violakat03

I don't even ride KI's bumper cars anymore. They depress me with how slow they go. I agree with Smurfy. The best bumper cars I've ever been on were Holiday World's, though Cedar Point's are pretty good and don't have a 'one way' rule or divider in the middle. Which, is a huge pet peeve of mine. They're BUMPER cars not RACING cars. If I wanted to go one way, I'd ride the go-carts. I'm riding bumper cars. I can't bump someone if they're driving away from me at the same speed. So I always ignore the one-way signs and bump the crap outta everyone. Haven't had a ride op say anything to me yet! Interestingly, Coney's are the only ones I've been able to do complete laps in reverse. Most bumper cars don't allow you to drive backwards that far. I was having way too much fun with reverse laps. Oh, and if you get stuck, that means you haven't ridden the bumper cars enough. I LOVE bumper cars, so I have mastered getting out of a traffic jam. And driving in reverse, apparently!

No it's not This isn't the thread for the argument, but I'm going to do it anyway. It is completely pointless. The midcourse was turned off under Paramount. There is no midcourse even installed on the clone at Six Flags America. Therefore, that trim brake is completely unnecessary other than because Cedar Fair loves trim brakes. Ok, I got that off my chest. I feel better now.

It was a tan Saturn hat, actually. But yeah, I was in line for Diamondback around that time. I was wearing a tie-dye Legend shirt from Holiday World. Josh had on a red Kings Island shirt.

I knew my friend Josh from West Virginia was going to be at Kings Island from ERT to close. Josh and I have an interesting friendship - we met online years ago through our mutual love of Kings Island and have been trying to meet up at the park since at least 2005. Earlier this year, we FINALLY made it to the park on the same day together and met face to face for the first time! So this would be our second time getting together this year, out of his 8 or something trips so far. Pretty bad track record, isn't it? Anyhow, I set my alarm early enough to get to ERT and repeatedly hit snooze. I think I finally rolled out of bed around noon, texted Josh to say I'd be there in a few hours, and set about rousing myself, showering, and getting ready to head out. I finally got to the park a smidge after 3 p.m. and Josh and I met at the front gate. I was craving Diamondback, so off we went. During our short 15 minute wait in the covered 'upper' queues only, we saw three different line jumpers busted by a very vigilant female security guard who was watching the line like a hawk. As she escorted one of the guests out through the single rider line, she got close enough that I could give her a high five. She seemed highly entertained by it. I give her major kudos for doing what so many have been asking for so long. At Diamondback, we requested and were given row 16. Josh got his arm soaked, I elected to stay dry. After Diamondback I asked Josh what he wanted to do, since I'm at the park all the time. He said he'd been wanting a Drop Tower ride, so off we went. After a 2 cycle wait, we watched the parking lot most of our ride, pointing out our cars in the gold pass lot. The guy behind us balanced a penny on his knee as we dropped and caught it in his hand. I still do not understand how he managed this. I won't say why I believe this is next to impossible, but I think he did something other than just let it rest there and then catch it. But, he didn't lose it! After Drop Tower, since we were back in that area, we decided to ride Flight Deck. Because, why not? After our first ride in front seat of the last car (best seat, IMO), there was no one waiting for our seat, so we stayed on for another cycle. We probably could have pulled off another one but decided to call it a day on Flight Deck. At this point, I knew dare-to-fly should be in or near the park. We'd made the arrangement the day before that if his phone died or he left it in the car, we'd meet at Diamondback. So Josh and I headed to Diamondback and made a quick scan of the area. No dare-to-fly. So, of course we jumped in line for another ride. While we were in Rivertown, we opted for a 6-2 ride on Beast, and then another scan of the Diamondback area. At this point I started having a ridiculously strong craving for ice cream. Josh wanted to buy a Diamondback shirt so we headed into the gift shop and browsed for quite a while. I eyed a few items I wouldn't mind having, peeked at the $20 bill in my pocket and decided to hold off. While wandering the gift shop, got a call from dare-to-fly that he'd be at the park in about 5 minutes, so Josh wrapped up his purchases (literally .. he bought a shot glass in addition to a shirt), and we headed to the front gate. As I milled about waiting, Josh meandered off to another gift shop. I gave up after 10 minutes and broke my cardinal rule in Cedar Fair parks. I do not buy food or drink in the parks. Well, call me a hypocrite now, because I HAD to have ice cream. $3.59 later, I had a cone (well, bowl actually) of soft serve chocolate-vanilla twist ice cream that I was happily licking as I met back up with Josh, and then finally the lost Flyer, at the front gate. I polished off my guilty pleasure ice cream as we headed for another ride on Drop Tower, where we waited one cycle and this time faced Son of Beast most of the ride. From there, we were going to wander about Coney as Racer had been mentioned (which perked a certain wood coaster fan's ears), but Josh looked at his watch to realize we only had 40 minutes left before the park closed! Hate those 8 pm closes after being used to 10 pm or later! After a quick debate (Diamondback? Beast? Racer?), Josh and I caved and went for a walk-on ride on red Racer, where we were all being fairly goofy. It made for a highly entertaining ride, more so than usual. We then headed for Rivertown, hoping for a last ride on Diamondback and Beast both. While walking through Nick U, I heard someone say my name, and Kat is not a very common name, so I spun around to find ... Beast Man! Our happy congretation grew one more as we walked to Diamondback. There, we faced a connundrum. With 20 minutes left, we knew there was only time for one more ride. Josh and I were both craving Diamondback, the other two were craving Beast. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted another Beast ride. So I sadly abandoned Josh (with the promise of meeting up at our splitting point) and the three of us headed out to Beast. We didn't get the last train of the night, but got fairly close to it. After our not-quite-night ride (pout), we met back up with Josh and wandered out of the park for the end of quite a nice, albeit short, day. We didn't wait in line longer than 15 minutes for anything, which was a nice change from the packed park of the past few weeks. In less than 5 hours, my ride count: Diamondback: 2 Drop Tower: 2 Flight Deck: 2 Beast: 2 Red Racer: 1 Plus plenty of 'hang out' time!

I've been wondering the same for a few years now, actually.

dare-to-fly can be removed as well, seeing as how I'm kidnapping him to Chicago and other areas, and we shall be enjoying trimless wood coasters that day.

Thank you to everyone in this thread for the warning about the construction. You have no idea how greatly appreciated it is. dare-to-fly and I will be staunchly avoiding that area of 65 on our trip there this weekend! I'm going to TRY to remember to shoot some videos so you guys can have a VTR of our epic coaster tour of awesomeness.

Congratulations, you experienced "mirrorlization!" I noticed the "done" written on a support also. I'm intrigued by it. I also usually make a joke about it when we come to a complete and unnecessary stop on the mid-course.

The discrepancies between GR measurements and rides measurements is because the people at GR take 3 seconds to do the measurement, because they usually have a huge line of other things to do. This leads to them not checking children to see if they're standing on their toes, wearing tall shoes, etc. I saw a girl in heelies (the shoes with skate wheels) that were obviously way too big for her (probably her older sister's), which added at least two or three inches to her height. Added to that, she stood on tiptoe. It put her over the 48" mark and she got a wristband. She then left GR and immediately changed shoes! I've seen many kids stand on tip toe and stretch as far as they could to clear a height line they shouldn't have. The GR people never looked down to check that they had their feet flat and their back straight. I've even seen them give a wristband to a kid who only cleared it because of her pigtails! The rides people take a little more time to make sure they get it right, because that is all the height measurement stations are there for and they're usually less hurried. They will make sure a child's feet are planted flat on the floor and if their shoes look suspiciously tall, high-soled or like they may be stuffed, they'll ask the child to take their shoes off.

Oh yes. I lost count of how many times it flipped while I was actually riding it. I had to go back and watch the video I filmed of it to count them afterward. KD's Crypt is one of my favorite flat rides.

Actually, Kings Dominion's Crypt flips 9 times. 8 if you don't count the one in the middle as a full flip - the gondola is locked until it fully inverts, then it releases while upside down but it swings back forwards instead of doing a completely flip, however it is completely inverted. I just watched the video I shot of the ride cycle and counted! Kings Dominion's is so much better than ours it isn't even funny. BTW, King Maple, your entire post was excellent. Your description of Crypt had me cracking up. You described it quite well! To experience the version described on the RWN site, you would have to go back in time and ride it as Tomb Raider, or to ride a more intense version, drive down to Virginia.

I only do tube slides (I don't like the wedgie or 'slide burn' associated with body slides) and I LOVED Splashin' Safari. Lots of variety in tube slides, two great wave pools, two lazy rivers ... overall, a wonderful water park!!

I just don't ride Invertigo. It always has too long of a line. When I do take a rare ride on it, I prefer to face forwards (riding backwards first) going up the lift, especially in the end seat. For some reason I'm fascinated by watching the cable mechanism and watching it release.

The Beast is getting to be an old man (for a roller coaster). Maybe it just takes him a little longer to get going in the morning than the young whipper-snappers like Diamondback.

My favorite would have to be Beast's crew. They are super efficient (I almost never see them stacking trains), energetic and always entertaining. Diamondback's crew for the most part is also great. There are a few ops that never look like they're having fun, are boring on the mic, and can get downright rude at times, but the rest of them are very nice. I saw two girls taking time out to the side to encourage a teenager who was afraid of riding and being very encouraging. I thought that was great. There are some people who are an absolute blast on the mic as well. Other crews I enjoy are Drop Tower, Son of Beast (who now seem to be mostly at Delirium, making it a great crew), and the train.

It's definitely worth contacting them. I think they do separate interview days for the 15 year olds because you can't work in a haunt attraction, so you'd be lumped in with the non-haunt interviews. But definitely call them and see if they're still hiring 15 year olds. They only have so many positions available for them, so they may be filled, they may not.

Very true. I've never worked somewhere that didn't have a similar rule. Show up in the area when you're supposed to be 'sick' and things could get very bad for you.

This is something to confirm with management, but the way I understand it is the only time you can't come to the park is if you call off for a day you've been scheduled. If you're scheduled off, including requesting the day, you're free to do whatever you want, including come to Haunt. You'll have a chance to go through other areas. In the past they've had dry run type days where you go through other haunts and then other employees come through yours. If they're doing that this year, you'll get the information about it in training. Keep in mind I have never worked Haunt, just know from what others have told me that they do this every year prior to October. Posted from my BlackBerry.

Urgent Scare is going to rock this year with all you awesome KICers working it!

You work at the park. You get into all CF parks for free with your employee ID. I think he meant if he no longer works at the park. By the fact he said he may be going to school, I'd assume he meant he'd be quitting his job and thus need a way to get into the parks. If you can get a platinum pass for 2010 and use it for the rest of 2009 it'd be worth it. I wouldn't buy a 2009 platinum pass at this point as it's too late in the year, unless you are going to be visiting parks a whole lot by the end of the season.

AZ guy... Wow. Don't know where to start. I guess I'll just say this then. Anything that is not public knowledge is not to be posted on this board. If you wish to risk your job by posting restricted information, go for it. Don't expect others to do it or to get any sympathy if you are disciplined for breaking company policy if you're an employee and breaking forum rules. Information about employee ride nights is considered confidential information because only the employees are told about them. They are not public events and are not public knowledge because they are an employee benefit. This sort of information is best kept to PMs or other forms of private communication if you'd like to discuss it with others. To quote Terpy... Just sayin'

So call. It's really not a difficult concept. I'm sure you've got the phone number for your department. If you don't, go look in your training material. It'll be in there. We are not the park. We cannot answer questions about ANYTHING relating to employment. That includes employee benefits, rules, regulations, expectations, etc. Most people on this forum are not employees. Those that are know that it is against company policy to give out information to the public that is not given directly from the marketing department. The employees that are on this forum are very eager to NOT lose their jobs and therefore are not going to answer your questions.

I'm really wondering how many times this must be pointed out. You work at the park. The park, not this forum, should be answering any questions you have involving employee-only information. Ask your supervisor. Ask your department office. Ask HR. Heck, ask guest relations, they could probably even answer it. Just stop asking here.