Disappointing Cedar Point Visit 10/25/24

[johnjniehaus]

So I drove up to Detroit to catch Cyndi Lauper's farewell tour and decided to swing by Cedar Point for about 3 hours on the way home. I personally have never been disappointed in Cedar Point and have always considered it the best park in the chain all things considered. I have always valued Kings Island for having the best ride ops in the chain but Cedar Point cannot be beaten for the quality and quantity of different coasters and flat rides. I also love the location right out on lake Erie. Best park in the chain - until today 

 

So when I arrived at park opening (11am) it seemed like a lot of rides were not open when the park was scheduled to open - the only coasters I saw running were GateKeeper, Valravn, Magnum and the wild mouse. I decided to start the day with Magnum and as I was walking back there I saw corkscrew and the Himalaya were going to be closed for the day. However they were testing rougarou around 11:30 which gave me some hope the day wasn't going to be full of closures. I got two great rides on Magnum (one of which was in the magic seat). After that the day went south... I decided to ride the monster and whenever they spun it around to load the other arms, it made a squealing type sound and broke down. So I was stuck in the top of the monster for about 20 minutes before they brought it down and got us off. The ride then closed down. No option to even wait for them to fix it so not sure what was wrong but it was definitely down. At this point it was noon and I saw the first train run on Millennium Force. I walked past Gemini and it was closed for the day as well. They were also testing the cedar Creek mine ride at this point. The lines in frontier town were very long so I continued towards Millennium Force which had about a 45 minute wait at this point. I knew if I rode it, it would be the last ride of the day so I kept walking (that was a mistake). Upon reaching Iron Dragon it also had a sign at the entrance that it was closed for the day. Coming back around the front of the park it was noticeable that the skyride was still not open and that raptor has never opened either (it's about 12:30 now). I ate lunch at the grand pavilion which was good. After lunch I checked the Wild Mouse line but it was broken down. Then I decided to ride Cedar Downs Racing Derby which is always one of my must rides in the park. That's when I saw the first train run on raptor (about 1:00pm now). I checked its line which was probably about 40min and I knew I'd be cutting it close on time... So I ran back to Blue streak and every que was full of people. I've never had more than a station wait for blue streak so that was crazy but seeing as so many rides were closed for the day or just broken down, I understand why. So regardless I decided instead of hitting one or two more flats that possibly didn't have an extraordinary line, I would lodge a complaint with guest services which they were very cool about it and of course said they are short staffed on Fridays in October. I told them that I understand but that if the ride availability is going to be greatly reduced, a destination park such as Cedar Point should have that information on their website so that people do not spend lot of money traveling there believing they are going to get to ride everything and then are treated to multiple all day coaster and ride closures. Kings Dominion and Carowinds had a posted ride schedule this past year for the non peak season of what was available. Kings Island updates the website on what is available during winterfest and I believe also states that Planet Snoopy closes early during haunt. I think at a minimum Cedar Point should be transparent about the fact Fridays feature a reduced ride lineup. 

To top the day off, one of my friends asked me to pick up a maverick track slice for him and they are officially sold out so even that venture was a bust! 

[Tr0y]

Yeah, outside of KI’s weak steel coaster lineup. KI in my opinion, has been the better park this season. The customer service was sub par at CP.

Heck, my room at the Express hotel was dirty and the furniture looked as if a dog got ahold of it. Totally not worth the premium they charge.

[disco2000]

33 minutes ago, Tr0y said:

Yeah, outside of KI’s weak steel coaster lineup. KI in my opinion, has been the better park this season. The customer service was sub par at CP.

Heck, my room at the Express hotel was dirty and the furniture looked as if a dog got ahold of it. Totally not worth the premium they charge.

Nah, they just going for that weathered, homey feel 

[BeeastFarmer]

1 hour ago, Tr0y said:

Yeah, outside of KI’s weak steel coaster lineup. KI in my opinion, has been the better park this season. The customer service was sub par at CP.

Heck, my room at the Express hotel was dirty and the furniture looked as if a dog got ahold of it. Totally not worth the premium they charge.

Looks like somebody has been "rubbing" a lot on that chair.

[WoodVengeance]

1 hour ago, Tr0y said:

Yeah, outside of KI’s weak steel coaster lineup. KI in my opinion, has been the better park this season. The customer service was sub par at CP.

Heck, my room at the Express hotel was dirty and the furniture looked as if a dog got ahold of it. Totally not worth the premium they charge.

I personally haven't visited the Express hotel (yet), but that definitely looks rough considering it wasn't that long ago that they remodeled the hotel. I did stay at Castaway Bay a few years back after that hotel got remodeled. The water park was fine, but the rooms weren't really that great. Very small table that hardly had any space to put stuff on and I also wasn't a fan of the hard floor throughout the entire room. I have visited all three of the waterpark resorts in Sandusky with my most recent trip having stayed at the Kalahari, and I personally think Castaway Bay is the weakest of the three in my opinion. It's nice that you get early entry to Cedar Point, but that's really the only benefit you get as there's no transportation to and from the park.

I can't really comment on Sawmill Creek since I haven't stayed there yet personally, but from what I've seen, Cedar Point could definitely improve their hotel properties not located on the peninsula. I'm sure Hotel Breakers is fine since that's located right next to the park and is the flagship hotel for Cedar Point, but it's definitely the most expensive resort you can stay at if you plan to visit Cedar Point.

[disco2000]

Sadly, you are experiencing what even some of the most die hard CP fans have been feeling for the last several years.

People I know that would/could never say a bad thing about CP now complain.  It is no longer the flagship park it used to be.  Lots of factors come into play, but the overall experience isn't what it used to be.

It will be interesting to see how they respond moving forward....sadly I think as long as people keep showing up in the record numbers, they have no incentive to improve the product.  

Why worry about if all the rides aren't going if the main parking lot fills up by 1pm on every Halloweekend ?  Until the attendance drops noticeably, they have no incentive.

[BeeastFarmer]

46 minutes ago, disco2000 said:

Sadly, you are experiencing what even some of the most die hard CP fans have been feeling for the last several years.

People I know that would/could never say a bad thing about CP now complain.  It is no longer the flagship park it used to be.  Lots of factors come into play, but the overall experience isn't what it used to be.

It will be interesting to see how they respond moving forward....sadly I think as long as people keep showing up in the record numbers, they have no incentive to improve the product.  

Why worry about if all the rides aren't going if the main parking lot fills up by 1pm on every Halloweekend ?  Until the attendance drops noticeably, they have no incentive.

Do you think this has anything to do with the change in park leadership or corporate budget cuts over the last few years?

[johnjniehaus]

It is true that while it's annoying when parks drop their standards, people will still go and the park has no incentive to be better. At least for me, I don't see myself visiting on a Friday in October again in the future. I still think it's a great park but today was very disappointing and now I know firsthand why Cedar Point is starting to get a bad rap for some of this stuff. Maybe for the locals it's annoying but not as big of a deal. If Kings Island closed Adventure Express, The Bat, and Invertigo for Friday haunts due to short staffing, I would be annoyed but as a KI local I'd know to go on Saturday or Sunday to ride those rides. With that issue of having multiple scheduled closures, who it really hurts is the out of town guest. That's why any planned closure such as Iron Dragon will not operate on Fridays in October should be public knowledge on the park website. Of course I think the park should have the rides open but I'm not even asking for that, I'm asking for transparency to the customer who not only potentially bought a ticket but also paid for all the travel expenses to go up to a little, out of the way, dumpy Ohio town called Sandusky to visit one the best parks in the country.