Crowds yesterday 5/20/2019

My wife and I took the day off yesterday and pulled the kids out of school in the hopes that yesterday, Monday 5/20/2019, would be a low crowd day. We were VERY wrong. There must have been some sort of event or something because the place was swarming with kids - there were buses upon more buses of kids. People everywhere! We don't eat food at the park but the lines for food were crazy I saw a line for Panda Express that had to be at least an hour long. To add to our trouble the wind was about 20mph and just about all the big rides were closed. Gatekeeper, Raptor, and Top Thrill were closed all day and Steel Vengeance didn't open until about Noon. We waited 2 hours for Valrayvn at park open from 10am - Noon. then another two hours for Steel Vengeance from Noon - 2pm. So four hours in the park and only two rides was not the start we were hoping for. We still made the best of it and it was still fun but this is not what we were planning for in any way shape or form. I really wish there was some way of determining when there are going to be special events that bring massive crowds to the park on days that should otherwise be uncrowded. Also we have learned our lesson to check the wind and make sure we never go back to the park when the wind is over 15mph.

Sorry to hear about the rough day. Unfortunately, that's the nature of the beast, especially this time of year. There are still a lot of school trips to the park. And actually, it was a very similar situation on Sunday. We were expecting a light day, but there was actually a pretty decent crowd, and the wind was keeping a lot of rides down that day as well.

I'm guessing between the weather, school trips, and all of the ticket promotions the park is running, the park is seeming much more crowded in these early weeks than in years prior.

Wind is the enemy of Cedar Point, especially this time of year; it's not just the speed but also the direction. On a typical Summer visit, one can always enjoy a breeze by Wicked Twister. Did you happen to notice that side of the park was blissfully calm? The lake was calm...almost no waves....while on the other side it was the complete opposite.

Hope you were able to enjoy your day regardless.

We were toying with the idea about staying at Breakers Sunday night to get early entry Monday morning as a strategy to get minimal wait for SV - really glad we didn't pull the trigger on the hotel. That would have really sucked and been a real waste to drop all that cash on the hotel only to have SV be down for early entry and the rest of the morning.

We headed out too, thinking we'd have the run of the place. Wrong. There were so many buses yesterday! With the big stuff down yesterday, that made the lines for everything else much longer. The line for people getting Churros/Funnel Cake Fries over by Wave Swinger was 23 deep at 4:00 PM. I could not believe there were that many people in line!

We still had fun though -- there was no line at all over at Linus' Beetle Bugs (formerly Tilt-a-Whirl). :)

Perhaps the heavy crowds are related to the Amusement Park 101 Education Days this week?

https://www.cedarpoint.com/explore/groups/student-youth-groups/educ...t-park-101

Was last week just as busy with Physics, Science, & Math Days?
I'm planning my first trip in several years with my oldest son, who is now 54" and all of the coasters will be new to him. Looking at Friday 5/31, assuming the weather is decent. Based on everything I can find there are no special events that day. But if we run into a day like you're describing, that will be a bummer.

If possible, the day or two after memorial day are ideal in the park: schools are ending and testing is being done (no trips), people are back at work from the first long weekend of summer, its simple logistics.

We've been several times and it is basically a walk-on to everything each day, all day/all night.

Would love to be able to go right after Memorial Day but can't make that work. The last day of school for our kids is May 30th. Plus we're coming from Cincinnati, so visiting on Friday means only having to take one vacation day.

I fired up the Google machine and found many schools are visiting this week.

Was there yesterday and now today, crowds are so much lighter today it is what I would expect from a May weekday have no idea why yesterday was so packed. More rdes are open today obviously without strong winds but still.

For a lot of school it was Senior Skip Day, as for the busses it was class trips.

Thinking about going tomorrow, but with the chance of thunderstorms I'm not sure. It's about a 3 hour trip for me so don't want it to be a waste of my time/money if big rides are going to be down due to wind/storms. Thursday looks like it'll be even worse, and I figured Friday would be busier than tomorrow.

Tomorrow’s weather seems decent according to Accuweather with a chance of storms in some spots in the afternoon. Maybe that’ll scare crowds away.

It's nothing more than hit or miss with the schools. Some days there will be 10 schools there for their physics day and various field trips, the next there will be 50. One could, of course, call all the school districts within a 3-hour driving radius and ask them what their plans are.

For us, even a busy windy day is a good day if we're at the Point.

I was at the park yesterday and everything was walk on except SV. That was my first time riding it with the new pockets. I think the metal detectors and the pockets slow everything down although I did notice that all 3 trains weren't stacking each time so I'm not sure. SV didn't open until around 12:30. I heard the late openings have been due to cool temperatures in the morning.

I am looking at the Webcam #3. It looks like they are working on the SV. I wonder if it will Open today.

We quickly decided to get the FL+ once we saw the crowds heading our way as be came from the back to the front at 10:15 AM Valravn was already at 1.15 hours then, and jumped to 1.45 hours after we rode it . SV was done until noon, and it went up to 2.50 hours between 2 and 3 - FL+ went from 15 minutes to 45 minutes. Front row Magnum was 45 minutes for us.

Thabto said:

I was at the park yesterday and everything was walk on except SV. That was my first time riding it with the new pockets. I think the metal detectors and the pockets slow everything down although I did notice that all 3 trains weren't stacking each time so I'm not sure. SV didn't open until around 12:30. I heard the late openings have been due to cool temperatures in the morning.

Honestly, I don't think the pockets or metal detector is slowing anything down. They don't seem to be attempting to send the next train out until the previous train has settled on the 2nd set of brakes behind the station. At least, that it what I saw yesterday. If someone else has experienced something else then tell me I'm wrong, I'd be happy to accept that, but at this point it is what it is.

That’s wrong. The pouches seem to slow everything down and add on top the fact that they’re training employees and it’s extremely slow dispatches now.

I'm sitting this one out, you all know where I stand.

Last year, with three trains, they'd dispatch the train well before the previous one hit the brakes - about when the previous one passed by the station for the final time - and that was after they waited about 18-20 seconds due to the midcourse not working. If the pouches are eating up that 20 seconds plus another 20 or so seconds for the train to make from that point all the way through the last lap and to the brakes, that really sucks.