TombRaiderFTW

Wow, that's awesome! As I understand it, that log flume was demolished to make way for Raptor. Great find!

Uh... Kudos to the guy in the middle. Balancing myself on those ledgers would pretty much terrify me.

^ I'm not for sure, but since the photo's from Westcoaster, I'd wager a guess it's at Knott's.

I saw the switchbacks used more often in 2011 than ever before. Haunt Saturdays were particularly severe, and I saw at least a few of them being used multiple times.

The thing I have to wonder about, though: why? What benefit does KI get from opening two weeks later than what they used to? I don't mean to whine, but the earlier opening days weren't completely empty--I've seen slower days on Haunt Fridays--so I don't think they were totally losing money a couple years ago. (Not that I'm privy to those facts... For all I know, those days were prone to attracting only passholders who wouldn't buy anything, so the park could have been losing money hand over fist.) It's been mentioned before on here that Paramount's season pass preview days helped train employees and iron out ride kinks prior to the real opening day. The old April weekends could almost be considered a substitute for that--they weren't packed, but they had enough people there that the park was running well by May/the start of daily operations. Maybe it was sheer coincidence, but 2011's opening day seemed pretty hiccup-y. Rides were down left and right, with relatively full queues of people who I personally witnessed complaining a lot. But I'm just speculating.

^ Actually, it's just Saturday and Sunday in April. Pre-2011 tradition would make this year's opening on April 14, the Saturday after Easter, but the park's said it will open later, like this year. I'm looking for them to open on April 28.

So... My family, being awesome, surprised me with a last-minute Dollywood trip yesterday. Thunderhead definitely did something to my wooden coaster rankings (though I haven't totally decided yet what that something is... The back seat on Raven and that last night ride towards the front on Thunderhead are currently sparring it out in my head. ) Are we allowed to resubmit ballots?

I'm confused... Maybe I'm remembering incorrectly, but I'm pretty sure the park, at least for the past 3 or so seasons, has posted on the website around this time of year that the schedule will be available "soon". "Soon" has usually meant some time after the first of the year. Am I wrong?

^ Actually, I only rode it last year, but I thought it was running pretty well regardless. Then again, I liked Hurler, so maybe I'm just weird.

Here's how mine shaped up. 1. The Voyage, Holiday World 2. Thunderbolt, Kennywood 3. Raven, Holiday World 4. The Legend, Holiday World 5. Hurler, Kings Dominion 6. The Grizzly, Kings Dominion 7. Blue Streak, Cedar Point 8. Jack Rabbit, Kennywood 9. Racer, Kennywood 10. The Beast, Kings Island I'll omit the other 19 for the sake of not boring everyone to death, haha. This year wasn't a great one, coaster-wise, for me--I barely made it anywhere, compared to past years. Still, I did get to go to Kennywood and Hersheypark, both of which are fantastic parks. (Honorable mentions go to Hersheypark's woodies. They're fantastic rides, especially Comet and Lightning Racers. I've just got a thing for defunct ride manufacturers, apparently. [The Gravity Group excepted, of course.])

Ah, okay. Thanks, Terp. I've never really understood a whole lot about Paramount Parks, so I appreciate the info.

^ Just trying to get an understanding of the situation... Weren't at least some of those people simply disposed of when Cedar Fair changed the staff in 2006? Or were Cedar Fair's decisions to remove them based on those rides? Or was that not the situation at all? The primary example of this I'm thinking of (though primarily so because he's pretty much the only Paramount staff name I know off the top of my head) is Jeff Siebert. But again, I don't really know much about how Cedar Fair handled itself in the Paramount takeover.

^ I stand corrected! For some reason, I was mixing up the story about John Allen being contacted to see if he'd help design the ride with Dinn... Don't know where that came from. Thanks for setting it straight, Monroe.

According to RCDB, The Raven was actually CCI's seventh project. Having ridden a few of their earlier rides (Hoosier Hurricane and Zach's Zoomer), you can definitely tell CCI was hitting its stride around the time of The Raven. Those rides have larger transitions and somewhat slower pacing, both of which started to change with Cyclops, Raven, and Great White. HH and ZZ are both still enjoyable rides, though; I love me some CCI. (For some reason, I seem to miss their rides the most this off-season... Wonder why.)

^ From what I understand, you're right on the first part and partially right on the second. One of the (owners?) of Custom Coasters International, Denise Dinn-Larrick, was the daughter of Charles Dinn. Charles Dinn was one part of the group who designed The Beast, as well as one of the primary designers in Dinn Corp., manufacturers of such rides as Cedar Point's Mean Streak, Worlds of Fun's Timber Wolf, Six Flags over Georgia's Georgia Cyclone, etc. I don't know how much the park wanted to copy The Beast while designing The Raven, but I have heard before that Will Koch really wanted a double helix on one of his rides to rival our Beast's famous finale. Supposedly, adding one to the ride wouldn't work (and I've never heard a reason why), but the idea lingered and later manifested on The Legend. (Personally, I'm kinda glad for this... The only place I could see a helix even fitting on The Raven would be around the ride's final right turn, and a helix--unless taken at really high speeds--would mess up the pacing of the ride, in my opinion.) On the rumor note, I've heard Will took out a second mortgage on his house to help pay for The Raven. Anyone know how true that is? Anyway, glad to hear you guys are enjoying it.

^ For what it's worth, you can find several photos of TR:TR's queue both in this site's and KIExtreme's great photo galleries. Another good source is DAFE's article from 2002 about Tomb Raider. I haven't been able to find video of any aspect of the ride, either. The again, what would there be to see in the video?

And, coming from someone who's been to a Winter Jam concert, do know that $10 is an absolute steal for the number of great performers that will be there. I highly recommend it.

I love that 1974 photo. I remember (albeit vaguely) how forested the area around KCKC was, and--even though I'm glad the park is what it is--I think I'd rather have that than The Crypt and Diamondback. Again, I'm loving this thread. Thanks (again), standbyme.

Since I know Holiday World has a few fellow fans here (and no fansite of its own), I thought I'd share this video I just found. I know I've certainly never seen it before--it's of The Raven in its first few seasons at the park, back when it was the only wooden coaster to be found in Santa Claus. A couple things I noticed: Will Koch looks really young. I didn't know video of the ride's grand opening existed. The most I'd seen were a few photos of Will and Denise Dinn-Larrick in the front seat, with Bill Koch clipping the banner. The Raven had buzz bars?! Ordinarily I wouldn't get this excited/jealous about such a thing, but after riding Kennywood's coasters this summer, I can't even imagine how crazy a fairly new Raven with buzz bars would have ridden. When did the change from buzz bars to individual restraints happen? I want a ride with Santa! Hope you guys enjoy this as much as I did. Finding stuff like this (and standbyme's historic photos, and TombraiderTy's occasional compilations) usually helps the off-season go by quickly. (Note: the reason I put "historic" in quotes in the title is because I frankly don't find the 90's to be too long ago. I'm not that old! )

And man, I bet the guy who uploaded that on YouTube is really handsome and smart. He just seems that way to me, for some reason. Call it intuition. I'm really glad I came across that on Google Videos, because it's honestly one of the best references to the actual ride that I know exists. Once upon a time, I also had links to a complete queue walkthrough video from 2002 and a video of the preshow. Somewhere along the way, I lost the address for them, and I haven't been able to find them since. They were on some odd, unknown video hosting site that, coincidentally enough, looked a lot like what Vimeo looks like now. Really wish I could find them again...

Yes! This is a great idea. This sort of ride will fit in perfectly there. Kennywood's a great little park, and I'll definitely be visiting again next year!

...The new wave pool will have magnetic trim brakes? (I'm sorry! I couldn't resist!)

They've gotta make their minds up. Which seat will they take? Too bad it's not Friday.

^ Not saying I don't want another Top Spin, too, but... Given our Crypt's issues with downtime and HUSS's (the manufacturer's) infamously slow parts service, I'd kind of be surprised if the park bought anything from HUSS to replace it. If the park would decide to just replace the ride, I bet they'd go for the Zamperla (or some other manufacturer) equivalent. Still, I don't think I've heard of KD's Crypt having as many downtime issues as ours, so who knows?

Am I the only one worried by this?