BGW 3/25/16

Arrived at the park around 1130am to light crowds. My wife and I have made this an annual trip for about the last 6-7 years to start out our coaster season. We used to do Kings Dominion with it but they started opening a week or two later a few years after Cedar Fair took over. We're in luck now as that option is available for this trip. Still up in the air at this point. BGW opened earlier this year (last weekend, ) but we weren't able to come down due to a work getaway weekend.

Through the front gate. Passes worked fine and they took our picture at the front gate when scanned them. We just get the fun card except for the years we're going to Orlando. The fun card gives us admission from opening weekend to the first weekend in September for both parks for the $77 price of a single day at the park. A great bargain.

We head right to Tempesto since it wasn't open on our only visit last year. Took 3 laps. Front seat, back seat and middle of the train. Front seat was our favorite. The launch is surprising. Really enjoyed the backward launch and and in the front seat you stop a weird angle that doesn't feel normal. Then the launch forward. The pop of air at the top is ejector air in spades. If the restraints weren't there it would've stood us up. The inline twist taken slowly is also very different and cool at the same time. The view when hanging upside down is awesome. After that its almost a blur. I timed it at 48 seconds from thumbs up to being stopped in the station. Enjoyable ride, but short.

The rest of the day was taken leisurely. After Tempesto we took front and back
seat laps on Apollo's Chariot. Then headed to the new Marco Polo Market place for lunch. Our old Italian favorites are here with a host of new offerings. Busch Gardens/Sea World Parks are one of the only(Knoebels also,) outside of Disney that we make it a point to eat there. Like the new layout but if they don't figure out a queue system inside there its going to be a horrible experience for the Summer crowds. Exceptional park food.

We walked around and rode all our favorite rides multiple times. We love their coasters. Alpengeist, Griffon, Loch Ness Monster, but most of all Verbolten. Which leads to my only complaint. First time I've been there early in the season with a lack of staff to run their coasters. We only got to ride Verbolten once due to only one side of duel loading station being loaded. I can sit on that coaster all day but wasn't going to reride it after our 50 minute wait. The bright side was that at least it was a front seat ride.

We rode a bunch of other rides and checked out the Celtic Fyre show before heading back to Trappers Smokehouse for dinner. Called it a day after and rode the sky ride on the way out.

It was a perfect day weather wise. Mid to upper 70's all day. The threat of thunderstorms held out until we were back at our hotel room for the evening. Can't ask for much more. Go back tomorrow for more. The weather is supposed to be sunny but 15 degrees cooler than today. Thanks for reading.

Between Friday and Saturday was like night and day It was like a Summer crowd and had to park in the Ireland lot across the road. We watched a few shows, ate lunch, and then left to enjoy Colonial Williamsburg for the rest of night.

Hoping the crowds at PKD are light tomorrow.

I was at KD Friday and Sunday (Sunday was cold but empty) and BGW Saturday. BGW really is great. Tempesto was awesome.

We skipped PKD Sunday because of the rain. Instead we ended up hanging out in Willliamsburg, and going to the stores my wife loves down there(Williamsburg Pottery, and Yankee Candle.) I couldn't believe the crowds at BGW on Saturday. It was crazy. We were going to prepay for Quick Queue for Saturday, but decided against it because we wanted to wait to see how much we were able to ride on Friday. Since we'd ridden all the coasters multiple times except Verbolten we were content to just walk around, people watch, watch shows(Pet Shenanigans, and Celtic Fyre,) and eat more Italian from the Marco Polo Marketplace.

Sounds like you had a good time too Tek!

I really wanna try Tempesto (or one of its clones)... I saw a great video of the one in Germany(?) and was very excited to find out there are several of these here in the USA! This is what Intamin's Impulse coasters could've evolved into.