News from Winter Chill Out 2021

News and notes from Winter Chill Out.

$61,000 raised for A Kid Again

Cedar Point’s COVID-19 procedures in 2020 resulted in no contact tracing back to the park.

Castaway Bay renovation will continue, but the hotel will open in May

Sawmill Creek is also under renovation and will not open this year.

Lighthouse Point - more RV sites on the former Sandcastle Suites site.

Steel Vengeance riders will be able to take advantage of new small lockers for free. The lockers are intended for small loose articles such as wallets, keys, and phones.

Early entry will return. Details coming.

Cedar Point ultimately wants to bring Fast Lane back, but no decision has been made yet for this season.

Forbidden Frontier. More residents. New storyline. New characters. Opens after Memorial Day.

On a typical day in a typical season, 50% of all guests will ride Millennium Force. In 2020, it was 75%.

The Town Hall project has been postponed and is not currently rescheduled.

So what is this "confidential" parade float I keep reading about on FB? No one has explained it except to say it has a Gemini train with demolished track behind it.

Haven't been browsing here in a while, but I always like reading the Winter Chill Out recaps, so thanks for always posting them Walt.

Thank god they are finally doing something more sensible regarding the lockers and loose article policy for Steel Vengeance. Only took them 3 years.......

Bummer about the Town Hall revamp, but that is an easy expense to axe when all entertainment companies are hurting for cash in every possible way.

Hoping to get back there this year. Didn't feel comfortable doing anything with crowds last summer.

That stinks to hear about Town Hall I was really excited for that. But it was made clear in the earnings call that money would only be spent to get parks open and operating this year so anything else will be tabled for awhile.

Personally I’d prefer that they wait on express lane until next season.

Walt said:

Lighthouse Point - more RV sites on the former Sandcastle Suites site.

As much as I'd love to see a new hotel out there, this is a no-brainer considering the huge RV sales boom that started last year appears to be continuing in 2021.

vwhoward said:

So what is this "confidential" parade float I keep reading about on FB? No one has explained it except to say it has a Gemini train with demolished track behind it.

The new large tent by GateKeeper had a wall with little viewing holes that gave glimpses of the parade floats for the Celebrate 150 Spectacular. The Gemini float looked very similar to what can be seen in the artwork for the parade that was released last year.

Thanks walt!

So I came but my son got tired of walking and wanted to leave... last trip for him for awhile lol..

So I missed out on the session and im really bummed because I've been waiting to hear about castaway! I've been bugging them on twitter lol.

Did they give any specifics? Will the whole hotel be finished in may? Is the ship gone? Is the waterpark not opening until a later date after the hotel? Any waterpark updates? Curious to see if the water coaster will remain since kalahari removed theirs due to safety concerns...

I know im probably the only one this vested in CB so any info helps!

Thanks for the update, Walt. Hope all that attended had a great time.

To Brandon's point, I know two families who jumped on the RV bandwagon since the pandemic began. Their kids were forced into remote learning and the parents involved also shifted to remote working, so they turned the pandemic into a giant road trip. Kind of genius, actually.

I'm actually surprised Cedar Point is doing as much as they are given the losses. Town Hall can definitely wait, and I suppose there are great cost savings by not having the park open weekdays in May. I was totally expecting (but hoping I was wrong) for Forbidden Frontier to be tabled.

I get the Fast Lane decision. Without an effective crystal ball, it's impossible to know how long restrictions are going to be in place. There are estimates that we could be out of the woods as early as April-May, or as late as July.

I couldn't find an answer... do they allow pop-up campers at LHP? I seem to recall no tents, but wonder if pop-ups are a gray area.

I really don't see why they wouldn't be. They are a type of camper trailer more than a tent and are not a "free standing" structure like even the big 8-10 person cabin tents are.

I like the free lockers for SV. I hope that can speed up dispatch times. I think the storage pockets slowed down the process by a large margin. I'm bummed about Town Hall. It's one thing I was looking forward to. I'm hoping access passes are gone but from what I have heard from others who attended, sounds like that will be the case. Hopefully they can start seating all rows again.

It's a shame they don't allow tent camping. With the original layout of Camper Village I understand but now that they have the space that was occupied by Sandcastle Suites, seems like a perfect spot out by Magnum to have some spots for tents. I certainly would take advantage of those sites.

Jeff said:

I couldn't find an answer... do they allow pop-up campers at LHP? I seem to recall no tents, but wonder if pop-ups are a gray area.

Yes they do. Back before I had a boat at the marina, I had an RV and would visit LHP probably once a month. I saw several pop-up campers there plenty of times.

I do my morning runs out and around LHP and saw they started the new LHP sites last year and then stopped when the pandemic hit. Most of the concrete and infrastructure is already in place. They need to finish the roads and get it landscaped. As far as not allowing tent camping, I can understand their thinking. Most of the sites are not large enough or have enough grassy areas to accommodate tents. Plus, they are marketing it as luxury RV sites. I havent seen many luxury tents out there.

On a typical day in a typical season, 50% of all guests will ride Millennium Force. In 2020, it was 75%.

I am curious about the significance of the park making this statement. Were they trying to give a sense as to how different their crowd was last year?

I am guessing the number changed so drastically because the older folks, who would typically not ride MF if they went to the park, did not go to the park last year. Maybe the same goes for families with young children. Without those two groups going to the park I could see that the resulting crowd demographic would be more typically inclined to ride MF.

I thought the staff did an excellent job this year. More stops, the bottom of the lift of MF was my favorite, along with the entrance to the Maverick launch tunnel, the infield of Steel Vengeance, and the Boneyard firehouse. Lunch had various offerings including some of the cherry flavored food items that will be available at the Frontier Festival like cherry rub flavored chicken and deep fried cherry rub ribs. I also loved how they had the basketball game open for some cool prizes, and Point Plaza was open for all of our shopping wants, Ken Miller was in there signing copies of Rolling through the years. Thank you to Cedar Point and A Kid Again for the continuance of this awesome event!

Lastly, I can confirm that the gondolas are not on the giant wheel.... 🤣

Come on spring!

In the 8am group session, Jason's 50 vs 75% answer was part of a long answer about if daily fastlane would return this year.

He kept coming back to saying that he hoped that 2021 in park operations would return to as close to normal as possible, by that he meant more like 2019 than 2020. It came across that he very much wants to have them available, and to fill trains and such.

The 50/75 thing, he said, was that their analysis told them that a much higher percentage of guests in 2020 came to ride coasters, saying that many "casual" park goers did not come last year. He said that his team was VERY aware of how unpopular the access passes were, and even acknowledged the criticism many levied in regards to the operations at Kings Island last season vs CP.

My big takeaway is that he wants full trains back, selling fastlane daily and no access passes this year, but he repeatedly reminded that the decision has not yet been made, and will be based on many factors and announced as close to park open as they can, so to not have to change course after announcing. It also seemed clear to me that he understood the overall guest experience last year fell well short of park standard once the crowds returned in the 2nd half of the season (he even mentioned the crazy long access pass lines as an example).

I am of the opinion that they don't allow tent camping because of the possibility of blowdowns during the not infrequent storms that cross the Point during the Summer. I've known people who claimed that it would take a tornado to take down their encampment, but they have never encountered one of those Lake Erie storms that fly across the Great Lakes.

I spend most of my summer at CP and I don’t think these monster storms roll through as often as you think. Do they happen, sure, but not enough to create a policy of eliminating an entire season of having tents.

That would be ironic, because that would mean the storms themselves are intense.

Well, see, that's exactly the problem! If the storms are intense, you certainly don't want to be!

--Dave Althoff, Jr.