Rustbucket Posted August 17, 2012 Share Posted August 17, 2012 Kings Island (8/12/2012) My week of coaster began at Kings Island. As usual, I dropped by Action Zone to ride Drop Tower for early ride. My son and I rode DT 6 times and head over to Diamondback for 2 rides. Diamondback is always satisfying. To me, back seats provide much better experience and airtime. I rather ride this B&M masterpiece over any other coaster in Ohio. I only rate Leviathan higher as far as B&M coasters go. We went over to Beast. Beast is also a satisfying ride. There are many other wooden coasters that I rate higher than Beast now, but I am not sure if some of those rides will age as well as Beast. We went over to Flight of Fear, Firehawk and Racer and left. Overall, we spent 3 hours at the park. This was typical Sunday trip for us. Six Flags Magic Mountain (8/13/2012) My latest business trip brought me to Los Angeles area. Of course, I decided to take adventage and visit SFMM. I was looking forward to riding Drop of Doom and Green Lantern. I have been on all of the coasters here except for Green Lantern. However, Drop of Doom is the one I was looking forward to riding ever since Six Flags announced the ride. The park looked extremely busy. It was also over 100 degrees. It was hot! Drop of Doom: I headed over to Drop of Doom first. This ride was built on the support of the Superman but the entrance was next to Batman the Ride in Gotham City area. The queue was enclosed and air conditioned which was nice on such a hot day. I waited about 20 minutes. It seems that many people were afraid to ride this. Some were flat out refusing to ride this. There were 8 seats on either side of the ride. Needless to say, this was a low capacity ride. 400 feet drop ride - ahh! I discussed the ride spec with an engineer near the ride. The magnetic brake was 136 feet. The climb took all of 45 seconds. This was not enough to full enjoy the height! : ) The delay at the top before the plunge was 6 seconds - same as Drop Tower. The restrain system was identical to Skyrush at Hershey, another great Intamin creation. This ride was quite a rush. As expected, the brake was quite harsh compared to Drop Tower. The view was incredible. Goliath looked so small! I had similar sensation when I first rode Top Thrill Dragster and saw Millennium Force. Best 4 second drop ride I have been on. I found the single rider line and rode this 5 additional times. (10/10) Green Lantern (#300) My 300th coaster! This was also in Gotham City area. I went into the single rider line and waited for 10 minutes. The restrain system was identical to Kingda Ka, Storm Runner and the original Intimidator 305. Yet another Intamin ride. This one is called 4-D coaster but very different from X2. This was a free swinging seats unlike X2. Also, this was not as good as X2. This really is a unique coaster. There were some question from Cedar Point about Green Lantern being a coaster or not. (Basic PR move for most coaster in a park debate.) This may not be a great coaster, but this is most definitely a coaster. (7/10) I rode Scream!, Goliath, and Tatsu. Tatsu is my favorite flying coaster. I was on a queue while waiting for X2, but the coaster broke down on the lift hill. After 45 minutes, they forced open the seats and brought down people from the train. Needless to say, the ride was closed for rest of the day. They provided a pass to go to front of any rides for everyone who was waiting on X2. (There were about 50 of us by this time.) I used the pass to ride Tatsu again. Overall, SFMM is a thrill ride junky’s paradise. I would still rate X2 and Tatsu as the best rides of SFMM although Drop of Doom is a great addition to the park. Knott’s Berry Farm (8/14/2012) This park has always been a great little park for me to relax during a business trip to LA area. With the park near RT 91, this park is very easy to get from my hotels. It also became a place for me to avoid bad traffic on RT 91. This was one of those cases where I wanted to avoid the traffic. Do I want to go back to hotel or spend a few hours at KBF. Hmmmmm. My first ride at KBF is always Ghostrider unless it is closed. I have not been on this coaster in 3 years since it was closed last time I was at KBF. This is my favorite ride at KBF although the ride has gotten somewhat rough over the years. I went over to Silver Bullet. This ride was so smoooooth!!!! I do not remember this ride being this smooth. This is an excellent inverted coaster. WindSeeker was near the kid’s area. The color was also quite different from all other WindSeekers. Xcelerator was built as a prototype to Top Thrill Dragster. I finally got a roll back on this. J After 20 rides, I decided to check out the markings all around the park near Knott Blvd area. Also, I learned that Perilous Plunge will be closed down. KBF coasters did not always open in the spring. In fact, Silver Bullet and Ghostrider opened in December. I wondered if there will be a new coaster in 2013. The signs indicated that there will be a new coaster in 2013 or 2014. Next up is Carowinds on 8/16… 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheCrypt Posted August 17, 2012 Share Posted August 17, 2012 I am so jealous of you! You have visited 2 parks in Cali that I have always wanted to visit! Glad you had a great time in each and every park. They all sound like wonderful parks. Thanks for putting this together, and I patiently await your Carowinds TR! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Interpreter Posted August 17, 2012 Share Posted August 17, 2012 Thanks for the great report. Ghostrider was such an incredible ride when it opened. You are so right about Beast aging well while.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gad198 Posted August 17, 2012 Share Posted August 17, 2012 Nice report, and congratulations on 300! I always thought Silver Bullet was a vastly underrated inverted coaster. The only part of the coaster I thought wasn't as good as some of the other inverts was the zero-g roll, but I probably like it more than every other invert other than Montu and Afterburn. Really a shame about Ghostrider though. I thought the first half was pretty good but them bringing the train to a grinding halt at the MCBR made the second half completely unmemorable. It might crack my top 20 wood in its current condition but would vault way up if it ran like the potential suggests. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VortexBFForever Posted August 17, 2012 Share Posted August 17, 2012 I visited KI a day after you did. I went on 8/13! If I ever go to SFMM it wouldn't be until 2013 at the earliest. Good reports! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
faeriewench Posted August 20, 2012 Share Posted August 20, 2012 The color was also quite different from all other WindSeekers. It blends right in with Fiesta Village like that For that its my favorite WindSeeker. Great reports! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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