Beware: Early Ride Closings No Joke!

^Side comment to Skyhawk06, I recall you saying a few weeks back that you were hired at the Marina and I see you are a Marina operations attendant. I hope it is going well for you and that you are getting plenty of hours and compensation.

I was looking at the CP webcams and noticed that the Marina was chock-full this morning. Could you share how wild and crazy it was when the extreme storm rolled through? Hope it didn't do too much damage to your area.

Well it's going alright minus today(sent home b/c dehydration), but otherwise it's been good. I can't speak for this morning because I was on noon today. About the storm, everything was shut down there and the store and whatnot were flooded. We basically spent the day afterwards cleaning up the aftermath of this whole thing.

Are you not drinking your water while on the job? And why not?

KI just cut back the next couple of weekends to 8PM.

For those who've been, how has the end of day traffic been leaving the point at closing? Has it improved since opening day?

I can say that last Saturday I left the park around 8:30, and it probably took me about 30 minutes to get from the CP Shores lot to Express hotel. So it's definitely still a bit of a struggle, but understandably so. I think until they go back to normal operating hours, that will persist.

It will be interesting to see what happens in the coming weeks. I think even a 10pm hard close will bring traffic improvements over the 8pm hard close.

The real answer, though, is still a soft-er close.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Last Saturday my younger son and I left the park close to 7pm because my feet were hurting. Traffic was moderate. My older son stayed until 8 because he had gotten there later and his description of traffic as he was talking to me on the phone was bad enough I told him just to pick another parking spot, roll the windows down and rest for a while. Things looked better about a half hour later so he tried leaving again but traffic was still heavy enough he wasn't able to make it back to home turf early enough to make it to Chipotle before they closed.

It’s great to be back! Relatively short trip today from 2-8. Pulled out of our spot at about 8:10 and other than avoiding all the small children venturing off the blue line with oblivious parents it was smooth and fast out of the lot. We were probably a bit ahead of the mass exit crowds.

Didn’t notice any early lines cut but we finished out at the front with Raptor, GK and then a 2nd meal at 7:35.

I've been seeing it across a number of threads but the food lines have gotten better than opening day?

I think so TC. We ate at Coasters about 3:30 and it was ~10 minutes to order and ~10 to pickup. The kitchen seemed a tad slow, but the food was hot and I will wait for that. 7:30 was at Corral and that was fast at 5 minutes (only one side open). I wasn't specifically scoping out food today but it seemed like most all the primary shacks were open with the exception of Lakeside and some of the carts. There were several food trucks in the Celebration Plaza area as well.

I will say at both the locations the staff were very friendly and helpful, a marked change from past seasons. So much so I was tempted to give a tip. Is that allowed? Next trip I will at least take down some names and send a shout out to GS. I was really impressed. $20/hr FTW.

So what is the TK Texas Sandwich at Corral? Specifically the crunchy mystery meat? Other than loaded with a months worth of carbs it was really good, just can't figure out what the semi-crunchy meat(?) was that wasn't the bacon.

Texas Toast, Country Fried Steak, Bacon, Pimiento Cheese, Lettuce, Tomato, Mayo.
$12.99.

Anyone have an update on the ride line closings? Saw on Reddit they were open until park close a few days ago, wondering if this is the norm and if so, that’s awesome. Anyone have updates?

From what I could tell last night there were not early line closings at least in the front of the park.

I haven’t witnessed any early line closings either. I had a feeling that as time went on and restrictions became lifted more and more that this policy would change.

I think its less about COVID restrictions and more about enough staff

Cargo Shorts said: “$20/hr FTW”

I’m really curious what this will look like on the future… Will they keep paying that high next year? And if they do, expect a lot of crying and complaining when Season Passes go on sale with a significant price increase

So a season pass costs $150, which is about $30/month, which is less than what one day costs bought at the gate. If you go once a week for every week of the season, it costs you, what $7.50 to get in? I would say that it's way under valued as it is now, even if you go just once a month. If it went up to $200 it's still a bargain.

Dutchman- Not disagreeing with your math. But just watch… Say Gold goes to $200 and Platinum goes to $250 across the chain. It will be anarchy.

Anarchy will ensue but I bet they still sell enough to not even flinch. Annual Passes have been way under valued for what you get.