of the Cedar Fair hypers with the staggered trains—Behemoth still has better airtime, but it is above average for this type of ride.

You may get wet on this ride.

Having finished our main interests at the park, we took a bit of time to clean up some of the mid-level rides. Vortex is still a poor excuse for a looping coaster, but that’s what you get from an old Arrow custom looping coaster. I do believe I hit my head a few times less than the last time I rode, though that’s not saying much. Adventure Express is still one of the better mine trains from Arrow, though the final lift hill that pulls straight into the brakes is incredibly anti-climactic. Backlot Stunt Coaster saw its best days a while ago assuming it ever had any. Most of the effects are now broken or only partially working. While the coaster has some fun elements the overall experience is confusing and average at best. Bat is the new re-theme of the park’s Arrow suspended coaster. While it doesn’t have the infamous status of the park’s original suspended coaster it is nevertheless a great ride and one that is increasingly hard to find these days. It’s good to see the parking taking care of it. Windseeker is one of 301ft. tall swing rides Cedar Fair bought several years back. These rides most famously malfunctioned at several parks on several different occasions, stranding riders at the top for multiple hours at a time. As a precaution, we made sure to use the restroom ahead of the time… Thankfully we need not worry. The ride spun faster than I recalled from Canada’s Wonderland’s model, but the view is still incredible. Around 2.30 in the afternoon, we got our re-entry hand stamp (a solid blob of green ink that was supposed to be Peppermint Patty from Peanuts) and took off for park #2 of the day—only about 30 minutes away.

Stricker’s Grove is a private park that can be rented out for events. As such, it is only open to the public 4 days out of the year. For a coaster enthusiast, this presents something of a challenge… As luck would have it, July 4^th was the first of the public days for the park this year. The park itself is tiny. Located in the middle of a few cornfields, it has a few concession buildings, several picnic pavilions, two wooden coasters, and a collection of flats that look they’re all from the 1960s or earlier. For anyone who appreciates interesting old rides, this is the place to be. The ticket sales lady immediately pegged us as roller coaster enthusiasts, which was not surprising given that we saw at least 10 or 12 others in our short time at the park. Both wooden coasters are very well taken care of. Teddy Bear follows the same layout as the junior wooden coasters at many Cedar Fair parks. While there’s not a whole lot of airtime, the ride is smooth and fun—the perfect coaster for kids to do their first. Tornado is the larger of the two colors and is quite a lot of fun. Again the ride is super well taken care of and very smooth. There are a few surprising pops of airtime throughout the double out and back layout.

Good airtime here.

..overweight.

Family owned and operated parks are always fun because everything is cared for and it seems like employees take a bigger interest in the operations of the park. Stricker’s Grove was clean, well kept, and full of friendly employees. As part of their public ride day, the park was offering discounts on food and even had a few grills set up outside making hot dogs, burgers, and brats for guests to purchase. Compared to other park prices, everything was very reasonable and quite good.

In under an hour we were on our way out of the park and headed back to Kings Island. I would have liked a little more time at Stricker’s Grove but we had already seen all that there was to see and without an unlimited ride wristband it wouldn’t make sense to keep hanging around.

Back at Kings Island, we found that the park had become substantially busier. Queue lines had grown everywhere, which ended up costing us rides on Flight of Fear and Invertego. Instead, we took another spin on Banshee before heading to Racer. Several years back, all the Cedar Fair parks with racing wooden coasters turned both sides forward rather than having a backwards side. This is disappointing for sure, but thankfully they were still properly dueling this ride. Though both sides had trim brakes in the turnaround, they were both surprisingly smooth (smoother than I’ve ever seen them) and had lots of good airtime. Having covered most of the coasters, I took some aerial shots from the Eiffel Tower before heading down to their shooting dark ride. For some reason I had forgotten that this ride is an omnimover dark ride system. Sadly that ended up being the most interesting thing about the ride due to guns that couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn much less the small target three feet in front of my face. To end the night, we queued a second time for Diamondback, checked off the giant Frisbee Delirium, and ended the night on Banshee. Once again, the operations were spectacular so we had no problem waiting for the front seat. At the same time, the park had started their fireworks show which had to have lasted at least 15 minutes. We were fortunate enough to see the finale while ascending the lift hill. Banshee was spectacular at night and a great way to end the day. I write this post from the middle of nowhere in Kentucky at 2am. The alarm will be going off at 7.30 to start the 2 hour trip to Dollywood where we’ll wrap up our parks for this time around.

Road Trip 2014: Days 1 and 2

The entrance looks much the same, minus the old Intamin drop tower.

Yesterday afternoon our trip took a hit before it had even started. Due to circumstances beyond our control we were forced to leave at 11pm rather than the intended 4pm. The net result was the elimination of our first overnight stay in Athens, GA. In a larger sense this meant we would be driving straight through 14 hours to Kentucky Kingdom, visiting the park, and driving another 2 hours to Cincinnati for our first hotel stay. As such, I’m writing this after having been up for about 40 hours straight. Excuse the incoherencies.

After a surprisingly uneventful 14 hours of driving through the night and into the next afternoon, we arrived at Kentucky Kingdom. I had visited on two occasions previously when the park was under Six Flags ownership. After failing to reach a lease agreement with the fairground the park sits on, Six Flags pulled out in 2009, taking many of their rides with them. Ed Hart, Kentucky Kingdom’s original owner, stepped in and reopened the park 5 years after Six Flags left. It’s wonderful to see the park reopened, especially under the original owner, but it still has a long way to go before it’s ready for the big stage.

A tale of two parks.

The picture above best explains the current status of Kentucky Kingdom. It is filled with bright and shiny new and refurbished rides that are set amidst a backdrop of apparent construction or abandonment. Let’s first look at the positives.

The new owners put the lion’s share of new capital into the waterpark. There are more slides (including the regions’ tallest dropbox slide form Proslide) and a number of new pools, rivers, and beach elements. While this was not our focus today, it’s clear that a large number of guests had come for the waterpark alone. A number of flat rides all sported shiny new coats of paint and new themes—the park opened with an ample children’s ride area and some classic teen favorites. Coaster-wise the park put quite a lot of effort into restoring the wooden coaster Thunder Run. It was running quite well today with only a few jarring moments but also an abundance of airtime and a very fast pace. Six Flags’ former SLC and Dueling wooden coasters still sit dormant, but they are listed on the park map as coming in 2015 and 16 respectively. These additions will bring much needed dry ride capacity to the park, something which we found to be desperately needed today…

The waterpark saw a large portion of the park guests today.

Thunder Run is running great once again.

The drop tower is a new addition to the park and provides a good non-coaster thrill.

Small details like this really boost a park’s quality in my eyes.

…which brings me to some negatives. We were lucky enough to get to the park at 2pm.. earlier than expected. With the park closing at 7 we knew we would have enough time to ride the coasters and explore the park. We did get that, but not much else sadly. Operations were nothing short of terrible for most of the rides. The park’s signature new coaster, Lightning Run, was operating with only 1 train and a dispatch interval every 5 minutes (which was sometimes generous). The queue is quite short however the operations created unnecessary waits of 45 minutes or more for the park’s star attraction with queues spilling out onto the main pathway. Aside from operations, Kentucky Kingdom ended up becoming almost two separate parks depending on where you looked. Lightning Run is a bright and colorful coaster which is currently sitting on top of mostly dirt with small signs saying ‘pardon our landscaping’. The picture that I referenced earlier showing the unfinished elements and razor wire is not uncommon around the park perimeter. Unfortunately, many of the rides and theming elements removed by Six Flags are obviously missed in the new park where sections look awkward or even abandoned. The good news is that all these problems can be fixed with a little bit of capital and a little bit of employee training. I understand the rush to get the park open, so it’s excusable that there are bugs during the first season… I only hope they can get it all sorted for next year.

Some park areas just feel abandoned. (some still actually are)

Twisted Twins sits closed at the back of the park. The sooner they can get this ride open, the better. The capacity will be a major boost.

I purposefully left out Lightning Run under the park positives because I believe that it deserves a category of its own. This roller coaster is nothing short of exceptional. Chance-Morgan’s first venture into a large coaster within the last decade is an absolute winner and blew away any expectations I had about the ride. Though only 100ft. tall, the coaster packs in some of the strongest airtime of any ride out there and smooth turns and transitions that look like they couldn’t possibly track as well as they do. Thankfully the entire ride is remarkably smooth for the amount of tight transitions along the 2500ft. layout. While the fiberglass seats are a tad uncomfortable, the lap bar is molded to fit to rider’s thighs and h old them securely. With an effect reminiscent of Skyrush, you will come off this ride with sore thighs if you decide to ride in the back seat. It’s absolutely worth it, however, and are the best seats in the house. The last small airtime hills can’t be more than 20ft. but generate a strong and abrupt ejector airtime that’s hard to find on many other coasters. This was the first installation of Chance Ride’s “Hyper GT-X Coaster” and I certainly hope that other parks will take note and make sure it’s not the last. Lightning Run has currently slotted into my top 5 coasters… a complete surprise that I never would have guessed at the start of the day.

While the restraints are tight they are still relatively comfortable.

Very tight transitions.

Incredibly strong airtime!

As a complete package, the park still needs some work but if I’m ever in the area I will make sure to swing by for at least a few rides on Lightning Run. As they get the two additional coasters open over the next two years, the park will become much more well-rounded (even though I expect their SLC to still be awful). Hopefully Ed Hart and his team will continue to update the rough edges and missing pieces to remake this park into a complete whole. It certainly has the potential. Give the park another top tier coaster to pair with Lightning Run and we’ll have a winner.

As I finish up this post I’ve just past 40 hours of being awake—after a hopefully great night of sleep we will tackle Kings Island and Stricker’s Grove tomorrow.

Trip Coaster Tally:

Lightning Run (Chance Rides airtime coaster)
Thunder Run (Summers & Dinn wooden coaster)

Road Trip 2014: Day 0

There’s something to be said for sanity… just not when it comes to coaster trips. I’ve noticed that my concept of what constitutes a reasonable drive has slowly expanded over the years into something that has probably long since passed stupid. Tomorrow I will embark on a relatively short trip compared to previous ventures but with no less driving. Unfortunately I am well aware that it will be one of the largest park-going holidays of the year, but sometimes one must take the opportunities presented. Happily, the July 4^th holiday also affords us the rare opportunity to visit Stricker’s Grove, a park only open to the public 4 or 5 days out of the year.

Our park plan is relatively simple:

– Kentucky Kingdom

– Kings Island

– Stricker’s Grove

– Dollywood

Because of time constraints we’re squeezing a lot of travel and all of the park visits over 3 days. Living in Orlando is great because it’s the center of the theme park universe… except when travel is required and it’s essentially one day up and one day back lost to driving. All told, we’ll squeeze about 2,100 miles of driving into 5 days. An unfortunate side effect of a compressed trip is losing actual park time. Kentucky Kingdom was a late add on with the realization that we would only have a few hours in the park. Thankfully, I’ve visited this park twice on previous occasions, so a few hours should be an acceptable amount of time to ride the new Lightning Run and also explore the park since it’s reopening by Ed Hart. We are shoving Kings Island and Sticker’s Grove into the same day since Stricker’s should only take an hour or two at best and its location in north Cincinnati means we can leave Kings Island, complete Stricker’s Grove, and still have time for more Kings Island afterwards. It all sounds simple enough, but looking at the map there’s certainly a lot of driving involved between them:

Stricker’s Grove will be the only new park of the trip but each of the other parks has a coaster I’ve yet to ride. Given all of them being open (something to never take for granted!), I will add 6 additional coasters to my list: Lightning Run, Banshee, Diamondback, Tornado, Teddy Bear, and Firechaser Express. Here’s hoping for a successful 6 out of 6! I’ll follow this post with one each additional day of the trip.

It’s Huge! Fun Spot Grows Up.

Whenever I’m driving back home to Orlando I know I’m getting close when I see the giant yellow billboards that exclaim “It’s Huge!” Fun Spot’s aggrandizing slogan has always been more of a source of amusement than anything, but with their latest expansion, the words are starting to make sense. Phase 1 of Fun Spot Orlando’s opened last week with the park rebranded as Fun Spot America at almost double the size. As with any park attraction, the road to the final product had many changes, additions, and cuts along the way. The only difference is that many of Fun Spot’s changes were made with already released plans. Let’s a take a look at how we got to the finished product we’re riding today.

The original park plan.
Photo from: http://parkrumors.com/fun-spot-expansion/

Our first piece of concept art comes from ParkRumors.com, who were one of the first on the case when Fun Spot began their expansion planning. I haven’t found this layout elsewhere online and judging by this being a picture of a plan, it’s easy to assume this never saw a public release. Still, it featured the first taste of expansion plans and how much the park was ready to grow. Key points here include the Ferris wheel perched atop the new park entrance to the north (photo left), the much expanded existing arcade building, the removal of all rides aside form go karts in the existing park area, and the Mondial Windseeker tower tucked in the elbow of the wooden coaster (presumably working more than Cedar Fair’s). In regards to the coasters, the lift on the Vekoma suspended runs towards the SkyCoaster, and White Lightning features the original, more traditional out and back layout from GCI.

Development Plan changes some ride positioning.
Photo from: http://parkrumors.com/fun-spot-expansion/

This development plan was also included in the same past at Park Rumors, but already shows changes from the concept art. All the rides have moved further north with the kiddie section being arranged as a separate cluster of rides. The parks existing arcade building does not show the expansion, though the Ferris wheel is still located on the new entrance building. The coasters remain in the same locations, but the Windseeker has moved slightly to a new circle of pathway.

Original Layout

Revised Layout

Somewhere between these leaks and the next official releases of concept art, the coaster changed dramatically. Fun Spot found some more money, presumably under couch cushions, and decided to improve their wooden coaster. Thankfully, there are two virtual POV videos on YouTube to compare! The original layout is much more family friendly with a diving first drop and mostly straight airtime hills afterwards. Between the video and the original concept layout above, you’ll notice a few small changes with some extra corners near the end. This ride doesn’t have anything particularly aggressive about it and would have certainly made a good family ride, but not the icon Fun Spot was looking for. Thankfully they took their extra change and invested in a brand new layout that included a much twistier out and back design that includes a full 90* banked corner on the turnaround. A double up and double down hill guarantee great airtime along the course. The virtual POV for this version confirms the additional airtime and layout nuances that come expected from a GCI these days.

GCI’s new layout for White Lighting. A nice twisted version of the traditional out and back.

New concept art shows modified coasters and rides.

After making the wooden coaster into a viable thrill attraction, the updated concept art released to the public shows a very different Fun Spot. The new White Lighting takes the place of the original while the Vekoma suspended rotates 180* to better place the overhead portion of track across the new plaza. The most noticeable other changes involve the Ferris wheel vacating the entrance building roof for its old home and the Windseeker tower disappearing completely. The Ferris wheel change is an understandable cut as the engineering to put a large wheel on top of a structure likely far outweighed the benefits of a cool looking entrance. Though this image only depicts Phase 1 expansion, the amount of rides is severely decreased.

Phase 2 includes the waterpark and some building expansions.

A very similar piece of artwork shows Phase 1 and 2 together. This layout includes the waterpark addition and building expansion clearly labeled as a phase 2 project. This plan reinforces the fact that many of the flat rides shown are placeholders—almost all the flats aside from the Screamin’ Swing have changed designs with this latest iteration. There’s no sign of the Schwarzkopf Enterprise that will eventually show up next to the music express.

Now that the park has opened, we can compare the existing to the last piece of concept art work. It’s a pretty safe bet that existing rides will stay where they are—concrete is a lot harder to change than a Photoshop file. The large elements of the built version match up rather well to the last piece of artwork. White Lightning turned out exactly like the plans and Freedom Fighter, the Vekoma, was also built as shown. Again, the only real differences are with the flat rides. Fun Spot was able to purchase Six Flags over Georgia’s enterprise and add it to the collection of opening day rides. It’s easy to expect that more rides are to be added with the phase 2 expansion… there’s certainly plenty of room.

This same first drop survived all iterations, but thankfully there’s a much better coaster after it than originally planned.

These pictures were taken before the Grand Opening when the station still needed some attention.

It’s great to see the old Six Flags over Georgia ride in a new home.

The restraints on Freedom Fighter really make the ride fantastic.

Even though it’s a stock layout, the ride seems very well suited for this location.

Fun Spot has a winner that I think they can safely call “Huge!” White Lightning is an incredible small coaster that is sufficiently thrilling while not isolating the family crowd. Airtime abounds, especially in the double up and down feature. While it’s not the kind of ejector air you’d find on something like Wooden Warrior at Quassy in Connecticut, it’s easily one of the top coasters out there for this size. Equally surprising is the Vekoma suspended coaster which features the company’s over the shoulder lap bar system. I certainly hope to see more of this type pop up—the upper body freedom combined with a smooth, intense layout make for a really great supporting ride.

Aside from the coasters, one of the most exciting things Fun Spot has done with this expansion involves concrete. No, really. Five years ago, Fun Spot was a mass of portable, off the shelf rides placed in the grass with a strip of asphalt or concrete as pathway. Now, they’ve started to install more permanent rides like the Schwarzkopf Enterprise and coasters with footers. But more than that, the new park pathways have decorative elements and concrete seating walls, a great sign that the park is building for the future. The Screamin’ Swing is already on site and seems to be ready for install at any time and the new go kart track is well underway. In talking with some of the park operators, they’ve said the owner would still like to go bigger. With any luck, the 220ft. Windseeker will return to the plan. This expansion is a step in the right direction for a small park looking to put their name on the map in a town full of theme park giants. The product they offer is uniquely their own in this market, and with some continued additions over the next decade Fun Spot could become a popular destination for locals and visitors alike.

Plenty of room to expand.

New coasters shine after dark.

Fort Wilderness Exploration Part 1: The Fort Wilderness Railroad

Riding the rails on the Fort Wilderness Railroad (picture from http://www.fwrr.info/)

Among the lost treasures of Walt Disney World, the Fort Wilderness Railroad is one fondly remembered by those who had a chance to ride it. At 3 ½ miles, the railroad loop circled the Fort Wilderness campground area offering a pleasant ride through fields and wilderness. For just $1.00, guests could ride all day long, whether to enjoy the view or have a ride to River Country, Disney’s first waterpark.

Unfortunately, the line was plagued with troubles, owing to its short 6 year lifespan from 1973 to 1979. Track was laid poorly and on soft soil, the engines couldn’t carry enough water, and close proximity to campsites all led to the line’s demise.

A number of other sites have done a much better job describing the railroad, so I will reference to www.fwrr.info for a more detailed look at this great attraction. (It appears this website has gone down and some point in the past and is being rebuilt. A tribute site with more complete content is located here: http://www.bigfloridacountry.com/fortwildernessrr.htm

Last week I took a trip to Fort Wilderness to see just how much of the railroad could still be seen. I only explored the northern half of the line, but there are plenty of signs of this old attraction. Though the line closed in 1979, much of the track remained into the 1980s. The Florida Zoo was permitted to salvage some rail, leaving only the ties. Some of the longest surviving physical relics were the two trestles along the east side of the line. These bridges made it at least to 1985 before Disney removed them, presumably for guest safety. These days, the most obvious hint of the railroad comes from the built up roadbed where the tracks were laid. A large portion of the northern half has been converted to sidewalk, but continuing along the line’s route it’s easy to spot ties, bridge footers, and some rail with a little careful inspection.

Below is a map detailing the areas I explored and what I found:

The pictures that follow are all keyed to this map to show where and the orientation of each shot:

1. We started here since it was one of the easier areas to find on the Northern end of the line. It was a surprisingly short walk from the boat dock, heading south. The railroad crossed the road just below the 700 and 600 camp area entrances. The built up roadbed is easy to find and the ties start within feet of the road. The ties located here are the closest to the existing roadway and the easiest to find without trekking into the woods.

2.Continuing off from the road, the ties continue heading northwest. From the section of the line we explored, this was the most extant.

3. Continuing up the route a few hundred feet there is some overgrowth and more signs of disarray with ties having fallen off the roadbed.

4. Pushing through the underbrush is another open section of ties.

5. Nearing the corner still heading northwest, nature has taken over. Ties are scattered around, but the route is less discernible.

6. Looking into the woods facing southwest, opposite picture 5.

7. Ties here and there and a few small wood retaining walls.

8. Detail of a few ties just along the road.

9. On the east side of the campground the roadbed cuts right through the pet walk area (an extremely obvious mound). At the back end are the 2 concrete piers for one of the 2 trestles.

10. Looking across the creek are scattered ties. This area is nearly inaccessible.

11. The map shows two pedestrian bridges at either end of this section of rail. Both have since been removed.

12. Again looking from across the creek, this was the only set of rail I was able to spot. There may be some along the far eastern section, but the area is so grown up it’s difficult to get anywhere close.

13. A few ties just off the road leading up the other trestle.

There is plenty more track I’ve yet to explore, which will hopefully lead to another part of this article sometime in the not too distant future. For those interested in park history, the Ft. Wilderness Railroad is a great place to start. It’s easy to find, has an interesting backstory, and can be explored for free. The majority is in public and accessible areas too, so there’s no trespassing involved. After all these years, the railroad can still be enjoyed.

Day 9

I’m currently typing this entry from 30,000 ft. somewhere over South Carolina. I realize as the days have gone on and I’ve become increasingly tired my blog entries have suffered from a technical standpoint. In the next few days when I’m more coherent I hope to go back and fill in the missed words and things that don’t make sense. Today we faced a choice as it was the only day without a pre-arranged plan. With Bobsleds closed at Seabreeze yesterday, one option was to head back for just that ride. Waldameer in Erie, PA was also considered, but quickly ruled out because of the distance. Lastly, we consider Darien Lake, a park we’d already visited a few years back, but one that had the most additional coasters nearby. In the end, volume one over the single coaster we missed, and by noon we were walking through the gates of park #17 of the trip.

Darien Lake is in the middle of nowhere. From our hotel in Rochester, the GPS took us on residential back roads through small town America. The park still has remnants of the former Six Flags ownership, though it is now run by PARC Entertainment. The parking lot was quite full for a Sunday morning, but thankfully queues remained average for coasters that ran primarily one train. It seems that waterpark drew most of the guests, something clearly recognized by the park in their recent additions. The last new coaster came in 2008 with the addition of the OCC Motocoaster, a stock model from Zamperla.

The star attraction in the park is Ride of Steel, an Intamin mega coaster. This huge ride looks like it has no business being in a little park this far off the beaten path, but apparently Six Flags management thought otherwise. The coaster and its mirror clone at Six Flags America have always been confusing to me. They are great rides in general, but about 1/3 of the coaster seems entirely pointless. After a great drop, turn, and ejector airtime hill, the coaster enters a wide, flat helix. Afterwards it runs along a piece of straight track before hitting another airtime hill. Next there is another long section of straightaway followed by another big helix before an airtime filed 3 hill finale. While the sensation of speed is something to be appreciated, the coaster is begging for a few more interesting features along the course. Regardless, the small lap bar restraints provide a fantastic feeling of openness and allow every bit of the strong airtime to be felt. Despite those sections, Ride of Steel still ranks as one of the better coasters of the trip.

It’s a shame the park lost the rights to the Superman name, because ‘Ride of Steel’ can really apply to almost anything…

Lots of airtime where there isn’t pointless straightaway and helix.

The same cannot be said for a few other coasters in the park. Predator, the park’s only wooden coaster has an abundance of great airtime, but also an abundance of potholes and spine-crushing bumps. This may rank as one of the worst large coasters of the trip. Predator has certainly deteriorated from my last visit. Viper, an Arrow 5 inversion custom design (the world’s first with 5 inversions) has also aged poorly with some very shaky moments through the inversions. After Dragon Mountain yesterday we had higher than normal hopes for Viper, but sadly they proved to be false. On a positive note about the coaster, the helix finale with an underground tunnel is still very enjoyable. The last of the less than pleasant coasters we tried today was Mind Eraser, the 2^nd Vekoma SLC of the trip. While I don’t believe it was as bad as the Mind Eraser as Six Flags New England, that’s similar to saying it’s better to only be partially on fire rather than fully so.

This looks nice, but looks can be deceiving.

Predator uses Holiday World’s old trains from Voyage.

Batwings look cool, but this particular one has a couple solid head smacks in it.

Why any park would buy one of these coasters is beyond me.

The last coaster we had time for during this trip was OCC Motocoaster, a Zamperla motorbike design. This was the first of the Zamperla bikes sold (it was the show model for Zamperla beforehand) and features a weird paint scheme of seemingly random yellow and white supports. OCC shares the same layout as Steeplechase at Coney Island, which we rode back on day 1. This ride reconfirmed our suspicion that the Coney Island model feels quite a bit faster and more intense. That’s not to say this ride isn’t any good—the launch and course are still pleasant and relaxing—more ‘fun’ than thrilling.

For what it does, the ride is a lot of fun.

Unfortunately plane flights dictated only a few hours at Darien, so a few flat rides wrapped up the final park of the trip. Darien is an enjoyable park, though one that feels like it’s been neglected over the years. Waterpark additions notwithstanding, the park could use a major addition, preferably a new caster to round out the lineup. For our trip, it was a little sad to end on a Vekoma SLC, but such is the way of things when you’re pressed for time. While leaving the park we checked out the pieces of Six Flags Astroworld’s old Intamin standup coaster that have been rotting across the street for several years. If anyone is to install this coaster, it looks like there would need to be some extensive refurbishment completed first.

Pieces of a forgotten coaster.

Tomorrow I will attempt to write an epilogue for this trip looking back at some of the high and low coasters. After 17 parks, it’s amazing how much variety is out there and how little things can make all the difference in terms of park enjoyment. For now I will give Canada’s Wonderland the Best Park Award (La Ronde for best new park), and Bizarro at Six Flags New England the award for Best Coaster. Thanks to everyone who has followed along and read the blog!

Up Next: Sleep!
Final Coaster List:

Dragon, Wisdom Rides Kiddie Coaster, Bowcraft
Sea Serpent, Miler Kiddie Coaster, Keansburg
Wildcat, Schwarzkopf Wildcat, Keansburg
Cyclone, Keenan Wooden Coaster, Astroland
Sea Serpent, Miler Kiddie Coaster, Deno’s Wonder Wheel
Soarin’ Eagle, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Scream Zone
Steeplechase, Zamperla Motorbike Coaster, Scream Zone
Tickler, Zamperla Spinning Wild Mouse, Luna Park
Circus Coaster, Zamperla Family Coaster, Luna Park
Ladybug Coaster, Zierer Family Coaster, Adventureland
Hurricane, S.D.C. Sitdown, Adventureland
Dragon Coaster, Church Wooden Coaster, Playland
Crazy Mouse, Zamperla Wild Mouse, Playland
Super Flight, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Playland
Family Flyer, Zamperla Kiddie Coaster, Playland
Wooden Warrior, Gravity Group Wooden, Quassy
Little Dipper, Allan Herschell Kiddie, Quassy
Yankee Cannonball, Schmeck Wooden Coaster, Canobie
Untamed, Gerstlauer Eurofighter, Canobie
Canobie Corkscrew, Arrow Corkscrew, Canobie
Goliath, Vekoma Giant Inverted Boomerang, SFNE
Flashback, Vekoma Boomerang, SFNE
Pandemonium, Gerstlauer Spinning Coaster, SFNE
Great Chase, Miler Family Coaster, SFNE
Thunderbolt, Traver/Baker Wooden Coaster, SFNE
Bizarro, Intamin Mega Coaster, SFNE
Gotham City Gauntlet Escape from Arkham Asylum, Mack Wild Mouse, SFNE
Catwoman’s Whip, Zierer Family Coaster, SFNE
Mind Eraser, Vekoma SLC, SFNE
Batman: The Dark Knight, B&M Floorless Coaster, SFNE
Cyclone, Cobb Wooden Coaster, SFNE
Alpine Bobsled, Intamin Bobsled, Great Escape
Comet, Schmeck/Allen Wooden, Great Escape
Canyon Blaster, Arrow Mine Train, Great Escape
Steamin’ Demon, Arrow Looping Coaster, Great Escape
Cobra, Intamin Stand Up Coaster, La Ronde
Vampire, B&M Inverted Coaster, La Ronde
Le Boomerang, Vekoma Boomerang, La Ronde
Super Menage, Vekoma Corkscrew, La Ronde
Monstre (Track 2), Cobb Double Wooden Coaster, La Ronde
Dragon, Intamin Indoor Coaster, La Ronde
Goliath, B&M hyper coaster, La Ronde
Toboggan Nordique, Zamperla Wild Mouse, La Ronde
Monstre (Track 1), Cobb Double Wooden Coaster, La Ronde
Leviathan, B&M Giga Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Dragon Fire, Arrow Loop & Cork, Canada’s Wonderland
Vortex, Arrow Suspended Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Behemoth, B&M hyper coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Backlot Stunt Coaster, Premier launched coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Wild Beast, Summers Wooden Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Sky Rider, Togo Stand Up Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Mighty Canadian Minebuster, Summers Wooden Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Time Warp, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Dragon Mountain, Arrow Looping Coaster, Marineland
Lady Bug Coaster, Zierer Kiddie Coaster, Marineland
Silver Comet, CCI Wooden Coaster, Martin’s Fantasy Island
Crazy Mouse, Zamperla Spinning Coaster, Martin’s Fantasy Island
Jack Rabbit, Miller Wooden Coaster, Seabreeze
Whirlwind, Maurer Spinning Coaster, Seabreeze
Predator, Summers and Dinn Wooden Coaster, Darien Lake
Ride of Steel, Intamin Mega Coaster, Darien Lake
OCC Motocoaster, Zamperla Motorbike, Darien Lake
Viper, Arrow Corkscrew Coaster, Darien Lake
Mind Eraser, Vekoma SLC, Darien Lake

Day 8

Our last full day of the trip was also one of the crazier travel days. We began in Vaughan, Ontario near Canada’s Wonderland, then drove to Marineland at Niagara Falls, crossed the border to Martin’s Fantasy Island, and then drove to Rochester to finish with Seabreeze. To me, it’s a wonder we got to all three places, let alone sufficient time in them. While it’s sad to see this as the last full day, the upcoming rest will be very welcome as I scrape the bottom of my energy resources.

In 2008, I tried on three separate occasions to ride Dragon Mountain at Marineland. The first two days it was down for maintenance. The third day the lady at the ticket gate tells me it’s too cold to run the ride and “why would anyone want to ride a coaster in this weather anyway?” Clearly she had not met a coaster enthusiast before. This time we were sure to check before entering, but on confirmation headed into Marineland for the first time. Straight away, our general opinion was one of confusion and amusement. The park is huge, and not in a packed full of things way like Canada’s Wonderland. In fact, you can walk for quite a while encountering nothing but trees and 40ft. wide pathways. Occasionally the monotony is broken with a medieval looking building containing a food stand, gift shop, or ride queue line. There is a large kids section in the front of the park and then a sprawling back area punctuated with rides or exhibits. It feels like they inherited a massive amount of land with the one requirement that it must be built on immediately. I will need to look up more history on this park later, but it was all very baffling.

They’re not lacking for space.

Robin Hood is not allowed to climb these rocks.

After a ¾ mile walk from the entrance gate (literally), we reached Dragon Mountain. Opened in 1983, this Arrow coaster covers over 30 acres and features an odd custom layout following the terrain of the mountains. The ride features two vertical loops and the world’s only bowtie inversion. It also has two fully underground tunnels, which are certainly an impressive feat. Though the track profile looks like it would be very rough and painful, the ride is surprisingly jolt-free and even a lot of fun. A twisting queue through rockwork leads to a dark and foreboding underground station that’s also incredibly quiet thanks to no music and very few other guests. The lift hill is big enough to require two separate chains. In the middle of the coaster is a helix that was meant to have a volcano façade around it. This was added in 2006, 23 years after the coaster was built. The ride was also to have a replica waterfall of Niagara Falls, but that probably won’t happen for another few decades at this rate. Dragon Mountain is hard to photograph from any angle thanks to the thick trees and overgrowth around it. On-ride, this adds quite a bit to the experience.

This is about the most of the coaster that can be seen in one shot.

Awkward banking that the train takes surprisingly well.

The dark cave station.

Most of the views of the coaster look like this.

The park’s other rides are largely miss-able (and also really far apart). They have a Huss Topple Tower that opened in 2008 before promptly closing indefinitely. The only other ride of note is Sky Screamer, a massive S&S triple tower on top of a hill. Like all things at this park, getting to the ride is a process… a long walk up a particularly steep path that curves around the mountain. Up at the top is a plaza with gift shop and food counter. The tower is one of the tallest of its kind and features both a shot and drop sequence, making the hike up the mountain almost worth it. If you sit on the correct side, there’s a fantastic view of nearby Niagara Falls.

A long, tiring walk to the top.

All the buildings in the park look like this. Pretty, but monotonous.

I was a little apprehensive to visit the park in the first place due to the controversy surrounding its animal conditions. There have been a number of stories about animal deaths and sub-par care. While I wasn’t able to see behind the scenes, I was happy to see that all the exhibits looked up to quality and were quite large. The two large pool complexes housed belugas and Kiska, the killer whale. It seemed that Marineland has provided quite a large amount of space for the animals, and they appeared to be receiving proper care. Kiska did look quite sad, though, being alone in her pool and lacking interaction time. The seal and sea lion pool indoors also seemed a little small, though with the number of animals it was probably about right. The best conditions seemed to be for the non-marine animals like buffalo, bears, and deer. The Deer Park section is a large walled area where guests can feed or interact directly with many deer. I certainly hope that the standard of care for the animals is to an acceptable level.

This bear was just enjoying the view.

Lots of elk.

The Deer Park area was a lot of fun.

For $8.50CN you could feed and touch a beluga.

Kiska looks a little lonely all alone, but she’s still an impressive animal.

Seals and sea lions asleep.

Marineland is quite a strange park. It almost seems amazing that they are still in business, but apparently they’re doing something right. At the back of the park there is a sign advertising the world’s largest aquarium being built. That was announced way back in 2003 and the most the park has to show is a big section of cleared land. If they’re going to build it, then it might take quite a while. The park did take longer than expected, but that was mostly due to having to walk about 4 to 5 miles to complete everything we wanted to see. Tiring, but strangely enjoyable.

Coming soon, but probably not.

One country and a world of difference away, Martin’s Fantasy Island is a small park on Grand Island above Niagara Falls. The park is tiny and essentially a fun fair type place with stock rides, no theming, and some picnic groves. The draw for this park was Silver Comet, a custom CCI wooden coaster. The park had a strange policy of loading front to back on the train (so the back seat was often left open) and an even stranger operating policy requiring the operators to lower your lap bar. I’m not sure if Martin’s is overly carious for liability reasons or what, but the rules are on the ridiculous side and mar what is otherwise a very enjoyable coaster with some great spots of airtime. A Zamperla spinning coaster completes the coaster collection. While this ride is not worth the admission, a few more rides on Silver Comet satisfied us enough to move on.

This is the biggest attraction in the park by far.

Poking up above the trees.

The spinning coaster was largely devoid of spinning.

Seems like everybody has a Star Flyer these days.

Concerning.

Seabreeze is one of the oldest parks on our trip. The small park in Rochester, New York is still family owned and well taken care of. Jack Rabbit is the main attraction, a 1920 wooden coaster built by John Miller. I’ve lost count of how many manually operated wooden coasters we’ve seen on this trip, but it’s fantastic to watch the operator still apply braking manually. The coaster runs trains by Morgan, which run fine though seem to take away from some of the historical feel of the ride. There’s a number of strong pops of airtime in the front seat, making it the best spot on the ride. While the coaster isn’t very long, it features a few airtime hills including a double down and a final drop fully enclosed in a tunnel. While not our top classic wooden coaster of the trip, it’s certainly up there.

The oldest coaster of the trip.

The Morgan trains look stupid in my opinion, but take the track pretty well.

Aside from Jack Rabbit, the only other coaster that was both running and not off limits (kiddie coaster) was Whirlwind, a Maurer Sohne spinning coaster. I’d never done an Xtended SC 2000 model, so it was interesting to try this more extreme version of the typical spinner. After three rides the overall verdict is possible, especially when you can sit on the side of the car facing backwards up the lift hill. Spinning is also largely dependent on weight which makes for wide variations in ride quality. In general, it seemed that once the car stopped spinning it wouldn’t get going again. On most rides, though, this happened late enough into the ride to not be a problem. Our main disappointment came with Bobsled being closed. This is easily the most unique ride in the park starting life as a junior wooden coaster before having a new steel track and additional structure added to it. Apparently the ride had suffered a mechanical fault earlier in the day and trains were just being cycled the rest of the evening. We’d like to try and go back for it tomorrow morning, though a lot has to go right for that to happen. Seabreeze was one of our favorite of the small parks, feeling very clean and wall cared for. I hope to see them continue to expand and maybe add another anchor coaster soon.

Whirlwind was a very enjoyable coaster.

Hopefully we can ride Bobsleds tomorrow.

This was a great log flume– it ran in a concrete channel cut into the ground, across a bridge, and through a tunnel.

The park maintains this automatic organ for their carousel. The whole area felt full of history.

Up Next: Tomorrow is still up in the air as to whether we’ll do a revisit of Darien Lake or go back to Seabreeze for Bobsleds. Either way, this will be the finale of a wonderful trip.

Coaster List So Far:

Dragon, Wisdom Rides Kiddie Coaster, Bowcraft
Sea Serpent, Miler Kiddie Coaster, Keansburg
Wildcat, Schwarzkopf Wildcat, Keansburg
Cyclone, Keenan Wooden Coaster, Astroland
Sea Serpent, Miler Kiddie Coaster, Deno’s Wonder Wheel
Soarin’ Eagle, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Scream Zone
Steeplechase, Zamperla Motorbike Coaster, Scream Zone
Tickler, Zamperla Spinning Wild Mouse, Luna Park
Circus Coaster, Zamperla Family Coaster, Luna Park
Ladybug Coaster, Zierer Family Coaster, Adventureland
Hurricane, S.D.C. Sitdown, Adventureland
Dragon Coaster, Church Wooden Coaster, Playland
Crazy Mouse, Zamperla Wild Mouse, Playland
Super Flight, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Playland
Family Flyer, Zamperla Kiddie Coaster, Playland
Wooden Warrior, Gravity Group Wooden, Quassy
Little Dipper, Allan Herschell Kiddie, Quassy
Yankee Cannonball, Schmeck Wooden Coaster, Canobie
Untamed, Gerstlauer Eurofighter, Canobie
Canobie Corkscrew, Arrow Corkscrew, Canobie
Goliath, Vekoma Giant Inverted Boomerang, SFNE
Flashback, Vekoma Boomerang, SFNE
Pandemonium, Gerstlauer Spinning Coaster, SFNE
Great Chase, Miler Family Coaster, SFNE
Thunderbolt, Traver/Baker Wooden Coaster, SFNE
Bizarro, Intamin Mega Coaster, SFNE
Gotham City Gauntlet Escape from Arkham Asylum, Mack Wild Mouse, SFNE
Catwoman’s Whip, Zierer Family Coaster, SFNE
Mind Eraser, Vekoma SLC, SFNE
Batman: The Dark Knight, B&M Floorless Coaster, SFNE
Cyclone, Cobb Wooden Coaster, SFNE
Alpine Bobsled, Intamin Bobsled, Great Escape
Comet, Schmeck/Allen Wooden, Great Escape
Canyon Blaster, Arrow Mine Train, Great Escape
Steamin’ Demon, Arrow Looping Coaster, Great Escape
Cobra, Intamin Stand Up Coaster, La Ronde
Vampire, B&M Inverted Coaster, La Ronde
Le Boomerang, Vekoma Boomerang, La Ronde
Super Menage, Vekoma Corkscrew, La Ronde
Monstre (Track 2), Cobb Double Wooden Coaster, La Ronde
Dragon, Intamin Indoor Coaster, La Ronde
Goliath, B&M hyper coaster, La Ronde
Toboggan Nordique, Zamperla Wild Mouse, La Ronde
Monstre (Track 1), Cobb Double Wooden Coaster, La Ronde
Leviathan, B&M Giga Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Dragon Fire, Arrow Loop & Cork, Canada’s Wonderland
Vortex, Arrow Suspended Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Behemoth, B&M hyper coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Backlot Stunt Coaster, Premier launched coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Wild Beast, Summers Wooden Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Sky Rider, Togo Stand Up Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Mighty Canadian Minebuster, Summers Wooden Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Time Warp, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Dragon Mountain, Arrow Looping Coaster, Marineland
Lady Bug Coaster, Zierer Kiddie Coaster, Marineland
Silver Comet, CCI Wooden Coaster, Martin’s Fantasy Island
Crazy Mouse, Zamperla Spinning Coaster, Martin’s Fantasy Island
Jack Rabbit, Miller Wooden Coaster, Seabreeze
Whirlwind, Maurer Spinning Coaster, Seabreeze

Day 7

As we near the end of the trip, it’s been quite obvious that we’re slowing down. Despite all that, we managed the ridiculous drive from La Ronde to Canada’s Wonderland, arriving around noon today. Canada’s Wonderland is my first repeat park (my first visit coming in 2008) with one notable exception: Leviathan. I’ve written about my feelings on this coaster before, especially in regards to why the ride is even here in the first place with another B&M hyper already towering over the park.

The entrance to the park got a lot more exciting this year.

Once again we elected to put larger ride counts over morals and bought the ‘Fast Track’ ticket, allowing us to have a shorter wait for many of the coasters and flat rides. This proved to be an absolute necessity for the park as it was jam packed. Lines for most coasters stretched nearly to the queue entrances. Paying the extra amount for the convenience of being able to ride faster and still choose which row we experienced was a good move with our limited schedule and limited likelihood of another visit anytime soon.

As it turns out, Leviathan would be my 300^th individual coaster, a feat that just shows how coaster riding has gone beyond just a hobby for me. From miles away, the coaster’s teal track is visible, an absolutely massive structure above the rest of the park. Taking a cue from Goliath at Six Flags over Georgia, the coaster actually runs outside the park’s entrance gate. This makes for spectacular visuals, both on and off ride. The coaster uses the traditional 4 across B&M trains unlike the tiered rows Cedar Fair’s purchased on their last three airtime coasters from the company. There are only 8 rows to each train which is strange because any other tall B&M runs 9. Thankfully, Cedar Fair park ride operators are some of the speediest around and can have a train in and out in about 40 seconds. This keeps the three trains moving and lines at their minimum. The coaster itself exceeded my expectations. While the back seat is incredible, the front is even more so. A long, but fast lift hill leads to a drop with incredible floating airtime. The rest of the course alternates with great moments of floating airtime and huge overbanked corners. Perhaps my only complaint with the ride is length. While it’s longer than anything else at Canada’s Wonderland (over a mile in fact), the coaster has such big sweeping elements that the coaster is over before it seems to really get going. Coupled with the fact that the brake run actually starts higher than Dragon Fire’s (the Arrow coaster) lift hill, I wished the coaster could’ve had one or two more airtime hills. But with all that said, it’s hard to complain about a coaster when it’s as good as Leviathan.

The train looks tiny as it ascends the lift hill into the distance. 306 ft. up!

Huge hills and big overbanks are lots of fun.

The major question after Leviathan is how does it compare to Behemoth? Personally I will take Leviathan just for the sheer speed of the ride. Behemoth has developed quite a rattle from my 2008 rides, though the coaster still produces the strongest airtime I’ve ever had on a B&M coaster. Behemoth also feels like a more complete coaster with lots of airtime hills, a midcourse brake run and a not insignificant section of corners and hills afterwards. I’d have to put these two coasters one after the other in my rankings list, though Leviathan gets the edge this time. Still, it’s weird having two of essentially the same type of coaster within one park. No complaints though, when they’re both fantastic.

Behemoth is slightly less so now with Leviathan. But 230ft. is still pretty big.

This has what Leviathan lacks: an ending.

After the two stars of the park, the coaster quality drops off dramatically. Coming in at a distant third is Vortex, the Arrow suspended coaster. These are getting harder to find, so it’s good to see the park still operating theirs. The ride seems to suffer from some serious pumping of the back car as it shuffles around in relation to the train. It’s awfully noticeable on the ride, though it doesn’t detract terribly much from the experience—the coaster is a lot of fun with some great swinging. After Vortex, the quality drops off even further. Backlot Stunt Coaster is the former Italian Job ride when the park was operated by Paramount parks. Now it’s been stripped of some theming and many of the effects have been turned off or aren’t working. It’s a fun family coaster, but that’s about all that can be said. More can be said about SkyRider, the park’s Togo stand up coaster, but not much of it is good. The ride suffers from some seriously bad transitions and uncomfortable restraints that add up to a very unpleasant ride experience. Slightly better, but still rough are the park’s two wooden coasters. Thankfully they both have some pretty decent airtime. At the bottom of the barrel is yet another Zamperla flying coaster (the roughest of the 3 so far) and one of the worst SLCs in the world.

Aside from Leviathan and Behemoth, Vortex is the park’s best coaster.

This cool mountain is the centerpiece of the park. It has a powered coaster running through it.

“Trick track is a great idea on a stand up coaster” ~said by no one, ever.

This is one of the more painful SLC’s we’ve ridden.

Oddly enough, many of the park’s flat rides outshine the coasters. They have an impressive collection including an Intamin drop tower, Huss giant enterprise, a Huss Jump II (only one in the world), a Mondial frsibee, a Mondial Top Scan, and a Mondial Splash Over (wet top spin). Along with lots of other rides, the park has quite an impressive collection to handle the crowds. The newest flat ride is a Mondial Windseeker, a 301ft. tall swing ride. The ride features great lap bar restraints and a smooth and comfortable ride up to the top. To me, it was more relaxing than anything and offered a great view of the sprawling park.

A great collection of flat rides. Sadly the Jump 2 looks more fun than it really is.

Windseeker is very relaxing.

Because of the sheer number of rides, cleanliness, and incredible speed of operations, Canada’s Wonderland is the park favorite of the trip thus far and will probably stay that way. Leviathan is an incredible coaster and there was nothing like finishing the park with two night rides in the front seat. For anyone visiting Niagara Falls or Toronto, Canada’s Wonderland is a great add-on day to the trip. I will happily come back though it seems likely I will continue to purchase the Fast Track pass if the lines stay as long as they were today.

Up next: Tomorrow is the last full day of the trip, but it might be too ambitious. The hope is to do 3 parks in a day, Marineland Canada, Martin’s Fantasy Island just across the border into the US, and Seabreeze in Rochester. If we’re not able to complete it all, Seabreeze can start the day on Sunday.

Coaster List So Far:

Dragon, Wisdom Rides Kiddie Coaster, Bowcraft
Sea Serpent, Miler Kiddie Coaster, Keansburg
Wildcat, Schwarzkopf Wildcat, Keansburg
Cyclone, Keenan Wooden Coaster, Astroland
Sea Serpent, Miler Kiddie Coaster, Deno’s Wonder Wheel
Soarin’ Eagle, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Scream Zone
Steeplechase, Zamperla Motorbike Coaster, Scream Zone
Tickler, Zamperla Spinning Wild Mouse, Luna Park
Circus Coaster, Zamperla Family Coaster, Luna Park
Ladybug Coaster, Zierer Family Coaster, Adventureland
Hurricane, S.D.C. Sitdown, Adventureland
Dragon Coaster, Church Wooden Coaster, Playland
Crazy Mouse, Zamperla Wild Mouse, Playland
Super Flight, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Playland
Family Flyer, Zamperla Kiddie Coaster, Playland
Wooden Warrior, Gravity Group Wooden, Quassy
Little Dipper, Allan Herschell Kiddie, Quassy
Yankee Cannonball, Schmeck Wooden Coaster, Canobie
Untamed, Gerstlauer Eurofighter, Canobie
Canobie Corkscrew, Arrow Corkscrew, Canobie
Goliath, Vekoma Giant Inverted Boomerang, SFNE
Flashback, Vekoma Boomerang, SFNE
Pandemonium, Gerstlauer Spinning Coaster, SFNE
Great Chase, Miler Family Coaster, SFNE
Thunderbolt, Traver/Baker Wooden Coaster, SFNE
Bizarro, Intamin Mega Coaster, SFNE
Gotham City Gauntlet Escape from Arkham Asylum, Mack Wild Mouse, SFNE
Catwoman’s Whip, Zierer Family Coaster, SFNE
Mind Eraser, Vekoma SLC, SFNE
Batman: The Dark Knight, B&M Floorless Coaster, SFNE
Cyclone, Cobb Wooden Coaster, SFNE
Alpine Bobsled, Intamin Bobsled, Great Escape
Comet, Schmeck/Allen Wooden, Great Escape
Canyon Blaster, Arrow Mine Train, Great Escape
Steamin’ Demon, Arrow Looping Coaster, Great Escape
Cobra, Intamin Stand Up Coaster, La Ronde
Vampire, B&M Inverted Coaster, La Ronde
Le Boomerang, Vekoma Boomerang, La Ronde
Super Menage, Vekoma Corkscrew, La Ronde
Monstre (Track 2), Cobb Double Wooden Coaster, La Ronde
Dragon, Intamin Indoor Coaster, La Ronde
Goliath, B&M hyper coaster, La Ronde
Toboggan Nordique, Zamperla Wild Mouse, La Ronde
Monstre (Track 1), Cobb Double Wooden Coaster, La Ronde
Leviathan, B&M Giga Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Dragon Fire, Arrow Loop & Cork, Canada’s Wonderland
Vortex, Arrow Suspended Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Behemoth, B&M hyper coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Backlot Stunt Coaster, Premier launched coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Wild Beast, Summers Wooden Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Sky Rider, Togo Stand Up Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Mighty Canadian Minebuster, Summers Wooden Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland
Time Warp, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Canada’s Wonderland

Day 6

Before I get into the park comments for today, I wanted to make a few notes about travelling to Canada. As it turns out, we were sufficiently unprepared for visiting Quebec for a few reasons. First, we hadn’t changed any money (and our Canadian front desk employee at the hotel couldn’t tell us of any places to do that). Second, we knew no French in an area where it is the primary language. Thankfully, Quebec is suitably prepared for Americans like us. Today we encountered nothing but friendly people and places that accepted Visa. Crisis averted. Though as one last aside, pronunciations can be important. At the border, the crossing guard asked about our itinerary – “La Ron-d-eh” was met with a blank stare. After a couple seconds she finally realized we were headed to “La Rond” (pronounced in a great French accent).

A very classy looking entrance.

La Ronde is in a great setting—on an island in the middle of Montreal. Entry is via the Jacques Cartier bridge, an improve sight in its own right. After a bit of winding through some historic looking stone buildings and lots of trees, you reach the parking lot. Reminiscent of Dollywood’s parking lot, it’s about 5 spaces wide and stretches forever. A quick walk brought us to the main entrance. La Ronde started as world’s fair location in 1967. After the fair, the rides stayed and the park expanded before being bought by Six Flags in 2001.

Fantastic Looking Bridge

Our first impression of the park was one of beauty mixed with neglect. A number of buildings and queue areas sat abandoned and paint was peeling everywhere. We saw a gorgeous building labeled as a dolphin stadium that looked like it hadn’t operated in quite some time. Aside from the newest of coasters like Goliath and Ednor, everything was faded or peeling including ride track, trains, stations, queue lines, and buildings. Nothing seemed to be in bad shape, but it all just needed a good coat of paint and a few days of landscape work. That said, the park felt wonderful. It’s been hard to place exactly what is to like about the park, but it has an enjoyable atmosphere and feels like the history has been preserved (and there seemed to be a lot of that). Because of short park hours (11-8) and a fair amount of crowds, we elected to purchase a Gold Flash Pass to skip the lines. In general, I’m opposed to any kind of skip the line upcharge pass that rewards privilege but I suppose with enough want and a small enough amount of time I can be bought. (As it turns out, there would have been very little chance of finishing the park had we not bought the Flash Pass.)

Our first stop was Cobra, one of only 2 Intamin standup coasters left in the world. While it has the distinctive B&M box track spine, this is an Intamin design (though it has been said a young Walter Bolliger and Claude Mabillard worked on the project team as employees of Intamin. The first noticeable thing about the coaster is the awkward restraint design—even moreso than the Togo standup coasters. On one side of the seat, your arm goes around vertical bar. On the other side, a half shoulder restraint with lap bar extension completes the contraption. Any kind of restraint no matter how strange of a design can still be good if the track design is ok. Sadly that’s not the case here. The track layout is full of potholes, headbanging, and roughness. After the midcourse brake run, the ride sort of dies with a few meandering turns and long stretched hills as the train finds its way to the station. As it turns out, this part is rough too. I had really hoped to like this ride seeing as it’s one of only two left in the world, but the ride makes me hard pressed to put it anywhere from the bottom ¼ of the list this trip.

One of the best park locations ever.

In terms of Batman: The Ride clones, this is up near the top.

Thankfully, the B&M inverted coaster next door is a world of difference. A mirrored Batman: The Ride clone, Vampire is smooth and incredibly intense. Aside from the peeling, faded paint and overgrown plants, the coaster felt like it could have been brand new. Our flash pass got us right on and we were on the back seat within a few cycles. Continuing the coaster tour, we stopped at Le Boomerang. This was about what you might expect from a typical boomerang, though I didn’t find it as painful as most, especially Six Flags New England’s. It had a fair amount of bumping at the base of the cobra roll, but aside from a bit of back compression, the ride felt fine—little to no head banging throughout the entire trip.

Next we turned to Super Manège. A twisted track in a tight space didn’t instill a lot of confidence based on previous Vekoma designs. But in an unexpected twist, we couldn’t have been more wrong. The coaster ran smoothly through everything, including all the oddly shaped corners and corkscrews. Super Manège ended up being one of our favorite coasters during the day. It’s beyond me how that ride ended up being so smooth, but I’m glad to have it. We even rode it again later in the day, which is something very rare for anything made by Vekoma.

Smooth and fun, yet so faded.

Everything just needs a good coat of paint.

We had trepidation about the next coaster too—the massive Le Monstre double tracked wooden coaster. Designed by Cobb, the ride is massive and looks like it could be very rough. In another instance of good news, the coaster turned out to ride just fine. The Morgan trains proved a surprisingly smooth ride with the only bumps due to the ridiculous shaping of the track. To put it simply, there is no need to have a helix that undulates up and down the whole way around the corner. The main complaint about Monster was the entire lack of capacity. Each side ran one seven car train and climbed the lift hill at a speed that could easily be passed by anyone walking at a normal pace. These two factors combined for huge waits even with a small queue. Unlike a lot of double track coasters that follow the same general path, there is a fair amount of variation along the course. Track 1 (which actually opened a year after Track 2) was my favorite, featuring less ridiculous undulations and a great double down airtime hill in the middle.

The massive structure certainly towers over the park.

The trains weren’t bad, but like everything they were faded and chipped.

We were certainly glad to have the Flash Pass, though there were still a number of rides where the pass didn’t apply. Unfortunately, poor operations made for huge waits. The Zamperla wild mouse ended up being a wait of nearly an hour because the operators were incapable of dispatching more than one car on the course at any given time. Thankfully a lack of braking made that coaster pretty worthwhile. Also a long wait was Dragon, an indoor Intamin family coaster. We didn’t know entirely what to expect from the layout, but it seems to be a custom designed course with decent theming along the entire track. There are no large drops to speak of, which fits well for the family aspect, but makes the 30 minute wait disappointing. Also disappointing (but only a little) was seeing the park’s SLC closed for maintenance. This brought our total possible coasters down to 10 (counting Monster as 2). Bringing it down one further, the Arrow mini mine train is restricted to kids under 54” and accompanying parents—something that was not readily apparent on the sign and resulted in an unnecessary 20 minute wait.

There was amazing theming in this area of the park. I’m guessing this is circa the late 1960s during the fair.

It’s tough to wait so long for such a small coaster. At least it was fun!

The star of the park was the B&M hyper coaster Goliath. Though it’s one of the smallest of the company’s mega coaster collection, the airtime is fantastic. Goliath follows a very traditional layout with a big first drop and a string of hill out to a flat turnaround followed by a string of hills back. The ride is smooth and relaxing with great floating airtime on every hill. This coaster also had the best operations all day, running 2 trains (the only coaster doing so!) and having a relatively quick dispatch interval. Also a rarity in the park, the track is still bright and shiny with colors reminiscent of the Superman brand that could easily be applied if this park ever receives the Six Flags prefix to the name.

Lots of hills and lots of airtime!

With coasters out of the way we could focus on the large number of flat rides La Ronde had to offer. The newest ride to the park is Vol Ultime, a star flyer ride. Sadly the ride is just under 150’ tall meaning there isn’t much of a view from the top compared to the observation tower or even the Jacques Cartier bridge next to the park. Still, it provides a fun ride that was more relaxing than anything. The other non-coaster of note was the Minirail, a small monorail around the park. La Ronde’s 1.3 mile loop is actually a remnant of a much larger loop around the entire island that ran during the world’s fair. Build by the Von Roll company, the little track runs automated trains of 15 cars on a slow journey around the park, stopping at 2 stations. The ride was a fantastic piece of history and a great way to relax and see the park.

Not too high, but still a cool ride.

This was my favorite park transportation system of any place I’ve been.

La Ronde’s major surprise for us came with the food. Instead of the standard Six Flags faire of Johnny Rockets, hamburgers, and chicken strips, La Ronde had a huge selection of great food. From poutine to crepes, there is plenty to enjoy all around the park. It seems like these are outside restaurant groups contracted to offer their food at the park, but whatever the case I could have easily spent a few more days just eating my way around the place.

Lunch time! Awesome food all around.

Despite faded paint and poor operations, La Ronde had a classic charm that couldn’t be ignored. It bumps Canobie as the favorite park of the trip and one I’d like to head back to sooner rather than later. With only 9 hours to experience the park, we felt like there was quite a large amount that we didn’t get to see and do. It all started with a world’s fair, but the park is still packed full of interesting things.

Up next: We’re partway into the longest journey of the trip… it’s nearly 3AM in Trenton, Ontario. Tomorrow is another hour or two to Canada’s Wonderland for Leviathan!

Coaster List So Far:

Dragon, Wisdom Rides Kiddie Coaster, Bowcraft
Sea Serpent, Miler Kiddie Coaster, Keansburg
Wildcat, Schwarzkopf Wildcat, Keansburg
Cyclone, Keenan Wooden Coaster, Astroland
Sea Serpent, Miler Kiddie Coaster, Deno’s Wonder Wheel
Soarin’ Eagle, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Scream Zone
Steeplechase, Zamperla Motorbike Coaster, Scream Zone
Tickler, Zamperla Spinning Wild Mouse, Luna Park
Circus Coaster, Zamperla Family Coaster, Luna Park
Ladybug Coaster, Zierer Family Coaster, Adventureland
Hurricane, S.D.C. Sitdown, Adventureland
Dragon Coaster, Church Wooden Coaster, Playland
Crazy Mouse, Zamperla Wild Mouse, Playland
Super Flight, Zamperla Flying Coaster, Playland
Family Flyer, Zamperla Kiddie Coaster, Playland
Wooden Warrior, Gravity Group Wooden, Quassy
Little Dipper, Allan Herschell Kiddie, Quassy
Yankee Cannonball, Schmeck Wooden Coaster, Canobie
Untamed, Gerstlauer Eurofighter, Canobie
Canobie Corkscrew, Arrow Corkscrew, Canobie
Goliath, Vekoma Giant Inverted Boomerang, SFNE
Flashback, Vekoma Boomerang, SFNE
Pandemonium, Gerstlauer Spinning Coaster, SFNE
Great Chase, Miler Family Coaster, SFNE
Thunderbolt, Traver/Baker Wooden Coaster, SFNE
Bizarro, Intamin Mega Coaster, SFNE
Gotham City Gauntlet Escape from Arkham Asylum, Mack Wild Mouse, SFNE
Catwoman’s Whip, Zierer Family Coaster, SFNE
Mind Eraser, Vekoma SLC, SFNE
Batman: The Dark Knight, B&M Floorless Coaster, SFNE
Cyclone, Cobb Wooden Coaster, SFNE
Alpine Bobsled, Intamin Bobsled, Great Escape
Comet, Schmeck/Allen Wooden, Great Escape
Canyon Blaster, Arrow Mine Train, Great Escape
Steamin’ Demon, Arrow Looping Coaster, Great Escape
Cobra, Intamin Stand Up Coaster, La Ronde
Vampire, B&M Inverted Coaster, La Ronde
Le Boomerang, Vekoma Boomerang, La Ronde
Super Menage, Vekoma Corkscrew, La Ronde
Monstre (Track 2), Cobb Double Wooden Coaster, La Ronde
Dragon, Intamin Indoor Coaster, La Ronde
Goliath, B&M hyper coaster, La Ronde
Toboggan Nordique, Zamperla Wild Mouse, La Ronde
Monstre (Track 1), Cobb Double Wooden Coaster, La Ronde