GodsOnSafari
2020-08-19 14:14:41 UTC
Like everyone, my experiences this year with parks are limited. Lots of them aren't open, the ones that are tend to be in places I refuse to transit to given their population's refusal to believe that there is a pandemic going on which has killed (as of today) in excess of 170K Americans and led to us being largely sealed off from the rest of the world. I don't want to spend much time on this, but I do want to reiterate that people who believe that the crisis is "manufactured" or whatever are compelete morons; perfect crystalizations of how the internet allows people with no knowledge at all about subjects to suddenly be experts on economics and public health while espousing viewpoints so totally wrong that it is obvious none of them have even read the wiki for most of these terms, much less completed a college course.
Having said that, here's this year's "new to me" stuff. It's a whopping ten coasters, two from Pre-COVID, 8 post-.
Hagrid's Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure: One of the Pre-COVID coasters, Intamin did it again with Hagrid, producing an attraction incapable under the best circumstances of having any less than 20% downtime during the day. In fairness, much of this is a result of the ride's incredible complexity, with switches, launches, drop track, etc. My first ride had a noticable delay in the cave, the second no delays. It's a fun ride with lots of themed elements and I think it lends itself really well to night rides with the overarching theme. Would I prefer to have Dragons back? Probably. At least it worked and never had a line.
Hurricane (Fun Spot Kissimmee): Placed roughly where the old SDC Hurricane was located in Old Town, Fun Spot's expansion into that facility to fill the need of anchor attractions comes with this used Star Jet coaster from Miler. With the original scrapped following its becoming of the symbol of Hurricane Sandy's destruction, this is the only one I'm aware of. The layout is good, with plenty of strong airtime and restraints that are fairly comfy. I've been on most (All?) of the big Milers built at this point and I love them all equally, including the ones which have passed onto the next life. Fun Spot owning two of them is kinda hilarious to me, and both are in garbage looking conditions.
Orion: My thing with B&Ms is I like when they have airtime. They're comfortable rides with great seats and restraints, and when you get airtime, you can actually enjoy it rather than being pinned between the seat and a series of restraints around the waist and ankles like SOME OTHER PEOPLE. Orion is fundamentally not an airtime machine. It has good positive Gs (better sustained ones than any other B&M hyper I'd say) but as far as airtime goes, it's got a couple straight hills, but no real return run or anything like that. I think it's definitely a back seat ride. I certainly don't hate it: it's a good ride, but not my favorite B&M of the year.
Rushmore Mountain Coaster: Perfectly good but not spectacular mountain coaster in South Dakota; it's located about 20 minutes outside Rapid City close to, what else, Mount Rushmore. There's some pretty solid drops that cause the cars to engage their automatic braking system afterwards, but you enjoy a pop of air. Liked it a lot.
Runaway Train (Super Slide Amusement Park): I never want to hear about how *INSERT MARKET HERE* can't support a park. Bismarck, a city of well under 100K, has supported Super Slide Amusement Park for nearly 50 years. It's a small family park catering to younger children with this slightly above average Wisdom coaster as the thing drawing enthusiasts. It lives on in spite of there being Pizza Ranch (the regionally appropriate FEC chain) being located here in town too. It's no great shakes as a coaster, but no one goes to North Dakota for that anyhow.
Candymonium: Remember what I just said about B&Ms and airtime? Well, this has it. That second hill has about 5 seconds of sustained strong floater air. So much fun. Not my favorite B&M hyper, but it's really good.
Merlin's Mayhem (Dutch Wonderland): After waiting in an uncomfortable 45 minute line for this thing, we boarded and it was not bad. The theming in the station and queue line is above average for this kind of park, and probably why the ownership wound up spreading costs from its construction across 3 fiscal years rather than just building the damn thing like most companies would. It's made for kids, so the seats are pretty small, which is also slightly uncomfortable for a suspended coaster. Onboard audio, a couple helices, it's whatever. Cha-ching.
Camelback Mountain Coaster: Aquatic built this, so it feels like a cheap knockoff that's falling apart, but that also means that it goes pretty fast and feels thrilling in a way the Wieglands don't often. Like the Branson coaster they built, this is a ton of fun with some pretty gnarly transitions and drops. Nice and lengthy too.
Thriller and Twisted Timbers (Land of Make Believe): It's a good kiddie park with an outstanding water park for its size, though the ownership leaves something to be desired (LOL at the signs about Visa and Mastercard outside the entry). There's a stock Miler kiddie and a stock SBF Visa Spinning coaster here to enjoy. Some of the more appealing things like the random bomber cockpit (the owner is a plane enthusiast), the train, the haunted walk through, and the truck turned into a "safari" ride were all closed not necessarily due to COVID but definitely due to cost reductions as there was on-and-off rain that day at the park.
Having said that, here's this year's "new to me" stuff. It's a whopping ten coasters, two from Pre-COVID, 8 post-.
Hagrid's Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure: One of the Pre-COVID coasters, Intamin did it again with Hagrid, producing an attraction incapable under the best circumstances of having any less than 20% downtime during the day. In fairness, much of this is a result of the ride's incredible complexity, with switches, launches, drop track, etc. My first ride had a noticable delay in the cave, the second no delays. It's a fun ride with lots of themed elements and I think it lends itself really well to night rides with the overarching theme. Would I prefer to have Dragons back? Probably. At least it worked and never had a line.
Hurricane (Fun Spot Kissimmee): Placed roughly where the old SDC Hurricane was located in Old Town, Fun Spot's expansion into that facility to fill the need of anchor attractions comes with this used Star Jet coaster from Miler. With the original scrapped following its becoming of the symbol of Hurricane Sandy's destruction, this is the only one I'm aware of. The layout is good, with plenty of strong airtime and restraints that are fairly comfy. I've been on most (All?) of the big Milers built at this point and I love them all equally, including the ones which have passed onto the next life. Fun Spot owning two of them is kinda hilarious to me, and both are in garbage looking conditions.
Orion: My thing with B&Ms is I like when they have airtime. They're comfortable rides with great seats and restraints, and when you get airtime, you can actually enjoy it rather than being pinned between the seat and a series of restraints around the waist and ankles like SOME OTHER PEOPLE. Orion is fundamentally not an airtime machine. It has good positive Gs (better sustained ones than any other B&M hyper I'd say) but as far as airtime goes, it's got a couple straight hills, but no real return run or anything like that. I think it's definitely a back seat ride. I certainly don't hate it: it's a good ride, but not my favorite B&M of the year.
Rushmore Mountain Coaster: Perfectly good but not spectacular mountain coaster in South Dakota; it's located about 20 minutes outside Rapid City close to, what else, Mount Rushmore. There's some pretty solid drops that cause the cars to engage their automatic braking system afterwards, but you enjoy a pop of air. Liked it a lot.
Runaway Train (Super Slide Amusement Park): I never want to hear about how *INSERT MARKET HERE* can't support a park. Bismarck, a city of well under 100K, has supported Super Slide Amusement Park for nearly 50 years. It's a small family park catering to younger children with this slightly above average Wisdom coaster as the thing drawing enthusiasts. It lives on in spite of there being Pizza Ranch (the regionally appropriate FEC chain) being located here in town too. It's no great shakes as a coaster, but no one goes to North Dakota for that anyhow.
Candymonium: Remember what I just said about B&Ms and airtime? Well, this has it. That second hill has about 5 seconds of sustained strong floater air. So much fun. Not my favorite B&M hyper, but it's really good.
Merlin's Mayhem (Dutch Wonderland): After waiting in an uncomfortable 45 minute line for this thing, we boarded and it was not bad. The theming in the station and queue line is above average for this kind of park, and probably why the ownership wound up spreading costs from its construction across 3 fiscal years rather than just building the damn thing like most companies would. It's made for kids, so the seats are pretty small, which is also slightly uncomfortable for a suspended coaster. Onboard audio, a couple helices, it's whatever. Cha-ching.
Camelback Mountain Coaster: Aquatic built this, so it feels like a cheap knockoff that's falling apart, but that also means that it goes pretty fast and feels thrilling in a way the Wieglands don't often. Like the Branson coaster they built, this is a ton of fun with some pretty gnarly transitions and drops. Nice and lengthy too.
Thriller and Twisted Timbers (Land of Make Believe): It's a good kiddie park with an outstanding water park for its size, though the ownership leaves something to be desired (LOL at the signs about Visa and Mastercard outside the entry). There's a stock Miler kiddie and a stock SBF Visa Spinning coaster here to enjoy. Some of the more appealing things like the random bomber cockpit (the owner is a plane enthusiast), the train, the haunted walk through, and the truck turned into a "safari" ride were all closed not necessarily due to COVID but definitely due to cost reductions as there was on-and-off rain that day at the park.