Oct. 11th and 12th first trip ever
I arrived in the US on Friday, 10th and I made a free stop-over deal with delta giving me three times in Ohio. Well, I had to drive all the way from Cincinnati to Sandusky and because everybody told me that would be about a 3,5 hours drive I originally planned to visit the Point on Friday night. Well, bad idea... By the time I made it through immigration and customs and after some trouble with my rental car (ouh, automatic gear, well, we don´t have this in Europe, and cruise control, what´s that?) I ended up in some really bad traffic on Friday night in Cincinnati. After an awfully long drive all the way up to Sandusky I finally arrived there about 11pm at night with a total of about six hours driving there so the first day at Cedar Point was Saturday, 11th. Yes, the first time ever I make my big dream happen and get to Cedar Point was Saturday, 11th. For all of you who weren´t there, it was probably the worst day you could chose for going there if you haven´t been there before. I have never seen longer lines in any park in the whole world, it was unbelievable. Dragster was a 3,5 hours wait most time during that day, and in the early evening even Gemini was 1,5 hours. I talked to some peaople there who go there more frequently and I got the impression that this is absolutely not what it´s normally like at CP during this time of the season. I ended up waiting for over half an hour just for getting dinner! Well, don´t get me wrong, I had a great time anyway and the reason for all these people coming up to the point was the perfectly warm and sunny weather. And I went there again on Sunday, so I got all my coaster riding on my second day.
I´ll now tell you about how good or not that good I thought those coasters at Cedar Point where, and with my second part of my vacation down in Florida I have some good ways of comparing all those rides. I know very well, that some of you will disagree about the one or the other, but as I have said before, that´s just my personal opinion.
Well, I start with the "not that great ones". First, mean streak, I just don´t know why this thing turns out to be THAT bad. I mean, it looks pretty nice at first and it doesn´t even seem that old (or am I wrong about that?) but I´ve never been on any coaster giving me such a rough ride, assuring you get some bad headache no matter in which row you sit. That´s something I don´t like about many wooden coasters, they normally give me some type of aching in my head (though there are few exceptions to this rule), but this one is really bad. And besides that, they somehow managed to build a woodie that gives you absolutely not the smallest feeling of airtime, at least not as far as I have noticed (one time third row, one time last).
Okay, the headache thing, you know, if a coaster is just boring or lame, that is still much better than getting a headache that will haunt you for the rest of the day, and Mean Streak prefectly accomplished that for me, so that´s why it appears at the bottom of my list. That´s also the reason why next up comes Mantis. Alright, I´ve only been on one single standup before (it was at Paramount´s Great America, I don´t remember the coaster´s name) and I remember that it wasn´t that much fun and gave me a really rough ride. Well, Mantis is really a nicely layouted coaster and I especially liked the colour sheme of this coaster but still - it´s a standup. I went on it three times (one in front, one in last row and one somewhere in the middle) and though the ride would have been fun just by the pure ride experience it wasn´t because I kept banging my ears onto the harness and my head was like bursting after my second ride. I don´t know if you can do anything about it and if there´s any standup coaster out there that is just pure fun, but Mantis, unfortunately, wasn´t.
Now comes the all-time object of hatred (at least that´s what I have heard from all Cedar Point fans), which only ranks third worst in my opinion, that´s Disaster Transport. The reason for that is though it might not be the most exciting coaster around, at least it doesn´t hurt you at all. Well, all the "theming" looks indeed like the work of some art class in kindergarten, but I didn´t think the ride itself was THAT bad, especially the dark parts of it where even fun. I even ended up going on it twice, I don´t know why everybody is complaining about it. I would say it comes even with Corkscrew, that´s the kind of old coaster we even have here in Europe, and there´s really nothing special about it, neither good nor bad.
Next there is Iron dragon, I thought this was fun, probably because it was the only walk-on this Saturday, but I guess back when it was built this might have been something really special, I liked it. Next up I would rank the mine ride and Gemini, especially the latter one being a really nice coaster for that age. And I´ve never seen a steel coaster on a wooden structure before, so this was quite interesting to me. Oh, and befor I forget about it, yes I would also rank Blue Streak somewhere around here, considering its age it´s still not only a classic but also a fun coaster and compared to Mean Strek it gives you not only more airtime but also a really smooth ride without any headache whatsoever (which was what I expected before I went on it).
Okay, next on my list comes raptor. I originally expected this to be one of my favourite rides at Cedar Point cause since I got my first inverted some many years ago (Top gun at Paramount Great America) these coasters where my favorite type of all. And still, it was fun, but somehow, Cedar Point seems to have bad luck with its B&M built coasters. It was better than those rough standard Vecoma build inverted we got here in Europe, but still, it´s not that much of a special inverted coaster. Maybe I´m just spoilt by Montu in Bush Gardens, Tampa, I have been on that a couple of years ago and after my days at Cedar Point I went to Florida again and was reassured, that this is one of my all-time favourite coasters, but Raptor doesn´t quite make it there. It´s fun, yes, but by far not the greatest B&M can build.
Now come the big ones which I enjoyed the most. I know many of you will disagree, but Dragster comes in on fourth for me. Yes, the pure sight of it is impressing and I admit that it was the first coaster in my whole life that I´ve been a bit scared of before my first ride. The launch is maybe some of the most intense feeling ever created by any coasters and the look down on Millenium Force from the top is impressive, especially at night (which was the last thing I did on Sunday, shortly after 8pm). But, and that makes me rank it only four, it is short, very short and before you realize what just happened it´s already over. Maybe it was just because this weekend was so packed with people and maybe if the wait was only half an hour or so I would rank it higher but I just thought the wait/ride time ratio was too bad to rank it number one (I´ve been on it three times, one in front, one in back and on in third row).
My number three is Magnum, which came of some surprise to me cause I didn´t expect too much from it. But I was really positively surprised. I went late at night on Saturday for the first time and the best thing about it is that it´s almost completely hidden and out of sight till you finally ride it. I couldn´t believe how huge the track is when I had passed the first hill for the first time and the atmosphere out there in this hidden spot of the park close to the lake was just great at night. And I liked the covered airtime hills at the end of the ride, this was a great feature. Yes, that´s some kind of a coaster, really nice.
Okay, my first two. I rank Millenium Force only second with my favourite one being... Wicked Twister. Well, as I said earlier, that´s just my opinion, and I was pretty much surprised by it. Millenium Force what great, the height of the frist hill really makes some difference, I didn´t think so before I went on it. This hill is just great and, well, somehow, the rest of the ride didn´t seem that special to me. I rode it over and over again, anyways, especially on Sunday when the lines where shorter, but mostly for the first hill really. Well, and Wicked Twister, this one probably gave me the inverted feeling I missed a little on Raptor. I originally thought, well, it´s not even a real coaster cause it doesn´t make a complete circuit, but the feeling of the ride was just awsome. I think most people underrate it a bit, at least that´s my impression. The start was pretty intense even when I rode it again and again and I liked the feeling when you got up there twisting and twirling around the track. And maybe part of the reason I liked it that much was that though it also doesn´t give you a really long ride, the wait times on this were so much shorter than on all major rides, even on Saturday, so it wasn´t like waiting for three hours just to do it again.
That much for the rides, apart from that maybe some overall impressions and hints for some of you who also plan to go their for the first time ever: First of all, yes, I definitely think it´s worth going there even if you have to cross the Atlantic Ocean for that. I´ll never forget these two days, no matter how crowded it was, and I would always do it again, and probably will some time during the next few years. Though not all of the coasters are the best of their kind, the shere amaount of different rides is just amazing to some coasterlover like me (and probably everybody else who is reading this now). What also was very special was the overall atmosphere, all the ride ops were really friendly, all the rides were going with all the trains they could use and, I have to mention this, also the crowd was really nice all the time. I mention this because I have experienced different things, especially at the Halloween Nights in Florida. Some advice for averybody who´s interested: First of all, never ever try driving all the way from Cincinnati up to Sandusky, especially if you just came over by plane on a long and exhausting flight. I really thaought I won´t even get there, maybe it was because I´m a foreigner and had to get accustumed to American traffic first, maybe it took me so long because I always kept to the speed limit, I don´t know, but it really seemed like a ride through hell to me.What I can recommend, by the way, was my motel, it was the Days Inn Mall Central in Sandusky, I booked it on the internet for only $29 a night and for this price it was really nice. Only ten minutes away from the park, they had endless television channels, friendly staff and it was really clean though maybe a bit old fashioned, but for this price I originally expected something really bad and it definitely wasn´t. Oh, and one last thing, the prices at CP are quite reasonable I think, especially if you compare it with those parks in Florida. I especially liked Midway Marked thought I had to que for getting in but it was still the best what I could do on early Saturday níght when the park was soooo crowded and the food was great and not too expensive considering that you can eat till you burst apart :-)
Okay, for those who are interested, you can read my complete trip report including the Florida part (which makes it even longer) over at Coasterbuzz. Thanks for everybody who really took the time to read all this and hope to see you around when I make it back to the point at some point in the hopefully not too far-away future!
I was at the park that Sat. you went, but only for a couple of hours. The crowd was unreal. Next time you can go to the Point, try and make it in June. Nice weather, much smaller crowds, but still all the atmosphere and magic that is Cedar Point.
BTW, last time I was in Germany, the rental car they gave me had an auto trans. and cruise control! Gotta say, I'm a big fan of German cars, especially VW's, and I wish that some of the models available in Germany were also imported over here.
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I'd rather be in my boat with a drink on the rocks,
than in the drink with a boat on the rocks.
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