Cedar Point 6/20 - Redneck, Raptor Mania, & Sand Vollyball

My sister has been bugging me to go to CP this summer. Her, someone who doesn't ride all coasters, and me, who is a junkie, is an odd combo at the parks. She refuses to ride some rides, but loves others. It's a weird problem as times we both have to split up and I feel bad leaving her just sitting in the TTD spectator stand area while I have the time of my life. Still, I pushed her a little this time much to her chagrin, and thankfully afterwards, pleasure.

Friday I drove up to see her outside of Cleveland and saw The Hangover (go see it now) and passed out early due to work the whole day. 630 wake up call and rolling out at 7am with some Mt Dew Throwback, we make the close to two hour trip to the Point. After stopping by Burger King for some breakfast and coupons, we end up at the park and wait at the opening barricade for half an hour. After the drop we walk briskly to Maverick and got two rides in, including one where we got half way up the lift, stopped, rolled back, and an employee came out to the front row. The guy in the front took out a Game Boy to pose playing with on the on-ride photo, a la xkcd chessboard. Soon afterwards the employee confirmed it was in fact Pokemon Red being played, and many of us in the car complained, saying Blue was the superior version. Maverick is still smooth, fun, and I had less head banging this time around, possibly due to my weight loss since the last time I was at the park (I lost around 30 lbs). It’s not challenging Millennium Force as my favorite ride at the park, and in general. We rode twice with minimal wait.

Next stop was Millennium Force. I rode the back and found it to be oddly jarring, not rough per say, but bumpy and not as smooth as Maverick and Millennium back in the day. It was odd, maybe it was just the back? I go back to ride again later in the day and found that in the middle it’s the same. Weird. Rode twice, waited about 30 minutes both times.

Raptor was interesting. We head over there around 11-12, and it was a hour and a half wait. I just came from Millennium Force and Maverick, with half hour waits tops, and I have to wait that long for RAPTOR? Well, we wait, and it was as good as always. Smooth with that damn transition into the end block breaks being a pain. Rode twice, later that day with no wait, no joke! Probably was everyone just riding the rides as they came into the park, instead of people heading towards their favorites. So different than Disney, where everyone heads towards the big rides/favorites first, people here just went to the first ride they saw.

TTD was on and off all day. It reopened just as we passed, so I jumped in line. Wait was to be about 30 minutes, but it broke down again 20 minutes later! Seems to be the sensors in the prelaunch wait area, as they were rolling trains back and replacing them. Maintenance watched the ride the whole day. This too was also unusually rough, being just as rough as KK was. Maybe there is something to this whole biggest lemon thing, eh? Got one ride in.

Next up was the ride on the almost alcohol purchasing aged Magnum. The new sign is retro-tastic and I do think they removed and/or cut back a lot of the vegetation around the station and queue line. The ride was fun as always, and my sister freaked out. Got one ride in.

Gemini was Gemini. One ride.

We then ran out of the park to the Breakers to have some TGI Friday’s, relax in the AC, and just chill some. We sat in the bar and had an amazing view of the beach, including the sand volleyball players, who mocked us with their muscles and sculpted bodies as we chow down on our burgers and fries. My small love handles and hairy chest were insulted by their toned, tanned chests. Sigh. But at least I’m not going to die from skin cancer and I’m riding coasters instead of playing sand volleyball, psha, who does *that* anymore?

We rode the train some after eating, catching a small nap on it, and did some flats, walked around, and caught up with some rides on coasters we were already on. We planned on staying longer, but we were so exhausted with everything we left early, around 7pm. My neck was thoroughly burnt and I’m now a redneck with a sunglasses tan on my face. Overall it was a great, fun day. Made some random people laugh, had fun on some awesome coasters, got my sister to fall in love with Raptor, and while we miss the giant ball fountain outside of Raptor, the new one is really really popular with the kids.

I’m looking to come back later in the year with my housemates next semester, and hopefully will put some sunscreen on my neck this time around…

LMAO I always forget my neck and my scalp. Then I go to itch my head and yelp.

There are so many variables which change the ride of a coaster, I think. I had only excellent rides on Millie, but I rode Maggie at the worst possible time of day in the ejector seat (1-3) and hated it because of the godawful pain and jolting I experienced. TTD was a million times smoother than Ka, but I've noticed that Intamin rides can be exceptionally jittery and just have a ton of vibration depending on which train you ride, how the weather is, the weight in the trains, and in general what kind of day it is. Fahrenheit is the best example of this I can think of: I've ridden it with no vibration, and I've also ridden it when the vibration was so bad that I thought the whole train was going to come apart and fall to the ground a la FD3.

Give your sister time. She'll likely experience more and more that she'll love, and then you won't have to watch those disgusting, muscle bound freaks play a game approaching extinction. LOL

I do agree, and I think forgot to mention, the weather and how it affected the rides. It was a pretty windy day and they turned off the water effects on Maverick. I should have ridden WT so I could say it was more weather, but again, sister.