Tuesday 5 June 2012

Day 12/13 - Cedar Point

The final park on my tour was Cedar point - at the time of writing, it held the record for the most coasters at a park (17) along with 6 flags magic mountain in California. about 2 weeks before the season start - they announced that wildcat would be taken down before opening, meaning only 16 left!
http://rcdb.com/4529.htm

As a rather large person, I was concerned about fitting on all of the coasters - Millenium force, top thrill dragster and wicked twister are all pretty well known as a tight fit - MF and TTD were no problems though - wicked twister however wasn't quite- more on that later.

As I only had 1 and a half days there, I decided to get the fastlane tickets for the first day to make sure I got on everything - was a great decision, and the fact they allow rerides meant I got a few goes on most of the stuff there. As it happened, I did all the riding I wanted on day 1, and could spend day 2 taking photos.

Also - staying at the resort meant I got an hour early entry, for "Ocean Motion, Midway Carrousel, Raptor, WindSeeker, Millennium Force, Iron Dragon, Maverick and Planet Snoopy", to my surprise, TTD was open as well - so I headed straight to that. It was built a couple of years before Kingda ka, and a little slower and shorter, but most enthusiasts rate it higher due to the smoother launch, and lap bars instead of over the shoulder restraints - first ride was in row 2, and I certainly thought smoother than Ka. And I decided I had to get front row (did later, along with back row and a middle seat), because the seating in row 2 blocked the view a bit more than other intamin coaster trains.

The top hat

One rather nice aspect of the ride, was the seating area on show here, along with Mantis and Iron Dragon:

Gave a nice chance to take pics of the trains as they zoomed by! (Millenium force is the blue coaster in the distance)





I then moved on to iron dragon, one of the last Arrow suspended's left in the world. It was great fun, shame Busch gardens had closed big bad wolf, also a shame I won't get to ride eagle fortress in korea. The coaster looks lovely over the water...

Final ride of the mornings early session was on MF - 300 foot tall, and according to "amusement today", the best steel coaster in the world - it was better than I305, due to lack of trim brakes, and night rides were great - but Bizarro is in a totally different class.

I then headed over to wicked twister, there was no queue so I headed straight on, figuring I'd be more likely to fit with a ride op squishing the restraints, than just using the test seat - it was a squash but I made it - It's a similar ride to possessed at dorney park, but I felt had more oomph in the launches - really enjoyed it - went on again later, and didn't get close to fitting - According to pointbuzz, the belts are all the same length, but some of the harnesses are a bit more forgiving - the test seat was even worse, the problem was with the positioning of the buckle - as you can see on this picture, there are 2 possible holders, and a number of holes for the buckle to be attached to - the test seat just has one, and that's positioned in between the 2 real locations here - making about 3 inches less!

Disaster transport nearby was closed (opened later), and space spiral was down both days - both rides are due to be demolished for a new coaster next year. So I did Maxair (Frisbee ride, not as good as flip flop at flamingoland or maelstrom at drayton), power tower - neither the launch or drop sides really did much for me and then moved over to raptor and blue streak -  Raptor is another B and M invert which wasn't as good as nemesis - although this one was pretty intense, particularly at the back.

Blue streak, in the distance here:
Was a rather decent woody similar to a shorter grand national at blackpool, without the "racing", Was a better ride at the front - my first ride was delayed about about 10 minutes becuase someone was sick on it!

Next ride was corkscrew, which was as bad as expected


After a lunch burger, I went on to Mantis - another uncomfortable stand up! And on to the other side of the park for Maverick, A coaster with 2 launches and a few inversions - first half of the ride is great, lovely smooth inversions, nice drop, and the launches are great - then some of the transitions get a bit rough in the second half, which is a shame, because it could have been excellent, but was just very good - still just makes my top 10 though!




Next was Mean streak - a rather sexy looking wood coaster
Mmmmmmmmmmmm!
Twisty!!   Unfortunately, it was the worst coaster of the trip, and only rivaled by bandit for the title of "roughest I've ridden"  - It vibrates the whole way around the track, with no notable plus points!

Cedar creek mine ride was a nicely located, pleasant enough mine train

I also got my only "screaming swing" cred of the trip - despite having seen about 7 others!  YAY! Love these rides..

That left just 4 coasters left to ride - (Jr Gemini will only let adults ride if they have a kid with them!) Woodstock express is a standard vekoma junior coaster, Gemini is a hybrid (steel tracks, wood structure) racing coaster - was ok.

Next was Magnum XL-200 -Built in 1989. was the first coaster to exceed 200 feet in height - wasn't bad
bad had a poor turnaround, and some of the hills had painfull air as your thighs whacked against the lap bars!


The final cred of the trip - Disaster transport is an enclosed intamin bobsleigh coaster - which begs the question "why does it have side by side seating?" (Mack bobs have bobsleigh style cars)




Dinner was a poor "all you can eat" affair- which seemed to be limited to pizza, cheeseburgers and dry turkey.
after that I did some rerides - and got on the racing derby - was just as fun as blackpools version.  The park looked really nice at night, all lit up, should have bought my camera!

On the final day, I just walked round and took some pictures, rode the skyway and train, and had yummy BBQ ribs for lunch

got some Millenium force lifthill porn from the train


I'm not a big fan of enterprises, but their's did look quite handsome:

it was then time to leave :(


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