So I just got back from two solid days of roller coastering in LA.
I rode Twisted Colossus at Magic Mountain and it is fantastic. The trick is getting an actual race going, but if it happens when you're on it, it's wonderful. X2 remains a fickle beast; I had one fantastic run on it and one run that was shaky just coming out of the station. Many of my buddies got their heads whacked pretty hard on it. Full Throttle is just great. I rode Tatsu at night in the front, which is almost certainly the best way to ride it.
Day 2 was at Knott's, which just recently closed Ghost Rider for rehab so I didn't get to add another wooden coaster to my list. I'd never been to Knott's before and the main thing I admire is that it's got more character than any Six Flags I've been to, and it's cool to see how they've made use of the space they've been given. Xcelerator is pretty good and the top hat is fun, but I probably liked Silver Bullet better.
Did you ride the new Voyage ride? I've heard it's real good. Also both Timber Mountain Log Ride and the Calico Mine Rides got separate million dollar refurbs to get them new state-of-the-art animatronics, which is really neat.
Knotts is really doing a good job of plussing everything recently. Also Jaguar was my first ever non-Disney coaster, so I have a soft spot for the park.
Did you ride the new Voyage ride? I've heard it's real good. Also both Timber Mountain Log Ride and the Calico Mine Rides got separate million dollar refurbs to get them new state-of-the-art animatronics, which is really neat.
Knotts is really doing a good job of plussing everything recently. Also Jaguar was my first ever non-Disney coaster, so I have a soft spot for the park.
I didn't do the Log Ride because I didn't want to get wet, which as it turns out was unfounded. The Mine Ride was neat, though if I ever do it again I need to sit on the other side of the car because I had to turn my head to see most of the scenes.
Voyage to the Iron Reef was neat, but it probably made me more queasy than any of the roller coasters I went on over the course of the weekend. (Also, we did Knott's after we did Magic Mountain. This was part of an event thing, so we were at MM until 11:00 PM, drove down to Knott's and checked into the hotel there. I probably got 5 hours of sleep and then was at Knott's at 8:00. Suffice it to say, I wasn't in tip-top shape most of the day.) When my buddies went back to do it again I decided to do Silver Bullet and took a ride on the railroad.
Silver Bullet is really a fantastic roller coaster. We went on a marching band trip to Knotts once, and there was absolutely no one in the park, so my friends and I got to ride Silver Bullet about 7 times in a row without getting off. Walking was a bit challenging afterwards.
I surprised my wife with a trip to Disneyworld for our 10th anniversary in a few months. We are big Disney fans who have been to Disneyland several times (we even went there on our honeymoon), and our last trip was with our son for the first time since he was a bit too young to really get into it before. The trip to Disneyworld is just for us this time though
We've never been to Disneyworld, so we're really excited, but it's kind of overwhelming given the scope compared to Disneyland. We will be there for 6 nights and staying at the Grand Polynesian, which is supposedly good since it's near the monorail. If anyone has advice on restaurants or cool out of the way stuff, I'd love to hear it.
I surprised my wife with a trip to Disneyworld for our 10th anniversary in a few months. We are big Disney fans who have been to Disneyland several times (we even went there on our honeymoon), and our last trip was with our son for the first time since he was a bit too young to really get into it before. The trip to Disneyworld is just for us this time though
We've never been to Disneyworld, so we're really excited, but it's kind of overwhelming given the scope compared to Disneyland. We will be there for 6 nights and staying at the Grand Polynesian, which is supposedly good since it's near the monorail. If anyone has advice on restaurants or cool out of the way stuff, I'd love to hear it.
When are you going?
Also if it's not too late to snag a reservation and you're willing to splurge and go all fancy for a milestone anniversary dinner, look into Victoria and Albert's. I haven't been able to go there personally, but i know a few forumers who give it rave reviews.
Silver Bullet is really a fantastic roller coaster. We went on a marching band trip to Knotts once, and there was absolutely no one in the park, so my friends and I got to ride Silver Bullet about 7 times in a row without getting off. Walking was a bit challenging afterwards.
I don't quite have the constitution required to just sit on a roller coaster and ride it consecutive times, but yeah, it's great.
I surprised my wife with a trip to Disneyworld for our 10th anniversary in a few months. We are big Disney fans who have been to Disneyland several times (we even went there on our honeymoon), and our last trip was with our son for the first time since he was a bit too young to really get into it before. The trip to Disneyworld is just for us this time though
We've never been to Disneyworld, so we're really excited, but it's kind of overwhelming given the scope compared to Disneyland. We will be there for 6 nights and staying at the Grand Polynesian, which is supposedly good since it's near the monorail. If anyone has advice on restaurants or cool out of the way stuff, I'd love to hear it.
When are you going?
Also if it's not too late to snag a reservation and you're willing to splurge and go all fancy for a milestone anniversary dinner, look into Victoria and Albert's. I haven't been able to go there personally, but i know a few forumers who give it rave reviews.
I'll check that out, thank you. We booked a reservation at the California Grill as we heard good things about it, but still have some openings.
We're going in late January, after kids are back in school and the marathon event is over. I booked it 7 months in advance so we could snag a Disney Vacation Club room instead of a regular room.
So my sister did not want to drive over last night - since I had the hotel and early Harry Potter stuff I figured I'd go ahead and go and just meet her when she got here
Turns out at Universal Studios if you are Florida residents you must both present ids and must both be present to get any tickets
Tokyo Disney is having a special event for October where they have recruiters for the villains, which means they have people in Villain inspired costumes that look really cool!
I surprised my wife with a trip to Disneyworld for our 10th anniversary in a few months. We are big Disney fans who have been to Disneyland several times (we even went there on our honeymoon), and our last trip was with our son for the first time since he was a bit too young to really get into it before. The trip to Disneyworld is just for us this time though
We've never been to Disneyworld, so we're really excited, but it's kind of overwhelming given the scope compared to Disneyland. We will be there for 6 nights and staying at the Grand Polynesian, which is supposedly good since it's near the monorail. If anyone has advice on restaurants or cool out of the way stuff, I'd love to hear it.
Hi yes you can PM me
Also are you staying at the Grand Floridian or the Polynesian
I know this is an old thread (didn't see a newer one) but there was no mention of Silver Dollar City and that is unacceptable. The most beautiful park I've ever visited. It's a theme park in Branson,MO where the theme (1880s era hill country for the most part, with some nods to early 1900s as well) encompasses the entire park, there aren't 'worlds' per se, and it's used to great effect. They went to great lengths to incorporate the exiting natural elements, so in many places the park is literally still in a forest. It actually got its start from a giant cave structure, which is open for tours still and is HIGHLY recommended, especially the last tour of the day which is done by handheld lantern light.
spoilered for size
Not the best pic but that stair structure is 4 stories tall, so you get an idea of the scale of it.
It's definitely a 'family' style park but it has some world class coasters, including Outlaw Run which is easily a top 5 world wooden coaster, and my personal top coaster overall (it's that one in Facetious' post on the first page, the first two pictures with the corkscrew etc). It's fast, it does just crazy things for a wooden, and it screams like a banshee when you ride it. There's Powder Keg, a launched coaster, and Wildfire, which is a suspended coaster; both are good, maybe not *great* but they are built on the edge of the park where there's a very steep dropoff so the views are incredible and they make you feel like you're much higher up than you actually are. Thunderation is a mine coaster which is geared more towards kids but it still hauls around the curves, and at one point they had a car installed where you faced backwards, although that probably won't return. A lot of your typical other park rides which are largely themed to some degree or other, theres a particularly fun dark ride called Fire in the Hole which has some decent surprises in it the first time you ride.
I won't go on about it for now although I could talk about it all day
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facetiousa wit so dryit shits sandRegistered Userregular
I've been living in Williamsburg, VA since the start of the year, like 5 miles tops from Busch Gardens, but have been super broke and been unable to visit the park. A friend might be taking me on Wednesday. The last time I went to the park was 16 years ago when I was still terrified of rollercoasters, so I've always regretted missing out on some of them (also I'm sad I'll never get to ride Big Bad Wolf ). I'll update with my experience!
"I am not young enough to know everything." - Oscar Wilde
New techniques in building wooden rollercoasters have made them completely amazing. Old, rickety wooden coasters are fucking terrible though. (Seriously, Mean Streak should have been torn down like 10 years ago. It's unrideable behind, like, the first four rows.)
ALSO ALERT ALERT MEAN STREAK IS SOON TO BE ABOLISHED. THIS IS THE BEST NEWS OF THE YEAR.
"I am not young enough to know everything." - Oscar Wilde
Great America up in Samta Clara opened up a Mass Effect 4D ride, and I somehow was there during opening weekend.
Hot damn that was a garbage ride. I felt bad for the people I was with because the ride doesn't bother explaining anything that's happening or who anyone is, and even I was struggling with some of the stuff.
Yet again necroing this thread but I have no park obsessed friends lol
Universal Orlando made an official announcement of their 3rd park. (They have a to-me-annoying habit of referring to Volcano Bay as their 3rd but I don't count it as such). First new entire park in the US in something like 20 years. It's frustratingly short on actual detail but looks like Nintendo Land on the left, with a peek at the Donkey Kong coaster on the far left, which is rumored to have a jumping element. Then top left is an entire land devoted to Universal's classic monsters (Dracula, Frankenstein, etc) which holy crap I am super stoked for. Top right is Fantastic Beasts... which ok not as iconic as Hogsmeade/Diagon but a magic-infused old New York could still be cool. And bottom right is apparently a How To Train Your Dragon/ general Dreamworks area. Not the biggest fan but a viking/dragon themed land is probably going to at least look really cool, and that racing/dueling twin coaster has tons of potential.
I'm really liking that they seem to be ditching connecting paths between the lands, and making you return to the hub. It creates a potential traffic problem but the tradeoff is greater immersion, keeping the 'lands' more self-contained allows for more detail. Think how Diagon Alley is handled, you can't see into it from outside, and you can't see the rest of the park from within; then apply that to an entire land. Great stuff. It's going to be hard wait.
It's a big park too, as pictured it's bigger than either existing park. The parcel of land it's on is bigger than all their existing land combined so lot of room for the future. Also helps explain why they've built so many hotels in such a short time frame. It'll be interesting to see how they handle transportation; if they do anything besides buses. Some park friends have suggested light rail but I don't know if it'd be worth that amount of effort, it's not THAT far from the other parks.
facetiousa wit so dryit shits sandRegistered Userregular
Jumping element...?!?
Also I am back to living in Williamsburg and once again have a Busch season pass. They just officially announced their new coaster for next year, Pantheon, which will feature an element that's only on I think one other coaster in the world right now: fast-switching tracks, so that you launch forward up a hill, and while you do that the track changes behind you, then you roll back and launch backwards up a hill, then roll back forward and get launched again over the hill and continue.
"I am not young enough to know everything." - Oscar Wilde
Also I am back to living in Williamsburg and once again have a Busch season pass. They just officially announced their new coaster for next year, Pantheon, which will feature an element that's only on I think one other coaster in the world right now: fast-switching tracks, so that you launch forward up a hill, and while you do that the track changes behind you, then you roll back and launch backwards up a hill, then roll back forward and get launched again over the hill and continue.
Yeah it's going to be incredible if they can pull it off. Basically the car you ride in is on its' own set of tracks that are for show, and the real wheels and track are below you. The link below shows a patent diagram where you can see a gap between the top tracks, and the bottom track rises up to simulate a jump over the gap.
I tried going a week after it opened and when the park opened you were funneled right into the line for the ride and then it was having technical difficulties. So a bunch of people stayed in the line and then I just went on other rides that didn't have any wait time. It was nice.
Forbidden Journey is like the best ride and I rode it twice in a row with no wait time since I went in the single rider line.
You wait 9 hours for a ride so that you can announce to other people that you waited 9 hours for a ride.
Her deal was, apparently, that she wanted to ride all the Harry Potter rides in one day. I think at some point, she was like, "fuck it, I can write something about this"
I tried going a week after it opened and when the park opened you were funneled right into the line for the ride and then it was having technical difficulties. So a bunch of people stayed in the line and then I just went on other rides that didn't have any wait time. It was nice.
Forbidden Journey is like the best ride and I rode it twice in a row with no wait time since I went in the single rider line.
FJ is great but I have to close my eyes during the video portions or I legit get motion sickness. And I can handle the other screen rides fine, it's just that one that does it. I'd hate to be a ride op on that one
I am going to Fuji Q Highland next weekend and I am puuumped for all the rollercoastering I will be doing
Fuji Q is real fun y'all
It's got some quality roller coasters
Holy hell that is a drop.
Yeah that ride (Eejanaika) was definitely one of my favourite roller coasters I've been on. The seats in the cart stick out from the central rails, and so also rotate during the ride, meaning you're looking backwards as you're going up the ascent, and then straight down for the drop. It's great.
I am going to Fuji Q Highland next weekend and I am puuumped for all the rollercoastering I will be doing
Fuji Q is real fun y'all
It's got some quality roller coasters
Holy hell that is a drop.
Yeah that ride (Eejanaika) was definitely one of my favourite roller coasters I've been on. The seats in the cart stick out from the central rails, and so also rotate during the ride, meaning you're looking backwards as you're going up the ascent, and then straight down for the drop. It's great.
Oh, it’s a 4D coaster? I thought that track looked a lot like X2 that we have out here at Magic Mountain.
Just booked my hotel and tickets for Universal Orlando. First time in 10 years and first Halloween Horror Nights. I loved Jaws, T2:3D, and Dueling Dragons, but I hope the Harry Potter lands make up for it. I'm waiting for the charge to hit my card before I complete the trip with flight and Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween, which will be the first time I've been there since the castle was a dang cake.
Just booked my hotel and tickets for Universal Orlando. First time in 10 years and first Halloween Horror Nights. I loved Jaws, T2:3D, and Dueling Dragons, but I hope the Harry Potter lands make up for it. I'm waiting for the charge to hit my card before I complete the trip with flight and Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween, which will be the first time I've been there since the castle was a dang cake.
I'm gonna have a good ole spooky theme park time!
I'd pay dearly to recapture going into Diagon Alley for the first time. If you're at all a Potter fan you're in for a real treat.
I have gone on Hagrid's coaster and its great. The queue is really well themed, but I went right as the park opened and was only in line for about 45 minutes.
When I get home I'll probably make a more detailed post.
I tried going a week after it opened and when the park opened you were funneled right into the line for the ride and then it was having technical difficulties. So a bunch of people stayed in the line and then I just went on other rides that didn't have any wait time. It was nice.
Forbidden Journey is like the best ride and I rode it twice in a row with no wait time since I went in the single rider line.
FJ is great but I have to close my eyes during the video portions or I legit get motion sickness. And I can handle the other screen rides fine, it's just that one that does it. I'd hate to be a ride op on that one
Is that what the issue is? Because I'm fine on the Gringotts ride, but man, Journey sometimes gets me really motion sick. Even Transformers gets me a little sick every now and then. I was figuring it me just getting older and not being able to handle the rides anymore.
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I mean, not to denigrate this because 90 degree drops are awesome, and I've wanted to ride a dive coaster for a long time, but
Maverick at Cedar Point has a 95 degree drop.
90 degrees is no longer the limit of coaster engineering!
Steam: Chagrin LoL: Bonhomie
I rode Twisted Colossus at Magic Mountain and it is fantastic. The trick is getting an actual race going, but if it happens when you're on it, it's wonderful. X2 remains a fickle beast; I had one fantastic run on it and one run that was shaky just coming out of the station. Many of my buddies got their heads whacked pretty hard on it. Full Throttle is just great. I rode Tatsu at night in the front, which is almost certainly the best way to ride it.
Day 2 was at Knott's, which just recently closed Ghost Rider for rehab so I didn't get to add another wooden coaster to my list. I'd never been to Knott's before and the main thing I admire is that it's got more character than any Six Flags I've been to, and it's cool to see how they've made use of the space they've been given. Xcelerator is pretty good and the top hat is fun, but I probably liked Silver Bullet better.
Knotts is really doing a good job of plussing everything recently. Also Jaguar was my first ever non-Disney coaster, so I have a soft spot for the park.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
I didn't do the Log Ride because I didn't want to get wet, which as it turns out was unfounded. The Mine Ride was neat, though if I ever do it again I need to sit on the other side of the car because I had to turn my head to see most of the scenes.
Voyage to the Iron Reef was neat, but it probably made me more queasy than any of the roller coasters I went on over the course of the weekend. (Also, we did Knott's after we did Magic Mountain. This was part of an event thing, so we were at MM until 11:00 PM, drove down to Knott's and checked into the hotel there. I probably got 5 hours of sleep and then was at Knott's at 8:00. Suffice it to say, I wasn't in tip-top shape most of the day.) When my buddies went back to do it again I decided to do Silver Bullet and took a ride on the railroad.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
We've never been to Disneyworld, so we're really excited, but it's kind of overwhelming given the scope compared to Disneyland. We will be there for 6 nights and staying at the Grand Polynesian, which is supposedly good since it's near the monorail. If anyone has advice on restaurants or cool out of the way stuff, I'd love to hear it.
When are you going?
Also if it's not too late to snag a reservation and you're willing to splurge and go all fancy for a milestone anniversary dinner, look into Victoria and Albert's. I haven't been able to go there personally, but i know a few forumers who give it rave reviews.
I don't quite have the constitution required to just sit on a roller coaster and ride it consecutive times, but yeah, it's great.
I'll check that out, thank you. We booked a reservation at the California Grill as we heard good things about it, but still have some openings.
We're going in late January, after kids are back in school and the marathon event is over. I booked it 7 months in advance so we could snag a Disney Vacation Club room instead of a regular room.
Turns out at Universal Studios if you are Florida residents you must both present ids and must both be present to get any tickets
Ha ha
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Maleficent:
Frollo:
Hades:
Captain Hook:
Scar:
Jafar:
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But I'm going to Knotts Scary Farm near the end of October so it's fine I guess.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
I always get Love in an Elevator
Maybe I'll ride it after work tomorrow
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Hi yes you can PM me
Also are you staying at the Grand Floridian or the Polynesian
Probably good to clarify before you get here
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spoilered for size
Not the best pic but that stair structure is 4 stories tall, so you get an idea of the scale of it.
It's definitely a 'family' style park but it has some world class coasters, including Outlaw Run which is easily a top 5 world wooden coaster, and my personal top coaster overall (it's that one in Facetious' post on the first page, the first two pictures with the corkscrew etc). It's fast, it does just crazy things for a wooden, and it screams like a banshee when you ride it. There's Powder Keg, a launched coaster, and Wildfire, which is a suspended coaster; both are good, maybe not *great* but they are built on the edge of the park where there's a very steep dropoff so the views are incredible and they make you feel like you're much higher up than you actually are. Thunderation is a mine coaster which is geared more towards kids but it still hauls around the curves, and at one point they had a car installed where you faced backwards, although that probably won't return. A lot of your typical other park rides which are largely themed to some degree or other, theres a particularly fun dark ride called Fire in the Hole which has some decent surprises in it the first time you ride.
I won't go on about it for now although I could talk about it all day
Steam: Chagrin LoL: Bonhomie
ALSO ALERT ALERT MEAN STREAK IS SOON TO BE ABOLISHED. THIS IS THE BEST NEWS OF THE YEAR.
Steam: Chagrin LoL: Bonhomie
Hot damn that was a garbage ride. I felt bad for the people I was with because the ride doesn't bother explaining anything that's happening or who anyone is, and even I was struggling with some of the stuff.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
Universal Orlando made an official announcement of their 3rd park. (They have a to-me-annoying habit of referring to Volcano Bay as their 3rd but I don't count it as such). First new entire park in the US in something like 20 years. It's frustratingly short on actual detail but looks like Nintendo Land on the left, with a peek at the Donkey Kong coaster on the far left, which is rumored to have a jumping element. Then top left is an entire land devoted to Universal's classic monsters (Dracula, Frankenstein, etc) which holy crap I am super stoked for. Top right is Fantastic Beasts... which ok not as iconic as Hogsmeade/Diagon but a magic-infused old New York could still be cool. And bottom right is apparently a How To Train Your Dragon/ general Dreamworks area. Not the biggest fan but a viking/dragon themed land is probably going to at least look really cool, and that racing/dueling twin coaster has tons of potential.
I'm really liking that they seem to be ditching connecting paths between the lands, and making you return to the hub. It creates a potential traffic problem but the tradeoff is greater immersion, keeping the 'lands' more self-contained allows for more detail. Think how Diagon Alley is handled, you can't see into it from outside, and you can't see the rest of the park from within; then apply that to an entire land. Great stuff. It's going to be hard wait.
It's a big park too, as pictured it's bigger than either existing park. The parcel of land it's on is bigger than all their existing land combined so lot of room for the future. Also helps explain why they've built so many hotels in such a short time frame. It'll be interesting to see how they handle transportation; if they do anything besides buses. Some park friends have suggested light rail but I don't know if it'd be worth that amount of effort, it's not THAT far from the other parks.
https://blog.universalorlando.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/BLOG_Image-Final-2.jpg
Also I am back to living in Williamsburg and once again have a Busch season pass. They just officially announced their new coaster for next year, Pantheon, which will feature an element that's only on I think one other coaster in the world right now: fast-switching tracks, so that you launch forward up a hill, and while you do that the track changes behind you, then you roll back and launch backwards up a hill, then roll back forward and get launched again over the hill and continue.
Steam: Chagrin LoL: Bonhomie
Yeah it's going to be incredible if they can pull it off. Basically the car you ride in is on its' own set of tracks that are for show, and the real wheels and track are below you. The link below shows a patent diagram where you can see a gap between the top tracks, and the bottom track rises up to simulate a jump over the gap.
https://www.coaster101.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/universal-donkey-kong-coaster-patent.png
And a clip of it in action, easier to parse:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=23&v=kAuVOvpC_kg
It ruled! I almost greyed out!
Steam: Chagrin LoL: Bonhomie
Twisted Timbers was also very cool and I didn't cry once, I'll have you all know
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Fuji Q is real fun y'all
It's got some quality roller coasters
I'm going up to Universal in a couple days and hopefully this time the Hagrid ride will be working and I'll finally get to try it out.
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
Forbidden Journey is like the best ride and I rode it twice in a row with no wait time since I went in the single rider line.
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
Holy hell that is a drop.
Her deal was, apparently, that she wanted to ride all the Harry Potter rides in one day. I think at some point, she was like, "fuck it, I can write something about this"
FJ is great but I have to close my eyes during the video portions or I legit get motion sickness. And I can handle the other screen rides fine, it's just that one that does it. I'd hate to be a ride op on that one
Yeah that ride (Eejanaika) was definitely one of my favourite roller coasters I've been on. The seats in the cart stick out from the central rails, and so also rotate during the ride, meaning you're looking backwards as you're going up the ascent, and then straight down for the drop. It's great.
Oh, it’s a 4D coaster? I thought that track looked a lot like X2 that we have out here at Magic Mountain.
3DS: 2981-5304-3227
I'm gonna have a good ole spooky theme park time!
I'd pay dearly to recapture going into Diagon Alley for the first time. If you're at all a Potter fan you're in for a real treat.
When I get home I'll probably make a more detailed post.
{Twitter, Everybody's doing it. }{Writing and Story Blog}
Is that what the issue is? Because I'm fine on the Gringotts ride, but man, Journey sometimes gets me really motion sick. Even Transformers gets me a little sick every now and then. I was figuring it me just getting older and not being able to handle the rides anymore.