Cedar Point 6/27/14 - What a Strange Day

My mom and I arrived at the park around 9:30 and made it back to Maverick in time for one early entry ride and rode in the back. My mom saw one of her high school friends and her 2 younger kids. They hadn't actually seen each other in person for a very long time and they had fun catching up, and her 7th grade son is a major enthusiast. He was so funny! Then the line just started to fill up but we managed to get on it again, this time in the front, with only a 5 minute wait. But as soon we we left, a lot of the main queue building had already started to fill up. We were glad to get our Maverick rides in when we did, since we hate waiting in that line.

We headed over Mean Streak and waited a couple minutes for the front and had the smoothest ride I ever have on it. The layout's still as boring as ever, but it was actually pretty enjoyable. Dragster was next, and we waited or the front row which came out to be about a 45 minute wait in total. It was so nice to get back on it and to just hear and see it running. Coastermania was so strange without it. After this was the longest wait of the day, in total an hour and a half for the front row on Millennium. It was fun and worth it, but we were surprised by the line. It seemed to move very slow, much slower than usual even though it was running 3 trains.

It was around 2:30 and we got lunch at Panda Express. Talking to one of the workers there, she said how it has been a rough day and that there were lots of rude guests, so we made sure to be extra nice. I don't get why people feel the need to act that way, and I felt bad for the employees. And let's just say that throughout the day, we have our fair share of interesting guest experiences (More to come about that later).

We just sat for a while and just relaxed. With platinum passes, I love how you never feel rushed and can take your time. It was fun people watching and enjoying the park's atmosphere. Then we decided to take a jaunt through the Frontier Trail. We stopped for about 20 minutes at the Barnyard. I still love this little surprise addition for this year. No matter what day we go or what time of day it's always so much busier than it used to be, and it's great seeing all the families with little kids who are smiling and laughing. Even though it's not a ride, I love Barnyard so much.

Then we stopped and watched Snake River Falls for a little bit. It was fun watching both the riders and the people standing on the bridge. If it was hotter I would've gone on. I want to get on the water rides at least once this year but at the time I didn't feel like getting wet, but I'm sure later in the summer I'll have a better opportunity to go on.

We decided to ride Mine Ride when we walked by, and we actually had to wait about 15-20 minutes and went on the front row. A couple little kids in front of us were funny, since one of them was very serious that Mine Ride's station used to be a house and that it was turned into a roller coaster. He couldn't be convinced any other way. It was so cute.

We noticed that SlingShot had been testing earlier with dummies, but while in Mine Ride's station, we saw people on it. We wondered if it could have opened already, but Jason tweeted that it wouldn't open until hopefully Tuesday. So after a fun ride on MR, we went over to SlingShot where there was a pretty decent crowd standing around. Employees were testing it and it was so much fun to watch. It was hilarious listening to the onlookers' reactions whenever the ride launched. People are just mesmerized by this ride, and even though it will be expensive (a worker told us it will be $25 to ride and $20 to buy the on-ride video) I will definitely try it. I really love the color scheme once seeing it in person. While watching it, we met Alex from MyOwnCP. He's really nice and it was fun meeting him.

Rude guest incident: a group of middle school ages kids were sitting around the new planters near the Gemini restrooms. After they left, we saw that hid ripped a lot of the flowers and were drawing and writing inappropriate things on the planters. There were 2 sweeps that came and they were frustrated.

So after watching SlingShot test for a while, we rode Magnum. In the ejector seat. It was painful, but fun. Then we went on Dragster again and waited about 20 minutes for the back row. While in line a kid around my age noticed the Banshee shirt I was wearing and said he works in the Diamondback shop at Kings Island. He says he actually doesn't like working at the park and doesn't like The Beast. Oh well. It was his first time on Dragster so he was looking forward to it. We waited about 5 minutes for Power Tower drop and faced the lake. Arms out and legs out is the best way to ride. :) We then decided to go back on Dragster again, but the line had lengthened a little bit. We wanted to ride in the front again and waited about 30-40 minutes.

We headed up toward the front of the park and went on Cedar Downs (I won!). Then we waited about 5 minutes for the front row on Raptor. I was looking forward to going on it after riding Banshee, and I have to say, Banshee is better. Raptor is still fun and is intense, but I love how re-ridable and overall just more enjoyable Banshee is. Since we were right by it, we decided to get a quick ride on Blue Streak. Only waited a couple minutes, sat in a middle seat, and had an incredibly smooth and fun ride.

Next was Gatekeeper and we rode the back left after about a 15 minute wait. I got a good look at the new structure that supposedly might be for a new haunt. The steel framework is up, and it definitely looks big enough to house a new haunted house. I got a picture from outside the ride.

After Gatekeeper was Wicked Twister, and we rode in the 2nd to back seat after 1 ride cycle. It was as enjoyable as ever. By this time it was almost 8:30 and I decided I wanted to ride Dragster again and then finish off with Millennium. We went to Dragster, only to discover it was closed due to mechanical reasons. We decided to wait around for a little while. Eventually it ran an empty train and it had a rollback. After seeing this, most of the general public became freaked out and left the line that was forming outside the entrance. Then a few other people were concerned that "the ride was leaking" after seeing the water used to cool the ride dripping down from the track. Another kid said "the ride is peeing!" which was pretty funny. Then there were some kids who were karate chopping and ripping out parts of the small bushes near the ride's entrance, which was annoying and disrespectful. Eventually there were only a handful of people left and I was in the front of the line. My mom has a broken toe so decided to wait on the benches across from the entrance. At one point the ride host offered his stool to anyone who wanted it, and the people around me knew I had been waiting there the longest and was first in line, so they all told me I could have it. So at least these people were nice.

I got to talking about Banshee with a guy and he said he went on Opening Day, and he said is was such a big mistake. He didn't even end up riding Banshee due to its line so he and his son plan on going back in the fall. We also started talking about Coastermania along with the ride host. I then explained to a man and 2 teenagers behind me what Coastermania was after they asked. It was actually pretty fun just sitting outside the entrance talking with the ride host and some of the other guests. The ride host, Plamen, was hilarious and was really nice. He joked around that we needed some firewood, s'mores, and a guitar while we waited, and made lots of other fun jokes and interacted great with all the guests, despite the tons of times he had to explain to guests approaching the entrance that the ride was down. He's great at his job. Then one of our other favorite Dragster (and all time favorite) ride ops, Ashli, came over and we talked with her for a little bit too. I also found out that there was Magnum ERT that night, which surprisingly I didn't even know about. That was fun to learn about.

Then about 5 minutes til 10, Plamen got a call that the ride would unfortunately not reopen. He thanked everyone for waiting around, and then my mom and I quickly headed to Millennium. We managed to get past the Luminosity mob and thanks to the 8 minute grace period, got in line in time. There were only 7 people behind us by the time the line was closed, so we had high hopes of getting on the last train of the night. Then when we were about halfway up the ramp, a woman came walking right on past everyone saying she was trying to get to her family. I can't stand people who do this, and try to cut everyone to reach family or friends who have previously been waiting in line. Even if she was telling the truth, it's still annoying.

Then something very strange happened when we were almost to the top of the ramp. A woman came barreling through, furious, along with several other people. We were thinking that this is just ridiculous, with all these people cutting us, but this time there was an employee following them. As the lady in front walked past us, she kept saying how a man left his 7 year old kid with her and her family and they had him all day. She said she saw him run onto this ride. Well, several minutes later when we were almost to the unload station, we hear someone screaming as soon as a train pulled through the brake run. The lady was standing below on the exit ramp yelling up to the train that had just come back. She was screaming and swearing at the top of her lungs, meanwhile everyone on that train just looked confused. Everyone around us waiting in line peered over to see and listen to what was happening. Basically the lady was calling the guy on the train out for leaving his young kid with her and telling him what an effing this and effing that he was.

I have to assume that there's more to this story than what happened. Maybe could this man be an ex boyfriend or ex husband? They seemed like they knew each other, but who knows. Also, for the lady screaming up at the man, don't you think she would not have wanted to make such a huge deal of it in front of everyone, especially little kids were in line and on that train? Apparently she just wanted to make it an even bigger issue, and was perfectly alright with swearing at the top of her lungs around all the kids. Classy. So classy. Such a great way to relieve a situation.

So then after the guy got off the ride, everyone around us in line starting booing him and taunting him as he walked by, which made him even more mad. I just stayed out of it and didn't say anything. Who knows what the circumstances were and I was not going to partake in behavior like that.

So anyways, once in the station they announced there would only be 2 more trains, and we were in the 2nd to the last row on the last train of the night! I love getting on the final train. It's so cool knowing you're the last people to ride that ride for that day. By then it was 10:30 so we quickly went to Magnum for the ride night. We ended up getting in 2 great rides. We could have got more since at 11:10 when we walked by, they were still letting passholders in but we were tired, hungry, and had an hour and a half drive back home.

Just outside the main entrance was the family who had the issue with the man abandoning his kid with them. I still don't know the whole story, but based on what I heard when I left, the man had an older son with him and the 2 of them wanted to go on all the big rides, so they left his 7 year old with that family. Like I mentioned earlier, I just don't see that he would leave his kid with a random stranger all day, and if he did, why didn't that family contact security or other employees? It just sounds fishy to me. It also sounded like the police had been involved, and the lady, surrounded by her own young kids, starting saying how the man kept saying "effing this and effing that right in front of the police officer." Again, this woman is not censoring this in front of these young kids.

So this whole situation was just very very strange. That's a horrible thing to leave your kid with someone else, but I feel like there's definitely a back story behind it. Then the lady used this opportunity to completely call out the man, paying no regard to her foul language around all the other guests. So personally, I think the lady is no better than the man but I'll hold all firm judgments since I don't have enough information to do so.

Then on our way out to our car, we saw this written in large letter with chalk: "Don't park my cars butt!"

What???????? Just something else to add to the strange things that day. And on the causeway, there was a car pulled over by 2 police cars and it looked like the car was being searched.

The day was so much fun and was a blast, but between strange occurences, and a whole day full of rude guests, it was just very odd. But thankfully we met lots of great staff and patrons too, and did talk to a bunch of friendly people around in lines throughout the day. Plus I have to give honorable mentions to Jasper of Maverick, Ashli of Dragster, and Plamen of Dragster. Best 3 employees of the park this year, at least as far as I've seen and have gotten to know. And in total, we got in 18 rides which is pretty good considering it was fairly busy and we took our time throughout the day. It was great to get to the park one last time before out vacation!