After 45 years Six Flags has finally got it right - SFNE 4/29-4/30

Hey everybody!

I'm sorry for this late TR, I've been so bombarded with schoolwork this week and I have SATs this weekend so I'm going to have to keep it kinda short.

Last weekend, my mom and I went to Massachussetts for the weekend. We went college searching in Worcestor visiting both Clark U and Holy Cross. We arrived at SFNE at about 5:00 and stayed til closing at 8:00. We also went the next day from opening until 3:30. I have got to say, Springfield is one of the most confusing cities I've ever been to. We got lost trying to find the hotel and Six Flags, although SF was easier because it was right next to the river.

Anyway, the park was immaculate. SFNE is a really nice park that I haven't really had the chance to enjoy in the past because my anger of Superman being closed in the past because of the 2001 crash, and 2 years ago we went for 3 hours and it was a rush.

The only rides closed were Tomahawk (dammit), and Mind Eraser.

Batman and Superman were both running 2 trains, both with a 2-3 train wait most of the time.

Superman is an excellent ride. I still like Millennium Force better but Superman rocks my socks. It is SO much better than Darien Lakes. It's not just the design, it's not as vibrational, the landscaping is better, the theming is better. Everything rocks. Darien Lakes is a POS compared to this thing. I ended up riding it about 12-13 times total.

Batman was a great ride. It's not rough but it feels like it has pennies or something glued to the track that I runs over. That's the only way I can describe it. More fun than I remember.

Catapult was a walkon, and the ride was decent. I freaked out when my restraint came loose a click, but overall it was a fun ride, but not anything to amazing.

Twister was running a pretty short cycle, but it was ok.

Thunderbolt was running fast as hell, this small coaster packs quite a punch.

Cyclone, only 1 train but it was a walkon. Great ride, a few rough spots but nothing too bad. The new queue looks great!

Scream! I LOVE this thing. It is so much fun. There were 2 towers running, both on combo mode. The Mexican ride ops were hilarious. The line was about 10 minutes both days and on Sunday morning I got 4 rides within 15 minutes.
I LOVE this time of year. I haven't been on rides in a while so the freefall effect was amazing all 15 or so times I rode it. The first ride was the best, after all these months in the offseason, with the exception of the MB hurricane.

You would lift up to get weighed, the mexican lady would be in the window waving "HELLO EVERYONE! HAPPY ANNVERSRY WELCOME TO SCREAM!!! ARE YOU READY TO SCREAM....? READY TO SCREAM? 10...9...8...7...6..5.4321 boom." On the way back "We hope you had fun! Thank you for riding Scream and enjoy your day Six Flags New Engand. Give arnold high five on the way out. High five. Give arnold high five."

Good times lol.

I also did Blizzard River and a few other rides, nothing too notable.

Overall a great trip and Six Flags is in the right direction. The park is clean, the bathrooms are clean, the characters are everywhere, as are the bathroom attendents. ALL the ride ops said hi, or how was your day, or have fun. It was really surprising. Many introduced themselves and volunteered to put your loose articles in the bin, especially the S:ROS ops

The place, especially the parking lot, reminds of Disney World. It's a Disney World with thrill rides (and a little less theming ;) ). Sounds good to me! :)
*** Edited 5/5/2006 2:05:30 AM UTC by Ride of Steel***

Nice trip report, but I never understood why people find it necessary to tell us whether that "funny ride op" is a Mexican, or some other race. We don't say "the white operator at Joker's Jinx was being funny today." Did her being Mexican really have anything to do with her being funny? No. :) BTW, I'm not Mexican.

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kRaXLeRidAh said:
Nice trip report, but I never understood why people find it necessary to tell us whether that "funny ride op" is a Mexican, or some other race. We don't say "the white operator at Joker's Jinx was being funny today." Did her being Mexican really have anything to do with her being funny? No. BTW, I'm not Mexican.

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I wouldnt mind it if someone said I was funny because i was a "funny white ride op." But thats just me. :)

Ros or anybody (in this topic) go on splash water falls. How was it? I have not heard anything from the new ride on how good it is, even when it was in texas.

SWF is pretty fun, line can get long though and when it does wait time is long and the sun bakes the back of your neck...I dont like climbing into the tubes, its a bit awkward, and sometimes theres a lot of water on the bottom of the raft so your feet get wet depending on how much water there is. The ride itself is pretty fun, takes a while to climb the hill and you just hold on to straps, so its a bit scary. If its only you and a friend, you spin like crazy going down but dont get really wet, and if its a full raft you dont spin hardly as much and it almost seems like your going to slide right off the sides in a turn, and you get to the bottom and theres more of a splash. But the waterfall hasn't been turned on yet, so you'll always get wet when it is on. All in all its a fun ride and a decent replacement for the flume, and the whole area looks nice and fresh, hopefully something huge will go in the spot of the former ferris wheel which is now just a big plot of dirt...

Thanks Mike for the response.

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Ride of Steel said:
Hey everybody!

Superman is an excellent ride. I still like Millennium Force better but Superman rocks my socks. It is SO much better than Darien Lakes. It's not just the design, it's not as vibrational, the landscaping is better, the theming is better. Everything rocks. Darien Lakes is a POS compared to this thing.

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Well, I've never ridden the Darien Lake version, but sometimes the SFA version suffers from the same fate. It's the price you pay sometimes for being the first out of the blocks. Onto the landscaping; When me and my friend rode in 2004, we just kept going--so this is where all the themeing money went instead of SFA and other Six Flags etc. You've got trees, bushes, tunnels, mist, concrete benches etc., etc. And if you think that's impressive, you should check out their Hurricane Harbor. Again, we felt robbed (of course, we didn't have a HH at the time, but they're still way ahead in terms of of quanity of slides and activity areas, but our Tornado has a better design).

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WILLDOG said:
Ros or anybody (in this topic) go on splash water falls. How was it? I have not heard anything from the new ride on how good it is, even when it was in texas.

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At least they got rid of the seatbelts they had a couple years ago...at least they did on PBR at SFA.

A trick to get your raft really spinning is to have everyone lean back when going down the slide,trust me it really wowrks & no matter how many or few you have in your raft you'll be spinning so much you won't be able to walk straight for a good while.

In defense of the poster... the Mexican comment does help tell the story. Even though some may find it racist, we ALL know that sometimes something is funnier because a certain race (the associated accent or behavior) is saying it or doing it. It is completely reasonable to believe that the accent or behavior of the ride-op made the situation funny in a way that it wouldn't have been funny before.

It's like when people say white people dance funny. YES we do generally dance less skillyfully than members of other racial groups, but it's not a negative connotation.

Great trip report, and I know exactly what you mean about the ride-ops. It's like when Carowinds ride-ops on the Hurler freestyle-rap on the microphone.

"I still like Millennium Force better but Superman rocks my socks. It is SO much better than Darien Lakes. It's not just the design, it's not as vibrational, the landscaping is better, the theming is better. Everything rocks. Darien Lakes is a POS compared to this thing."

I've never ridden the NE version, which looks incredible, but I prefer SROS @ DL to millenium Force. Yeah...little offended.

I hate it when people refer to Intamin as a Swiss company.
SFNE is one of the SF parks that I'd love to go to. Mainly because of Supermam Ride of Steel. I have only been on the one at Darien Lake and I loved it. I rode it 9 times and I loved that park despite some bad TRs. I can't wait to get out to that part of the country one of these days.