Conneaut Lake Park 8/26/2016

After spending a couple of days at Cedar Point, my brother and I made a stop at Conneaut Lake Park on the way home to eastern Pennsylvania. We arrived at the park at 12:50 PM. The first thing we noticed when we arrived that was a stark difference from our visit two years prior was -- there were other people in the park!

After getting wrist bands, we immediately hit Blue Streak. It was nice to see the roof of the Tunnel rebuilt, but the experience would be better if the walls did not leak in so much light. I was impressed with the new track on the first drop, but hopefully the next couple hundred feet of track will be rebuilt this off season. Other than that section, the coaster is running wonderfully. Hopefully light bulbs will be put into the empty sockets over the break run, it just looks wrong with a light bulb every forth socket.

Next up was the Devil's Den, and it was nice to see all the effects working. It was also nice to see the two person crew having all four cars in active use.

We decided to do a round of mini-golf. The course has a nice layout, and the carpeting is in great shape. A neat surprise was a couple that was playing the course the same time as us lived in the same township as I grew up in. Talking with them, we decided there were three things that would make this good course into a great one. First, the course needs to be swept out daily and water removed from the holes. Second, the landscaping needs a little TLC. And third, the pumps need to be fixed. Standing water is not attractive.

We filled up the next couple hours going on the flats and eating. A couple of notes: The Music Express needs, well Music. They were letting us snap the cables on the flying scooters. The food was delicious, and the portions were fair for the price. The Tumble Bug had all of its motors. The train was running nearly full loads of guests. Dodgem could use more than five working cars. And the Men's room by Dodgem had a large number of out of service toilets.

Next we went into the small water park. The first thing I notice was a there was no changing areas, but the bathroom served us quite nicely. I was happy to see the lockers priced at 50 and 75 cents per use. Although a few of the locks were broken, there were a very large number of available lockers. Unfortunately for the park, they do not have the change covers on, so the lockers give you your money back (once you already locked your locker.) It would also be nice for the keys to have wrist straps. The first thing we found odd was the one path was a fine gravel, but to our surprise, it was not bad on the feet. The lazy river was nice and relaxing, with all of the elements working. The kiddie area looked nice, with a good number of kids playing. The big surprise was the slides. Although a few of the seems between slide segment were a little rough, I have no qualms ranking the two slides as some of the best body slides I have ever ridden. We went down a dozen times each.

Comparing this visit to our visit two years prior, we were blown away with how much improvement we saw. The only ride that was non operational was the Toboggan sitting in the back of the parking lot, which I do not believe they own anymore. We expected to spend two, maybe three hours at the park, but we ended up spending six and half hours in the park.