My Jumble of Thoughts from Opening Day

[coasterfanatic83]

• Made a kid cry on Dodgem, which has new straps, but seemingly moved very slow.
• Racer's new wood helped, and the new dino looked huge from the ride. Also, we could see the WindSeeker cage behind the ride.
• Bier Garten looks really good.
• Some children ABSOLUTELY NEED supervision while in the park.
• Adventure Express gave a great view of the topography of the land where SOB once stood. Fun after dark, as always.
• The TV's in Festhaus had ESPN on, which made me happy!
• The new show, Rock 'n Roll Never Forgets, has very good performers. I was at the 1:30 show, and the TV's did go out about halfway through the performance. The lights were cool, and the Michael Jackson tribute was phenomenal.
• Flight Deck has no seat belts this year, just OTSRs! Also, was the pre-ride audio new this year?
• The area were SOB once stood looks like a place that will be fun to keep an eye on this year!
• Reds HOF Grille was delicious and was a beautiful atmosphere. The porch has a great view of the splashdown as well. Unfortunately, the service was awful at best. I understand that it was the first day, but the people at the front were rude, our orders were messed up, my silverware wasn't clean, and the checks were wrong. Our server asked me, "Are you finished with that so I can take your plate?" when I was not done eating yet. Also, a plate was delivered to our table that was for somebody else. The service was a wreck, but I assume it will get better with time. I will be back, just because the food was so darn good. I recommend the pulled pork!
• Beast was really smooth. It may be from the re-tracking, reduced trims, because it is early in the season, or because we weren't on a wheel seat, but it was smoother than I can ever remember it.
• I found pink on me even though I didn't race today. It was everywhere in the park, but it came right off with some scrubbing!
• I sat on my first handrail of the year today!

Thanks for struggling through my jumble of thoughts! If you have any questions, just ask!

[KI-ORIG-EMP]

Think of opening day for the Reds Hall of Fame Grill as a stress test. You can see now things work or don't work under pressure and what needs to be improved upon. The same goes for the rest of the park. Things should improve by the next weekend.

[The Interpreter]

Dry Run Day.

Wasn't that a good idea?

Employee Day not really a full size substitute.

Terp, who likes to ask questions.

[jcgoble3]

Made a kid cry on Dodgem, which has new straps, but seemingly moved very slow.

You made a kid cry? Bad boy.

The new show, Rock 'n Roll Never Forgets, has very good performers. I was at the 1:30 show, and the TV's did go out about halfway through the performance. The lights were cool, and the Michael Jackson tribute was phenomenal.

The main KIC group was also at the 1:30 show. We were sitting right at the center of the building. Many of us had our new KIC shirts on. Did you see us?

I found pink on me even though I didn't race today. It was everywhere in the park, but it came right off with some scrubbing!

Many of the participants looked like they made NO attempt to clean off before heading into the park for the day. I took a shower and went out to the car and changed into clean clothes before heading into ERT.

I sat on my first handrail of the year today!

"Here at Kings Island, the metal handrails are our friends, and so we ask that you please do not sit, stand, climb, or breakdance on the metal handrails. Thank you." <-- Actual handrail warning I heard from a ride op on Flight Deck a couple years ago.

[TTD-120-420]

Made a kid cry on Dodgem, which has new straps, but seemingly moved very slow.

You made a kid cry? Bad boy.

He had help.

I'll add my thoughts into this since I was with Caleb the whole day.

1. Season Pass Processing was a nightmare. I expected it to be busy, but the people working in there didn't know what they were doing.
2. We thought we saw Mr. Scheid directing traffic in the morning, which we thought was odd.
3. The teaser signs on the construction site are gonna drive us all crazy this summer.
4. Even if it is super cloudy, I should still wear sunblock. I'm burnt sooooooo bad. Hate being a ginger.

[coasterfanatic83]

I did see a few of you guys around today, just never did say "hi."

And the Dodgem circuit when the kid was a little red-eyed was my first ride of the year- I was kind of excited!

In terms of Reds HOF Grille, I understand that there was stress and it was a new thing for a lot of them, and I am not one to complain about hardly anything ever, but it was so bad today. I cannot remember ever having issues with service to that extent in any restaurant, inside or outside of a park. I loved the restaurant and will be back, and I'm confident today was the bottom and it gets better from here!

[LongLiveTheSmurfRide]

My wife and I hit the Reds grill around the time it opened (maybe the 4th people seated). It took a very long time to get our food and it seemed like every table around us (including ours) had some kind of serving/billing issue. It was almost comical how bad it was, really. We just had to laugh at the amount of apologies around us. We were polite and still gave a good tip though because we knew this was the first day. I hope they get things moving more smoothly for the future.