Saturday, July 28

So it's been a couple years since going to the Point. I'm going to do the trip report in the "awards" fashion that someone posted earlier. I found this format to be wildly entertaining. So here it goes...

The I'm Not At Disney Anymore Toto award goes to the resort entrance gate and Witches Wheel. Several bollard lights at the resort gate where out or knocked over with safely cones in their place. Witches Wheel just looked bad with several lights out.

The Ok, So This Works as a Replacement for WWL award goes to Shoot the Rapids. My 7 year old son loved it and neither of us got that wet.

The most appropriately named ride goes to Maverick. This ride is a true rodeo.

The Don't Miss It at All award goes to Wildcat. If it were still here, I probably woudn't have ridden it anyway.

The Last Minute Execution Award goes to Luminosity. While the show is great and does the job, I really dislike the location. I honestly think the midway looked better with the big screen and Wildcat. Those curvy benches are not any better than the 1970's benches that used to be in front of Wildcat. A beachside location for Luminosity would have really been spectacular.

The Surprisingly Popular Attraction Award goes to All Wheels Extreme. The 5:00 show was packed!

The It's Not That Ugly Award goes to Disaster Transport. If the theming of this ride were kept up, the warehouse building would make perfect sense. I still don't understand why they let the theming go. Shouldn't this be part of the maintenance budget for the ride and taken into account during the planning stage?

The I'm Glad They Added This Award goes to Windseeker. What a fun little ride in a cool setting!

The Meh Award goes to Dinosaurs Alive. My 5 and 7 year old boys weren't very impressed with the dinosaurs, although they loved the dig site and the gift shop. By the way, MF really takes away from the immersive experience, in my opinion.

The I Wish I Would Have Ridden It Award goes to Mean Streak. Even looking at it, it looks smoother than the last time I was here.

The Biggest Loser award goes to Fast Lane. While it proved to be worth it for the majority of the lines, i. e. under 20 min. wait, the Fast Lane for Millennuim Force was posted at 60 min. all day. While I realize Fast Lane sold out today, 60 min. is unacceptable in my book.

The Square Wheel Award goes to Raptor. It seriously felt like something needed to be replaced.

And finally, the Overall Kick @$$ Award goes to Maverick. This ride Is quickly becoming one of my favorites.

I hope your enjoyed is years awards. Be sure to tune in next year!

Forgot one...

Roller Coaster Tycoon Award goes to Mechanic 1 and Mechanic 2 seen fixing Monster.

Overall, we had a great time and the park was functioning well with all rides operating at capacity as far as I could tell.

The reason the all wheels extreme show is so packed is because some of the cast is currently in the top 24 on Americas Got Talent :) I went last year and there was hardly anyone there and then I went last week and it was packed.

I was there a couple weeks ago on a Sunday (5PM show) and the guy who wears the roller blades took a nasty spill (crash actually) doing a flip in mid air over the table top, but overshot it and fell about 20' to the ground. It was really bad. He was hurting for the rest of the show, but continued on (sorta). Watching him after that, he MUST have broken some ribs and part of his arms. Even his fellow performers were deeply concerned for his well-being, so it was not an everyday crash.

Oh, and after buying Six Flags flash-pass last week, I gotta say that I think Fast Lane sucks. If they want it to be successful and not piss people off, they need to invest in a system like SF. Once it was my "time" to ride, I rarely had any wait beyond a train or two, depending where I wanted to sit.

^I'm sure the the performer would have been laying there in pain if some of his ribs or parts of his arm were broken.

Maverick, been years since I've been to SF and I haven't yet used the Fast Lane yet at Cedar Point -- what are the advantages/disadvantages of SF's system vs. Cedar Point's?

Much appreciated.

SF gives you a pager, on which is listed every ride available for "Flash Pass". I believe it also displays the current wait times. You pick which ride you want to reserve, and the pager alerts you when it's your time to ride. Show up at the ride, they scan the pager (which then "releases" it so you can reserve another ride, you can't reserve more than one at a time) and then you generally get station access.

The base rate (usually around $40-50 depending on the park and time of season) acts just as a reservation system. If the line is an hour, your pager goes off an hour after you make the reservation. For a bit more, they cut something like 90% off the wait time. This option would be roughly what CP's Fast Lane currently offers, basically under a 5 minute wait most of the time. The most premium level of access is essentially the same as the second level, except you get to stay in your seat for two rides in a row.