CP and Soak City July 7-9 (long)

This is a first trip report for me, but there were a lot of things I noticed that I felt were actually worth mentioning this time.

Saturday was our Cedar Point day, and we arrived at the park close to 1 P.M. due to a late start, but on a Saturday, it doesn't make a big difference.

My first obvservation was the cost of parking, now at ten dollars. I was expecting valet service at this point.

We parked in back by Soak City, and our first ride of the day was Magnum. The ride host was controlling flow into the station, and that was a blessing. It's much easier (especially when you have a larger party) to figure out what lines go where, so kudos to the Magnum crew that day, the ride ran very efficently.

Up next we rode Gemini, and the station was almost empty, no wait whatsoever...not sure what that was about, still a good ride though.

Maverick was our next choice, and I was in eager anticipation because of all the great things I've heard. The wait was an hour and a half, although they did have a reset so that took us to two hours. Thank you CP for leaving the trees near the queue, that took the sun's beating away for awhile.

The station looked great, and it was a near perfect match to the old WWL area, so again, nice job to P and D at CP. The ride itself was fantastic. I could never catch my breath as it was non-stop fun, and the inversions and air-time were insane. What was also insane was the use of OTSRs. Um, what purpose do these serve, besides causing considerable pain to those who don't hold on to the proper handles? Overall, a great addition to the park, and finally one that actually works the way its supposed to.

Throughout the day we also touched base with Raptor, Millennium, Snake River Falls, and many others. Disaster Transport looks worse this year, and honestly, if you read this Cedar Point, get rid of it before it falls in on itself.

Now onto the negatives:

Food services sucks. Period. I'm thankful for those who come to our country to work at CP, but honestly, if you can't understand what I'm saying, or you don't understand the menu, work in a different area of the park. Futhermore, how long does it take to come up with a cup of ice water and a pretzel? I also noticed three dollars for the 20 oz. bottles while waiting in line...did we not learn from the summer of 3.50? On a hot day, people will probably pay it, but that's not the logic to use to charge people so much for so little.

I also noticed smoking everywhere in the park, and in line. So here's what I propose to CP for next season: don't waste your time coming up with smoking areas when you're not going to enforce it.

Beyond that, the park seemed very clean and bright, and most rides were running in great condition, but I would like to see another flume ride go in, so I don't have to get soaked to cool off.

Soak City, Monday

I don't normally go to Soak City anymore, since I've been spoiled by bigger and better waterparks, but it had been awhile and it was again a really hot day.

I have to point out again that Soak City needs to get with the program. Even Kalahari has things that Soak City still doesn't have, and Cedar Point needs to learn that today's waterparks are far ahead of them, hopefully we'll see some updates in the near future.

My biggest disappointment however was with the lifeguards, and this applies to just about all of them. If you don't like your job, then do something else, or pretend to like it. Being rude is not the same as enforcing rules, and every single time I watched a lifeguard remind a guest of a rule, they were extremely rude. I don't care if you have to work 10 hours a day, that is no excuse to be rude and downright mean, most employees don't do it in the the park, so don't do it at Soak City. I was really surprised at the low level quality of guest service we had there, it was pretty sad.

The slides were fun, the water was nice, but its a waterpark, not much to say.

Overall, it was fun, but there are still areas where dire improvement is needed.