Associated parks:
Cedar Point, Sandusky, Ohio, USA
I left Kings Island at 8:22pm to head to Cedar Point Coastermania! I arrived at my hotel the Best Western Sandusky Inn & Suites a little over 3 hours later. I must say I would recommend this hotel to anyone staying for an extended period of time for a Cedar Point trip. It was so clean and they had flat screen TV's, a couch, refrigerator, and microwave. It really wasn't that bad of a price either compared to some of the other hotels out there. It is also only about 4 miles from the park so that was nice too.
So I woke up around 8am the Friday morning and hit up the hotel breakfast. They had make your own waffles which were awesome and some really good cinnamon rolls that I enjoyed. The breakfast was another reason I hyped the hotel. Then it was off to Cedar Point. This was my fourth trip to the park in the last 4 years and I still get goosebumps coming off the causeway when I see the "city" of roller coasters. It is an awesome sight. I registered for Coastermania and bought the $67 two day ticket which is an amazing deal if you (like me) only plan on going to Cedar Point once on the year. They gave us a badge with the schedule on back which was nice and an envelope with two tickets, (for the dinner Friday night & lunch Saturday afternoon) and free all-day soda wristband.
I entered the park at 9:15am and decided to hit up Raptor. I rode it 4 times in a row. What a great ride. It feels intense from beginning to end and still gives me a wow factor everytime I ride it. Then it was about 9:50am and I decided I would run over to MF before the GP crowd ran for it. The line wasn't bad at all (maybe 10 mins) and I got on towards the front and had an amazing ride! MF is my favorite coaster and I am so giddy after riding it yet again. I went back for another ride on it and waited about 15 minutes this time. So I had 6 rides in my first hour at the park and I knew it was going to be a good day.
I then went to Mantis and spoke with a couple in line who had never been to Cedar Point before. I always love newbies at the park. They were asking me which rides were the best and I told them. I got on Mantis knowing good and well I was probably going to get beat up a bit which I did. I was surprised to see them not using the trim brake on the first drop. I guess they have a reason for this because it was off both days I was there. It was the only time I would ride it during my trip. After Mantis I decided to hit up Magnum next and rode it three times in a row with no wait. I found that I enjoyed Magnum so much more than the last three visits I made to the park. Why? I have no idea but it just rocked and rolled! I found that those last hills to be so much more thrilling this time.
After Magnum I went and rode Woodstock Express for the first time. I really just rode it to get the coaster credit and actually enjoyed the ride. It was really good for a kiddie ride. I then rode Gemini three times in a row with no wait. This really is a great ride. I enjoy it every time. Plus I just love the retro look of the station, the racing element, and all the good drops. Then I hit up Mean Streak and boy was it "mean." I love looking at the structure because it is so massive. I did find that after the MCB the ride was a little bit smoother at points and there was even a little bit of airtime but that's about it. After MS I went and hit up Cedar Creek Mine Ride. It was alright. I enjoy the drop over the water and the helix at the end.
At this point in the day I felt like it was time to have a change of pace from what I normally do at Cedar Point and that is, ride water rides. *gasp* I must say that I had a blast doing this. I normally do not ride water rides at amuesment parks but felt like I should give it a shot. I rode Whitewater Canyon and found it to be one of the better water raft rides I think because of all the waterfalls. I mean from what I could tell almost everyone was getting soaked including myself! I then went and rode Snakeriver Falls twice since there was no wait both times. It was a fun ride. The drop was nice and it created a good splash (still not as great as Mile High Falls at the former Kentucky Kingdom which I feel had the best splash of this type of ride). I did the standing on the bridge thing and got soaked after being soaked. Then I rode Whitewater Canyon again with about a 10 minute wait.
At this point I was in my regular clothes completely soaked and I did not care because I knew I had a change of clothes in the car and I was going to hit up soak city. Before that though I saw Maverick running trains again. It had been broken down moments before so the line had cleared out. This in my opinion is the best time to hit up Maverick right after the ride opens up after a breakdown. I got in line and was on in less than 10 minutes! It was great and being soaked gave the ride a different feeling. Maverick just has so many thrilling elements it's amazing.
Soak City here I come. I mean talk about DEAD! Soak City was completely dead. No lines for any water slide. It was amazing. Again, normally I don't like water parks because they are usually too crowded for me but when I saw there was no one there I couldn't help but to go crazy riding everything. I rode 10 slides in less than an hour. I really enjoyed the big raft slide (i don't know what it's called) I went on it twice and the second time was unreal. We had four big guys in our raft and I still don't know how we did not flip that thing over! It was wild and the people I rode with were like that is the best ride I have ever had on that. I was also impressed with the speed slides. Holy crap what a ride! I literally went airborne on both of them and flew into the pool at the end. It was so thrilling.
After soak city I went to my car and changed/rested a bit. Then I went back into the park and decided to ride Blue Streak and caught three rides in a row on it with no wait. This is really a fun ride. I enjoy the airtime and quickness. From Blue Streak I caught an almost night ride on MF and it was amazing as always. After MF I went to Power Tower and rode the drop side. It was so cool at night and it was so amazing to look out over TTD and MF and see all the lights on the lake. From there I needed a bigger 'thrill' so I went to Top Thrill Dragster and rode it twice with about a 5-10 minute wait. Kudos to the park for keeping TTD open till after 10pm so I could catch a second ride on it. Brilliant ride at night. It was priceless.
At this point I went and sat down waiting for ERT to start on Magnum. At about 10:42pm they started letting people on the ride and I got to talking with another enthusiast from Florida in the que's and we caught three straight rides on Magnum together. On our first ride they had the trims turned off and it was unbelieveable! We flew threw that pretzel turn and hit those last hills with blazing speed. Ejector air is an understatement on this rides when the trims are off. From there we went over to TTD to catch a few rides on it and while we were in line it broke down. After being in line for 5-10 minutes we decided to go back over to Magnum and rode it once. Then we saw TTD was back up and went over there and caught back to back rides on it with no wait! Again Kudos to the park for keeping TTD open until 12:15am since it was broken down for some of the ERT time.
It was an amazing end to an amazing first day at Cedar Point. I have nothing but great things to say about this place. The ride ops did such a great job all day getting trains dispatched. I got in 36 rides on the day 6 of those being during ERT that night. I was there from 9:15am till 12:15am at night! I got 7 rides on Magnum, 6 rides on Raptor, 4 rides on TTD, and 3 rides on MF all with little to no wait! I seriously don't think I waited in line more than 15 minutes all day. It was a remarkable day and start to Coastermania!
Collin Aynes
Glad you had a good time! It looks like you got a ton of rides in!
BTW, the raft ride is called Thunder Canyon, not Whitewater Canyon.:)
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