Coastermania by Dvo

Here we go... Another 3-day report, so bear with me.

Friday I got to the park around 2:00. I entered through the resort gate, but I didn't see any signs to check in for coaster mania. So I asked the employee at the gate where I checked in, and he just gave me a strange look. He had no idea what I was talking about. So obviously I assumed check-in was at the main gate only.

Anyway, I entered to find a moderately large crowd. I got a few small rides in, and then rode Raptor before meeting up with some others from this site at the front gate. We got checked in and then went back around to the resort entrance again.

We ended up getting some decent riding in during the normal hours of the day, especially in the evening. The first Coaster Mania event was the social hour, which I was planning to skip. Boy am I glad I didn't. They said they were having "hors d'ouvres." On the contrary, they had an immaculate spread, including veggies, chicken nuggets, quesadillas, cheese & crackers, and a cash bar. Not to mention the nice plates and utensils. This was my first Coaster Mania, so needless to say I was already impressed.

The 2nd event was Ron Toomer's presentation, which was pretty entertaining. After that we got some more riding in, and around 8:30 the crowd really started to die down. We were at Skyhawk around 9:30, and we were able to marathon the ride, including easily the best ride I've ever had. Let's just say we got more than our share of airtime.

Around 9:45 we headed to Magnum for the first ERT. Hooray for trimless rides. It was running like a well-oiled machine, and we got a few rides before heading back to Skyhawk and Maverick. The Maverick ERT was less enjoyable, since it was the only ride running. We barely managed to get 2 rides on it.

Day 2:
Woke up at 5:10 am. Ouch. Nonteheless we got to the park around 6:45 and walked back to MF. There was a moderate line by the time we got there, but we were still able to get 4 rides on it by 7:30. We then went to Power Tower for a quick ride, and TTD for 2 rides.

Once the ERT was over, I was expecting the park to get really crowded due to the gorgeous weather. To my surprise, the park was really empty all day! We got incredible ride numbers on everything. At the end of the day, I counted 55 rides on 22 different rides, including night ERT. Speaking of...

The night ERT began with maXair and Blue Streak at 11:00. We rode maXair first. Mistake! The muffleheads were atrocious at maXair... We were doing anything we could to keep them out of our faces. Pretty gross. After that we headed to Raptor for the best ERT all weekend. There was no line at all, so we were getting re-rides when the seat wasn't going to be filled. I got 10 laps in 1 hour. Also, on our very last ride (2nd last train of the night), we made it to the block behind the station, but the final train got stuck at the mid-course brake. So we were evacuated and got to walk down! A fantastic end to the day.

Today I went to the park for a few hours, and it was empty again. I got 6 more laps on Millie in about an hour and a half, and then rode a few other things before finally making the long haul back to Cincinnati.

All in all, it was a fantastic first Coaster Mania. Free food, great people, tons of riding, and perfect weather. Now if there was only a mufflehead eliminator... Maybe they'll re-brew the Rockstar Energy drink to eliminate those like they do trim brakes...

The muffleheads were pretty bad over the coastermania weekend. While waiting in line for Millennium Force, we saw a black cloud by Wicked Twister, and thought there might be a fire. Eventually someone figured out that they were the muffleheads. Anyway, it was a great weekend.

While riding Skyscraper Friday at dusk we could see clouds of the muffleheads above the groups of trees in Camper Village. It was like nothing I'd ever seen before. The only thing worse than that was while buying some Dippin Dots last night seeing the walls inside the little stall covered with bugs.

While riding the Sky Ride at Dusk virtually every tree by the Cadillac Cars had a huge plume of them coming up. Also I lost count of the hits to the face I got in the back of MF an hour later.

Yeah they were really awful. Going up the MF ramp you could look around and see swarms in every direction. We stuck our hands straight up Friday to see how many we could get stuck to our hands/arms. I got 12 ;)

(just so everyone is clear we went to the bathroom and cleaned up afterward)

Those 2 rides on Maxair sucked, those bugs got everywhere!

0g said:
The muffleheads were pretty bad over the coastermania weekend. While waiting in line for Millennium Force, we saw a black cloud by Wicked Twister, and thought there might be a fire. Eventually someone figured out that they were the muffleheads. Anyway, it was a great weekend.

That is hilarious-my hubby saw the swarms of them out by the beach and he thought the train had gone by or there was a fire or something!
Yeah the only thing worse than muffleheads are horseflies.

I had so many mufflehead corpses on my car I went through a car wash when I got home and there are still corpses stuck on the car! Blech! :(

Luckelly they wash out of clothes fairly easily

Jo

I think I got Muffleheads in every exposed orifice on my body. I'm really glad I decided not to moon that one guy!

We still had a great weekend, too. The staggered ERT was a pain, as it made the lines for Friday ERT longer than the lines before closing. Still 23.5 rides over 15 coasters in a day and a half isn't bad.

If you're wondering why I say 23 and a half- I was one train behind you on your last Raptor ride. Fun to coax my semi-frightened 8 year old daughter down that 100 foot spiral stairway. Of course today, she's ready to go back and ride Raptor again.

^ Glad I'm not the only one who counted that as half a ride. :)

Btw, my girlfriend and I checked-in for CM at the resort gate Friday at about noon with no problems. We went directly into the office. I will say I only saw about 10 lanyards in the office then, so perhaps supplies were just limited??

What coaster die-hard can think of a better way to end Coastermania than a walk-down from a coaster? The lucky ones got to walk down from the end of the brake run. The really lucky ones got to walk down from the mid-course. I'm just mildly disappointed that I didn't get to walk down. I had hit my limit just a little bit before, and stopped riding Raptor.

Og, if I had been solo, I would agree. Having to coax a nervous 8 year old down those stairs took a little bit of the fun out of it.

By the way, we noticed a lot of people taking pictures of us while we were stuck. Would sure like to see some of them.

Muffleheads? Is that their technical name? They looked like horney mosquitos to me. Never heard of 'em before but I sure ate a lot Friday evening on MF sitting in the front seet. I asked the folk in line what kind of wine would go with bugs like these? A Pinot Noir seemed to be everyone's favorite. What you all think?

Coasterpriest

I do agree that they look a bit like mosquitos. What they are called varies a bit by where you are. Near Lake Erie, they are called muffleheads. I've also heard them called non-biting midges and seen them by Lake Michigan as well as Lake Erie.