Cedar Point Disappointments but Who Cares ?(August 10 & 11)

On the same trip to the Ohio State Fair, my family also went to Cedar Point. This was a Friday, and a Saturday. It was really packed at the park. It was also cooler at this park than at the fair the days before. We arrived there at about 12:00 or so. The first thing we do is go on Maverick.

Maverick- You probably heard what the ride does already so I'm going to go in what it does. I will just give you my opinion. The rides wait for me was about an hour and a half. I went in the single rider line, and it didn't save me much time, but it's time (I guess) 5 minutes is better than anything. I personally thought it was a little mundane. The reason was because it just had 3 of about the same inversions. To me, they were like corkscrews you might find on some other coaster, but oh well. They were a little smaller, but oh well. I did like the tunnel though, but that's only how long of the ride. I felt barely any airtime. I was expecting much better with that. It was quite rough also for what it was. For a launched coaster, I rather go on Mr. Freeze. This ride reminds me of a Arrow coaster (really). It was in between good, and bad for me. I did it once. Nothing GREAT, or close to it, but that's my opinion.

Since I did a disappointment, I will do a wow, this ride is cool.

Cedar Downs- Now, I'm going to admit that this was a great ride, but I do think it was good. How awesome is a ride in which you try to beat other horses in a race? It's not a single rider type of ride because it's not good if you go with people you don't know, but what about your sister. In case people don't know what this ride is, it's 4 horses that are in a row, and there might be 20 rows of 4 horses. I don't know. Anyway, the horses move forwards up and down, and backwards up and down while the circle is spinning. It's like a horse is in front of another. You see which horse is going to win in your row. GOOD ride.

Carousel- It was just a normal carousel. Too bad all carousels can't be PTC. I wish they were. They would be all great. This carousel was kind of slow. This was the one right near the front entrance.

MY Favorite Ride at the Park was:
Chaos- Everyone goes WHAT? This ride is made by Chance, and it is currently up for sale. Too bad. I compare it a Zipper, but a little less intense. It's a circular ride with the cars facing the people in line. The ride starts tilting at 70 degrees, and the cars go upside down. Lift up your knees, and you shall go upside down more. Of course, you have double restraints, but lift them up to that when it starts flipping. Nothing makes the cars go upside down. They just randomly go upside down. The heavier the car, the less you will go upside down. The sign actually says the maximum weight for the car is 320. That's kind of a ridiculous. If you get to guy teenagers in one car, that could easily be 300. If one person is 200 lbs, and the other is 150, that's already over. The ride is timed at 1:45, but it takes about 35 seconds just to flip which is way to much time, but what can you do. I went on this ride A LOT. On the first day, it was a walk-on. On the second day, it was a two or three wait to get on the ride. This ride is AWESOME.

Max Air- It's a GOOD ride, but I don't think it's great like the KMG Fireball I was talking about. It took like 15 minutes or so the first day. There is nothing else much to say.

Matterhorn (Flying Bobs)- I liked the Ohio State Fair Flying Bobs better. I also like the Hay Bailer at Gaugea Lake better. Too bad, they don't go backwards. These aren't the fastest in the world. I wish they went faster. I believe I waited 3 times to get on this the second day.

Blue Streak- This ride was 45 minutes. I couldn't believe this. I went in June before 2 years ago, and there was no one on this. That day, it was pretty packed to. So, I see a 45 minute wait, and go wow. However, it's a PTC, and you can't say no. It's a great PTC roller coaster. I love Out and Back PTC's. It's smaller than other ones, but oh well.

Sky Hawk- Wow, was I disappointed. It seemed really weak. I thought it was just a good ride, and not a great ride. I thought it was going to be as good as Freak Out, or KMG Fireball, but it wasn't. It just seemed forceless. It was definitely not worth the 30 minutes for me.

Tilt-A-Whirl- Last time, I went to the park, and I didn't know they had this ride. I was so disappointed that they had this ride last time, and I didn't know they had it. WOW! This ride was just AWESOME. I wish I could have ridden it more. I only did it once. I was on it the first day, and I really wanted to get on Dragster after this ride. There wasn't just enough time for a Tilt-A-Whirl. I'm going on a Tilt-A-Whirl next week, and I was on a Tilt-A-Whirl the last two days, so I didn't feel I needed to ride this more than once even though if I had more time, I would have. It was a walk-on, but it was late at night too. This ride is in the STUPID kiddy area. I hate that. I wish it was somewhere better. I can ride this ride, and enjoy it, and I'm not a kid. It shouldn't be in that area. Give the kids another smaller ride. It like putting a big bumper car ride in that area too. Anyway, the ride was smooth, and fast. This was some great Tilt-A-Whirl. It seemed like they just refurbished it, or bought it.

Geminin- It was typical fun on Gemini. I did this ride twice. I didn't have more time for more rides on it. It was a walk-on at night. They were both racing. This is just a fun airtime, and helix fast fun ride.

Top Thrill Dragster- I went on this ride 3 times, and it was worth all the time for it. It's the second favorite ride at this park. It never gets boring to me.

That's it for the rides. Yes, I would have went on more rides if I had time, but every ride was really packed. Raptor on the second day has a 2 hour wait, and I wasn't going to do that. I could've done that, but than I couldn't have got on Chaos as much as I did.

I was originally going to Indiana Beach instead of Cedar Point because of Chaos. I wanted to ride Chaos, and that's the real reason for me going there. Well, guess what? They got rid of it a 2 weeks before I left. So, we went Cedar Point because they have a Chaos instead. This trip for me (at least) to Cedar Point was centered on riding Chaos, and I did tons and tons of times, and I was happy. Yes, I was disapointed at Maverick being what it was, but again I found more good or great rides at the park with the Tilt-A-Whirl, and Cedar Downs.

I have yet to find and ride a Chaos. Sigh.... :(

I have heard many comparisons of it to the Zipper, which is my all time fave... so I am just itchin' to find one.

Hurry up before they go away for good. The Indiana State Fair is supposed to have one there this year (August 8-19). It's with Farrow Shows who is owned by NAME (carnival company). There is one at Valleyfair in Minnesota. Don't forget about Las Vegas at the Circus Circus Adventuredome Amusement Park indoors.

You also have Funland in Denmark, Belmont Park in California, Fun Plex in New England, Clementon Amusement Park in New Jersey, and Martin's Fantasy Island in New York. Either Darien Lake, or Elitch Gardens put there Chaos back up after SF took it down. I don't know which one. Supposedly, Wild Adventures once had it up, but I don't know if it's gone. I think it might be. Indiana Beach is just TOOK there's out.

That is a fun ride, I wish they were keeping it, but at the same time I am sure whatever they will replace it with will be worth it for my tastes. Afterall I would take Raptor over that old log flume any day!

Last I heard, Cedar Point's Chaos was not for sale. (Not that it will necessarily be there forever)

You seem like a hard person to please. I absolutely LOVED maXair, Maverick, and Skyhawk. All very very fun rides.

Chaos is fun. You seem like the person who enjoys the simplicity of rides. I don't know how Maverick reminds you of an Arrow. Seeing as, you regret any inversion of an arrow coaster, and the inversions on maverick are welcomed with open arms.

As for airtime, where do you sit? I've sat in every seat, and have gotten air, all over the place. It difference maybe in body type build.

What other coasters did you ride? MF? Magnum?

I hope this doesn't come out wrong, but do you prefer flats over coasters? Although Cedar Downs has more to it that I thought, i might check it out this weekend.

Great to have someone show their appreciation of the flat rides at CP. So many people talk about the coasters but ignore the great assortment of flats that the park has.

True confession time: I avoided Chaos for a long time---it looked positively vomitrocious. When I had more or less ridden pretty much everything else in the park, I finally sucked it up and gave it a try.

That thing was just plain FUN. I giggled the entire time.

I've never been on Chaos at Cedar Point. That's because my first and last Chaos experience, which was at Indiana Beach, left me sick for two hours. I admit I'm fairly prone to motion sickness, but this was a new level of ill. :)

My CP Chaos confession:
-Every time (and Im talking close to a dozen times on different days now) I get in line for Chaos, the thing breaks down while Im in line or when its loading. Its become so laughable that even though I do enjoy those rides I refuse to ever get in line for the CP Chaos.

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BANDandDCI said:
Chaos is fun. You seem like the person who enjoys the simplicity of rides. I don't know how Maverick reminds you of an Arrow. Seeing as, you regret any inversion of an arrow coaster, and the inversions on maverick are welcomed with open arms.

As for airtime, where do you sit? I've sat in every seat, and have gotten air, all over the place. It difference maybe in body type build.

What other coasters did you ride? MF? Magnum?

I hope this doesn't come out wrong, but do you prefer flats over coasters? Although Cedar Downs has more to it that I thought, i might check it out this weekend.

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I don't hate Arrow. It just reminded me of an Arrow. My complaint is that the same inversions happened over and over again. I think X and Demon (SFGAm) are GREAT Arrow Coasters. However, I don't think that Corkscrew (CP), and Double Loop (GL) are GREAT. I separate rides from being great, good, and bad. Great means I could ride that particular coaster, or flat for a long time. Good means I will ride that coaster or flat about 1 or 2 times a day, and bad just means forget it. I will stand in line for a great ride a whole lot longer than a good ride because I believe it's worth it.

No, I like both coasters and flats a lot. At Cedar Point, I really enjoy Raptor, Blue Streak, Gemini, Mantis, and Top Thrill Dragster. I think those are the great roller coasters that the park has. I think Wildcat, Corkscrew, and Disaster Transport are good. I don't care for Millenium or Magnum. I think Millenium is kind of boring, and Magnum is the other way (rough).

Out of the rides I have been on, I think that 46 are great roller coasters, and I think that 22 are great flats. Great roller coasters in my opinion include Incredible Hulk, Goliath (at SFOG), G-Force @ Ohio State Fair, Joker's Jinx, X, Riddler's Revenge, Great American Scream Machine (SFOG), Shockwave (SFOT), Runaway Mine Train (SFOT), Batwing, Head Spin (GL), Dominator (GL), Hydra, and others. For the 22 flats, I believe that Shocker, Power Surge, Orbiters (that tilt enough), Thunderbolt, Chaos, Spider, Zipper, Indiana Jones (@DL), Freak Out, KMG Fireball, Force 10, Scat, Wipeout, Yo-Yo (that tilts like Cypress Gardens) are all great rides. There are more for both of these lists. I like coasters and flats.

For Sky Hawk, and Maverick, I would put them into the good category. I would lean more for good though. Maybe, the most I would see willing to wait for them is less than 30 minutes or so. The disappointment was that I thought they would be my version of what GREAT rides mean. Maverick just looked awesome of what it does, but it just was mundane for me. I will ride it again when I go back there, but it's not a must for me to ride again. It's more like if I have time, I will ride it again. If the line is as long as it was before (1 1/2), I would definitely not be waiting for it.

For airtime, I sat in the middle of the train. I don't know. I didn't ride all those coasters at Cedar Point that I said I liked though during that visit. I have been to the park 2 years ago, and have ridden all of them except the kiddie coasters.

I really enjoy Chaos as well. Very fun ride. I love it because I have only had to wait one cycle typically.

Some of the rides they don't make the line big enough at the park. Max Air, and Chaos are two of these. I betch you that if Chaos had a bigger queue area, it would get people than it does. The line is stretching into the midway when I was there, but again it was a Saturday.

It's like the swings at SFGAm. The queue area is so darn small that the ride is always a walk-on. If they made it bigger, it would probably get more people in line, and it would be a bigger wait.

I don't believe the PR person about it not being up for sale. They would get that picture off the Internet already. *** Edited 8/14/2007 2:33:43 PM UTC by Spinout***

In the past, CP has been stuck with queues bigger than necessary - MF, Magnum, and WT come to mind. They removed some of MF's queues, they never use the extra Magnum queues (although I'm sure back in the day they did), and WT's queue has hardly ever been filled (when I worked there it never got full even on Saturdays).

Because of this, they went for a smaller queue on Maxair...I don't think they counted on the ride being so popular though and the queue ended up being on the small side!

I think Maverick's queue is about the right size though...it's sufficient for now when the ride is so popular but won't take up too much extra space when the ride levels out in the future.

Spinout- Ah I see. Yea, everyone has their opinions. As my list is the same, and differs as well, I like many of your great coasters, except Hydra(It's horrible). Don't bash me for that, I was really disappointed when I rode it the first time, and riding it more and more ruined the ride.

You seem like the rider who prefers the inversion coasters as to non-inversion(MF and Magnum). And riding and loving those coasters, I can see why the 2 corkscrews on Maverick were "meh" or repetitive. I myself actually find those coasters that do 5 or more inversions repetitive, especially when all are shown, like Hydra. Reasons why Dominator, previously known as Batman, is an exception to my preference against multi-looping coasters. But don't get me wrong, I'll definitely ride it, and love every minute of it.

But i agree above, it is great to see someone else likes Flats. Seems to be a rarity in the coaster world.

Chooch249, the Chaos rules.

Re Arrow coasters - I have not yet met an Arrow coaster with inversions that did not hurt my head for roughness. I've been to KD, HP, BGW, SFGAdv, and CP, so that includes at least Anaconda and Corkscrew and GASM.

- E *** Edited 8/15/2007 1:42:34 AM UTC by ErinGoBraugh***