Bansheelover

Dollywood has the Dolly Parton flair that puts it above a lot of its sister parks. We go to Dollywood for the experience in this order the shows, food, shopping, atmosphere, then rides. I would imagine SDC does not have the same caliber of shows as Dollywood, but probably some more intense rides.

What new credits did you get in 2026? If this topic needs moved, understand. My new credits this year. Cedar Point Top Thrill 2 - finally got to ride it. I value my time, and refuse to wait in lines over an hour for any roller coaster, and finally went a day where I waited about 20 minutes. This ride was incredible. Went into my top 15. Siren’s Curse- Did not get to ride, but worth mentioning. Made it all the way to the loading area to have it break down on me twice, and shut down for extended periods of time. Kings Dominion Reptilian - A bobsled coaster, very unique one and done for me. Too uncomfortable. Was closed on my first visit for the Jungle Xpedition expansion a few years back. Tumbli - first time I have rode a coaster like this. Absolutely terrified me, my daughter loved it, I will only ride it ever again if she wants to. Rapterra - my favorite new ride at Kings Dominion. Nice and smooth, good speed, good inversion, good theming. Kings Island needs a ride similar to this. Dollywood Thunderhead - a lot of fun, seems to be a bigger faster version of Mystic Timbers. Top 2 favorite there. Big Bear Mountain - Great story, launches, and smooth ride. This roller coaster is what they are all about. Just a lot of fun. Mystery Mine - cool story, boring coaster, and I need to be a lot smaller human being to ride it. 6’2” 250lbs doesn’t cut it. Fire Chaser Express - I had high hopes for this one, I did not research the rides before going, major let down for me. Thought it would be a more aggressive like Maverick. Wild Eagle - beautiful views, just a nice sweeping ride over the mountain. Might be my favorite winged coaster. Tennessee Tornado - an old arrow that gives Vortex vibes, sure do miss Vortex when I come across coasters like these. Blazing Fury - Fire on the mountain fire, fire in the hole. Corny campy ride. Lots of fun. Told my kids and nephew it had a huge drop. I had no idea what it was just making stuff up to put fear in my nephew. Lightning Rod - Fun ride, love the quad down, and ejector air. Not my favorite RMC. 12 new credits to draw closer to 200. I am at 174. Hopefully next year make it Six Flags Great America, and Canada’s Wonderland. I do not ride kiddy coasters, so that hampers my numbers a bit. However a great 2026 season.

This year the Bansheelover family bought Season Passes to Dollywood. A fantastic idea by the way. We made three trips to Dollywood with a fourth planned for after Christmas. Our first trip was in December of 2025 with three days. We explored, ate, and watched a lot of shows. After the Smokies in Christmas show I felt like I should pay extra it was that good. Our second trip was opening weekend in March. We got to see Dolly herself, and only 15 feet from her. I am glad my kids got to see her being such huge fans. So sad that she has passed. We also saw the world famous theme park traveler Don Helbig at Dollywood walking under the train tressel toward the Grist Mill. Our third visit this summer was just a good ole fashion ride, eat, and buy everything in sight. I think Big Bear Mountain is my favorite ride there followed by Thunderhead. I would love to see KI get a ride similar to the Bear but more extreme. We opted not to renew our passes for 2027 as we will turn our attention to other adventures, and I am actually kind of sad we will not be returning to Dollywood.

2026 Haunt is in the books. I always enjoy the different seasons of Kings Island, and understand it is a local amusement park trying their best with limited budgeting, and staffing. I did not try any of the extra foods, as I do not care for super spicy flavorings, but I did enjoy the mazes, and scare zones. The best maze of the year was Jason, I liked how each area was themed towards a different movie. The ending water effect showed where Jason drowned in Crystal Lake. The numerous Jason's throughout also being different to show the movies was a great details. If not for Jason Order of the Dragon would be the top, the attention to detail on the dead people around the table is awesome, each murdered in a different way. The hanging vampires towards the end is always interesting as well. I don't quite understand the connection of dracula and the dragon, but still love it. Alien Abyss is my third favorite due to the darkness, I wish more were like this. Metal Massacre has potential needs more scare actors, but a good idea. KillMart and Slaughterhouse may have ran their course. I still like Slaughterhouse for all the blood, but Killmart is boring anymore. I did the Conjouring not knowing anything about the movies. I did it three times, and the first time it was just my daughter and myself. It was fantastic. I did not know a Six Flags amusement park could pull something like that off, the young lady who led us through was fantastic. The scare zones are interesting, I think Hooked needs to be its own maze a lot of potential. Pumpkin Eaters with all the pumpkins and village setting is great, Needs to be in a more condensed area to maximize the scare actors. Abandoned is a lot of fun, I see the most people running there due to the chainsaws. It too could be its own maze. With a few tweaks, Haunt can be even better. Less is more, and focusing on making the experience better will make Haunt something everyone can enjoy for years to come.

I did not ride any flat rides. There was a storm coming and I wanted the coaster credits

Today we visited Six Flags Darien Lake with our All Park Pass. The park is in the middle of no where, and was about a 30 minute drive from our hotel in Buffalo. We were in the area to see the falls, and Lake Ontario. We arrived at 11:05am five minutes after opening, and probably were one of 30 cars in the parking lot. We had no problems scanning in with our Kings Island Gold Passes, although the ticket lady admired mine for a moment. The weather was calling for thunderstorms around 2 so I wanted to make sure to ride, Ride of Steel first. This park I did a little research but did not look at the map. We quickly went towards the Ride of Steel, and found the entrance to Predator on the way. In all we rode all the roller coasters, and Moose on the Loose. The park is quite small, and reminded me of Michigan's Adventure. A tad neglected, a tad nostalgic, and a lot of fun. 1. Ride of Steel This was my favorite ride, it is an Intamin coaster that flies through its course. It is a very forceful coaster with good pops of air, and strong helixes that made me gray out. It does have weird straight piece of track that gets the ride over a lake. I rode this twice, and it was a blast. 2. MindEraser This ride was a lot of fun. It was intense and whippy. It had new restraints and was very smooth. I had a lot of fun on this ride, and wish I rode it again. 3. Tantrum SFDL newest coaster, it was quick and whippy as well. Very short, but packed a punch. If it was longer may be number 2 on my list. 4. Viper Rode like Vortex of my teenage years. Fun, and brought back a lot of memories. Those old arrow restraints sure do hurt now days. Is it old age or new coaster restraints are so much better. 5 . Predator A fun woodie with titan track on some of it. Parts that do not have it are extremely rough. Runs by the lake and is fun, but the rough ride knocks to to fifth place. 6. Boomerang I am not a fan of these. I rarely ride Invertigo, and this was rough. 7. Motocross was not opened while we were there. Moose on the Loose was a lot of fun. Everyone rode it and laughed through the track. Highly recommened it. Overall I enjoyed my time at Darien Lake. We were able to ride everything we wanted in 2 hours. With our meal plans and drink plans unavailable we did not participate in those activities. The park is small, and easy to navigate. However I would not spend more than a day here or make it my main objective in the area. If in the area again I would love to catch a few rides on Ride of Steel and Minderaser. The staff were very friendly, and the operations were one train, but quicker than expected after slow dispatches at SFOG, and Great Adventure. The park ranks in my Michigan's Adventure, Dorney Park tier. Which is enjoyable but glad it s not my home park. Bansheelover tiers Home Park Tier (Best of the Best I've Been to) 1. Kings Island 2. Cedar Point 3. Carowinds Visit Again Tier (Fun but not the best) 1. Kings Dominion 2. Six Flags Grand Adventure 3. Six Flags over Georgia Glad I went, but glad not my home park Tier 1. Michigan's Adventure 2. Dorney Park 3. Six Flags Darien Lake

Yes, flip the light switch. KI for coasterstock did have a sign may have to wait to see if they put it out again or just get lucky.

I worked there for laser tag. Fun fact Kings Island did not operate it. I was hired by an outside company who rented that space. They were based out of Charlotte, and had one at Carowinds as well.

I have rode it 20 times. I enjoy the ride, but a lot of my friends don’t like it.

Going vertical!

After looking over a few topics the original poster started, they are not what we would consider the poster child for good health. Eating BK, and smoking areas. I for one would not dine at Burger King in the park or outside the park. I could not imagine eating a whopper with cheese and onion rings then riding the Banshee. I would only be good for a ride on the bathroom stall after suffering from nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, and diarrhea!

Yes, they have a full time staff that works in HR and the offices.

I have been to Haunt twice so far. Last Saturday after the rains we went, and went through Slaughterhouse and Madam Fatale's. Both were fun, but limited scare actors due to the weather. We arrived around 10:30pm. Rode Orion, Diamondback, and Banshee twice. I went last night and did Pumpkin , Hooked, Cornered and Alien Abyss. All were fantastic, and had major upgrades from the previous years. Good amount of scare actors, and the kids had a blast. The fog was amazing, and had to the atmosphere of the evening. We will see what Sunday night brings when we go back.

In t minus 16 hrs and 20 minutes Six Flags and Cedar Fair merge. Tomorrow morning I am venturing to Six Flags Cedar Point to ride Batman (formerly known as Raptor) , Joker (formerly known as GateKeeper), and Dr Doom's Free Fall (formerly known as Valravn.) The midway we so gracefully loved will be decked out in DC characters and rethemed to Gotham City. On Tuesday when I return to Kings Island I will find that Action Zone has completely be rethemed the Banshee is now known as Batman, Invertigo is Superman, and The Bat is the Joker. All the retheming of Planet Snoopy is adorned by Bugs Bunny and company. I am very excited.

Yay! A dueling watercoaster that probably will only have one side operating on any given day, with 5 tubes. Although it will be a fun experience, the not operating all the attractions in the waterpark at full capacity is what gets me.