Early Entry a Joke?

Untalented893 I have had similar early entries that you described on several occasions over the years and I do early entry at least 25x each year. I have also had several where everything is up and running on time. I'm not sure the reasons in every instance, but temperature and wind early and late in the season influence when and if a particular ride opens and delays didn't happen so much during the warmer parts of the season. Ironically, when I did the MF photo shoot in the beginning of September this year, MF was not ready and they were still testing with water dummies when we were supposed to be riding. It finally opened much later than planned that morning. But, it was a chilly morning and you wouldn’t want her to valley during a photo shoot.

I did early entry this past Friday at 5pm and the only coaster that was running was Valravn with 2 train operation. I think Maverick may have been open as well at the time but I couldn't see her and did not want to chance walking all the way back to find it closed too. I rode Valravn once then walked past MF and they were still testing with a full trains of water dummies, so I figured it would be a while until it opened so I crossed my fingers and headed to Maverick and it was running fine, all 6 trains! I got three rides with little wait. It was pretty cool and very windy Friday, that is probably why most of the coasters weren't running, at least while I was there. The only ones that ran while I was there (until 9pm) that I could tell were Valravn, MF, Maverick, WT, ID and BS. The rest were down, probably due to strong North winds. GK was testing as I walked out the entrance at 9 and MF had a 1.5 hour wait.

I miss having Raptor in the early entry line up. On those days when MF was not on time, I would just marathon Raptor until I saw MF with guests riding it. I got tired of rushing back to MF just to find it not ready and not open. I also miss the re-rides that the ride ops allowed on Raptor on Sunday mornings and Friday nights in the fall when I was there. It wasn't uncommon to get 10-15 re-rides without exiting the train. If you had someone in your line you were asked to switch to a line or seat with no guests. It was encouraged on days when they had to have a certain head count on board before they could dispatch the ride (cold and windy days).

Hey CP, please bring back Raptor to the early entry line up, I miss her dearly! :-)

^ Raptor truly is the most consistently reliable, intense, and underrated coaster in the whole park 2nd only maybe to Maverick in terms of consistent intensity. After Maverick and MF, Raptor is my and others' 3rd favorite in the park, and is the gold standard of lasting popularity and reliability. Give it just 1 or 2 years and I'd bet that Raptor will surpass Gatekeeper and Valravn for the most riders during the year at the front of the park. Can never get enough of Raptor, and the only coaster on Earth that I'd be willing to wait longer for per 1 ride is Maverick, so early entry would be a blessing.

TwistedWicker77 said:

Untalented893, it sounds as if you need to review the early entry rides list again. Raptor hasn't been Early Entry all year as well as Rougarou. I can assure you Gatekeeper, Millennium, Kiddie Kingdom, Tiki Twirl, Valravn, cedar downs, Cadillac cars, and Midway carousel have all been open on time every morning for early entry unless weather played a factor. Maverick however, I cannot guarantee that one being open ever haha

Yeah, I apparently was still thinking the lineup was the same as last year with Valravn added. However, this doesn't change the fact that of the 4 times I was able to do early entry, 3 of those times MF had only 2 trains at opening with them stopping operation to add a 3rd train about 30 minutes into the hour of early entry. That to me seems more like operation errors rather than mechanical issues (though it could just be really bad luck the 3rd train always had issues while I was there). I also had a time that Gatekeeper wasn't open on time and Maverick experiencing it's seemingly usual issues a couple of times. However, it seems as if I've just been unlucky as most people don't have these issues. I do however miss having a couple of rides close by so if there were issues with one you could easily head to another early entry ride, like Rougarou and MF or Raptor and Gatekeeper.

I made this thread mostly to see what other people's experiences were since I'm not able to do early entry often. While I was frustrated when I made this thread, it wasn't meant to complain so much as to gather other people's experiences and see if there were issues in their early entry procedures.

I'm imagining that the 3rd train waits until the line will consistently fill all the seats.

But I haven't used early entry since 2003.

CP Maverick said:

I'm imagining that the 3rd train waits until the line will consistently fill all the seats.

But I haven't used early entry since 2003.

If this is true, then that's a silly policy. They know that a 3rd train will be required on pretty much every operating day, and putting that 3rd train on is a timely process (at least the 3 times it happened to me). The train needed to be tested with the water dummies and took a ridiculous amount of time that should be done before the ride opens for early entry.

It has been like that with MF more often than not for several years and I have been frustrated as well. I don't know the reason why it happens so often. It got to the point where we just went straight to Raptor and marathoned until we could be sure MF was running. There are several vantage points where we could look over and see if MF had people on it and then head over and get as many rides until the line got too long. At least we didn't waste much of the early entry hour trying to find a ride that was open. Raptor was rarely down for early entry (weather permitting). I wish they would bring her back in the early entry line up without removing one of the others.

Clearly im in the minority here...but early entry has made our last 2 trips to CP amazing right off the bat. My girl and I did 3 nights at Breakers in early August and utilized Early Entry each day. Valravn, Millenium Force, Maverick and Gatekeeper before the park opened to the public was worth the price of admission to us. Flawless execution? Nah. A worthy perk to staying at Breakers or having a pass? No doubt.

Comparing CP's early entry to KI or any other park near by is a false choice. CP is the only park I am aware of where 95%+ of the seasonal employees live on property. None of the other parks have the employees living in dorms to the extent of CP (or at all in some cases). Makes a big difference. They could open at 8am if it were deemed profitable as the employees are all there already.

So your saying it's virtually impossible for any other park to open an hour early like CP, because they cannot schedule their needed employees to be there an hour before regular opening time? Huh?

Yes - that is exactly what I said - IMPOSSIBLE - you must have missed the word the first time because I didn't capitalize it.

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/virtually

Yes, clearly asking staff to wake up 30 mins earlier for a 9am opening as apposed to a 9:30 am opening is clearly unreasonable. Whether staff live onsite or not has zero affect on when a park chooses its early entry.

With that philosophy, Kings Island should be closing earlier than Cedar Point to let their staff drive home, but its the opposite. KI is open until 1am.

Yeah, it's on employees to show up when scheduled -- whether that is a "regular" time or not. Where staff lives is beside the point. McDonald's and Walmart and Six Flags have managed to muddle along quite nicely over the years without employees living on site.

We have noticed the same issues with early entry quite a few times this summer. I had to go back and check the website because there was a line so often outside Millenium that I thought maybe it had been taken off the early entry list

I mean, maybe it's me partying too hard still on point. Would any of you seriously be in riding roller coasters at 8:00 and staying until Midnight like in July?

Hell, 8:00 I'm rolling over, no way would I be up riding coasters. Vacation is time to sleep in, unwind, and relax. That 8:00 business is for the regular work week.

When has the park opened for ERT at 8?

With a 4-year old in tow, that morning ERT is incredibly valuable, because we're not likely to make it to late evening or night when crowds might thin out. So if they're going to advertise ERT as a perk for resort guests and pass holders, they really should make a concerted effort to get ERT rolling every day on time.

That said, our ERT experiences were better later this season than early in this season or last season.

^Coastermania. It opened at 7AM for ERT!

I plan on being at Marina Gate for early entry 3 hours from now. The plan is for 1 or 2 rides on Valravn, then 1 or 2 rides on MF, then 2 to 3 rides on Gatekeeper. After that, anything is gravy, but being able to ride those three coasters without much wait time due to early entry this year has been great. We even walked back to Maverick once for my only rides on that this year. Too bad Iron Dragon is not early entry this year.

Another fun summer! Shout out to the fine crews!

^Hey Thabto, I see your picture with the Goodyear Blimp. FYI, the DirecTV Blimp launched from here at 10:30am, headed west, crew said they were not going to Chicago and would return to Cleveland tonight. Possible flight around CP?