Pillsberry123

Early on in the season there are quite a few school trips. I know my school visits at least one a year for either science class or as an award for having good grades all year. In fact, I know that the PLTW class at my school will be visiting on the 13th (the day that you've specified). I would recommend avoiding the areas of the park with a lot of crowds until later in the day, as this will be when you get most of your rides in. Remember that people will most likely be running for WindSeeker and Diamondback. If you will be getting there early, ride the rides in Action Zone before heading back for the stars of the show.

I would expect to pay that a day at a much more well known destination park like one of the Disney Parks or even Busch Gardens, but $51.99 for a day at some local kick is way out of proportion. When you could go to the Zoo, Aquarium, or even another local park for less (Stricker's Grove and Cony Island anyone?) Assuming that the family is extreme about saving money, their budget will go more like this: 2 x $35.99 for discounted adult tickets = $71.98 2 x $31.99 for two children = $63.98 Gas = ~$15-$20 Parking = $12 Breakfast will be eaten at home, lunch will be packed, and dinner will be a stop at McDonald's on the way home. The only food will be soft pretzels as snacks and several drinks throughout the day. Around $20. The gift shop will be avoided. This puts the daily total for a family at $187. Much more manageable, but considering that every step was taken to save money, it's still crazy when there are much more affordable choices. In my opinion, the online discount ticket price of $35.99 should be the regular prices. Don't even offer an online discount if you can't make them lower than $35.99. The price of juniors/seniors should be lowered dramatically from $31.99. Only four dollars less? C'mon. $24.99 at least. On top that, it's been said before that lowering the food prices and increasing the quality of food would increase food revenue, but that ship has sailed before. Parking is another thing that needs a look over. $12 is way to much to park. At least offer reduced parking in a lot that is further away. I'd rather see parking at around $6, but if no one complains, nothing with change.

Wow, that's pretty high when you think about it. Really. Family of four - ~$200 for tickets $12 for parking ~$50 for food and drinks ~$15-$20 for gas ~$20 for stuff from the gift shop $302 for a day at the local amusement park. Something's not right here.

I've enjoyed looking at all these pictures! Thanks for doing this! Opening day is getting closer and closer. I can't wait for crazy load of trip reports to come this Saturday.

I've enjoyed looking at all these pictures! Thanks for doing this! Opening day is getting closer and closer. I can't wait for crazy load of trip reports to come this Saturday.

This is a pretty interesting read: http://glenwoodfincafe.blogspot.com/2011/03/how-much-oil-does-united-states-have-in.html

On a Tuesday, the crowds will be pretty light. Like rotag said, weather will make a big difference as well. Remember this, the water park is the main draw. When most people visit Holiday World, the first thing they do is ride the dry rides. After they eat lunch, they head over to Splashin Safari. After lunchtime, the dry side of the park usually isn't crowded at all. I've racked up 10 rides on the Raven in less than an hour around 3 or 4 o'clock. So if you don't plan on hitting the water park, you'll have plenty of time. If you are hitting the water park, it won't be terrible since you'll be visiting on a Tuesday.

I laughed at the video! Very well done!

There's a Comfort Inn on Interstate 64 (about 7 miles away from Holiday World) which has rates as low as 89 bucks a night. http://www.comfortinn.com/hotel-ferdinand-indiana-IN149

Unless you come Opening day, the lines won't be that bad. Last year I came on Sunday, the weekend AFTER opening day, and I was one of only 3 other people getting their pass processed.

From the GP standpoint probably Diamondback, but I can ride it all day without any problems. I actually find it one of the easiest rides in the park to ride. If you want to talk about scary rides, I consider Drop Tower to be pretty scary. That's the only ride at the park that I'm a little nervous about riding.

Yeah, it's not like Roller Coaster Tycoon where randomly borrowing $200,000 to build three coasters is logical (and $200,000 isn't even close enough to build one coaster, I've never understood why Roller Coaster Tycoon's money system was so unrealistic). There's things to worry about other than building as many roller coasters as possible. There's a SBNO coaster in Action Zone right now which I hope will be taken care of next year (and no, I don't mean fixed and reopened). Cedar Fair has spent their money well for Kings Island. They've fixed the park up one area at a time, and I hope that Action Zone will be done next year. That's what I expect to see for 2012.

I agree 100%. I don't care if we don't get a lot of thrill rides. Heck, I'd still love the park just the same if Diamondback wasn't built, but I'm going to love seeing the Crypt and Flight Deck look presentable. Little stuff. Something I forgot to mention is that The Beast has received some more re-tracking. I'm looking forward to see how it performs!

I like it more for the fact that you can see a lot more. With the amount of detail on the old map, details were a little harder to find. The one thing I don't like is how they got rid of the colored paths that distinguished themed areas.

A lot of stuff has been done this offseason, from WindSeeker, Dinosaurs Alive, Flight Deck's Paintjob, Crypt's improvements (whatever they may be), and the pavers in Coney Mall, it has been great. Not bad at all. I think that management has made a point this offseason that they do care about the small stuff that usually only enthusiast care about.

I don't think that he'll be that devastated by not riding the ride, just as I am not devastated that I haven't been inside a Wal-Mart for 6 years (as I said I wouldn't do 6 years ago). When people get mad and protest something they usually mean what they say, even if it may seem that they don't. Anyway, away from attacking and trying to offend another person off of the forums, onto the topic. - As other people have said, I would give more power to individual parks and allow them to make a lot of their own decisions on a set budget. - I would stop dealing with Intamin, as they have come off as a pretty unreliable company. - I would invest in more sit down restaurants, lower the food prices, and market them. This way the food revenue can stop leaving the parks for much better, cheaper selections 10 minutes down the road. - I would invest in more resort properties (similar to the Hotel Breakers) that offer perks such as discounted tickets, ERT, or an indoor water park. This would encourage guest to stay onsite, bring in more revenue, and encourage people to stay longer. - I would improve communication among the parks and their fans via the internet (which it seems like they have already began doing pretty well).

I was raised on a little bit of everything, so I don't really care what characters are at the park. I'll admit that Scooby-Doo was probably the star attraction of the kids area, but I am not opposed to Peanuts either. I'm all for keeping with tradition, but Snoopy is a good park mascot, too. As for the area, it pretty much comes off as the same area with new paint. Everything looks great, the kids seem to enjoy it, and it hasn't lost its credibility as the best kids area. It's an all around win in my opinion. Great transition over from Nick to Peanuts.

Eh, as long as you can tell what the rides on the map are, I don't really care. Cedar Point's map is perfect imo.

Well, we know that the one at Cedar Point is a little bit behind the one at Kings Island, but this is because Cedar Point opens later. Kings Island'a WindSeeker will be the first to open. As for construction, you can watch the progression here. None of us here are aware of when more pieces will be delivered or added. http://www.visitkingsisland.com/public/fun/webcams/index.cfm

Off day or not, an hour of ERT is awesome. Even if it's just to get the chance to jump in the front seat of Raptor or Millennium with little to no wait (or Maverick, if you're one of those people.)

I think we need to see the end of Spongebob. Something new wouldn't necessarily affect ridership, because the GP probably wouldn't care anyway. As for the enthusiast, something new would get me to visit it again, rather than watching the same thing year after year.

In my opinion, visiting Cedar Point ONCE as well as Kings Island a few times pays for your passes. The only thing I'd worry about is the price. If you are buying passes for a family of four, you'll notice that a lot more than you would if you buy gold passes, however, they are worth it in my opinion. You get all the Gold Pass Perks (including free parking) at all Cedar Fair parks. This means ERT at Cedar Point, so you also gain the perk of staying at a resort. This means no pressure of staying at a resort for discounted tickets and ERT, so that could mean rooms for as cheap as $70 a night in Sandusky.

I vote no. I don't see how you could consider it a coaster. There's no way for me to explain why or why not, I guess it's just one of those things where it depends on how you look at it. I don't see how you could consider Surf Dog a coaster and not consider Viking Fury a coaster.

Instead of getting a new sitdown restaurant I'd rather they improve on the food quality that they offer now. Instead of adding a new restaurant, make the current food worth eating and affordable.

Definitely a good point. We all know that when something small breaks, nothing is done, and when a lot of small things break, nothing is done. I really hope that whatever they decide to do here is something that they can keep committed to, otherwise we'll have nothing but a bunch of broken dinos in 10 years. The more I think about this the more I think something should have been done with Son of Beast. I mean it's pretty obvious that it's not going to ever reopen at this point, and the thought of them bringing the loop back is even more ridiculous. Let's tear it down and get the area looking right again, instead of having a huge SBNO wooden coaster dominating the skyline of the park. Now we'll have another year of it just sitting there, and seeing how much was spent on Dinosaurs Alive, I doubt it will be taken down next year.